Dead South Series (Book 1): Dead South

by Bohannon, Zach

  He nodded. “Okay.”

  Brooke’s face turned bright, and a smile grew on her face. “Really?”

  Jon smiled. “Really.”

  She threw her arms around him, embracing him. Jon’s hands landed on her bare back, where the tank top didn’t cover. He ran his hand around there, feeling a woman’s soft skin for the first time in a long time. When they pulled apart, her hands naturally landed on Jon’s face. She traced the scar on his left cheek that he had gotten in an encounter with a zombie and stared into his brown eyes. Then she leaned in and kissed him.

  Their lips touched, and Jon allowed it to happen. Brooke ran her hand down his cheek and to his neck, sliding her nails across it. Jon left his right hand on her back, but put his left hand on her neck, sliding it down and under the strap of her tank top and squeezing her bare shoulder. She moaned and kissed him harder, slipping her tongue into his mouth.

  She pushed against him, and as he had his eyes closed, he didn’t feel like he was kissing Brooke. All he could see was Carrie. He let go of Brooke and pulled away from her.

  Gasping in surprise, Brooke stared at him, but he managed to avoid her gaze. She then covered her mouth.

  “Oh my God, I’m so sorry.”

  “No, no,” Jon said, looking up. “It’s not you.” He sighed and rubbed his forehead. “I just don’t know if I’m ready for this.”

  “I’m so sorry. I feel so stupid.”

  “Don’t, please.”

  “I’ll see you tomorrow,” Brooke said.

  She cupped the back of her head and turned around, exiting the tent. Jon tried to stop her, but it was no use.

  Jon sat back down in the chair, putting his head back into his hands. He ran his hands through his hair and exhaled as he stared at nothing.

  “What the fuck are you doing, Jon?”

  30

  Jon didn’t sleep. He stayed in his tent, alternating between lying on his bedroll and sitting in the chair until he couldn’t any longer. He didn’t feel a bit tired, having too much adrenaline rushing through his veins.

  His mind had been racing ever since Brooke had come to visit him. But he knew what he had to do to keep her and the others safe.

  Standing from the chair, Jon looked down at his possessions on the ground. He wouldn’t be taking them with him, and would leave most of his stuff in his bag. His guns lay on his bedroll out in the open so they would be easily found. He covered them up enough to where, if a child happened to walk in, they likely wouldn’t notice them. But whatever adult came to check on him, who he assumed would probably be Brooke, would be able to spot them easily.

  Turning his attention to the corner behind the chair, Jon put his eyes on his baseball bat. He reached over the chair and picked it up. Grasping the handle with both hands, he took a couple of practice swings before running the fingertips of his right hand up the shaft. Bloodstains decorated the wood like pockmarks. Along with his bike, the bat had been his most trusted ally ever since Carrie and Spencer had left him. But he knew now that it would be of little use to him. He kneeled down and lay the bat at the end of the line of guns. He gave it one last stroke, then patted it.

  “See ya, friend.”

  Standing back up, Jon exhaled and stepped out of the tent.

  The sun appeared to be at least another hour or so from coming up, though it was difficult to know for sure. Time passed by in a weird way when your mind wouldn’t slow down, usually going at a slower pace for Jon. All he hoped was that most of the people in the camp, specifically Brooke, weren’t awake and would have no idea what he was doing.

  As he stood outside the tent, Jon scanned the camp. It was pitch dark, all but for a couple of lanterns lit near the front gate. He moved carefully toward the camp entrance, making as little noise as possible in case anyone loitered outside.

  He spotted his bike sitting under a carport to his right. He would get it, but he needed to take care of the guard at the gate first.

  A man who Jon had only briefly seen around the camp stood at the gate. Jon guessed he was in his late 20s. The man was a little bit shorter than Jon, though around the same weight.

  The guard stood at the broken gate with his back facing the camp. He’d been instructed to alert the camp of any intruders by ringing a bell that had been fashioned for such warnings. Jon crept up on him, moving across the dirt carefully so as not to get his attention. He moved so quietly that he could hear the man breathe as he arrived behind him. But his boots crunching the dirt finally caught his attention.

