Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 2): Siren Songs Read Free Page B

die.”
    She looked at him and was dismayed to see how uncharacteristically
serious he'd become. Something bad was coming. He leaned close. She
heard a car engine approaching. It was a sound she recognized. He
began to whisper.
    “This is how Victoria dies.”
    And then she saw it happen.
    3
    Grandma woke with a start. “OH MY GOD!” She heaved
sideways and tumbled into the sleeping figure of Victoria next to
her.
    “Grandma, that's the second time today you've woken up
saying that. What kind of dreams are you having?”
    She looked around, initially unsure of her surroundings, but
quickly gathered her wits. Last night she'd almost gotten them all
killed when she woke up screaming those same words while zombies were
lurking around their group. “I think there's a cure to this
thing. I think I'm a key part to learning the secret of that cure.
I've been told—”
    She appeared to force herself to think, but to no avail. “He
showed me...things.”
    “Grandma, if I didn't know better I'd say you've been
reading too many zombie books. Of course that's what they tell
you. 'There's a cure' and it’s up to you and your merry band to
find it and save mankind. As if there's no one else in the world
searching for a cure but two kids and their grandma. Who told you
that? Was it the same person who told you about Phil's wife?”
    Just this morning she seemed to glean information on a police
officer's dead wife and daughter “from beyond,” which
helped them negotiate their way to safety over the bridge—but
that seemed like a miracle. This seemed more like misinformation. A
distraction.
    “I don't know. I have these dreams and they're so vivid, but
I forget them almost as soon as I wake up. I think it's Al telling me
these things.”
    “Grandpa?”
    Liam remembered great-grandpa Al from when he was a small child,
and through pictures and movies his family had taken back then, but
he had very little direct recollection of the man, other than he was
a kindly person who loved to laugh and joke with anyone who happened
to be in the room with him. As with his great-grandma, he referred to
him simply as “Grandpa” in normal conversation.
    “Grandpa is talking to you in your dreams?”
    “That feels correct.”
    Liam took a minute to study her. He knew she was quite old, 104 to
be exact, but never once had she ever displayed the least bit of
dementia. He didn't think she was starting today. “Alright
then. I believe you of course. But what does he expect us to do about
a cure? He might as well tell us Santa Claus is real.”
    Grandma gave him a sideways glance, which Liam took as an
invitation.
    “Santa is real?”
    Victoria hit him on the shoulder, but all three were laughing.
    The consensus was that even if there was a cure to this horrible
plague, they were in no condition to find it. They were hardly in a
position to move beyond the tree. Grandma's cane went MIA back under
the Arch, and the big wheelchair given to her by a passerby was lost
last night when Liam whiffed tossing it onto a moving train. He and
Victoria could help her walk for a short distance, but that wouldn't
work for a longer journey. Step one of their master plan to save the
world had to begin at the most rudimentary level. They had to find
transportation.
    Liam studied their group. He was the 15-year-old boy dressed in
jeans and a Mountain Dew T-shirt, carrying a small Ruger Mark I .22
caliber pistol inside his waistband. Victoria was his partner, a
modestly pretty 17-year-old girl clad in a formerly beautiful black
cocktail dress covered almost head to toe in coal dust, and
accessorizing with Liam's brown leather belt around her waist so she
could use his holster for a duplicate Ruger Mark I. They were both
caring for Liam's 104-year-old great-grandmother. She was wearing a
light blue pant suit and a head scarf, with the ability to walk
unassisted for about ten feet, armed only with a Rosary. They also
had Liam's backpack which had some sundries such