either. As Max and Stewart went towards it, Stewart suddenly grabbed Max and stopped him.
“Max! Zombies!” Stewart said, point to just beyond the car.
Max looked at the car and then concentrated to bring his second sight up, “Oh no! Oh no! Bill!” He pulled his arm away from Stewart and ran towards the car.
“Max!” Stewart whispered loudly after him, “Stop! Think for a minute….”
But her call was in vain as Max ran forward to see if Bill was okay. Jogging up to the car Max saw two zombies standing about fifteen feet away from it. The first one was a man in overalls with a baseball style cap on his head, he had to tip the scales at three hundred pounds and boasted a full beard, one of his arms ended in a skeletal hand that twitched chaotically as he turned to face Max. The other zombie was a young girl, she looked like she was in better shape than the man, but her waist length hair was wet and matted down, as if she had been swimming. Her skin was a pale alabaster and her lips were visibly blue even in the dim light. She did not appear to be wounded in any way and Max, even while rushing in, knew what that meant.
“Kill him dad!” the girl screamed as she flung herself around the back of the car away from Max's rush. She must not have seen Stewart right away because when she did she tried to stop and her feet skidded out from under her on the parking lot gravel, dumping her on her posterior.
“Freeze kid!” Stewart said, “I can put a bullet into your brain from here, don't you doubt it.” Stewart was holding the shotgun and kept it trained on her while the other zombie shambled towards Max.
Max had his pistol out and was getting ready to fire when Stewart's voice stopped him, “Max, don't.” They had both agreed to stay as quiet as possible, in an attempt to go unnoticed by the authorities on this side of the river.
The zombie kept moving towards him at a slow and lumbering pace, Max backed away, moving towards Stewart, while he did so he cast his mind's eye out to see if anyone else was nearby. With a gasp of relief he finally noticed Bill's life force coming from inside the car, the man was laying down across the front seat, sleeping!
“Shhhh!” cautioned Stewart, then to the girl she said, “Stop the other zombie or we'll kill you both.”
“You'll kill us anyway!”
“No. Maybe. But we could do that now.”
“You don't want to make any noise! Stop dad!” the fat man ground to a halt, eying Max evilly from where he stood.
“Fuck, but you're a big boy.” said Max quietly looking at the guy.
“What do we do Max?”
“Me? You're the one who stopped me! What were you planning to do?”
“I don't know, I was just making it up as I went along!”
“Let us go!” pleaded the girl.
Stewart shook her head, “We can't do that honey. How many more would you kill?”
“Just enough to get my dad back. Then we would stop. I just want someone…I couldn't find my mom or brother, I just need someone.”
“Handcuff them to one of the light poles?” suggested Max.
“She is probably strong enough to break a set of cuffs. We know what they can do.”
“Well what the hell Stewart? Should we send them back across the river?” to the girl he said, “My buddy there, the one you were going to eat, he says the military is all over on this side of the river, how long do you think you could last here before they found you?” as if to punctuate his point a long stream of automatic gunfire rang out to the north of them.
The girl started crying, “I don't have anyone. I just want him back. I know…I know he will get smarter if he just….”
“Eats someone. Yeah, we know.” Stewart seemed to reach a decision then, a cold look came into her eyes, “Okay, get up, we'll send you back across the river.”
“Stewart? Are you sure?” asked Max, with some hesitation in his voice.
“You want me to take care of it or not? I've decided, you check on Bill. Honey get your dad over here and get in front of me, I will walk you back to our canoe, at least you won't have to swim across again.”
Max watched as Stewart marched the two in front of her, shotgun held at her shoulder and aimed at the girl. He shook his head, not believing what he was seeing, then approached the car. Bill was sound asleep in the driver's seat. Knocking on the window startled the man, who reached for his rifle before seeing it was Max.
“Sleeping?” Max asked as his friend rolled down the window, which also released a wonderful smell of cooked food.
“Well I figured you guys would be awhile, where is Jane?” A shotgun blast sounded from the boat ramp, followed by another shot a split second later. Max didn't answer his friend, but took off running for the ramp. Bill started the car and drove it down to the boat launch, where the headlights illuminated Stewart. Max had arrived before Bill had pulled the car around and was talking with Stewart. Bill saw two bodies down by the canoe, both of them looked dead, killed by shotgun blasts at short range.. He could hear Stewart talking to Max, her face was set in a firm, uncompromising line.
“It had to be done.”
“But you told them…you told her you wouldn't!”
“You wanted me to let them go?”
“No! I….fuck. It wasn't her fault she was like that.”
“I shot her first, she didn't even know what happened, her old man barely turned around to get his. I couldn't let them go and kill someone else Max. I did what had to be done. It could be me, but it just wasn't that hard of a decision. Hey, Bill! Cut the lights man, you're blinding us down here!”
Bill turned the headlights off, leaving the running lights on, he put the car into reverse and backed up until he could turn sideways to drive out of the park. Max and Stewart came up and she stood by the driver's door expectantly. Through the open window Bill said, “Let me drive, I know where we are going.”
“Okay, pop the back door so Max can get in. I am at least riding shotgun.” Stewart pulled a couple of shells out of her pocket and reloaded her gun.
After getting into the car Max and Stewart were quiet, the silence was starting to grow when Bill finally asked, “Do I want to know what that was about?”
“No.” Max and Stewart answered together.
“Oh-kay then.” Bill drawled slowly, “So how was the crossing? You have any other trouble?”
“No, we made it okay, there was a lot of gunfire, but no one shot at us.” answered Max.
“You two okay?”
“Max is being a pansy, but yeah, I think we will be fine. You're okay aren't you Max?” asked Stewart.
Max let out a long sigh and said, “You know, yeah, I am okay. It is a new world out here, that means new rules. I guess I am not thinking clearly is all.”
“Probably buddy, you've run ragged all the way from Colorado I can see having a hard time adjusting to things, nothing to be worried about.”
“Yeah too much has happened too quickly. I will get there, don't you worry. Stewart?”
“Yeah?”
“I am okay, it just took me by surprise is all. I can see it. In fact, I wish I were as strong as you. Like I said, I will get there.”
“Good, I am glad you two buried the hatchet, we got a couple hours on the road to get to Osceola and fighting the whole way would be bad.”
“You think the kids will still be there?” asked Max
“Probably, I mean you gotta figure the train didn't just run past all those other towns on the way there, they probably stopped at every po-dunk station along the way to load up more people. We might even beat it to the station. Even if we don't we can find out where they took the kids.” said Bill.
'What about John? Did you find him?'
'No.' The curt reply was all Max needed to hear to make him drop the subject.
They settled down for the long drive, with Bill offering them some food he had picked up along the way. They wanted to decline, but then found out the smell in the car was from a bucket of fried chicken the military guys had given him after he made the river crossing. While they were eating he got them up to speed on what he
