Since The Sirens Box Set | Books 1-7

by Isherwood, E. E.

  Now standing, Liam could clearly see the man's face and the look of fear there.

  Eventually Bart seemed to relax.

  Then he seemed to fall asleep.

  Several minutes went by before the colonel spoke up. “It seems to be the common disease process when injected like this. First the patient falls quiet, and the transformation begins. It is very much like when a person is bitten, but not quite as fast, or violent. You are going to see it momentarily.”

  But time went by and nothing happened.

  Minutes. Then fifteen.

  The staff became more antsy the longer the experiment went down this unexpected path. The doctor was still standing near the CT equipment, studying a small panel on its side. Other equipment with heartbeat and vitals were pinging along, telling everyone the man was not yet dead.

  “Is he fighting it?” The colonel said it with incredulity.

  “Sir, we don't know. This telemetry data is all out of sync. I need more time to tell you what I'm looking at.”

  The colonel moved closer to the action, leaving Liam standing in front of the observation chairs. It did occur to him he was witnessing, nay, participating, in the first act of the last chapter of the camp itself.

  This is where we all get infected.

  But his curiosity would not be sated so easily, even against such fears.

  “I don't believe it!”

  Everyone stopped at the exclamation from the doctor. She was standing at her station, but pointing to the patient. She moved around the scanner so she could look at Bart's face. She needed the visual confirmation before she would add, “He's awake.”

  No one was moving but the colonel. He moved to the near side of table, where he could see Bart's face too. Now Liam moved closer, if only so he could observe the whole spectacle. He was standing toward Bart's feet, but could still get a serviceable look at the man's face. And his eyes.

  “Hello, sir. Can you hear me? Do you know what's happening?”

  “Janey? I hear you.”

  “Sir. Do you know where you are?”

  “I hear you better now. What is this place?”

  “Sir, you are in the Elk Meadow Research Facility. You are here as a volunteer. You are helping us with our research.”

  “It really is beautiful here. It's so good to see you again.”

  “Um, it's good to see you too, sir. How do you feel? Are you in pain?”

  Bart was now looking straight up, not at anyone inside the room, but up into the scanner shroud around his head. He kept talking. “Am I dead? I don't feel dead. This seems so real.”

  “No, sir, you aren't dead. We see your vitals and you're doing just fine. Can you tell us if you're in any pain?”

  “You know I'm not a praying man, but I think this calls for a prayer. Janey has been found! And who's that? Clara my ahn-gyel! How are you still alive? Where are we?” He looked around as if he was seeing more than the metal contraption above him. And then began a prayer, first in English, but as he went along it digressed into gibberish, or maybe a foreign language.

  For several minutes, Bart talked in fits and starts.

  While the room was focused on the man on the table, Liam sat back in a rickety metal chair. He conducted a drill involving his cell phone and his fast hands. While the phone was in his pocket he was able to swipe through the lock screen. When he felt safe no one was looking, he turned away from Bart and his observers and whipped out his phone, found the recording feature, started to record, noted the Wi-Fi signal indicator once again, and then dropped it back in his pocket.

  He knew it was dangerous, but something unusual was happening here, and he wasn't going to let the opportunity go to waste. If he got out of here, someone might be able to decipher this nonsense.

  He stayed in his chair for ten minutes, wondering the whole time if he had a guilty look on his face. No one bothered him as Bart rambled on and on.

  Until Bart called for Liam.

  In crystal clear English.

  Then, all eyes were on him.

  3

  Liam looked up with genuine surprise. He pointed to himself as if to say “Did he say me?”

  Everyone nodded in unison. The colonel punctuated it by beckoning him to come to the table.

  They all huddled around Bart as Liam closed ranks. He was looking at Liam from under the device. “Hello, Liam. Thank you for the kind words back in the truck. Give my regards to Marty.”

  Liam was struggling to find an appropriate answer.

  From his left side, the colonel was nudging him. The unsaid words were, “Keep him talking.”

  What do you ask a man with dementia, infected with zombie blood, who is under observation from a government agency of indeterminate nature? People always love talking about themselves. “Did you find Janey? How's she doing?”

  “I found Janey here in Heaven. Yes. She looks marvelous. I'll be joining her soon. Her husband is here, too. He and Janey were by my side every day until the world ended. And my angel, Clara, too.”

  Was dementia creeping back into his words?

  “Mr. Bart, do you know where you are right now?”

  “I'm under observation at the Elk Meadow Research Facility. I am a volunteer. I am helping with research.”

  If Liam didn't know better, that was snark from the old guy.

  Now Bart was talking in a hushed voice. “But I've learned something in this place, inside your machine. Something they didn't want me to find out. A secret.”

  His next words were a whisper. Everyone leaned in to hear. “They can read my mind, but I can read theirs too. Clara, my little angel, showed me the truth about what they did to her.”

  Bart began looking left and right in the chamber as if he was seeing something and reacting. “Damn you! You've given me no choice. Let me tell them the truth.”

