GENERATION Z THE COMPLETE BOX SET: NOVELS 1-3

by Peter Meredith

  Mike drew in a long breath; before he could release what was surely going to be a profanity-laced tirade, Jillybean snapped her fingers. “Hold your tongue, Mike. You’ll only be wasting your breath.”

  The boy thrust out his chin. “It’s mine to waste.”

  Jillybean’s eyes drooped. “For now. Leney, can you please bring me a drink. Something warm. And get something for them and yourself as well. We don’t really have time for a last meal.” Leney bowed at the waist and left.

  “You got a Corsair bowing?” Jenn exclaimed. “If I didn’t hate you so much, I’d be impressed.”

  “I didn’t do this,” Jillybean said in a low tone. “It wasn’t me. It was…someone else inside me. Someone you don’t know.”

  Jenn arched an eyebrow. “It’s you now. If you feel so bad about this, you could free us with a snap of your fingers.”

  Jillybean shook her head, shrugged and then nodded all in the space of a second. “I-I could, but look around. They’re mad for blood and if I don’t give it to them, they may take it.”

  “They might take your blood, you mean?” Jenn shot back, feeling a giddy kind of mania surge through her system. “If I were queen, I would take the risk.”

  Jillybean’s fists balled and her face grew in anger and desperation. “And would you risk Aaron’s life? Or Lindy Smith’s? Or Shaina Hale’s? Don’t you get it? I’m not worried about my life. I’m worried what will happen if I fail. I’m barely keeping them under control. If I could figure out how to postpone this, I might be able to save you, somehow. I just need some time to…”

  A great shout caused her to jerk around. The test dummy had broken its rope and had crashed to the ground. The Corsairs roared their approval.

  Someone cried: “Forget the hanging. Toss them from the top of the lighthouse!” This was considered a genius idea and a chant was taken up: From the top! From the top! From the top!

  “I think Jillybean might be right,” Stu said, in a shocked whisper. He had turned a light shade of green while watching the Corsairs caper about in a growing frenzy. “They’re going to kill us no matter what.”

  “Because of you,” Jenn hissed at Jillybean. The giddiness was gone and all she had now was an overpowering fear eating her insides up. She was going to puke. There was no doubting it, the only question was when. She wanted to hold off until everyone was looking away, however it was beyond her control and she vomited on the ground in front of the Queen’s black boots.

  More laughter had her crying. She wouldn’t look up as she begged, “Don’t throw me off a building, please.” It didn’t seem like Jillybean would have much choice. The ropes were all tossed down from the lighthouse and forgotten by the Corsairs who were going ape. It was going to happen in seconds.

  Jenn saw herself being dragged, kicking and screaming to the top and then… “Please do something,” she begged.

  Jillybean stared at the three of them for a few moments before turning to gaze out at the sun setting behind the clouds. Her mouth began to open and close as if she were preparing to say something horrible but couldn’t bring herself to.

  Eventually, she said, “There is one way I can save you from being thrown off the building.” She looked back over her shoulder and locked eyes with Jenn. “Do you remember the poison?”

  Jenn’s hopes had shot sky-high at first, now they dropped almost to nothing…almost. Anything was better than being tossed off a building, especially one that was only middling tall. She could easily imagine herself only breaking both legs and maybe an arm. They would throw her a second time if that happened.

  The tears were back as she nodded. “I remember. W-Will it hurt?”

  Jillybean had to bight back on her own tears as she answered, “No. It’ll be quick. Give me a minute to move away before you use it.” Leney was coming with a tray of tea. Jillybean reached up into her mass of hair and took the tiny vial from somewhere within it. She let it fall in front of Jenn as she turned her back on the girl.

  “I’ve changed my mind about letting them have anything,” she said to Leney. “One too many smart remarks. Come, let’s see about this new idea. Throwing people from the roof does have its merits, but what about all the betting? Maybe we should add a distance factor.”

  This was cheered with new enthusiasm and under the noise, Jenn grabbed the vial. It felt strangely warm, but not unpleasantly so. She had already told Mike and Stu about the poison, which made a second explanation unnecessary. The three took turns staring at each other and then at Jenn’s balled fist.

