“To the front door,” one of the men said.
When they arrived at the door, the other man opened it. Jon walked out onto a porch and down a few steps, and then the men faced him to the right and they kept walking. The sun shined into his eyes, and he couldn’t protect them from it with his hands behind his back. It shone bright, and it didn’t help that he hadn’t seen it in a couple of days. A tree finally blocked its rays, making it easier for him to see. He then saw where they were taking him.
A crowd made up of mostly white men had gathered at the center of the settlement. Their clothes didn’t all match, but most wore some form of dark or camouflage cargo pants and plain t-shirts. Jon thought that no one in the camp would miss the execution and that the several dozen standing outside likely made up its entire population. They stood in front of a wooden platform with a rope hanging from a plank going across the top of it. If not for the contemporary houses and the way the people were dressed, it would have looked like something out of a Western movie.
As they got closer, people in the crowd started to turn. Some tapped the person next to them and pointed at Jon.
The whole scene gave the camp more of a cult feel than anything. What had Judah done to these people to make them be this way? What sorts of promises had he made? What was his vision? Jon wouldn’t find out, but he feared for Hope’s Dawn more than ever now. He only hoped his sacrifice would be worth it.
As Jon inched ever closer to the platform where he would experience a public death, a chorus of boos festered in the crowd. Despite the disapproval, Jon kept his head up. His legs had gained some more strength, too, allowing him to walk with a more normal gait.
The anger in the people’s faces surprised Jon. Many bared their teeth. He saw flared nostrils and moist foreheads. There was so much hatred being directed toward him. The way these strangers looked at him was the same way he’d imagined himself staring down zombies as he'd plowed through them in the barren world. He hated them, yet didn’t know them. Was this really any different?
Members of the mob began to throw things at him. The two men leading Jon stepped away, not wanting to get pelted. The crowd cursed him as they hit him with rotted vegetables and all sorts of plastic things. Some even through mud.
A few people who had nothing to throw punched him on the arm or slapped him across the back as he passed. Jon felt the pain, but he gritted his teeth to push it aside. As he’d promised himself, he kept his head up.
As he approached the platform, Judah stepped up onto it from the back, and the crowd turned their attention to him, letting out a roar. He put his arms out to the side and then bowed like he was some sort of saint. To these people, he was. To Jon, he was nothing but a monster… and a worse one than any of the undead creatures walking the earth.
When Jon got to the steps of the platform, the two men who’d come and gotten him met him and helped him up the stairs. Though, what they did almost caused more harm than good, as they nearly made him trip and fall on the top stair. With his back turned to the crowd, Jon stood atop the platform as the cheers for Judah turned into more boos for him. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Judah looking at him and smiling. He looked over at him, and the leader gestured for him to join him where he stood.
The smile grew on Judah’s face as Jon lumbered over.
“Why the sad face?” Judah asked. “It’ll all be over soon.”
Jon didn’t acknowledge him. He simply stood under the noose and then turned to face the crowd. The two helpers came up onto the stage behind Jon, and one of them fashioned the rope around his neck. He felt no tug from it, knowing that would come soon enough when the door beneath his feet opened up.
Judah stepped out to the edge of the stage and put his hands up in a gesture meant to encourage the crowd to be quiet. He basked in the silence before opening his speech.
“Today, my friends, is a glorious day, for we will give justice to our fallen brethren. Those who died innocently at the hands of this monster who stands before you.”
The crowd booed again at the acknowledgment of Jon. But it took everything for Jon not to kick the bastard off of the stage. Those men Jon had killed hadn’t died innocently. The first had attacked Brooke and Terrence, and the others had been sneaking around Jon’s cabin. They’d deserved to die.
“But no longer will the dangers of the Savage threaten our community,” Judah continued. “No longer will he threaten our cause. Threaten our hopes of a better world for all of us. Today, we will put this animal down, and we will watch him draw his last breath as he hangs from this rope.”
The crowd roared as Judah faced Jon. He stopped to within a couple of feet of him as he glared at him and smiled. Looking down, he next reached into the pocket of the coat he wore and pulled out a rectangular piece of paper. Holding it between his index and middle fingers, he flipped it around.
Jon’s eyes went wide, and he swallowed as he stared at the picture of his family that had been in the chest at his cabin. His goal this entire time had been to show no emotion. No sense of anger or sadness. But seeing the photo broke him.
“You son of a bitch! You fucking bastard!”
“Oh,” Judah said, his smile growing. “So, you do have feelings. I was beginning to wonder. But that’s why I saved this trick for last. I hope you don’t mind. Besides, it will act as a gentle reminder of how you all died.”
Jon tried to swallow, but his throat was too dry. He narrowed his eyes and tilted his head.
You all?
“Ah, so I guess it’s true that you didn’t know. We do quite a good job of hiding our work most of the time. You thought it was the zombies that killed them, didn’t you?”
Jon’s eyes dropped to the ground. His legs nearly gave out from under him, and he felt the tug of the noose at his throat as he went limp.