  “Huh?”

  Before the guard could turn around, Jon wrapped his arms around his neck. Using his right hand, he covered the man’s mouth so he couldn’t scream.

  “Where’s the Vultures’ camp?” Jon asked. “I’m going to take my hand off your mouth so you can answer me. Do not scream.”

  Once Jon removed his hand, the guard breathed heavily.

  “I-I’ve only been up there once. But if I remember right, you just take the highway up to Duncan Road. Drive down a little ways, and you’ll eventually come to the camp. Trust me, you can’t miss it. Why? What are you doing?”

  “That’s not important. What is important is that you pretend like you never saw me. Don’t go run and tell the others that I left. It’s for their own good, and yours. You got that?”

  Breathing heavily, the kid said, “Yes.”

  Jon then let him go, and the guard stood up straight. He massaged his neck, finding oxygen with deep breaths.

  Jon hurried over to the carport, still trying to be somewhat quiet but less careful than he’d been before. He grabbed the handles of the bike and rolled it over to the gate. He looked into the guard’s eyes as the kid continued to rub his neck.

  “Do the right thing,” Jon said. “Keep guard here, and don’t say anything.”

  Then he continued out of the camp.

  Jon waited until he was about a hundred yards from Hope’s Dawn before getting on the bike. He took one last look back at the camp encased in darkness before starting the bike. The engine roared to life and he sped away, kicking dirt up behind him as Hope’s Dawn became nothing but a memory fading in the distance.

  Jon basked in the silence of the barren dusk, the sun only now starting to come up. The wind hit his face as he turned onto Duncan Road, and all he heard was the sound of his bike. The ride to the Vultures’ camp wasn’t a long one, but for Jon, it felt like he was riding across the entire state of Tennessee.

  Somehow, he found a way to be in the moment. To enjoy the peace all around him. No zombies lumbered near the road, either, allowing him to pretend for these moments that they didn’t exist at all. He didn’t think about Hope’s Dawn or Brooke. He simply lived in the moment.

  That sensation faded when he spotted the gate of the camp ahead of him.

  Keeping the same speed, Jon continued toward the camp. A ten-foot-high gate guarded the settlement with barbed-wire stretching across the top of it. Posted outside were wooden signs with warnings like “Keep Out” and “We Will Fucking Shoot You” written in red paint.

  Jon came within ten yards of the gate and stopped the bike. A balding man wearing camouflage pants and a gray t-shirt stood on the other side with a shotgun pointing through the chain-link fence.

  “Don’t you fucking move!”

  It wasn’t as if it mattered if the man shot him at this point. He’d be dead anyway. The guard would regret it more once Judah found out who he had shot, pissed that he hadn’t kept Jon alive. Jon calmly put his hands in the air.

  “I’m here to see Judah,” Jon said.

  The guard scoffed. “No one sees Judah, you fucking prick.”

  “Yeah, well, something tells me that he’ll want to see me.”

  The man on the other side of the gate tilted his head. He smiled, one of his top front teeth missing.

  “You’re the Savage.”

  Jon said nothing, remaining on his bike with his hands still in the air. The guard laughed.

  “Holy shi
t! Ah man, Judah is going to be so happy to see you!”

  The guard turned around and yelled to some others in the camp. Two other men approached the gate and the guard explained who Jon was. They all smiled as they opened the gate and approached the bike, the guard’s shotgun still aimed at Jon’s forehead.

  “You better not try a goddamn thing, or I swear to fuck that I’ll blow your brains out.”

  “I’m not gonna do shit,” Jon said. “Let’s just get this over with.”

  The two other men went behind Jon, yanking his hands down and binding them together with a zip-tie. They then pulled him up, making him stand and nearly knocking his bike over in the process.

  The toothless guard lowered the shotgun and moved into Jon’s personal space. He smiled, emitting a deathly odor into the air from his breath. It didn’t faze Jon.

  “Let’s go show the boss who we’ve got, boys.”

