Free Zombies vs Polar Bears: Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse, Book 5 by E.E. Isherwood Page A

had
been successful in killing them all, it would have eliminated a
Snowball leader, a patriot gun-running captain, and a tight family
unit who had the inside track on the NIS.
    The implications were too terrible to share with Victoria.
    What are the implications? For real.
    He wasn't sure he believed it. Could it be real? Could zombies be
programmed to seek out specific targets and attack them?
    No, that's got to be something I read in the fiction section.
    He was on a roll thinking about his books, and the examples
within, but he couldn't remember ever reading about programmable
zombies. That was a relief, though he reluctantly admitted it still
didn't mean it was false.
    He only smiled at Victoria, hoping she wasn't a mind reader.
    2
    Lana returned to Liam and Victoria, providing the needed
distraction for Liam. He didn't want to put any more fear into the
girls than was necessary. Zombies were terrifying enough without
thinking they could sniff out specific enemies. Early in the
disaster, while on the train out of St. Louis, he imagined the
zombies were following them with a purpose, but they were also on an
obnoxiously loud train leaving the city in the dead of night. What
else were they going to follow? But the idea formed they could follow
him...and now this.
    “Hey guys. Cairo is still intact. I knew you'd be concerned
about Grandma. So am I. One of the radio operators said the town is
being deluged by zombies from the north, but they have strong
defenses in place.”
    “Liam and I walked on their levees and saw the huge ditch
they built. They had tanks and other weapons pointed in that
direction, too. They can handle them.”
    Liam wanted to point out the futility of defending any refuge in
the long run, but he was already thinking negative thoughts and
didn't want to compound them. He nodded to let his mom know he'd
heard.
    “But there are problems.” She took a seat against a
small tree across from them, then looked around. There were people
nearby, but not within quiet-voice range.
    “I heard Jason talking with his people. They gave him a
bunch of bad news. Something about that big convoy. About the Army
across the river. Boats. They were feeding it all too him. He walked
away with one of them, so I came over here to not be too nosy.”
She smiled.
    Liam wondered if she thought of his dad at times like this. He
would have been at home in a bank of shortwave radios sitting in a
random forest somewhere. Was this up her alley, too?
    “Mom, do you like this kind of stuff?”
    She looked surprised. “What? You mean smelling like sweat,
looking like I always just woke up, and crying eight hours of the
day?” She softened. “I'm sorry. What do you mean,
exactly.”
    “No, I just meant doing the stuff that dad liked to do.
Shoot guns. Run around in the woods. Collect ammo.” He thought
of his dad's secret stash of guns and ammo in their basement. Most of
it had been destroyed, he knew, though they each held the distinctive
AK-47 rifles which his dad had horded. They pulled extra 7.62x39 ammo
from Lucy's Football . “Or did you do it because you, um,
loved him.”
    “Oh Liam. I loved him because he did all that stuff.
He was too stoic to tell you how much he loved you in that note, but
he would have done anything to protect you and I. He did do something
to protect us. He got all those guns together, all those camping
supplies, all that gear. He was prepared for anything. It was only
bad luck that took it all away, and bad luck that took him away,
before he could properly tell you why he did everything he did.”
She paused. “He did it for you. So you would be prepared and
could survive the hard times— these hard times. It's why
we both did what we did.”
    She laughed.
    “Do I love spending my nights with ten thousand other
campers, cleaning weapons, and sneaking through forests? Not really.
But I'm here because this is how I can best show my love for you—and
for you Victoria.” Lana teared up a