Judah’s eyes went big, lighting up. “Yes…you did think that. Well, that wasn’t the idea. See, we were going to bring them back to camp with us when we found them wandering in the woods, alone. Your son would have grown into a strong young man. He would have been a lot of help around here. And your wife, she was a pretty one. It would have been nice to have her around. But you know, she had to be stubborn. She had to try to fight and resist us. We didn’t want to kill her, you understand that, Jon. But she gave us no other choice. And those zombies that were nearby…well, I’d hate to have seen what they did to their corpses.”
All this time, he’d been killing the undead in response to the deaths of Carrie and Spencer. But when he’d had the chance to take out those responsible, the man responsible, he’d simply handed himself over to him instead. An utter sickness came to Jon’s stomach, and he couldn’t hold back the tears in his eyes. Tears not of sadness, but of rage and anger.
“It makes me happy that I was able to break you before I watch you die,” Judah said, whispering at a level where only Jon could hear him. “Now, we’ll see if I can make you squeal just like your wife and your bitch son did.”
Jon jerked his head up, wishing he could find the spit in his mouth to launch it into Judah’s face. But there was nothing there.
“Even if you don’t, I’m sure I can make someone else you care about squeal. Maybe when we go back to Hope’s Dawn to finish the job we started.”
And there it was. Judah had been lying the entire time. Jon’s sacrifice would be for nothing. Brooke had called it, and Jon had had some sort of hope that the Vultures would hold to their word if Jon turned himself in. But it would all be for nothing.
“I swear to God,” Jon said, “you are going to die a horrific death, you fucking bastard.”
Jon moved his hands and tried to get himself out of the noose, but nothing happened. The two men then grabbed him, and Judah took a couple of steps back before Jon had the chance to even try to kick at him. Judah laughed while the crowd booed Jon’s attempts to harm him.
Jon continued to kick and curse, but then one of the men punched him in the small of the back and kicked him behind the kn
ee. He coughed from the punch and his leg buckled from the kick. He fell down and the rope caught him, pulling on his neck and choking him. The crowd cheered, and he remained there for around ten seconds before the men picked him back up. Judah then raised his hands.
“Silence,” he commanded, and the crowd went quiet. “We will commence with this public execution, and I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’d like to be able to hear if his neck snaps.”
The crowd cheered for only a few seconds before going quiet again.
Judah came back to Jon. He ran his hand through Jon’s hair and over his face, toying with him and sending a chill up Jon’s spine.
“I promise that I will take good care of your friends at Hope’s Dawn. I won’t make them suffer for too long.”
Jon had nothing to say as Judah stepped to the side. It would all have been futile at this point. So, Jon instead closed his eyes.
When he did, he found himself not only picturing Carrie and Spencer, who he knew he’d see soon, but also Brooke. He could see her smile, which had been the only thing to bring any sort of joy to him since his family’s passing. He lowered his head in shame, trying to fight off more tears in the moments before his death.
I’m sorry I’ve failed you, too.
He waited for the floor beneath him to disappear. To hear the sound of his neck snap. But the next thing to come was neither of those things.
It was an explosion.
35
Jon nearly fell from the surprise of the explosion, but managed to keep himself on his feet. The crowd had turned their attention from the gallows to the shed that was on fire to Jon’s left some thirty yards away. Only, there was no sign of the source of the explosion. Had something inside the shed simply caught fire?
Surprisingly, the Vultures remained calm. It was perhaps how Judah had trained them. The leader stood at the edge of the platform, looking out toward the burning shed. An eerie silence fell over the settlement as everyone waited to hear Judah’s command. All the while, Jon all but hung from the rope, ready for the floor to be thrown out from under him so he could meet his fate.
Judah had started to turn around, presumably to continue with the execution, when an engine roared in the distance. Everyone in the crowd turned around toward the front gate, following the sound.
Squinting, Jon watched as a box truck came barreling toward the camp. It failed to slow down, instead slamming through the gate and breaking it open. The metal fencing shot out on either side of the truck as it came speeding into the camp.
Jon’s eyes went back to the burning shed, and that’s when he saw a bottle flying through the sky. It crashed into a car sitting close to the burning shed. Fire lit up around the vehicle, and it exploded within seconds.
Molotov cocktails.
Panic finally set in when bullets were flung from the entrance of the camp and into the crowd. A few Vultures fell to the bullets. Many of them held weapons, and a firefight ensued.
Jon’s eyes went wide. He couldn’t free himself from the noose, and bullets continued to come through the air. Whoever was shooting likely didn’t give a shit about him, and he wondered if a bullet to the head might be better than hanging from the end of this rope anyway.
He looked around, seeing where the others had gone. Judah had disappeared, and the two men who had led him to the platform were nowhere in sight. Unless someone decided to jump up onto the platform and unleash the trap door beneath him, Jon was at least safe from hanging for the time being, but he still had the firefight to worry about, including the worry that one of the Vultures would turn their guns toward him for the pleasure of it.
Pulling at his bound hands and simultaneously moving his neck around, he tried to get out of either the restraints or the noose. Nothing worked.
“Come on!”
The Vultures had at least spread out and found cover, most having done so away from the platform, so the bullet storm in the air had at least subsided. But he still couldn’t work himself free, and remained exposed out in the open.