  31

  Jon kept his head high as the three men led him through the camp. He didn’t want any of these assholes thinking he was scared. Several of the bastards had come outside of their homes and work sheds to watch him march through their settlement, his hands bound behind his back. He didn’t look any of them in the face, keeping his eyes forward, but he could feel all of them staring at him.

  The camp was similar to the one at Hope’s Dawn. The Vultures had founded it around a cluster of houses along with sheds and garages they’d built from scrap. The most significant difference was the house at the top of the hill.

  A plantation home sat at the top of a short hill at the end of the camp. It wasn’t as big as others Jon had seen, but still had the large white columns in the front. A concrete path curved up the hill to the door of the house.

  They were heading up that hill toward the house now. Jon knew only one person in the camp who could live in that house.

  The three men leading him didn’t say much, but none of them could wipe the smiles off of their faces.

  “You have no idea how happy he is going to be to see you,” the guard said.

  Jon said nothing. He wouldn’t play these games. He simply kept the stoic expression on his face, showing no emotion one way or the other.

  When they got up to the house, they found a guard holding a rifle standing at the door. He raised his eyebrows as the group approached.

  “What the hell are you doing here, Bill?”

  Bill gestured to Jon. “Can’t you see I’ve brought someone to see him, Carl?”

  Carl looked up. “And can’t you see it’s barely dawn. Judah’ll have our heads if we wake him right now.”

  “I don’t think so,” Bill said, smiling. “Not for this one, he won’t.”

  Carl narrowed his eyes and studied Jon. Something suddenly clicked, and his eyes went wide.

  “It’s him, isn’t it?”

  Bill laughed and nodded.

  A smile grew on Carl’s face, and he opened the door to the house. “What are we waiting on, then?”

  The men behind Jon pushed him, nearly sending him face-first down onto the wooden steps that led up to the porch. But he managed to keep both his balance and his composure. Climbing up the steps, Jon entered the house. It was too dark inside to see. The men held onto him and led him down a corridor and then to the right into a living room. One of the men opened the windows, though not much light came in with the sun still not fully risen. But then he lit a few candles spread across the room, bringing some illumination.

  “I’ll go get him,” Carl said before heading to a nearby staircase.

  Jon could barely see him move, but he heard the creak of the old steps as he climbed upward. All he could hear was the man walking through the home and the breathing of the men around him, bringing an eerie feeling to the darkness. He remained calm, controlling his breaths and showing no emotion. If these were going to be his last moments alive, he wasn’t going out with these bastards thinking they had any power over him.

  Waiting felt like it took days. Jon wanted to get this over with. To come face to face with the man who had burned his cabin down and terrorized the innocent people at Hope’s Dawn and to learn what his own fate would be. His palms sweated, and his internal temperature seemed to rise in anticipation.

  Then he heard the door squeak shut upstairs and the sounds of footsteps moving over the floor and then down the stairs. It was more than one person coming down. Jon focused on the direction of the stairs, the sun starting to rise and slowly bring more light into the house. He saw the silhouette of two men walking down. The man in the front, presumably Carl, stood next to a wall once he reached the bottom of the stairs. The other man crept into the living room, his face remaining in the darkness for several moments.

  When he came into the light, Jon saw his face for the first time.

  Judah laid his piercing green eyes on Jon. He wore a white ribbed tank top tucked into a pair of black cargo pants and had black combat boots on his feet. His bald head shimmered in the candlelight, and a smile grew above his goatee. He said nothing as he came closer to Jon. Jon didn’t let his eyes off of the man. Judah stepped in front of Jon, moving to within a couple of feet of him. He clasped his hands behind his back and stared.

  “Good to see you again, friend,” Judah said. He spoke without any kind of Southern accent, surprising Jon.

  Jon wanted to scoff at the notion of this bastard calling him a friend, but he held off.

  “I see the fine people of Hope’s Dawn did the right thing.” Judah looked at Bill. “Did he come alone?”

  “Yes, sir. Just him and his bike. We’ve already had someone pull the bike into the camp.”

  “And no weapons?”

