Deadrise (Book 3): Savage Blood Read online

  Savage Blood:

  Deadrise III

  Siara Brandt

  Copyright © 2015 by Siara Brandt

  SAVAGE BLOOD: DEADRISE III

  ISBN-13: 978-1519590206

  ISBN-10: 1519590202

  First Edition. All rights reserved. Except for use in

  any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work

  in whole or in part in any form is forbidden without

  the written permission of the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents

  are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used

  fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead,

  business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Printed in USA

  OTHER BOOKS BY SIARA BRANDT

  A Restless Wind

  Dark of Peace

  Kadar’s Quest: The Legend of Iamar

  Blood Scourge: Project Deadrise

  Blood Storm: Deadrise II

  Stealing Cady

  Tales from the Waterlily Pond

  Tangled Vines

  The Ashes and the Roses

  The Belly Dancer and the Border Agent

  The Meadow and the Millpond

  The Patriot Remnant: Return to Freedom

  The Shadow’s Fall

  The Waterlily Pond

  For Shanna, who has no fear when tackling the Technology Beast,

  and who understands that sometimes the dead really are alive.

  Chapter 1

  “Maybe you’ve heard about this one. If you spend any time on the internet at all, chances are that you’ve come across something. And if you have, I’m guessing that you have as many unanswered questions as we do.”

  There was a slight pause in the broadcast as the man sitting behind the desk compressed his lips into a thin line and frowned down at the papers before him.

  “In-less-than-a-week’s-time,” he went on, stressing each word for emphasis. “There has been a rash of over nine hundred unexplained deaths across at least forty-two states. That’s almost a thousand lives suddenly and mysteriously cut short, folks. That’s more than twenty deaths per state.” There was another pause. “As widespread as this is, that is a big deal. It’s something you should be paying attention to if you’re not already. We certainly are.

  “While we sympathize with the victims and their families, there is something very disturbing about these deaths. There are reports that the dead, in many cases, had to be put down like rabid dogs - those are not our words - because they had become aggressive and uncontrollable and had exhibited bizarre, cannibalistic behavior. Some people have even gone so far as to describe these unfortunate souls as unstoppable, flesh-eating monsters. And, here is what is even more alarming. There are reports that the dead aren’t staying dead, even after they’ve been shot multiple times. What seem to be credible witnesses say that they are getting up and coming back to life after they appear to be dead. Yes, you heard me right. After they seem to be lifeless, they are getting up and walking around again. As in re-animated corpse. As in – I really hate to use this word - zombie.”

  Here the narrator fell silent again. His frown reappeared. Then he said in a deeper, more deliberate voice, “No, I’m not telling you about the plot of some book or horror movie that has just come out, although that’s exactly what it sounds like. At least to any sane, rational person it sounds like fiction.”

  He shook his head slowly at his own report as if even he had a hard time believing the words that were written there. “While we have done our best to try and get at the truth, we’re being continuously sidetracked. We’ve been told that the reports are exaggerated. Or that they are outright hoaxes. And the powers-that-be absolutely don’t want us to use the word zombie. They’ve gone so far as to threaten us if we do. I guess they are worried about a mass panic if the truth does come out. But you deserve the truth, no matter how bad it might be.

  “It’s also true that our society seems to have become obsessed with the very concept of zombies in recent years and we have made every effort to avoid using the term. But over nine hundred mysterious deaths? In less than a week? With the dead appearing to be resurrected again and again in state after state? And it’s not just here. France, Germany and Japan, among at least a dozen other countries around the world, are reporting similar attacks. Coincidence? I don’t buy that for a second. You shouldn’t, either.

  “We admit we have mostly rumors to go on. But the reason they are rumors is that no one can get any reliable information out of the authorities. Did you hear anything about this on your local news channel? I didn’t. No one - I mean no one - is reporting on this story. Not the way it needs to be reported. For some reason, all you hear from the mainstream channels are crickets. Which means the mainstream media is letting us down. Again. And this time, there may be dire consequences as a result of their silence. You can’t protect yourself, and your family, if you don’t know the facts.

  “Even more troubling, it seems that our government has gotten itself involved in some kind of cover-up. The Feds, though no one knows what branch or what division exactly, are showing up in HazMat suits where these incidents are taking place and then they do what they do best. They try to hush everything up. I can tell you with certainty that this is not a hoax. I can tell you that something very alarming is going on. No matter what they try to tell us. I’ve seen some of the actual video footage myself. I’ve heard directly from people who have been present at some of these attacks. People that I know are credible sources.

  “The official statement, vague as it is, is that zombies don’t exist. And both the US government and the CDC claim that they know of no virus or condition that would reanimate the dead and that a zombie pathogen absolutely does not exist. What they are admitting is that the deaths, although we are beginning to believe that they may be grossly underestimating the numbers, are occurring in what they are calling clusters. Which means there are a number of deaths concentrated in specific areas. There are several possible explanations for that. And none of them are good.

