Casey had called them home, and it was his duty as war chief to get them there. The raids were over for now, they had let the survivors know who they were. They had raped and killed and plundered. They had taken new recruits and feasted on the flesh of the fallen, building their fires where the survivors could see and smell. They had the fortified towns quaking in fear, and the outlaw outposts knew not to give them any crap. The Raiders ruled. The Raiders did whatever they pleased.
There had been a few places that were too well-fortified for his crew to take. Not many, most he’d scouted out they could overrun without any problems. The family farmsteads, or the tiny outposts with fifteen or twenty people thinking they could make it on their own. Most of them he’d just shot up a little, let them know there was a new sheriff in town. Some he’d sent packing, seeking the protection of the big settlements with the big walls. Casey had a plan and it was working beautifully. All they had to do now was take over Lakota and stop those do-gooders from setting up their version of the New United States. Casey said Lakota had gotten strong over the winter, had even sent a hit team down to Mexico to take him out. They’d failed, of course, and now it was time to strike back. Time to set up shop in the biggest and best city. Time to run this country as they saw fit.
He’d been there in the woods that day they got punked by those two clowns, Gunny and Griz. They’d walked right in among all of them and threw down an ultimatum. Pounder didn’t blame Casey, he’d been between a rock and a hard place, with the townies and their machine guns to the front and about a million zombies running up their ass to the rear. They didn’t have a choice but to help kill off all the hajis. But now, he grinned his wicked, sharp-fanged grin, now they were going to put it to rights. Now they had built up their army and would have all the comforts of the old world. Electric lights, cold beer, running water. He was looking forward to it.
He kicked at an old Mountain Dew can and liquid spewed out, fizzing into the dirt.
Pounder froze.
That can had just been dropped, it was still half full of soda. He was the only one within thirty feet, one of his men hadn’t done it. He looked closer then, saw the boot prints, the tire tracks and, by god, right there, the paw prints of a big dog.
The Road Angel.
That sumbitch was here. He looked around sharply, suddenly feeling like he was under crosshairs. He’d been hearing all the bullshit stories about the kid for months. Some white knight of the road. Except he knew the tales weren’t bullshit, not all of them, anyway. He’d lost a lot of men up here, a lot of his lady slaves, too, as he called them. Just yesterday he’d sent a scout into Blackfoot to get one of his crews when they didn’t answer the radio. He came back with a story of an ugly kid with a bad scar and mean ass dog. He’d killed half the men in a bar, and the other half at the garage. A punk ass kid and his mangy mutt against sixteen men. And now he was here in this tiny little wide spot on the road. He was still here, they would have seen him leaving, seen the dust cloud. He was hiding somewhere.
He called for his second and Smiling Jack trotted over, thumped his fist against his chest.
“You need something, Pounder?” he asked.
“Send a couple of trucks out to block the road in both directions,” he said. “And a few on that little road to the north. We’ve got us a hideaway here in town. We’re gonna play a game of cat and mouse.”
Smiling Jack peeled his lips away in an ugly imitation of a smile, his sharpened teeth showing brown and stained.
“Be quick,” Pounder snapped. “I think it’s that Road Angel punk, so tell them to look alive or they’ll wind up dead.”
Pounder stayed on his bike, scanned the windows, felt the hairs on his neck prickle. Probably his imagination; just jumped up jitters for no reason. That little brat was most likely hiding in a basement or attic somewhere. He got lucky in Blackfoot. Hell, he probably had a bunch of townspeople help him ambush his men. That had to be it, he assured himself. No bratty ass kid was that good, or that lucky.
Jessie knew as soon as the fat biker kicked the Mountain Dew can, he’d been made. He watched the guy look around carefully, then call his man over. A few seconds later, the fang-faced man was yelling for trucks to set up roadblocks. He had to figure something out fast, time was ticking and their noose was tightening. The little burg lay in a flat prairie, it really was just a wide spot at the junction of two county roads. He could drive through the fields, but there was no cover. They’d send a few thousand rounds into him before he got out of range. The old Merc was tough, but he was pretty sure it wouldn’t take that many bullets and keep on truckin’. He could hide but they’d discover his car, kill his dog, and burn the town if they couldn’t find him. They had enough men to do a grid search anyway, they’d flush him no matter how well he hid. The only option was to run, get out before they had a chance to get their roadblocks set up.
