Life After The Undead (Book 2): Death to the Undead Read Free

better. He told me the people of North Platte knew what they were getting into when they rebelled, and in the back of my mind, I knew he was right. But he wasn’t the one on the podium. He wasn’t the one delivering the bad news. The one thing I hoped was that with my arm still in a sling, the workers would feel sorry for me.
    The crowd gathered in the high school gym. I stood on a soap box in the middle of the basketball court, facing the bleachers with a bullhorn in my hand. As I stared at the crowd, I tried to pinpoint the men and women I thought would rush me first. I cleared my throat and brought the bullhorn to my mouth.
    “First of all, I would like to thank you all for coming.” My voice cracked through the mouthpiece. Thankfully, the horn covered the majority of my face.
    My cheeks and ears turned red. “As I’m sure some of you are aware, we had a visit from Florida within the past few weeks.” I expected the crowd to burst into hushed whispers amongst themselves, but I was met with silence.
    I carried on. “We have reason to believe they are planning an attack. Perhaps planning on wiping us off the face of the earth.” I paused and flinched, expecting angry roars from the crowd. Again, I was met with silence.
    “We think the safest course of action is to leave North Platte. We think we should head into the West.” I lowered the bullhorn. It was out now. If they were going to get angry, I couldn’t stop it.
    Quinn sat in the front row, and I found his gaze. He nodded and gave me a thumbs up. I turned my attention back to the crowd, a knot developed in my stomach. I would have preferred them angry and yelling at me. At least then they would have reacted. All of them sitting there in silence made me nervous. Was I supposed to give them more information? Were they expecting something else from me?
    “Is there any way we can be sure they are coming here to destroy us?” A voice spoke from the crowd.
    I looked up to see a woman, probably in her mid- twenties, with a blond-haired, blue-eyed boy on her lap.
    I shook my head. “No. Unfortunately, it’s all speculation at this point.”
    “Then why should we leave on speculation?” It was an older man, close to 60, who wore a plaid shirt and sat with his arms crossed over his chest.
    I shrugged. “That choice is up to you. I’m just telling you what we know. Or what we think we know. After the group from Florida left here, Tanya,” she sat next to Quinn and I pointed her out, “came here to tell us about a zombie infestation.” I told them the story about the zombies in the truck and how they attacked in the storage yard. After I finished, I was met with silence again, but the crowd looked at one another, searching each other’s faces for an answer or more information.
    Quinn stood from his seat and faced them. “What Krista is saying is that it’s better to be safe than dead. We don’t know for sure that they are coming to destroy us, but we have to plan for the worst-case scenario. Would any of you put it past The Families to see you dead?”
    Members of the crowd shook their heads.
    “They sent you here for a reason,” Quinn continued. “And now you are a threat to their power and means of control. They have already tried to rein in the people of Florida, to keep them afraid, what do you think their next logical step is going to be?”
    “Why the West?” the woman with the child asked. “Why not somewhere further east? Maybe up north?”
    “You know,” I said, “anywhere you choose to go outside of North Platte will be safer. But if Florida realizes you’re gone and wants to hunt you down, they probably won’t stop looking for you in the east or up north. I’m pretty sure they’ll hesitate coming after you in the West.”
    “Where are we going to go in the West?” A teenager with stringy brown hair asked. “There are thousands of us.”
    “And there are completely abandoned cities,” Quinn interjected.
    “But they’ve been