  “It’s pretty clear that what we’re seeing is some kind of new epidemic, but the cause is anybody’s guess. At least no one will admit to knowing the cause. The CDC assures us that we have nothing to be concerned about. That may be true, but do you trust the government to tell you the truth, the whole truth and nothing but?

  “You probably also didn’t hear about the sudden outbreak of a mysterious illness in a number of public schools and colleges across the country, which also apparently called for immediate, secretive HazMat investigations. Yet the government is assuring us that none of these cases are related.

  “What they don’t seem to realize is that you can’t hide something like this forever. Not in this modern age of technology. What are the possibilities being churned out on social media? Anything from a new super virus to a terrorist attack to tainted food and water to contaminated drugs coming in from Mexico. And let’s not forget the most popular conspiracy theory out there. Government testing gone awry.

  “If you think that zombies are just the stuff of a bad science fiction movie, you’d be wrong. It’s hard to believe, by any stretch of the imagination, that governments would actually fund and conduct reanimation experiments. But there’s unrefuted, documented proof that the Russians did it way back in the 1940’s. The Nazis not only delved into the occult with their sick experiments on human beings. They also jumped on the bandwagon and tried bringing the dead back to life. So did the Chinese. And the US? If you’re under the impression that we’re any better, guess again. We conducted our own brand of twisted
, top-secret research for decades. And lest we forget, in the 1950’s the CIA ran the notorious MKULTRA Program with some of those same Nazi scientists it invited over from Germany. The tests then were nothing short of maniacal. Just think what our state of the art labs could come up with in this age of technology. You think governments worldwide wouldn’t want to get their hands on something like this?

  “Sinister science? You bet. Evil unleashed by the hands of unscrupulous, unprincipled men on an unsuspecting populace? Undeniably possible, and, at least in the past, unquestionable. We don’t know what is happening out there today, but isn’t it possible that there is something going on that they don’t want us to know about? For a world that embraces violence, terror and so-called Days of Rage with more and more frequency, what can we expect to happen? Should any of us be surprised if we reap a whirlwind of chaos from the seeds we’ve sown? And shouldn’t we expect that eventually that chaos would grow beyond our ability to control it?

  “It’s just something to think about and a story we’ll keep an eye on because, as always, we’re looking out for you. Good night, folks. This is Ben Glock, and that’s your smoking gun for today.”

  “Are you listening to that idiot again?”

  As the screen door squeaked open, Aili Landis stiffened but she didn’t turn around. She went on staring out the kitchen window as she finished drying her hands on a dish towel. “I didn’t know you were already home,” she said as she hung the towel back up and turned in time to see her husband glance at the clock on the wall. He slid his gaze back to her.

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” Mead Landis asked, irritation roughening his voice. “It’s past five o’clock.” He continued to stare at her through narrowed eyes as if he was probing for a weak spot. Then he asked in his usual belligerent tone, “What? You didn’t want me to come home?”

  Aili suppressed a sigh and braced herself inwardly for what she knew was about to come. A confrontational mood was nothing new for Mead, even if he had just walked in the door. “I didn’t say that,” she replied evenly enough though she had to make an effort to keep the hostility out of her own voice. “I didn’t know it was so late.” She wasn’t going to be drawn into this. It was what he wanted.

  Mead watched her a few moments longer, then made a scoffing snort and shook his head dismissively. “Why do you waste your time listening to that garbage?” he asked, jerking his head in the direction of the TV.

  “I like hearing someone talk to me,” Aili said, already knowing that the explanation was a waste of her breath. If there was an idiot around here, it wasn’t Ben Glock. There was one standing right in front of her.

  “He’s not talking to you,” Mead informed her as if she wasn’t bright enough to figure that out for herself. “He’s talking to millions of other gullible idiots.”

  In the distance, a long, low peal of thunder rumbled like a caged beast. A storm was building. A bad one by the look of the clouds just beginning to rise over the trees.

  “He can’t see you,” Mead went on. “He can’t hear you. He doesn’t even know you exist.”

  The way you try to pretend that I don’t exist, Aili added silently to herself as she set the table.

  “I would think you’d have better things to do with your time,” Mead said as he walked over to the kitchen table. “Did you get to the bank today?” Without waiting for an answer, he picked up the remote and aimed it at the TV. “Because if you didn’t . . . ”

  Aili turned back to the stove and did her best to block Mead out. As always, his tone had set up an immediate wall between them. It was Friday and weekends were always draining for her, both physically and emotionally. She had learned a long time ago that it was best to get dinner over with as quickly as possible.

  “I don’t know why you waste your time listening to the news at all,” Mead said without looking at her. “You can’t change a damned thing that’s going on in the world,” he went on as he scrolled through the channels. “Let me guess. Dinner’s going to be late again.”

  “It’ll be a little late.”

  He let out an impatient sigh. “Why doesn’t that surprise me? What are we having?” he asked as he waited for the weather screen to appear.