  “We shouldn’t wait,” Stu said, his voice dry and harsh. Mike swallowed loudly and then nodded. Jenn agreed in principle, but couldn’t seem to unclench her hand.

  “Maybe…” She looked out at the bay. Her imaginary rescuers had not arrived. By now, Jillybean was on top of the lighthouse, waving at her adoring Corsairs and studiously avoiding looking at her latest murder victims. “I-I guess we should do it.” Finally, she opened her hand, which was now shaking so badly that she nearly dropped the vial.

  From high up, the Queen cried out, “Who’s ready to dispense with some much needed punishment?”

  “Hurry, Jenn,” Mike said.

  She took a tiny sip from the vial. It tasted like noxious chemicals and it was a struggle to swallow it. Her tongue was numb before it went all the way down. “I love you, Mike.”

  He swallowed his dram and his face immediately went red and his eyes began to bug. “I-I love you, too. I-I can feel it working.” He crushed into Jenn and squeezed her, but not with as much strength as he might have wished. Their limbs were quickly going numb.

  And still, Stu hadn’t taken his dose. He stood staring up at the Queen with the vial raised. The courtyard went eerily quiet and at first Jenn thought it was her hearing going, but then she saw everyone staring. Her legs gave out a second later and she and Mike crumpled to the cracked and pitted courtyard surface, their arms around each other.

  The world was fading as her lungs stopped and her heart slowed, and slowed and slowed, and then stopped without the least fanfare. One moment she was alive, the next she was dead.

  “I love you, my Queen,” Stu said and swallowed the poison. “I probably should have said that earlier.” The last thing Jenn saw was his smile. He wasn’t afraid to die. He welcomed death.

  Epilogue

  As the sun dropped below the horizon and the grey day became a grey twilight, Stu knelt down next to Mike and Jenn. They were slumped together, but it seemed proper to him that they should be holding hands. “W-When you w-wake up on the other s-side,” he whispered through numbing lips.

  He laid down and stared upwards. Seconds later, the poison racing through him took his life. There was no pain when he died. He just died and no one said a word.

  With her shoulders thrust back and her face a carefully controlled mask, the Queen strode down into the silent courtyard. A thousand judging eyes were upon her, ready to pronounce her “only woman” if she showed the least emotion. She said nothing as she waved a hand at the guards who were fumbling around looking for a pulse on one of them.

  They drew back as she knelt down beside Stu and touched his throat. He was still warm, but wouldn’t be for long. A shudder ran up her back.

  Picking up the vial, she saw there were only a few drops left. They beckoned to her. They were a siren’s call that she wished she could dash herself to pieces upon…only doing so, taking the easy way out, would leave two-hundred innocent people at the mercy of the army she had created in her image. The vial disappeared as she stood.

  “Have the guards who were closest to them lashed,” she ordered Leney. “Twenty strokes apiece. And when you’re done, lock them away for questioning.”

  The men who’d been guarding the prisoners gasped and a few began whining, but could do nothing more since they were surrounded by an outraged mob who had been lusting for blood and death.

  The lashes were meted out right there in the courtyard within full view of the three sprawled bod
ies. With rigid stiffness, the Queen refused to look in their direction until the whip had snapped its last. Only then did she let her eyes flick back down.

  “I suppose we’re going to have to do something with them,” she said to Leney. With a shrug, he suggested throwing them in the bay. She sighed. “There’s a reason I am queen and you are not. Ruling is a juggling act. I have to appease some, make others fear me, and shower love on the rest. And the next day I have to rearrange the order. Subtly of course, so no one’s the wiser.”

  “Well, you pissed off those Santas by whipping them,” Leney noted. “And you made your old friends fear you. Tossing them from the top of the lighthouse was a great idea.”

  He seemed to have forgotten that it hadn’t been her idea at all and she didn’t give him reason to think otherwise. She gazed up at the prison, where the Islanders and Hill People had retreated before the executions. Donna Polston was in one of the windows; she was as grey as the prison walls.