He pulled his eye away from the reticle, started to scoot backward out of his hide, and noticed a flash of black leather splashed with red in the trailer. He brought the scope back up and zoomed, pulling her in close. It was the girl with the emerald eyes, although she was barely recognizable. His breath caught when he moved the reticle over her and saw the damage they had done. Her hair was matted with blood and her face had been kicked in, lips smashed, eyes blackened, nose shattered. She was sitting, leaning against the bars, eyes swollen shut, and a woman was crouched beside her. It looked like she was adjusting a bandage, so at least she was still alive. There were slashes and tears in her leather and it was worn to shreds in places. Bad road rash, she’d gone down hard, and at high speed, slid for a long way on asphalt. That wasn’t where most of the damage came from, though. Jessie recognized a brutal stomping when he saw it. Somehow these guys had knocked her off the bike, then put the boots to her. Shot or stabbed her more than once, judging from all the blood on her leathers. She had given him valuable intel, Wire Bender had been ecstatic when he passed on the radio frequency, said it was critical, might even save the town if they had prior warning of what Casey was up to. Jessie owed her.
He flipped off the safety, moved his sights, and pulled the trigger.
Pounder’s head exploded, spraying the man furiously cranking the handle of the fuel pump. Jessie shifted left, caught another in the chest and moved his sights again, not watching him scream, clutch his chest, and crumple. He snapped off two more rounds before the Fat Boy tumbled over with Pounder’s lifeless body starting to cook on the hot pipes. Jessie wasn’t trying for headshots. No need. A bullet in the brisket would put a man out of commission and kill him slowly. These clowns hadn’t been expecting trouble, they were used to dishing it out, not taking it. None of them were wearing armor, all of them wore grisly trophies telling the world what badasses they were. How tough they were. Scalps and bones didn’t stop bullets. Jessie sent round after round into them as they fled for their trucks, cans of beer and bottles of whiskey tossed in their flight.
Bullets started flying his way from near the end of the convoy, but they were shooting blind, raking the houses and trees with automatic fire from AKs and ARs. He crawled out a little farther so he could see them, scoped a man with a mohawk, and sent a round into his shoulder. He saw another man duck down in the seat and put two through the door, heard a satisfying scream of pain. More gunfire came in, they had figured out where he was. The windows of the dodge shattered and the car rocked with the impacts. Jessie backed out fast, rolled into the yard, and belly crawled past the edge of the house, using the bushes as cover. They were coming for him now, he heard engines fire up and the squeal of rubber on asphalt as they tore across the parking lot.
Jessie sprinted across Hickman Street, diving behind a tree as the bullets ricocheted off the road and spanged the metal of rusting cars. He flipped the selector to full auto, swung out in a crouch, and emptied the rest of the magazine into the windshield of the truck as it bounced across the field behind the gas station. It swerved and plowed into the car he’d just been hiding unde
r, but men in the back were jumping out, laying down heavy fire. The bullets weren’t even close, they were shooting and running at the same time, but they were coming in from all angles now. He heard a truck skid around the corner at the other end of town, some five blocks away, and he ran for the cover of a low-slung metal building. He hit the door hard with his armored shoulder and it burst open against a screaming band of the undead. They’d all been frantic in their efforts to get out, to get to the noises and the fresh meat. They went flying backward and Jessie was stopped in his headlong flight for safety. He quickly reversed and darted back out, feeling his jacket pull as a lucky round caught it from the men running and gunning, filling the air with lead. The undead were on their feet in seconds, well preserved from the elements, and ran for the noises. For the fresh blood.
