THEM Gabby's Run: Paranormal Apocalypse: A Zombie Apocalypse Military Novel (THEM Paranormal Zombie Apocalypse Series Book 4)

by M. D. Massey

  CONTENTS

  THEM

  COPYRIGHT

  DEDICATION

  OPENING

  PROLOGUE

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  EPILOGUE

  TO BE CONTINUED

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  THEM

  Book Three

  Gabby's Run

  A Paranormal Post-Apocalyptic Action Novel by

  M.D. Massey

  Modern Digital Publishing

  AUSTIN, TEXAS

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  MDMassey.com

  Copyright © 2016 by M.D. Massey.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.

  Modern Digital Publishing

  P.O. Box 682

  Dripping Springs, Texas 78620

  THEM Book Three: Gabby's Run/ M.D. Massey. ‌—‌ 1st ed.

  Dedicated to the survivors, who choose

  to live as victors and not victims.

  To make a difference, visit www.PROTECT.org today.

  Thou huntress swifter than the Moon! thou terror

  Of the world’s wolves! thou bearer of the quiver,

  Whose sunlike shafts pierce tempest-winged Error,

  As light may pierce the clouds when they dissever

  In the calm regions of the orient day!

  Luther caught thy wakening glance;

  Like lightning, from his leaden lance

  Reflected, it dissolved the visions of the trance

  In which, as in a tomb, the nations lay;

  And England’s prophets hailed thee as their queen,

  In songs whose music cannot pass away,

  Though it must flow forever: not unseen

  Before the spirit-sighted countenance

  Of Milton didst thou pass, from the sad scene

  Beyond whose night he saw, with a dejected mien.

  ~from Shelley’s “Ode to Liberty”

  PROLOGUE

  My name is Gabby Mendoza, and I’m not entirely human. This is my story.

  ONE

  HUNTRESS

  I was tracking a small group of undead through a wooded area just north of Camp Bullis, doing my best not to be seen as part of my “assignment.” My uncle Tony watched me from about a hundred yards away, from a small ridge that overlooked the trail I followed. Normally, I’d be working from cover. But this time, Tony had instructed me to track this small group and eliminate all of them without being detected. That meant I had to move fast and quietly, so I stayed on the trail to avoid stepping on leaves and twigs that might give me away.

  These training missions, as my tío called them, had become more and more frequent. I’d been living with Uncle Tony since I was eight, when he’d rescued me from a refugee camp that was being overrun by the dead. My parents had been killed a few weeks before, and I’d ended up at the camp through sheer luck after being found by soldiers scavenging for supplies. If they hadn’t found me and taken me with them, I’d have died‌—‌that’s a fact. I guess that’s why I’ve always liked soldiers, and the idea of being a soldier.

  Tony isn’t a soldier, he’s CIA. Or, at least, he used to be CIA back before the bombs dropped and the dead came back to life. I don’t remember him coming around much before the War‌—‌maybe only once or twice to visit around the holidays. My mom always said he had an important job, that he was too busy with work to visit. But he always brought me cool stuff when he came around. One time, it was one of those Russian wooden doll sets, where each doll fits inside the next larger doll. I thought that was pretty cool. Another time, he brought me a slingshot that could fit in your pocket. I liked that even more than the dolls.

  Uncle Tony rescued me from that camp eight years ago. Back in pre-War times, I’d be learning how to drive right now. Instead, I’m learning how to kill. These days, when Tony brings me a gift, it’s usually something deadly. New bolts for my crossbow. Rounds for my pistol. A fighting knife. Anything that can help me stay alive and survive in a world that isn’t at all safe for children. Although, I’m not really a child anymore, not by a long shot. I might still look like a kid, but that’s just a side effect of the serum he and Aunt Lorena gave me‌—‌another gift to help me survive.

  I continued stalking the path, paying careful attention to any sounds that might let me know I was close to the deaders I was following. I’d picked up their scent a while back, and their tracks were unmistakable. But deaders could be unpredictable, and it paid to be overcautious around them. You never knew when they might just stop and wait for you, standing completely still until you stumbled into them and they were chomping on your throat. Or, they might circle back around you without you realizing it. Although all zombies were stupid, some were smarter than others. The smart kind would hunt you like an animal. So I never let my guard drop on a mission.

  I heard some movement around a bend up the trail, and skirted off the path into the trees for cover. Sure enough, one of them had gotten turned around and shuffled back down the path toward me. It wasn’t because the deader had heard me; if it had, it would have moaned loud enough to call all the other deaders in the area. No, this one had just decided to turn around for no good reason at all. They were unpredictable, and that made them more dangerous than they appeared.