  “I think they’re going to need a little something to appease them. We’ll use the boat.” She gestured to where the Captain Jack sat under layers of blue canvas. “Mike was a sailor. He would’ve wanted a burial at sea. And Jenn…” The tiniest show of emotion slipped out as she swallowed, thickly. “I just don’t like the idea of throwing dirt on her face. She’s too pretty.”

  “And you want to use the Captain Jack?” He snorted laughter. “I don’t think she’ll make it to sea. That hunk will probably sink twenty feet from the dock.”

  “Then tow it to the Golden Gate Bridge and let the tides have her. The Islanders will appreciate the gesture and maybe it’ll soothe some ill-feelings.”

  Once it was commanded, it was done. The Islanders, which is what the people from the bay area were called by the Queen’s Men, were given the honor of preparing the cold corpses. Jenn was wrapped in her white and gold flag, while Mike and Stu were bundled in sailcloth. As there were no uninjured men left among the Islanders, Donna Polston, Shaina Hale, and Rebecca Haigh took the bodies themselves and placed them gently aboard the Captain Jack.

  The three women openly cried as they worked, as did most of the Islanders who came down to the dock to see the boat off. The Queen could not allow even one tear to fall. She was all business and held herself in a singular unblinking pose until the boat was pulled away and then she only whispered a soft, “Goodbye.”

  With torches blazing, the Captain Jack was towed to the bridge and cast off into the Pacific, where she was never seen again.

  Eight hundred miles to the north, Neil Martin, said his own goodbyes though they were of a far less upsetting nature. His goodbyes were to Deanna Grey, Governor of Bainbridge Island, and her daughter Emily, who gave him such a prolonged hug that he had to wrestle himself away from her clutches, which wasn’t easy. Although Emily was not quite twelve, she was already taller than Neil and had her mother’s easy, cat-like grace and her father’s natural strength.

  The two of them worried about Neil now that he was alone. He had always been something of a hermit, but since Jillybean had left, he was rarely seen.

  “Come on, Uncle Neil, one more slice of pie,” Emily insisted, following him out into the evening. “Or I can wrap it up to go. You look like you’ve lost, like a ton of weight.”

  “Which is a good thing,” he replied, patting his belly. “I was getting too fat. Go on back inside. You’re letting all the heat out.” It was a brisk night; his words were accented by little plumes. “Go on, now.” She crossed her arms showing a touch of the obstinance her mother was known for. “Fine,” he sighed, giving in to the inevitable. “If you want, you can bring me a plate of leftovers tomorrow.”

  She hesitated. “Just not at the school, okay?”

  “Not at the school,” he agreed. There were three schools on Bainbridge Island; two were normal functioning schools, while the third housed Jillybean’s ghoulish experiments. Inside its dank, horrid walls were zombies of immense size, their foul, greasy heads scraping the ceiling. Others were chained to tables, their flesh, covered in scars and stitches. These were the beasts that Jillybean practiced surgery on.

  In one room were grey livers sitting in trays of green fluid and in still another were brains held in glass jars—all of them strangely smooth and oddly shrunken.

  Sometimes the basement would emit a hellish, chemical stench and there’d be a shimmer in the air over the school. Even Neil didn’t like going down there. He was afraid that by flicking on a light-switch he could blow up half the island. Jillybean loved her explosions and every few months, she would test some compound or another out on the Sound.

  It was usually quite an event and everyone would congregate along the immense wall that ringed the island, and watch the fireworks.

  People knew Jillybean well enough to never voluntarily go into her school.

  Other than the Governor, Emily and a couple of others, few people knew much of anything about Neil Martin.

  To most of them, he was nothing but Jillybean’s handler. Yes, they shared a last name, but according to the gossip which encompassed a good chunk of the entertainment available on the island, they were not father and daughter. It was thought that he had adopted “crazy” Jillybean simply to give her an air of credibility.