  He was yelling, causing everyone at the operating table to jump back in surprise. But then he resumed speaking very softly, inviting everyone to get closer once more to listen. “They killed Clara because there can only be three. I want you to know that much. They've threatened to do much worse to me. I have to do what they want. God forgive me. Forgive me, my Clara. For what comes next, I can only say...I'm sorry.”

  Everyone had leaned in to listen to the wisp of a man. The medical team was on one side, and Liam and the colonel were on the other—Bart's left. The colonel remained closest to Bart's head, determined to not miss anything spoken between Bart and Liam.

  While everyone was focused on the words coming out of his mouth, Bart had somehow worked his left arm out of its restraint. He didn't even have to be quick about his next deed. He grabbed a very surprised colonel and, with uncanny strength, was able to pull him the last foot or so to his face. In doing so, the colonel's head slammed into the CT device. Bart sunk his teeth into the side of his face.

  Liam sputtered backward, as did the medical team.

  Almost before their eyes Bart's vitals spiked and then flatlined. He was dead.

  Liam took a few more steps back. To their credit, the medical team rebounded from their initial horror and were back in action. One was securing the hand of Bart and was working on reattaching it to the operating table while the other two attended to their leader.

  Liam kept moving back. One small step at a time.

  This is it. I'm living THAT moment when it all goes to Hell.

  His mind was exploring the breadth and depth of the collapse of mankind. Did it all start in some government lab just like this? An experiment gone wrong spawns the undead to march on their nefarious journey? Or was the original virus released intentionally and methodically by a malicious purveyor of death? A cult? A secret organization? A foreign government? Terrorists? The colonel swore he knew nothing about its origin, but maybe it was above his pay grade?

  The colonel regained his feet, hand covering the bloody marks on the side of his face. Any other day, it would be an unremarkable wound needing minor treatment, but here, in this context, it meant
he was already a dead man. He looked over the scene from end-to-end. The anxious staffers. The dead patient. Liam moving slowly backward. He spoke to Liam first.

  “Dammit, kid. Maybe I should have tossed you into the corral after all. Huh?” He gave a weak laugh. “I've got to take care of one thing. I think you know what it is.”

  He stood up to his full height and saluted his staff. “Good luck and godspeed, everyone.” He pulled out his gun. Liam expected him to kill himself right on the spot, but instead he aimed the gun at Bart and put a round through the man's head. He took off through the backdoor of the tent's main room.

  Liam was paralyzed with fear.

  He heard several gun shots.

  An air raid siren began to wail.

  Liam put two and two together and remembered the jets above. But they couldn't get here that quickly, could they?

  “Are we about to be bombed?”

  He said it to the remaining staff members, who shared his sense of uncertainty at the moment. The doctor answered.

  “Protocol dictates when a base is compromised, it will be terminated by the Air Force. But that siren is just the alarm for the camp to evacuate. The colonel must be giving us a chance to get out while we can. He's the only one outside this room who knows the plague is here. In fact, we probably could have contained it if we had killed him immediately.”

  Liam didn't like the look in her eye. Was she somehow blaming him? No sense waiting around. Liam spun around and ran out of the tent.

  And into chaos once more.

  4

  It had literally been ninety seconds since the sirens cranked up in the camp. Already, all the Humvees were speeding away, toward the front gate of the park. Only the MRAP was lagging behind because of its size and weight. The doctor and medical staff from the tent he just left had mounted a Humvee and were on their way out.

  Standing there marveling at the speed everything had happened, Liam figured the camp staff must have already had one foot in their vehicles the whole time. There was no other explanation for how fast they evacuated. He had no doubt Hayes was in the lead.

  He ran hard to Grandma's tent. The air raid siren spun down as he closed the distance.

  When he arrived, all the survivors were sitting up and alert, including the one he wanted. “Grandma! You won't believe my story, but we have to get out of here. The Air Force is going to bomb this place out of existence.”

  “That didn't take long.”

  Liam wasn't surprised these people had been left behind. Not after he saw how they were treated and where they were all destined to end up. But he did begin to fret about getting everyone safely out. He couldn't very well take off with Grandma and say “best wishes” to everyone else.

  While he was in the midst of thinking through his options, he saw the colonel walking his way. When they saw each other, he motioned for Liam to come to him. There was no point in refusing.

  “Hello, sir.”

  “Listen, son, I don't have much time. I've seen this plague take root more times than I want to remember.”

  He gave Liam a photograph. It was folded and torn, as if it had come from a broken picture frame. “This is my wife and son. I know you'll probably never meet them, but if this ship ever rights itself and you get to Denver, please tell them my last words were my love for them. I wrote their address on the back. This photo is my most prized possession in life, Liam. Guard it well and get it to them if you can.”

  The photo showed two people on a mountaintop. The wife was pretty, with wind-blown red hair down to her shoulders. Seeing the son, he understood why the colonel had been treating him as a human being. The boy standing in the photo looked to be about Liam's age. He even had the same shaggy haircut common in his generation.

  “I'm actually honored, sir.”

