The Zombies: Volumes One to Six Box Set

by Macaulay C. Hunter

  Elania clicked onto Sombra C News and tapped REPORT ACTIVITY. Shepherds/cops are currently gathering up Sombra Cs in Cloudy Valley, California. She pressed send. A reply came at once, asking for any more details and telling her to stay safe. Down the ticker for Hot Areas was Blue Hill. Zaley leaned closer to read as Elania clicked on it. Preliminary reports stated that all roads leading east out of Blue Hill were closed, and Shepherds were blocking the freeway entrance there. Clicking back, now Cloudy Valley was listed for Hot Areas. So was Penger.

  They stilled to hear a scuffle of feet. The man was walking in the road. He was speaking to someone, either present or through a phone, and too far away for them to make out the words. Oh God, Micah was driving over! Her body aching from this position, Elania wrote to her. A Shepherd is watching Coe. You can’t come here.

  The response came from Austin. I am a vampire. Fear me! Or hug me.

  Austin, don’t let Micah drive onto this road!

  I know a riddle.

  What had Micah done, pulled him out of the dentist’s chair and loaded him in the car still high on nitrous? As Elania typed in for him to give the phone to Micah, another text arrived. What do you get when you combine a V-6 and a Shepherd?

  “What is wrong with him?” Zaley whispered.

  “The nitrous hasn’t worn off yet,” Elania whispered.

  A flat Shepherd.

  She wanted to look over the porch for the man, since she wasn’t hearing him any longer, but the tarp would rustle. Tell Micah to cruise past this road and check for Shepherds. Don’t just stop in front of the house.

  Okay. Everyone should have nitrous vented into homes and schools and workplaces. Then we could all be happy all the time. Punctuated by a stream of smiling emoticons, the message finished with a commentary that Micah was driving very fast.

  “I shot someone,” Zaley whispered. “Oh my God. I killed him.”

  “You had to,” Elania said, in shock about it herself. There was a dead man in her backyard. A text came from Corbin, addressed to everyone that Shepherds were attacking. We know, Elania thought, and then passed the phone in horror to Zaley. They had killed Corbin’s mother.

  A response came from Quinn. Is this a joke? We’re on our way back there!

  Turn around and get on Sombra C News, Elania replied. A car drove by and she stiffened. People called back and forth far down the road. Whether it was Shepherd-related or innocent she could not discern. Closing her eyes, she concentrated. They were just too distant. The lightning-fast cadence was either excited or angry.

  Austin texted. Oxygen just makes people sad. It’s making me sad right now.

  Salmon Park had been added to Hot Areas when Elania returned to Sombra C News. A brace was reported at Rayne Road, cutting off the major southern exit for Cloudy Valley and freeway access. Zaley gripped Elania’s arm in warning and they stilled at footsteps going at a jog past the house. Then Coe was silent.

  Taking the phone, Zaley wrote to Corbin. He did not respond. She passed the cell back with a message from Austin that the V-6 had cruised past Coe and that neither of them saw anyone on the road or sidewalks. They were turning on Belge and would come up Coe from the south side. If no one was around still, Austin would text to run to the car.

  Elania gripped the phone and prayed while straining to hear the V-6. It was a quiet car, and not until it was nearly to the house did she hear the faint rumble of its engine. The text came and they lifted the tarp and peeked cautiously over the porch. The sight of the midnight blue V-6 almost made Elania cry. She and Zaley wended their way through the clutter to the stairs. Rushing over the lawn as Austin opened the back door, they climbed into the seats and Elania yanked it shut. Micah pulled away from the curb casually and headed north to the stop sign. The heat was on and all of the vents were pointed her way.

  Geneva had moderate traffic going both ways. At the first opening, Micah stomped on the gas and breezed over the lanes to go west. They hit thicker traffic a block away and slowed to a crawl. Looking back through the mirror, Micah said, “Elania, duck down and get on Sombra C News for updates.”