  The gossipers also had it on good authority that Neil was some sort of an adviser to the governor, although in what capacity it was never really known. Neil was a mystery few people cared enough to try to unravel.

  But there were some who knew at least a little of who Neil Martin was. They knew that beyond his scarred face, his shrimpy size, his corny dad-jokes, and his myriad of sweater vests, there was something more to him. For instance, they knew that he had helped destroy the River King and had defeated the Azael in a great war.

  They knew that he was a threat. And they also knew that without him there was a chance Jillybean would simply collapse in on herself like an unstable star.

  He was aware he had enemies, but he felt completely safe on Bainbridge. No force of man or beasts could overcome its great walls. Not even the Corsairs.

  After a second goodbye to Emily, Neil walked easily down the well-lit streets, not worried in the least about himself. His mind was on Jillybean and what sort of trouble she could be getting into. He wasn’t exactly worried about her safety; that she could overcome any obstacle set in her path was not in question. It was who she would hurt along the way that bothered him.

  “And what about her meds?” he asked himself as he came to his own little cottage. Without Jillybean and her manic energy filling the place it didn’t feel like home. It was lonely inside.

  Sighing, he reached for the doorknob and… “Hey, ow!” He yanked his bleeding hand back. Something under the knob had cut him. Bending down, he squinted at the knob and saw the gleam of metal. “What the hell?” Carefully he pulled at the edge of the thing until it dropped onto his porch. It was a razor blade.

  Suddenly the cold seemed to penetrate his coat and his green sweater vest, going right to his heart—the edge of the blade was coated in a wet, black substance. He didn’t need to smell it to know that it was zombie blood. Hurrying inside, he flicked on the light and saw that the cut was deep—the infection was in him now.

  The war had come to Bainbridge.

  ***

  The End

  ***

  Author’s Note

  Before you ask, yes the Generation Z story continues! While you wait for Book 4, The Queen Unthroned, which is now available for pre-sale, please consider doing some writing of your own in the form of a review of this book on Amazon and/or on your own Facebook page. The review is the most practical and inexpensive form of advertisement an independent author has available to get his work known. I would greatly appreciate it.

  Now, that you’ve left your review—thank you very much—may I suggest another series of mine featuring a younger Jillybean? Many of you are probably curious how the apocalypse affected her and how she got to be so messed up in the head. Check out my ten bo
ok series: The Undead World. Although she doesn’t show up until book 2, it makes sense to begin with book one: The Apocalypse

  Peter Meredith

  The Apocalypse:

  Greed, terrorism, and simple bad luck conspire to bring mankind to its knees as a viral infection spreads out of control, reducing those infected to undead horrors that feed upon the rest.

  It's a time of misery and death for most, however there are some who are lucky, some who are ruthless, and some who are just too damned tough to go down without a fight. This is their story.

  What the readers say about The Apocalypse:

  "No frills, just raw and earnest fear."

  "Fun and scary, it will have you turning the pages right to the end..."

  "This has everything I love in a good story: interesting characters, vivid details, fast pacing, and a shocker at the end.”

  PS If you are interested in autographed copies of my books, souvenir posters of the covers, Apocalypse T-shirts and other awesome Swag, please visit my website at https://www.petemeredith1.com

  PPS If you would like your name to appear in it, please contact me at petermeredith07@gmail.com. I try to use as many fan names as possible, but if your name is Willy Willoughby, maybe just write to say hello.

  PPPS: The first chapter of The Sacrificial Daughter is set below. If you get hooked, don’t blame me, I didn’t invent books, you know.

  PPPPS: I need to thank a number of people for their help in bringing you this book. The chief of this is my Editor and mum, Elizabeth Meredith—Love you, MOM! Also, there are my beta readers Greg Bennett, Joanna Niederer, Michele Heeder, Eric Gothier, Paul Clay, Jeanette McGaha, Connie Nealy, Ezben Gerardo, Virginia Keim, Jenn Lockhart, Nancy Spedding, William Mclean, Michelle Stewart, Fi Findlater, Kariann Morgan, Roy Bost, Joel Koenig—Thanks so much!