He scurried away scarcely believing the turn of events. “I love you Lizzie, I will follow you until I find a way to fix whatever has happened here tonight.”
Prologue 2 - 
Eliza’s biting of her brother Tomas’ neck had profound effects on his physiology. It was not enough to ‘turn’ him into the monster she was to become but it nearly stopped his pineal gland in its tracks. Tomas would age but at a rate the giant sequoias in Northern California would envy. The link that Tomas shared with his family, not always willingly, intensified.
Over the years Tomas repeatedly sought ways to communicate with his sister, only to have every avenue closed to him. Eliza was stronger than him and would not allow the contact. But still he was aware of her presence and would follow her around the world hoping that one day she would once again sit with him and tell him bedtime stories. As for his clairvoyance? Who knows, maybe he does have ‘witches in his head.’
Prologue 3 -
I swear to God I had better be dead if this, my third journal turns up and I’m nowhere to be found. My first journal sits in my office at whatever remains of my homestead in Denver Colorado. I had no time to save that book as zombies flooded through my master bedroom wall. As it was I lost Bear, the Rottweiler who had saved my life. My second journal, I was to learn, was burned with all the clothes that I had been wearing when that asshole Durgan shot me with a crossbow. Seems I had bled like a stuck pig and they did not want to risk infection from the clothing so they peeled me out of it and tossed it into an incinerator. Most likely the journal would have been unreadable coated in that amount of congealed leakage anyway, but maybe I would have been able to salvage some of it. So my dear fellow survivor IF you find this journal, you will notice I am dead because this thing will be stapled to my forehead and I’m not moving!
CHAPTER ONE -
“Can you see anything?” Tracy said nervously as she looked out over the expanse of the dead.
Travis stood on top of the truck roof, looking over the same vista as his mother. His grandmother’s house stood almost a half-mile away. A citadel under siege, thousands of zombies enshrouded the house. His dad, BT and Jen had made a plan to lure their enemy in and destroy as many as possible, hopefully taking with them their presumed leader Eliza. Travis stood stock-still but rage and anxiety coursed through his body. His father, Michael Talbot, had not figured on this many of the living dead assembling. He was going to need all the help he could get to make it away from that house.
All he could do was stay here with his mother Tracy, his sister Nicole, his brother (who he was convinced was an agent of the enemy) Justin, Henry the wonder bulldog and Tommy, who Travis had no classification system for. Tommy played the part of a smiling simpleton, but that was becoming a cover that was increasingly difficult for him to pull off.
“Can you see anything yet?” Tracy asked for the fifth time.
“I can see that they’re going to need help.” Travis answered back.
Tracy looked up the truck at her son who at 16 was rapidly and forcibly becoming a man. Tracy had known the moment Mike had made this shitty plan what his true intentions were. He had never been a good card player, his emotions always bled through. When he had held her tight and kissed her tenderly as the rest of the family went to the storm shelter out in the south fields, she’d known his plan was a one-way trip. She should have left an hour ago, like Mike had told her to, but she’d known that crap about meeting down the road was just that, ‘bullshit’. Could she sit here not helping and on top of that watch her beloved die? She felt there had to be something she could do, she saw it in Travis’ eyes. He was like a snapping pit bull on a thin leash. He would rush into the fray in seconds if she did anything more than nod at him. His sense of duty to the rest of the family though was what was keeping him in check. Mike fearing that Travis would attempt this rescue had made it abundantly clear that if anything were to happen to him that it fell on Travis’ shoulders to keep the family safe. As much as it pained Travis, he would not join the fight.
“The house is on fire.” Travis said flatly.
The end game was in play. Tracy knew her window of opportunity to escape was rapidly closing. “Help me up.” she told Travis as she climbed into the bed of the truck and onto the roof.
Hundreds of zombies had entered that house and still the brunt of them remained outside. With the house burning, Mike’s chance at a viable defense no matter how feeble, was over. There was nowhere for Mike, BT and Jen to go. Tracy wept. The look of pain and anguish on Travis’ stoic face ripped her heart. Nicole was in the backseat of the truck sobbing quietly, she couldn’t watch. Justin slept the sleep of the drugged. Henry stood guard over his dreams. Tommy had witnessed the assemblage of the abomination and then left to sit in the minivan by himself. Even through the closed windows they could hear him periodically wail to the heavens.
“Mom I can help.” Travis said through clenched teeth.
She almost relented. She’d drive. He’d shoot. They could get there. If they didn’t? Could she watch her son die? “No, we’re leaving, we’ll go to the place your dad said we’d meet and we’ll wait for an hour like he said.”
Travis’ eyes blazed. She could see the hurt a thin level below the surface. “What happens after an hour?” He asked her straightly.
“We go on.” Tracy said resignedly.
Tracy and Travis turned as they heard the door to the minivan open and slide shut. Tommy’s face was puffed up from his excessive crying. “They’re out of the house now.” He said in a monotone voice.
“How…how could you possibly know?” Tracy asked. “You can’t see them from there.”
Tracy was still looking at Tommy. Travis knew better than to question his abilities and had swung his vision back to the farm house trying to verify the new information. “I see them! He shouted.
So did Tracy, she didn’t know how, they appeared as clearly as if they were being viewed through a good pair of binoculars. Three lost souls in a miasma of death. The house burned so brightly it was difficult to look in its direction. She saw the futility of hope. There was no escape. She had crossed the line. She had stayed long enough to witness Mike’s death. A large piece of her would go with him.
“Mom, let me go?” Travis nearly begged.
“For what Travis? So I can watch you die too!” She snapped.
Travis turned away. His gaze fell upon Tommy who was looking off to the east and away from the house. Travis followed his line of sight. On the fringes of his vision he thought he saw something. A trail of whipped up snow made him realize he was not witnessing an illusion. Hope crept dangerously close, but he forced it down, for all he knew this was zombie reinforcements, although he couldn’t see the point. They wouldn’t even be able to get into the fight before it was over.
The air ripped open as .50 caliber chain gunfire erupted. Zombies fell in sheets. Tracy turned to the din. Three vehicles raced into the coalescent horde of zombies, two military vehicles, one a fortified troop transport and the other a humvee with a white Ford pick-up in between.
“Brendon?” Tracy asked.
Tommy wept silently and nodded.
Three feet of fire spewed from the turret mounted guns on each military vehicle. Zombies couldn’t die fast enough as bodies were shredded, decapitated, de-limbed, disemboweled and de-lifed. The carnage was on a scale none of them had seen, even at Little Turtle’s final stand, and yet it wouldn’t be enough. The zombies didn’t turn to face this new threat. They still pressed forward and toward the doomed trio. The staccato burst of Mike’s AR had been replaced with the much tamer 9mm, she knew he was running low on ammo. Hope was on the verge of breaking through but was being held back actively by reality.
“Come on Mike, don’t die on me now!” Tracy screamed, barely able to hear herself over the ear splitting bursts of large caliber rounds.
“Come on Brendon!” Travis shouted.
Nicole came out of the truck. “Brendon? Did you say Brendon?”
Travis pointed, but his sister at all of 4’ 11”, who would have a hard time making height at an amusement