Jessie sprinted across the street toward the old post office, a solid brick building that would give him some cover. He didn’t even try to save the empty magazine, he tossed it as he ran and slapped a fresh one home. He heard the roars of the undead and the shouts of the men behind him, hoped it would buy him enough time to get to his car. Two motorcycles zoomed up to him and he barely dove at the last second, their machetes cutting air instead of flesh. As they shot by, Jessie rolled off the road, sprang to his feet and sprinted behind the post office. Another truck opened up, the man jerking the trigger as fast as he could, ripping the bricks and sending fragments flying. Jessie spun and dropped low, holding the trigger, answering in lead. He aimed for the man hanging from the window and trying to fill him full of holes. Lead met the thin body panel and punched right through, shattering the glass, slicing through the inner panel and finding a home in the man’s groin. The gun fell from his hands as he grabbed for his crotch, everything else in his world forgotten. Jessie saw the dirt and grass kicking up around him, more bikers joining the first two, firing their pistols over the handlebars. He rolled, felt the impact of one or two lucky bullets as they hit the Kevlar. He aimed the M-4 in their general direction, spayed and prayed, ran in a crouch across the little park toward his car. Gunfire was all around him, from the trucks, the bikes, and the men running. Most of it wasn’t directed at him, he still heard the scream of the zombies on the attack.
Good, he thought. If I could free up a bunch more, I might have a chance.
There was a narrow, bush-filled greenway between the credit union and the hardware store and Jessie dove in it, hoping against hope they didn’t see him, hoping he could get a little breather. His back and ribs hurt like the dickens, and he was having a hard time getting his breath. He’d been hit with .45 slugs, from the sound of the guns. All he knew is, whatever it was, it packed a hell of a wallop. He only had a few seconds. They’d find him quick. There weren’t any windows or doors on the side of the hardware store, but it was a metal building. He pulled his sturdiest knife, the Ka-Bar, and plunged it into the metal, sawing frantically. The gunshots were all concentrated near the post office, they were concentrating on the zombies, the more immediate threat. He heard the bikes roar by, then a few more trucks. They would figure it out shortly, they would know he was still on the same block, hadn’t crossed the road.
He peeled the tin back, kicked through the insulation, shoved over a shelf of plumbing supplies and wriggled in, still trying to catch his breath. He pulled the metal back in place and lay still, willing the hurt away. The new entrance should pass a quick glance down the alley but when they didn’t find him right off the bat, they’d get serious in their search. They’d know where he was.
He wondered how many he’d killed so far. Fifteen? Maybe a few more, probably a few less. He heard a volley of shots, then he didn’t hear the zombies anymore. Trucks roared down the road, tires skidded, voices shouted, motorcycles went up and down the dirt alley behind the store.
One more block and I would have made it, he thought.
He heard them now, his ears attuned now that the gunshots had stopped. Men in clinking bone necklaces, rattling chains on their jackets, heavy stomping boots. This building was useless to make a stand in, it was tin. Hell, he’d got into it with a knife, they’d turn it to swiss cheese once they saw his entry point. He was surrounded, he heard them all around the store.
Good, he thought. I won’t have to go looking for them.
He smiled to himself at the old soldier’s joke. If he was going to die, he wouldn’t make it easy for them. They were going to have to work hard to put him down. He got up slowly, making an effort not to groan at the throbbing pain in his back and side.
A cadence they sang during his months of training over the winter popped into his head. Stay low, move fast. Shoot first, die last. One shot, one kill. No luck, pure skill.