  “Chicken.”

  She heard another sigh. A deeper, more-prolonged one. “I hope it’s not going to be dry this time,” he grumbled to himself as he directed his scowl at the TV. “I suppose I’ll have to eat it. I’m starved since I had to skip lunch.”

  While Mead waited for the local weather to come on, he patted his shirt pocket, pulled out a cigarette and slipped it between his lips. He was still frowning as he pulled a lighter from his pants pocket, lit it and held the flame to the end of the cigarette.

  After a few deep puffs, he dragged the cigarette from his mouth and swore irritably. “What the hell is wrong now? Aren’t we paying for a cable station that actually works?”

  “It’s probably the storm,” Aili said automatically. Experience had taught her that Mead’s bad mood was only going to get worse as the night wore on, and there wasn’t a thing she could do about it.

  Not having any success with the weather station, he flipped through the channels until he came to a local station. The news was on.

  “Violence escalating in the Middle East as attacks continue . . . possibly related to the recent Days of Rage . . . ”

  Mead didn’t have any interest in watching the news so he started flipping through channels again while Aili put her efforts into finishing dinner as quickly as she could. Thus distracted, they settled into the only mode where they were not fighting. Complete and utter silence.

  “What the hell is going on?” Aili heard. “A damned news report on this channel, too?”

  She turned to look at the TV herself, saw the word ALERT in big red letters moving across the bottom of the screen and knew that another breaking story wasn’t a good sign it. It was time to worry if the local stations were covering this. Nationally, there had been breaking stories all afternoon and increasing reports of violence everywhere. Whatever was happening, it was apparently getting worse. And it was getting closer. In addition to the TV and Ben Glock’s show, she had checked out the internet herself. She had seen videos of actual attacks and officials in Hazmat suits in different parts of the country.

  Glaring at the TV as if he could intimidate it in that way, Mead shook his head and muttered something under his breath as he went on listening.

  “ . . . the killers show no normal signs of rational thought processes. Experts are saying it may be some kind of dementia or brain infection. Some sort of encephalitic seizures or catatonic schizophrenia have been suggested although the source is as yet unknown. An incident at a government building in Virginia today has authorities . . . ”

  Aili glanced over at Mead, but he didn’t look back at her, nor did he acknowledge her growing concern. Whatever thoughts he may have had he kept to himself.

  “Over in St. Louis, violent demonstrations have broken out over the shooting of several unarmed suspects in a series of brutal assaults. And in Illinois, there is unrest in the streets of Chicago as police gun down an unarmed man who may or may not have been a homeless man. Eyewitnesses say the man appeared to be on drugs, but many are expressing their outrage over the police taking such aggressive measures against the general public. People there, as well as in other states, are already uneasy about racially-motivated incidents. No comment as yet from authorities there, but police are being understandably cautious, fearing that another incident is going to spark a full-blown riot. And in several cities across the country where sporadic episodes of violence have broken out, curfews are being been set up for tonight.”

  “There are plenty of people looking for an excuse to riot and to loot,” Mead mumbled cynically to himself before he took another long drag on his cigarette. A thick stream of smoke unfurled in front of his face before it vanished upward. “As soon as it gets dark, watch ‘em come out.”

  “These reports have been on T
V all day,” Aili told him. “What will we do if it comes here?”

  “If what comes here?”

  She indicated the TV screen with an exasperated wave of her hand. Why did Mead have to pretend that he didn’t know what she was talking about? “That. Whatever it is,” she said.

  “That is just the news trying to scare people. That’s how they get their ratings up. They exaggerate things and play on people’s fears.”

  Aili turned towards the open window. She could hear the faint whine of a siren in the distance. That certainly was no exaggeration. “What if- ” she began.

  But Mead cut her off abruptly. “What if nothing. I told you before. You shouldn’t be listening to this bullshit.”

  “Shouldn’t we be able to talk about this?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” he growled, his patience wearing thinner than it already was. “I’ve had to deal with problems all day long. Just get dinner on the table. And get me a beer.”

  Of course she hadn’t expected Mead to reassure her. She hadn’t expected him to calm her fears or even discuss those fears with her. He opened his beer, immediately drank half of it down, and then, lowering the can, suddenly changed the subject. “Let me guess. Elan isn’t here. He’s taken off like he always does on the weekends. And I’ll just bet he didn’t finish those chores that I gave him. I’ve told you before, that kid wouldn’t be so lazy if you didn’t constantly baby him. He’ll never grow up and live in the real world.”

  Aili clenched her jaw. That kid was her son. She suddenly knew she needed to put some space between her and Mead. Before she got drawn into an argument with him and said things she would regret. Before she told him how she really felt about him. Because at this point, the less Mead knew, the better. And because she was afraid that once she got started she wouldn’t be able to stop. So, before he could think of another disagreeable thing to say to her, she crossed the kitchen, pushed open the screen door and went outside.