"Oh, but that's where you're wrong," Ron said. "I took samples of your genetic material and kept you busy running around in circles in case we needed more later. You do have a very interesting ability in your genetic sequence, but it's not the one you think."
"What is it?"
"You have a very peculiar ability hidden away in you to control the undead. Whether or not you can actually exercise this power, or if you're just a dormant carrier of it, it doesn't matter. But you passed it on to your son. I hear he was quite the prodigy with it."
Sarah's eyes widened. "David? How do you know about him?"
Ron looked up toward Glass with a smile. "Mr. Glass has eyes and ears all over the place. He sees things, he hears things."
Could it really have been true? Did she really have the same ability her son did and she just never knew it? All of this sudden information overwhelmed her. She remembered Vanessa peculiarly using the EEG equipment on her to read her brainwaves. So it was true. She really was just used as a hapless lackey to chase her own tail while they worked on the final nail in the coffin of humanity. And as she thought about all of this, a sudden revelation came to her.
"That's why!" she exclaimed. "When we were in that lab under the police station in Raleigh... the self-destruct sequence was counting down and we made it to the elevator, but we were a little too late. That lab should've blown before we got out, but the explosion waited until after we left the building to go off. We didn't die because you were with us... his golden boy." She threw a contemptible look at Glass, and now she felt more anger and rebellion than fear.
"Very good," Ron said with a smile.
"Enough of this," Glass boomed. "Do we need her anymore?"
And all of a sudden, her rebelliousness disappeared as the icy chill of fear ran up her spine.
Ron considered her for a moment. "No, we have everything we need from her. In fact, we won't be needing her ever again. Goodbye, Sarah."
Her eyes widened.
"Kill her," Glass said to his men.
As the soldiers lined up and began to aim their rifles at her, she took off.
A blaze of bullets followed her and peppered the lab as she ducked and tried to get away from them, moving around a tall cabinet to shield herself. The soldiers quickly hurried around the cabinet and continued their fire, one of them hitting her in the calf.
Sarah yelled and fell to the ground.
They all kept their rifles trained on her as they quickly approached to execute her.
But Sarah wrapped her fingers around the edge of the bookshelf and pulled it in front of her, letting it soak up the bullets as she pressed the button next to the vent. It slid open and she crawled through. She got to her feet and hobbled to the end of the secret exit, opening the door into the woods and climbing down the rock face. She kept throwing glances over her shoulder as she ran away, expecting to see the soldiers pursuing her, but they had given up the chase.
She noticed the sound of whirling helicopter blades somewhere in the distance.
Sarah skirted around in the woods, making a wide arc around the lab and finding a hill to use as a vantage point. The helicopter was somewhere on the other side of the hill, and she struggled up the steep incline to get a good look at it. When she got to the top, she lay on her stomach and kept herself hidden from view as she peered down the slope and saw the military chopper sitting in an empty field next to the trees of the forest.
A minute later, she saw Glass and his men leaving with Ron for the helicopter. When they arrived at it, one of the men pulled open the side door and they all piled in. But before they shut the door, Sarah noticed someone else who was already sitting inside. It was a zombie, its skin ashy and leathery, and it was shackled in chains so it couldn't get away or bite anyone. It looked to be a little boy, no older than eight or nine years old. Then as Sarah tried to understand why he looked so familiar to her, her jaw hit the ground.
It was David. It was her son.
He languidly fidgeted in his seat. And for a brief moment, his head turned and looked up at her. But his eyes were the same milky whites as the other zombies; no recognition in them.
Then someone leaned forward and slid the door closed, blocking her view of him. The helicopter's blades spun faster, then it took off from the ground and ascended in the air, and with a slight forward tilt, it moved out of the area and out of her sight completely, taking her son with it.
Sarah sat up and pressed her back against a tree. As she stared forward at the forest, her mind racing, she was absolutely breathless.
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Other books in the Zombie Apocalypse Series:
The Fall of Man
A Rising Tide
Ashes in the Mouth
In Shadows
Scourge of Evil
Coming soon:
Hell on Earth
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jeff DeGordick is a horror and post-apocalyptic novelist currently living in southern Ontario, Canada. Writing stories was his first passion as a child, but he's also had forays into testing and designing video games for a living, and a very brief career as a cook.
He began writing in 1994 at age seven, embarking on a long journey of spinning strange and sometimes gruesome tales, penning many short stories and partial novels as a hobby, including a published novel and short story on Amazon under a pen name.
Currently, he's continuing work on the Zombie Apocalypse Series and sowing the seeds for a new horror series in the not-so-distant future.
Table of Contents
Copyright
Foreword
1. The Eden Project
2. Dust Up
3. Faith Reprise
4. Predator and Prey
5. A Ghost from the Past
6. The First Item
7. Search Party
8. Sunset
9. The Second Item
10. Circling the Wagons
11. Round Up
12. Beat Down
13. Vantage Point
14. Penned In
15. Departure
16. The Final Item
17. Victory
18. Brawl
19. The Project Goes Online
20. Full Circle
Afterword
About the Author
Zombie Apocalypse Series (Book 6): The Eden Project Page 21