Fountain of the Dead by Scott T. Goudsward Read Free Book Online Page B

something that had beaten into her as a child. In the foyer was a small table with an empty fruit bowl on it. The carpeted stairs leading upstairs were free of dirt and debris, nothing to cause a sneeze or to trip over. The living room had a sofa, love seat, and a rocking chair that faced the unused fireplace; any and all excess firewood was for the fire pit. The mantel was dusted and the framed photos that sat on it were perfectly straight. The curtains for the bay windows were pulled shut and the front door boarded over. An empty gun rack hung on the wall near the door.
    The laptop was on the coffee table facing the empty spot on the wall where the TV should have been. Instead there was a barrister’s book case filled with photo albums and a few silver framed pictures. Meredith sat on the couch and powered up the laptop. The laptop and computer equipment were the only items, that weren’t major appliances, or basic necessities, allowed to run off the generators.
    Micah walked around the room. Despite all the times he’d been in the house, he looked at all the pictures again, and all the while his own photo album was inside the satchel. He never asked if the photographs were of Catherine’s family or the people who had been in the house before the meteors. Or even the generic pictures that came with the frames.
    “What are we doing?” Grace asked.
    “Hacking into Boston’s web to find a still functional search engine, to look up Mr. Pierce and his zombie cure,” Meredith answered.
    “How much time?” Grace cracked each knuckle one by one.
    “No more than five minutes. Last time they traced me in seven and wouldn’t trade us fuel or ammo for a month.” Grace typed methodically and fast when the laptop was turned over to her. It was an old machine with a cracked cover, but the only source for information outside the village gates. Meredith started a timer on her watch. Micah stood behind them and watched the progress over the back of the couch. When the signal was secure Grace opened the browser and waited for it to connect.
    “Four minutes.” Grace tapped her fingers against the table until the browser started moving. She typed waiting for screens to load, but she was typing too fast for the old computer.
    “Where’d you learn all this?” Meredith asked.
    “My parents were professors at MIT; they were always teaching this stuff before the storm. When the storm hit we were in a university computer lab. They taught me, just in case things ever returned normal.” Grace shrugged and resumed typing.
    “What’s normal?” Micah scrawled across his whiteboard.
    “What’s his name?” Grace asked.
    “Pierce.” Meredith answered.
    “First name? Grace typed some and pushed her dark hair from her eyes.
    “No clue.” Meredith tapped a finger against her head. “He said it--
    “Did he say where his grant came from?” Micah shook his head. He eased the curtain open a hair as a gunshot rang out. A fine sheen of sweat broke out on Grace’s forehead. The urgency was affecting her typing.
    “Three minutes.” Meredith said.
    “John,” Micah scribbled on his whiteboard. “His name is John.”
    Grace pounded her fists on the table upsetting a dish of small sculpted wooden fruit. “This is so slow, it’s agonizing.”
    Micah rushed around the table to fix the displaced bowl.
    “I’m in.” Her fingers danced across the keys and at the four minute mark, the connection went dead. Grace shook her head and fell back into the soft couch cushions. Micah walked around the couch and closed the laptop and sat on the couch next to the girls.
    “The signal was too weak, if we were closer I could have gotten more info, any info. “They killed the signal,” Grace said
     
    * * * * *
     
    “Grace, you have to be quick.” Marjorie Edmonds said. “Right now, we still have internet and electricity.” Marjorie looked across the empty lab. Her husband Lyle stood near the door, with a shotgun in one hand and aluminum