Zombies Ever After: Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse, Book 6 by E.E. Isherwood Page A

onto the front stoop, he had to make his choice.
    It wasn't a hard decision. He ran across the street.
    It was the only scenario that didn't directly involve mindless
drones.
    Liam waved his arms in a regular pattern as he fled into the
street. His shotgun was in one hand, but he didn't point it at the
defenders. The hope was the humans over there would see him and, most
importantly, not shoot him as a zombie.
    “Help,” he shouted as he ran.
    The gunfire background noise of the city was ebbing low at the
moment, giving him a chance to be heard. The street was several lanes
wide.
    Much to his surprise, the defenders didn't welcome him. Gunfire
came in his direction.
    “I'm not a threat,” he shouted. But he also turned,
and got very low. Now he was running down the middle of the street,
in full view of the defenders and the drones.
    Smooth move, Liam.
    He looked back to the house. Two drones had come over the top of
the house and were in pursuit. The tank drone was probably still
inside, though he imagined it storming out of the front part of the
house like some kind of mechanical Kool-Aid Man.
    Ahead, he saw an incongruity in the pavement. A chance at escape.
Already running, he ran as fast as his feet could carry him.
    When he reached the sewer lid, he slid down and got to work
lifting the circular piece of iron. As any number of books and movies
would attest, all he had to do was lift it and start his climb down.
There was no way the drones could follow, nor could they remove the
lid if he shut it behind him.
    But, he was betrayed by TV. The lid was heavier than he imagined,
but it also didn't have any hand holds for him to grab. Instead, it
had a series of small holes. He would need a big hook to lift it.
    Torn between running some more and struggling to get a couple more
fingers in so he could keep trying—he never even budged it—he
felt the blast of air currents from a drone. It was the black one.
The white one was nearby but seemed to be satisfied to stand off from
the action.
    Liam put up his hands, then stood. If he couldn't sneak down the
drain, and he couldn't make it to the living people in the blockade,
he wasn't going take a bullet while lying down. The drone didn't seem
vulnerable to a shotgun blast, which was just as well since he left
the gun lying on the ground. A part of him hoped whoever was
controlling the drone would see him surrender, and not order it to
kill him. The gun on the bottom was only five feet away, pointed at
his neck.
    Right where I got hit with the tag from the other drone.
    While he marveled at the ruthless efficiency of whoever was
controlling the drones, he didn't immediately hear the nearby
gunfire. Only when bullets started to snap off the outer shell of the
drone did the threat present itself.
    He ducked back to the ground.
    The drone rotated, so it faced the park defenders back at the
intersection. They were only a hundred yards away. A bullet whizzed
by—missing both him and the drone. Danger was everywhere.
    In his haste he forgot to grab the box of ammo for the shotgun, so
he only had the two shells he'd loaded earlier. Unsure if he was
doing the right thing, but unwilling to do nothing, he picked up the
shotgun.
    More pings hit the drone; it returned fire with a few quick shots.
    Liam did the only thing he could think of that might help. He
aimed for the drone.
    The white helicopter shot one of its tagging arrows at him as if
to defend its black mate. It hit him in the meat of his shoulder and
hurt much more than the last one.
    Now angry and scared, he focused on putting the two rounds in the
most vulnerable part of the floating menace next to him. He couldn't
identify a definitive weak spot in the workings, so he just aimed for
what he figured was the backside.
    He pulled the first trigger and felt the powerful recoil. The
target erupted in a flurry of sparks.
    When he pulled the second trigger, he was a little bit off target,
but it tore into the upper mantle of the