  “None, sir.”

  Judah looked at Jon. “You obey quite well. I anticipated more out of you, given how extensive your resume is.”

  Jon continued to bathe in his own silence. Judah laughed.

  “I guess I should have expected you to be the quiet type. That’s fine. You’ll talk eventually, one way or the other.” Judah turned his back to Jon, taking a couple of steps away before unclasping his hands and putting his right index finger up. Then he turned back around to face him. “I must say, though, your work is impressive. We’ve seen you from afar out in the fields, mutilating those zombies. So brutally. With no remorse. Tell me, does that feel good for you?”

  “Not as good as it felt to kill your men,” Jon said without hesitation.

  “You son of a bitch,” Bill said, lunging toward Jon with his fist up.

  “Stop!”

  The command had come from Judah, and Bill stopped in his tracks. Judah went to Bill and grabbed him by the wrist.

  “Get the fuck out of here, now,” Judah told him through gritted teeth.

  Bill looked like he’d seen a ghost as Judah threw his arm out of the way. He said nothing, but exited the house at Judah’s command. Judah then turned his attention to Jon again, his mouth turning back up into a sly grin.

  “It is quite impressive what you were able to do to my men,” Judah said. “We’ve managed to navigate this world mostly unscathed. A few deaths from the infected, but no more than that. Of course, that’s quite a lot easier when you’re at the top of the food chain. When you have control over others.”

  “That make you feel better about yourself?”

  Judah put his arms out. “Of course, it does. Look around you… oh, that’s right. We haven’t been formally introduced. Your name?”

  Jon stared at him, saying nothing.

  “Right, of course, you won’t give that up. Well, the name Savage will do for now. Look around you, Savage. You think it doesn’t make me feel better about living here? That I have a whole community of folks a few miles away who go out and do most of the work to keep our community surviving?” Judah marched toward Jon, stopping only a foot from his face. “You’re goddamn right, it makes me feel better about myself. Gets me more aroused than any woman could think of.” He poked Jon in the chest, leaving his finger there. “You made a grave mistake killin
g my men.”

  “As did you by burning down my cabin.”

  Judah laughed. He then leaned in next to Jon’s ear. “What I did to that piece of shit cabin is nothing compared to the kind of misery I’m going to put you through.”

  Jon gritted his teeth and slammed his head into Judah’s nose, head-butting the Vultures’ leader as his only way of mounting any sort of offensive. He heard the crunch of a breaking nose moments before being taken down to the ground by the two men behind him.

  Without his arms to brace his fall, Jon hit the rug below him face-first. He only had a moment to lick the inside of his mouth to make sure the teeth were still there before kicks pounded his ribs. Jon gritted his teeth, absorbing the pain. He’d braced for this moment.

  “Get him up on his fucking feet!” Judah barked.

  The two men picked Jon up under his arms and yanked him up. His ribs screamed at him, but he fought to ignore the pain. The men held him still, and one of them even grabbed onto a wad of Jon’s hair for leverage. Looking across at Judah brought a smile to Jon’s face, though. Blood covered his broken nose, and the Vulture leader no longer wore his own smile.

  Judah came forward and wrapped his hand around Jon’s throat, squeezing and choking him. He stared into Jon’s eyes with a sort of dead rage that Jon had only seen in the faces of the undead.

  “You are going to fucking regret what you did, Savage,” Judah said, spitting blood between his words.

  He then stood back, reared his fist, and knocked Jon out cold with a single punch.

  32

  The steel-toed boot hit his ribs again, but Jon had almost grown accustomed to the pain. As soon as it made contact, he spit more blood onto the ground.

  “Get the fuck up,” the man kicking him said.

  Jon gasped for air. He wasn’t sure exactly how long he’d been held captive, but it had been at least a day and a half by his estimation. Cuts and bruises covered his face, as well as both the front and back of his entire torso. His legs were weak, and his arms ached constantly. Even so, he managed to push himself up into a table-top position, only for his tormentor to kick him in the ribs again. Jon fell back down to his stomach as the man laughed. He squatted next to Jon.