  “The other thing I want to give you is your pistol and pocket knife back. I'd give you mine too, but I just emptied the mag firing in the air. Spurring my people to get the hell out of here. We all have to be armed in today's—,” a pause while he searched his lexicon, “society.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I still can't trust you completely, but you're the closest thing I have left to a confidant. Everyone else has run off.” He tried to laugh, but it was more of a sad cough. “First things first. I showed you two kinds of zombies in the back forty. There is a facility in downtown St. Louis housing dozens of different types of zombies. They bring them in from other cities. I was there. I know what this infection eventually does to a person. It's why I've worked to the bitter end to find a cure. You might find someone with answers there. Secondly, I—”

  He contorted in a fit of pain.

  “—I ensured all the data from our work here was uploaded to our central servers so other doctors can see what happened. We have some big ass data connections, so I have no doubt it will make it out before any unpleasantness from the sky. What you saw today was an incredible deviation from every other infected patient. It was his age. I know it. That man was 106! Your grandmother is a precious resource. The data will confirm it. You—”

  More contortions.

  “—Oh shit, I'm in trouble.”

  He stumbled to one knee. Straining to resist, or at least give the appearance of resistance. Maybe the old soldier just wanted a heroic exit.

  “Keep your grandma alive. Help us find the connection between age and the virus. Help us find the cure. Get her to another camp. Humanity depends—”

  He dropped his other knee, and screamed.

  “God forgive me!”

  Then, almost in a whimper, “I won't end up like...”

  “I love you, Susan.”

  Unceremoniously, he pulled out his sidearm, looked at Liam with real sadness, and put a round into his own head.

  He had saved at least one bullet for himself.

  The colonel turned out to be a decent guy, at least by the standards of the apocalypse. Liam would have enjoyed giving him a witty rejoinder that he would never in a million years take Grandma to another facility like this one, but he didn't feel the need to dump on the man's last words. However, he did glean one significant piece of information potentially useful in reuniting his own family.

  Big ass data connections.

  5

  He ran back to Grandma and her friends. He wished he knew how long he had. The colonel seemed satisfied there was enough time for the data to upload, so maybe they had some leeway.

  “Grandma, you and the others have to start walking out of here! I'll be right back!” He didn't even wait for a response. He felt he had to move as fast as possible to get what he wanted to do, done.

  He ran to the other big canvas tent, the mirror image of the one where Bart died. He wasn't surprised to see it was a duplicate on the inside too, probably so they could run two tests at the same time. He flew out of that tent and started exploring the remaining smaller tents. What he needed had to be in one of them.

  The fear was creeping up on him, but he forced it back down. He made himself take a few deep breaths and think. That's how he saw the data cables. Those wires would inevitably end up in the tent with the connections to the outside.

  It was a tent very near the colonel's. It made sense he'd want to be near the expensive equipment. Liam ran in and was rewarded with a blast of cold air. They spared no effort to keep the servers and other equipment properly cooled, even inside a leaky canvas tent.

  He whipped out his phone, and tried to acquire a signal. Even though there were a dozen wireless access points, he was unable to find any that didn't require a password to let him link up. He was not a tech guy per se; most of his knowledge had to do with keying in passwords, not how the internet was built or functioned. His dad was the tech guy, and even he had to write his password—

  That's it!

  He ran out of the tent and popped directly into the colonel's. He went to the bank of computers off to the side. Even though they were off, he was able to locate the wireless router for this tent. It was
still blinking happily. He flipped it over and was rewarded with a hand-written note, providing the password to access this device.

  “1 2 3 4 5”

  “Hey, I use that on my luggage!” Liam shouted the joke from an old movie his dad loved to watch.

  It was the combination a leader would use who didn't want to be bothered with the minutia of ever having to remember a complex password to access his own network.

  Not as security-minded as you thought, herr colonel.

  In a few seconds, he had entered the pass code and found a connection. He scrolled into his chat history and found a discussion between himself, mom, dad, and a few other family members. He didn't want to engage in a lengthy conversation, but it was the easiest way of blanketing as many people as possible with a short message.

  ***This is Liam. At Lone Elk Park at a gov camp. Just broke free. Beware Hayes. Heading for home. Have grandma. 7d since sirens.***

  He entered the time in case there were delays. He hit send and was thankful to see the message went out the door, figuratively speaking. He waited a few moments for a reply, wondering if anyone happened to be looking at their phones. Were the networks even working? A couple minutes of nervous pacing and he decided he could wait no longer. He had spent maybe five minutes running around the camp looking for the data connections, and it felt like an eternity. If a message went out to the Air Force when the alarm first sounded, how long before they were here? He felt the crush of urgency.

  No answer came through. But no “network not found” messages either. He opened his email and banged out the same message. He only sent to mom as she had an easy-to-remember email address. He hit send and was pleased again to see it go out.

  That's when the first bombs exploded. He nearly dropped his precious phone out of fright.

  He hung his head out of the tent, afraid he would see his own death falling from above, but the big explosions were coming from inside the woods. A good ways into the woods. They were blowing up the corral and destroying evidence of the grave. Had to mean the camp itself was next.

  Run!

  Liam made it to Grandma's tent in time to find many—but not all—the residents standing around out front. There were actually three other tents in the compound used for test subjects, so the total number of elderly was quite a bit more than he imagined.