  I didn’t want to have deaders in front of me and deaders behind, so I readied my crossbow and took aim at its head. This one wore black pants, scuffed up black shoes, and a blue short-sleeve collared shirt with a name-tag on it. I couldn’t read the tag, but the deader looked like he’d been about sixteen or seventeen. A teenage boy from the looks of it, with dark hair‌—‌thin but athletic, and tall. I wondered if I would have dated a boy like that, if I’d been a teen before the War. My mind wandered for a moment, then I brought my thoughts back on task and shot him through the temple. Guess I’ll never know. The deader crumpled, and I was in motion before it hit the ground, moving swiftly and silently out of the brush to reclaim the bolt. I sprinted up the trail to catch up with the rest of the deader herd.

  I found them farther on, crowded around a tree. A cat, hissing with fear, clung onto one of the tree’s lower limbs. Deaders preferred humans to any other animal, but they’d eat anything warm and freshly kil
led. Dr. Perez said it had to do with their innate desire to be alive again, and also because of instincts they inherited from the primary who created them. Primaries were dangerous: a much smarter, faster, and stronger version of regular undead. Tony hadn’t allowed me to hunt one yet, but he would, soon. First, I just had to show him I could take out these deaders without being seen or heard. Es pan comido, a piece of cake.

  I snuck through the brush, moving carefully to avoid making a lot of noise. Some noise couldn’t be helped, but the deaders were too distracted by the cat to notice the small amount of sound my footsteps made. They were moaning loudly, and between their moans and the cat hissing and yowling, there wasn’t much chance that I’d be detected. I leaned out from behind a tree and put a bolt through one of their heads, pinning it to the tree trunk a few feet below the cat. The other four kept reaching and clawing for that poor tabby. Hang on, little guy. You’re about to be rescued. I moved to a new position and recocked and loaded the pistol crossbow as quietly as possible.

  Once I’d moved to a new position and made certain I remained unseen, I let another bolt fly. It hit the deader squarely in the skull, and she dropped like a rock. None of the other deaders seemed to care that their companions were dropping like flies. This is too easy, I thought. Bored, I decided to stay in the same spot to take out the rest as quickly as possible, even though it went against what Tony had taught me. He’d always preached to me that I needed to hide, shoot and move, because staying on the move increased your chances of survival. But I felt hungry and tired, and I just wanted to get this over with.

  I hit the third deader with a bolt, and was cocking the crossbow so I could end the last one when I heard a noise behind me. I flipped over and brought the crossbow up just in time to catch a ghoul sneaking up on me. Ghouls were the smarter ones, the ones that would hunt you sometimes. This one had snuck close enough to spit on me without me hearing it, and that pissed me off. I fired the crossbow, but it flinched and the bolt struck it in the shoulder. Great.

  I crab-walked backwards as it lunged toward me, forgetting about stealth and now only concerned with staying alive. It grabbed my ankle with a grip that was so strong it hurt me when it squeezed and pulled. I kicked frantically at its face while trying to cock the crossbow, but it was pulling me closer and I was running out of time. I dropped the crossbow and pulled my .22 pistol, firing three times at it from close range.

  Sadly, the small subsonic .22 rounds weren’t enough to punch through the ghoul’s skull. I was about to become a snack for this thing, unless I could plant one in its eye. I kept firing until I ran out of rounds, hitting it several more times to no effect. With no time to reload, I dropped the gun and pulled my fighting knife, holding it in a reverse grip so I could stab the thing in the skull when it climbed on top of me.

  TWO

  ERROR

  Just as it was crawling up my legs to take a bite out of my gut, its head went flying off its shoulders and its body collapsed onto my lap, dripping gore all over my pants and stomach.

  “Ugh, gross!” I shouted angrily as I rolled the corpse off me. I looked up at my Uncle Tony, who sighted in on the last deader as it approached through the trees behind me. A small report from his silenced 9mm pistol and the thing fell just a few yards from my position. He knelt and wiped the heavy bolo machete he always carried with him on the pant leg of the ghoul, then sheathed it at his left hip.

  “I had things under control, you know,” I said with a scowl as I wiped the deader gore off my bare skin.

  He pursed his lips and nodded. “It certainly looked like it, mija. I’m sure you would have ended that ghoul, right as it took a bite out of your estómago. And how would I explain that to Lorena, hmm?” He tsked and handed me a bandana. “See what happens when you get sloppy? You die. And someday…”

  “I know, I know‌—‌you won’t be around to save me.”

  “Exactly. Now, let’s hear your after-action report.”

  I groaned as I pulled myself up from the ground. Giving an “after-action report” was Tony’s way of making me pay attention to minor details, which he claimed could be the difference between life or death. But I already knew I had to be aware of my surroundings at all times, and I thought these debriefings were overkill.

  “Do I really have to? I mean, you saw what just happened. Why should have I have to repeat what you and I both witnessed just a few moments ago? C’mon, Tío‌—‌give it a rest.”