  Elania slipped off her backpack and lay across the seats. Connecting to the live feed, she turned up the volume. “-in California. Preliminary reports have been confirmed that a massive Sombra C sweep is taking place at this time from Lilan up to Salmon Park and possibly Castlebar. Sombra Cs are being shot for resisting, and forced into vans if not. If anyone you know lives in this area, call them now. If you do, get out. Don’t pack, and don’t call the police. Officers are assisting in the purge. We have one report that Hardy Street in Lilan has not been braced-”

  “That doesn’t do us any good!” Micah burst. “Has Geneva been braced?”

  “-and that Yanmar in Penger is also free-”

  “What about Corbin?” Zaley asked hoarsely.

  “He isn’t answering me,” Austin said, busy over his phone, “and neither is Janie. Brennan is clear across the city hiding in the restroom at Cirrus Park. He doesn’t know where else to go.” He turned down the heat.

  “Corbin told Brennan that he was going to the high school to hide,” Micah said, turning it back up. “Don’t, I can still cut diamonds with my nipples from that fucking dentist’s office. I forgot my backpack there. If we can get out here and through to Yanmar, Zaley can drop us off and head back for those two . . . shit.”

  Elania peeked over the dashboard. “I can’t see anything. What is it?”

  Leaning forward for a better look, Austin said, “I see lights. They’re stopping cars up ahead.”

  Micah pulled onto a side street and coasted past houses. “Okay, Geneva’s out. That has to get to Sombra C News. We’ll try for Caravel.”

  “We should stop at the high school. It’s on the way,” Zaley pleaded.

  Austin pulled up a map to navigate the V-6 through the residential streets as Elania reported to Sombra C News. Geneva Road going west out of Cloudy Valley is braced. Has anyone reported Caravel?

  Someone at the station wrote back. Caravel has not been reported yet as open or closed. On the screen, a reporter held up a makeshift ticker tape reporting Geneva as braced. “-gunfire has broken out at Lincoln Elementary School in Lilan, where daycare workers are hiding Sombra C students in the office-”

  “Tell them that you have a Shepherd’s daughter with you,” Zaley said quietly. “Sombra Cs are being taken to an illegal confinement point. I don’t know where, but my father referred to it as campgrounds. Old campgrounds. Tell them the name Evan Hudson as Patron Saint. Tell them my father’s name, too. They can pass those along to the Armed Forces or whoever can do something about it.”

  Elania relayed the information while the car weaved through streets, one of which dumped them out onto Colfax. They turned left and went north. The reporters broke from California to discuss purges taking place in other states. A text came from Brennan. Is there any way out of Cloudy Valley?

  We don’t know, Elania wrote. We’re going to try for Caravel. Cirrus Park isn’t too far away from there, if you want to meet us. Caravel and Mountain-

  Suddenly, the car jerked to the right and accelerated through a residential street. Pressing send, Elania forced herself up and looked behind to a black van turning into the road behind them. Austin shouted, “Micah, watch out!”

  Kids were crossing the intersection in front of them. The V-6 spun right to avoid them and they shot down a narrow road, Elania spotting the sign and screaming too late, “It’s a dead end!” They turned around at the loop to go back just as the black van cut off their exit and stopped in the dead center of the road.

  “Zaley, get out your gun! We’ll have to run for it!” Elania cried.

  “Go fuck yourselves,” Micah said hatefully to the black van, and gunned it. Pulling hard to the right, everyone in the car was thrown around as it leaped the curb and drove onto a lawn. They screamed as the V-6 smashed through flowerbeds and bushes, uprooted a young fruit tree. Bouncing over the driveway and into a spindly, anc
ient fence, wooden stakes sprayed against the windshield. The left side of the car dipped, traveling on a lower step of a walkway through the middle of the yard. Micah swerved around a brick pedestal holding up a decorative lamp and nailed the fence on the other side. Beyond it were clay planters, which shattered and sent dirt over the windshield after the stakes.

  The Shepherd in the driver’s seat opened fire from his window. Elania and Zaley covered their heads and buckled over as the V-6 crashed into lawn chairs, through a line of empty garbage cans, and jolted back into the road on the other side of the black van. They tore away, Micah accelerating more and pressing on the horn as Slinten came up fast.