He heard the screams of people near the front of the camp and looked up, squinting his eyes again. For the first time, he could see the faces of some of the attackers.
“Son of a bitch.”
It was the people of Hope’s Dawn.
Jon saw several familiar people, including Terrence and Hugo. He searched for Brooke near him, but didn’t see her. He hoped this meant she had decided to stay home with Lucas instead of coming to fight, but Jon knew better than that. Women like Brooke didn’t ignore battles like this one.
He’d continued working to free his neck from the noose when he saw someone approach from his left. Jon turned, ready to kick at a Vulture, but instead saw a face he wouldn’t have expected to see at all.
Max, the guy who Jon had wanted to leave on the roof to die only days earlier, was running across the platform toward him. He held a pistol in his hand.
With bullets continuing to race through the sky, Jon didn’t feel it was time for a proper greeting.
“Get me the fuck out of here.”
His hands shaking, Max didn’t argue. He pulled a knife from his pocket and cut the plastic ties from Jon’s wrists. Jon felt relief as the restraints broke loose, but he had no time to enjoy it. He brought his hands up to his neck and rid himself of the noose. He briefly massaged his neck before the gunfire reminded him that he had to get down.
“Can you walk?” Max asked.
“Barely.”
“Come on,” Max said, putting his arm around Jon.
The kid led Jon to the stairs which he had used to get onto the platform. They moved as quickly as they could, Jon’s legs slowly gaining back strength. On the ground, they walked along the side of the platform, heading for the rear of it to take cover. Then, as they rounded the corner, a shot sounded and both men fell to the ground, screaming aloud.
Jon hit the ground face-first, but other than the impact of hitting the ground, he felt nothing else. But looking over, he saw things weren’t the same for Max.
Max had been shot in the back, and he lay on his stomach with blood pooling around him.
Looking back, Jon searched for where the shot had come from and saw a Vulture aiming a rifle at him. Jon’s eyes went wide, and he rolled behind the gallows, just avoiding the bullet which skirted the dirt instead.
Jon then looked at Max, who groaned in pain.
“Max, buddy, I know it hurts, but you have to stay still. They won’t waste a bullet on you if they think you’re already dead.”
But he couldn’t stop moving. While not doing it aggressively, Max squirmed. Jon hoped the Vulture would still choose not to waste a bullet on Max if he didn’t see him as a threat, but he couldn’t take the chance. He saw the gun lying near Max’s right hand, a good five feet or so from the back of the gallows. Taking in a few deep breaths, Jon exposed himself to the shooter while quickly grabbing the gun. The attacker got off one shot, but it skidded across the dirt, missing both Jon and Max. Not wanting to miss an opportunity, Jon raised the gun and aimed it at the man. He fired without hesitation, hitting the Vulture in the chest and sending him down to the ground.
Jon then turned his attention to Max, leaning over him and putting his hands on his shoulders.
“Stay with me,” Jon said. He went to rip off part of Max’s shirt to try and stop the bleeding, but stopped as Max’s hand grabbed onto his leg. He looked up at Jon with bloodshot eyes.
“I-I’m sorry I was such a pain in the ass.”
Jon could see now that there was no saving him. He took Max by the hand, being the only one there to offer him any comfort in his final moments.
“Don’t you say that,” Jon said. “You’re a fucking hero. You saved me up there.”
“Just… take care of them. Help Hope’s Dawn. Take care of Brooke.”
Nodding, Jon squeezed Max’s hand. “I will, brother.”
The grip on Jon’s hand let up, and he watched Max exhale one last time before his eyes stared
blankly off into the distance. He waited for a moment to assure he was gone, and then rolled his eyes closed.
Finding cover behind the gallows, Jon plotted his next move. The pistol wasn’t going to take him far in taking down any number of the Vultures, but in his mind, there was only one he had to take down. Looking ahead, he saw the large house at the back edge of the camp. He knew that was where Judah would have retreated to.
Standing, Jon kept his eyes on the house. And with a clearer view, he saw two people running toward it. He squinted his eyes to see a man alongside a woman in a blue plaid shirt and with a blonde ponytail. He could tell from the way she moved who it was.
Brooke.
And she was heading into Judah’s house.
36
Jon ran.
He fought against the pain in his legs and in his body and fucking ran.
Chaos reigned around him, but Jon ignored it. He knew Judah was in that house, and watching Brooke enter it had made his heart drop. Nothing else mattered but getting to her.
He almost didn’t notice the Vulture jump out from his right. The man came screaming toward him with an ax reared back, and he swung it at Jon’s head. Jon ducked at the last moment, ignoring the blow and sending the man into a spin. Aiming the pistol, Jon put a bullet into the back of the guy’s head as he spun once more and then hit the concrete face-first. It had happened so fast that it was almost as if it hadn’t happened at all. Jon only cared about getting to the house.
Jon had gotten to within fifteen yards of the front porch steps when Bill, the man who had initially captured Jon at the front gate, came out from behind a tree, aiming a shotgun at Jon. Jon raised the pistol.
Dead South Series (Book 1): Dead South Page 13