He put in a fresh mag, then eased over to the back door right about the time one of them was throwing his foot into it, breaking it down. Jessie sent him flying, a pair of bullets hitting him in the bottom of the foot, running up the leg bones and exiting through his rump. Jessie leapt out of the door, firing on full auto, spraying the men bunched around. They dove for cover and fired on instinct, their bullets slamming into each other and missing their target as he hit the ground, rolled, and came up running. A shotgun blast caught him in the chest as he sprinted toward his car. He could see Bob still in it, barking ferociously, spittle spraying the windshield. He didn’t feel the pain, just felt like someone hit him with a kitchen table or something. His feet flew out from under him, his M-4 flying away in a different direction. He landed on his back, his jacket shredded, the Kevlar ripped and torn, and what little wind he had left in him got knocked out. He couldn’t lay there gasping, he had to move, he had to fight. He grabbed for his pistols and came up shooting, even as the surprised man tried to chamber another round. Two nine-millimeter Ripper rounds sent him flying back against the hood of the Merc, blood spraying from a dozen holes. More explosions erupted all around him as the other men from the truck and the bikers opened fire. Most of them missed, fired in haste while men were ducking for cover, not believing the kid was still standing after a shotgun blast. Jessie couldn’t breathe; his vision was going dark, and he felt the broken bones of his ribs grating together. Blood spurted from stray pellets that had torn through his shoulder and arms, but he kept fighting. His fingers kept pulling triggers, his eyes kept finding targets. His hands knew the ways of war. Men went down screaming, clutching at blown open bellies, hollowed out lungs, and all manner of splintered bones from his bullets. The Radically Invasive Projectiles were illegal to use, according to the Geneva Convention. But this wasn’t Geneva, and Jessie kept killing. He couldn’t keep it up, he couldn’t breathe, he could only suck in the tiniest of gasps. He needed to get to the car, he needed to get away.
He was surprised when he suddenly found himself falling. He didn’t feel any pain and wondered why for a second, until he saw the leg of his pants gushing red. He spun and fired behind him, thought he may have heard a man scream, thought he may have heard shouting and revving truck engines, but then he heard nothing as his face slammed into the ground.
44
Jessie
He awoke slowly, with a mouth full of dirt and a body full of pain. He lay there, still and unmoving, eyes closed, taking inventory. He could breathe now, that was good. He wasn’t dead, so he hadn’t bled out. That was good, too. He twitched his fingers. His arms were splayed out, pistols still in his hands. He wasn’t tied up or in the cage. With care, trying to minimize the hurt, he rolled over and slowly pushed himself into a sitting position. He felt his ribs move and grate against each other. He felt the mud-clogged hole in his leg start oozing blood again. He heard Bob barking at him from the front seat of the Merc.
There were a few bodies scattered around him and more across the street. He didn’t remember shooting that many, but he’d lost count after ten or fifteen. A few of them weren’t dressed in leathers and bones. They were wearing rags. Prisoners from the cage? Nothing else was moving, either dead or alive.
He scooted on his butt back to the car and opened
the door, letting an enthusiastic and overly slobbery Bob out to whine and lick at his face. He let him say his wet hello then shooed him after a few seconds, pushing him away and yelling in a whisper for him to git. Bob did, running off to sniff at the bodies.
Jessie dragged himself up into the passenger seat, trying to keep his leg straight, keep his broken ribs from grating, and popped open the glove box. His misty blue mystery medicine was there, wrapped in a rag and waiting for an emergency. Jessie figured this qualified. He plunged the needle into his arm and pumped the icy liquid into his bloodstream. He wasn’t as bad off as he’d been when they beat him senseless in the prison last year, but it was a close second. He could barely breathe, he had busted ribs and his leg had a couple of holes blown in it. He sat back and fumble fingered his guns, sliding in fresh magazines. It took a while, and he had to rest afterward.
He still hurt. It took him a minute to realize the injection wasn’t the same as the morphine drip he’d had. The blue liquid wasn’t a painkiller, it was the super soldier shot. He sighed and pulled out the custom CPAP mask. It took some effort, but he popped the quick disconnect on the nitrous bottle strapped between the seats and attached the hose dangling from the mask. It worked with a simple mechanical switch. Press the button on the hose, get a filtered shot of juice. The more you breathed, the gigglier you got. Pain eased away. The drawback was, it only lasted a minute or two. It was fine as long as he was in the car, getting back out meant facing the pain again. He needed to get out of town, or at least hidden. He saw a lot of raider bodies everywhere he looked, but there had been more than that. He wondered why they’d broke off the attack, they had won. He had been on the ground unconscious. Maybe they thought he was dead. He looked over at Bob, who was still sniffing around, but he wasn’t on alert. He wasn’t barking at anything. He listened and heard nothing more than the wind rustling the trees or a listless flap of the flag at the post office.
Zombie Road IV: Road to Redemption Page 30