  I am about to die, Elania thought. The V-6 exploded into the four-lane road and swerved to the right to avoid being creamed by a truck. A minivan going west braked hard as the V-6 charged into its lane. A hybrid slammed into the minivan’s bumper and the car behind it swerved off the road to not crash. It went through a chain-link fence around a yard. Micah shot west and yanked the car onto the first side road.

  The phone had been knocked out of Elania’s hand somewhere along the way. She scrabbled to retrieve it from under the passenger seat. It was still playing the news. “-an assault on what was planned to be a late-night session concerning the budget. It is unknown how many survivors are trapped in the Senate chambers-”

  “The world is ending,” Elania said blankly.

  “One minute, we have one fucking minute to find him or I’m going!” Micah shouted. She braked outside the high school and Zaley flew out of the car before it was even at a full stop.

  “Corbin!” she screamed, sprinting over the grass as Micah laid on the horn. “Corbin! Corbin, where are you?”

  A dog burst out of the bushes by the pool and hurtled for her, a leash trailing wildly. Then Corbin emerged, filthy and astonished to see the V-6, and started to run. He caught Zaley in his arms and crushed her in a hug, lifting her off the ground and swinging her in a circle. The dog jumped around their feet.

  Micah blasted the horn. Once they were all inside, Bleu Cheese in Elania’s lap, the car turned east for Caravel. She embraced the dog, needing that solidity as the news played. “-Pitch forced into hiding. Returning to our evacuation coverage, there are ongoing attacks on Sombra Cs from Florida to California. The attack in Brenton, Florida is exclusively a spill. Repeat, a spill. Murders. If you are trying to leave Brenton now, Sombra Cs are fighting for control of Palance Road. Do not let yourself be pulled over by anyone! Jan, will you report on the situation in California?”

  “Sure, this is a bag-and-spill as Shepherds call it, captured or shot depending on degree of resistance. Extending from Delmar in the north down to Lilan in the south, Blue Hill to the east and Penger to the west, Sombra Cs are being rounded up and taken to an illegal confinement point. We’ve just gotten word that it may extend all the way south to San Criata, and an unconfirmed report from Duban means that Blue Hill may not be the easternmost limit. We’re marking the whole area as red-”

  “Do any of you guys have water?” Corbin rasped. Pushing the dog to Zaley, who grunted at the weight, Elania unzipped her backpack and gave him one of the Super Robo-Man bottles. He drank deeply and said, “You guys are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen in all of my life. I mean that.”

  “Your mom,” Zaley whispered.

  “Escape now. Feel later,” Micah ordered. “Are there updates on Caravel?”

  Elania checked. “No. Ketterman is being braced at three points. American and San Simeon are also braced to Blue Hill. They can’t have missed Caravel, Micah, not if they’re getting the smaller ones like San Simeon!”

  “Sometimes they leave certain roads open deliberately,” Austin said. “If they know Sombra Cs are fleeing by that road, they can close down Salmon Park and trap us there. It gives them less of a search area. They’ll pen us in.”

  “No one’s fucking penning me in,” Micah muttered. She turned down the heat.

  Hitting refresh, Elania looked with dismay to her phone. “It’s braced. Caravel is braced at the Woodsman Diner. I told Brennan to meet us at Caravel and Mountain.” They’d fit him in somewhere, kick the dog up to sit in the front, and wedge Brennan in the back.

  “Elania, my phone is loading too slowly,” Austin said. “Figure out where the Woodsman Diner is on Caravel. Tell me if that’s north or south of Empen.”

  “Fast, I’m turning on Caravel in two blocks,” Micah added.

  Hurriedly, Elania searched the diner, finding it at 11580 Caravel. It was a sickeningly narrow and winding road, one guaranteed to give one if not more of the triplets motion sickness in the few times the Douglas family had taken it. Dad always drove slowly to minimize the stomach upset, pissing off people behind him.

  She mapped the address of the diner to Empen and followed the purple line over half a mile of twisting road. “Empen is south. That doesn’t help anything! It’s a dead end to the west and loops back down to Cloudy Valley to the east!”

  “I bet they haven’t braced the Gray King Nature Path,” Austin said.