  He shook his head. “Not a chance. I can’t be around all the time. You know they want me back in Midland to work on Project Cerberus at the central lab. Just because there’s no real government left, it doesn’t mean I don’t have people I have to answer to. Eventually we’re going to have the resources to put our countermeasures in play, and at some point that’s going to require me to leave you here with Dr. Perez. My job is to prepare you to survive on your own, without me or Lorena to look out for you. Quit stalling and give me your report.”

  “Fine.” I rolled my eyes and played back the events of the last few minutes in my head, wiping goo off my clothes as I spoke. “Per orders, at 1425 hours operative began tracking six hostiles, and arrived at current location at 1545 hours. Operative was able to approach hostiles undetected.

  “Prior to engaging main group, one hostile separated from main group and was neutralized approximately 20 meters east-southeast of main group’s location. Operative proceeded ahead after neutralizing lone hostile, and was able to observe main group of hostiles while remaining undetected. Operative then shot three hostiles in their heads with a primitive high-velocity projectile weapon, eliminating those hostiles without alerting the others in the group.

  “Operative was flanked by a level two SNE, and fired on the subject with the projectile weapon and with her sidearm.” SNE stood for supernatural entity. Tony liked it when I used his CIA lingo, especially abbreviations. But it always made me feel like a dork talking this way. “Both weapons were ineffective, and operative failed to neutralize hostile. Operative’s handler arrived at that time and neutralized both remaining hostiles. Operative was unharmed.” I wrapped the bandana in a plastic baggie, placed it in a cargo pocket, and brushed my hands off on my pants. I sighed. “End of report.”

  “Noted.” Tony chewed on a toothpick and looked around the area. His face was a blank mask, which meant he was analyzing my performance. I stood still and waited for him to say something. He pulled the toothpick from his mouth and gestured at the tree. The cat had long since vanished into the brush beyond. I hoped it was okay.

  “How did the ghoul flank you?”

  I took a deep breath and sighed. “I lost visual contact with it as I was moving to a secondary area of concealment.”

  He nodded. “So you failed to count heads again after you arrived at your secondary vantage point.”

  My shoulders slumped. “I thought it was on the other side of the tree.”

  He picked his teeth and frowned. “You assumed. Assumptions will get you killed.”

  I groaned. “Alright, I messed up‌—‌I get it. Now, can we just head back already? I’m tired, I have cramps, and I just want to eat something sweet and lay down.” That was my trump card. I’d only recently started getting my period, and it made Uncle Tony uncomfortable when I talked about it. The truth was, after all the training he put me through over the years, I barely even noticed it. I wasn’t going to let him know that, though.

  His eyes bugged out a little, and I was pretty sure I saw him blush. “Oh. Okay then. That’ll be all. Um, let’s head back.” I hated to make him squirm, but living with him was a lot like being in the Army. At least, that’s what Lorena said. She had been a captain in the Army before the War, so I figured she knew what she was talking about.

  “Hang on, Tío. I have to pick up my shells.” That was a rule he made me follow; we left no trace of our passing. Or, at least, as little sign as possible. He stood silently off to the side of the trail as I policed the area for my brass, and then waited as
I hid the bodies and brushed the area with branches to disguise any sign of the fight. I was rushed, so it wasn’t perfect, but it’d have to do because I really did have cramps.

  Tony looked the area over with a sweep of his gaze. “Good job, mija. Let’s go get something to eat, and I’ll make you some manzanilla tea when we get back to the Facility. Also, I think I have some ibuprofen in my kit if you need it.”

  I smiled at him. “Thank you, Tío.” That’s the thing I liked about Uncle Tony. He was a hard man, but he always looked after me. I grimaced, hamming it up as I placed a hand on my tummy. “And I think I’ll take that ibuprofen now, please.”

  I had to turn away to hide my smile as he rifled in his bag for the bottle of pain killers. Like Lorena always told me: if you’re going to put a guilt trip on someone, you may as well go all the way.

  THREE

  BEARER

  On our way back to the Facility, we came across a group of punters. “Punter” was short for “people hunters.” They were major creeps. Punters supplied the slave trade in the area, and many of their clans worked for Them, supplying the level three and higher SNEs with fresh meat in exchange for safe passage and scavenging rights in the Corridor.

  I guess I should explain how we classify supernatural entities, otherwise referred to as Them. Level one SNEs are your standard biters and shufflers: deaders that are slow, stupid, and easy to kill. Level two SNEs are a bit tougher; they tend to be stronger, faster, and smarter, but not anywhere near as smart as a human. A ghoul classifies as a level two SNE, and I think revenants do too, although I’ve never seen one up close. Level three SNEs are really dangerous, and often they’re primaries. Primaries are SNEs that can create other SNEs. For example, a nos-type vampire who is a primary can bite humans and cause them to turn into revenants or vamps. Lorena knows all about that stuff, but mainly I’d just been learning how to kill Them.