  “We can’t drive on that,” Elania said as the V-6 turned and began to climb the slight grade of Caravel.

  “We can’t drive anywhere! They’ve cut off all the roads.”

  “And they know the V-6 now, if not already from the Book,” Zaley said. “You’re thinking that we should walk the Nature Path?”

  The last thing Elania wanted to do was get out of the car. She clicked to the Sombra C News map of Cloudy Valley and sought for an alternative exit. All of the connecting roads had flashing red circles indicating a brace. But the Shepherds couldn’t keep this up forever! The braces would come down in a few days, possibly tomorrow, and let them escape in the car. They just had to lay low until then. “Isn’t there somewhere we can hide in Cloudy Valley? I really don’t want to be without a car.”

  “There’s no choice!” Austin burst.

  “There is a choice,” Micah said calmly as the V-6 turned west on Empen. “Austin and I are going to try our luck with Gray King. Elania, if you want to risk it here with the V-6, the car is yours. And anyone else who wants to stay. Share nicely.”

  “Gray King,” Zaley and Corbin said immediately.

  “They’ll catch you in five seconds if you go on foot,” Elania argued. Outside the windows, the trees were thick and dark. Log houses up steep inclines were pushed back from the road, which had no sidewalks. Children jumped on a trampoline in a front yard.

  “Maybe,” Micah said. “Or maybe they’ll catch you in this car. There’s no reason to fight. We don’t have to stay together. But I’m not going to be chased around this city. Take the V-6.”

  “Do you even know where this path goes?” Elania asked Austin.

  “We just did a small hike in it for a field trip ages ago, from here up to the Mountain extension and back. Keep going north and it skirts close to Salmon Park. There are offshoots that head deep west through the redwoods. One path somewhere leads to Charbot, some to nature preserves, and others out to state beaches.”

  She had forgotten about Brennan. Caravel is braced. We’re trying the Nature Path. Elania paused, and decided not to correct it to they’re. Checking the map, she typed out another text. Mountain will carry you all the way to Caravel, where it stops. Cross Caravel to a path called Gray King Extension. We’ll be there.

  In her head, she heard her father saying that they couldn’t let themselves imagine what might truly be coming, because it was too frightening. Was that why she wanted to stay in the car? It was a known quantity, a familiar presence. She needed time to make this decision, yet the V-6 was now climbing a driveway that flattened out into an empty parking lot.

  The news continued to mumble from her phone. “-Port of Los Angeles is now under the control of Prime, who threaten to disrupt the distribution of everything from furniture to clothing to auto parts if their demands-”

  “I’m staying,” Elania blurted. She could not go forward until she had thought more about
this decision.

  “That’s fine.” Micah pulled into the spot closest to a dirt path labeled GRAY KING. A bleached-out map was behind a glass cover under the sign. “If this path is braced, we’re going to be right back, so give us a few minutes, will you? Move the car behind those trees and no one will see it.”

  “Pop the back, Micah,” Austin said. The others got out, Zaley giving Elania a quick hug first.

  The phone burbled in the tight grip of her hand. “-pipelines have been destroyed in Montana, spilling countless barrels of oil into the Yellowstone River-”

  Corbin tried to return the Super Robo-Man water bottle, but Elania shook her head. “You’ll need water. I have another one.”

  “Good luck,” Corbin said. Dry tear tracks were down his dirty cheeks.

  “I got into Pewter,” she blurted.

  He smiled. “Then get there. And make them keep on respecting you.”

  Elania climbed into the front seat and unrolled the window. Coming around from the back with a backpack over his shoulders, Austin pressed a kiss to her cheek and whispered, “Bye.”

  “Brennan will be joining you from the extension,” Elania said.

  “-Armed Forces have been overwhelmed in Ohio, Georgia, and Tennessee-”

  Micah replaced Austin at the window. “See you, Elania.”

  Don’t leave me, Elania begged internally as the four readied to go. The dog bounced all about and sniffed the trees along the edge of the parking lot, enjoying this new game. Zaley returned the keys with the bear spray.

  “-we are spinning out of control-”