by Lund, Dave
MSOT Coronado, CA
“We have one radar truck, two M-ATVs, fuel, food, water, although we’re shorter on ammo now than we were … we’re not that bad off.”
Chuck, Hammer, and Happy each gave reports of the Chinese activity at the airport. Although they had created havoc and destroyed the radar trucks, there were still too many men, too much for nine men and limited resources to handle. After the night’s raid it was doubtful any spot in the area would be safe to hide. With the sun rising and some discussion, they agreed on a plan to travel east to Marine Corps Air Station Yuma. What they would find they didn’t know, but it was a start. With a silent prayer for their fallen comrade, Aymond gave the signal for them to move out.
CHAPTER 20
Groom Lake, NV
March 23, Year 1
Jessie, Sarah, and Erin rode in the FJ, Bill and Brit following in another survivor’s vehicle, a worn old Suburban. Tied to the roof of the Suburban were two sections of heavy PVC pipe that Bill had made into a pole, a spool of wire, coaxial wire, rope, and stakes; a large amount of items for such a bizarre project.
“Baby, I have no idea why she’s here, but at least she’s riding in the other vehicle.”
“She doesn’t like us because we’re not her little happy house elves doing her every bidding.”
“I think Erin is right, Sarah; she had her perfect little underground fiefdom and we’re the Vikings pillaging the supplies and taking control, her little village destroyed in our wake.”
Erin wasn’t happy; Brit had somehow made it along for this trip. As it was explained that morning by Jake, the three of them were going to escort Bill aboveground to install a new radio antenna that he’d built, and being mission critical it had to be installed immediately. Brit hadn’t been mentioned; when they saw her Jessie argued with Bill about her coming along, that she hadn’t been through any of the firearms training yet; Bill assured her that Brit had survived long enough to make it to Groom Lake and that she would be OK. Still, the mood in the FJ was dark and unhappy. Since starting the firearms classes they’d had fresh air and sunlight, and had enjoyed getting outside and away from the frequent power and system outages plaguing the facility underground.
“Look, we can’t do anything about it now, and this isn’t supposed to take too long. Let’s just hope it doesn’t so we can get rid of her and he can go play with his radio.” Jessie frowned, gripping the steering wheel. It took her a second but she took a deep breath, trying to relax. The dirt road to the antenna site wasn’t that bad, but it made for slow going. Eventually they arrived. Jessie, Sarah and Erin fanned out, scanning the area around them for threats. They didn’t see any, but lately there seemed to be an uptick in the number of dead making its way into the middle of nowhere.
Brit wore a strange mix of layers, including a huge, ugly red scarf and matching red knit gloves; where she had found them none of the women knew, but even in the cold March air they didn’t find the temperature all that uncomfortable outside. They all made fun of her for the impractical cold weather gear.
“How is she going to grip a pistol with knit gloves on?”
Jessie frowned. “I don’t know, Sarah, I’m not even sure she brought one.”
“But the rule?”
“I’m not sure she cares. Remember, she’s better than the rules, she is the rules.”
The wind and dust was another problem all together. The three of them wore goggles and each had shemaghs pulled up over their faces. The wind gusted with more intensity as time wore on, and none of them understood why Bill wanted to try to get an antenna up with the wind so strong; but he’d been very insistent that the antenna be put into service immediately. The antenna wasn’t their problem. They were to stand around while Bill worked and take care of any real problems that shambled their way.
Bill took his PVC-pipe-antenna-mast off the Suburban and began working on attaching the long loop of wire. The small buildings by the other antennas hadn’t been cleared yet, the group having stopped the process of building clearing until they trained more people to help. They appeared to be secure, and none of them really wanted to deal with clearing them today; the wind was just getting worse and blowing dust became more miserable.
After about an hour of trying to set up the mast, Bill came to the girls and asked for help. Ready to get things done and leave, they agreed. Brit just stood outside the Suburban with her scarf wrapped tightly around her mouth, her eyes squinted shut against the wind and dust. Two more attempts to push the mast up failed.
Jessie yelled over the wind, “Bill, it just isn’t going to work today. You can tie off your gear here or you can put it back on the roof of your truck, but you’re done, we’re done, the conditions are only getting worse!”
Bill nodded, although he looked disappointed. He began uncoupling his home-built antenna, packing it away to carry back to the hangar. Erin went back to sit in the FJ, angry for having to be out in the miserable conditions and angrier about Brit coming along, even though there hadn’t been a chance to say more than two words between them.
Jessie and Sarah helped Bill as best they could and tried to hurry along the process. A strong wind gust rocked the FJ. Erin looked up and saw Brit fall over and started to laugh, stopping abruptly when she realized that Brit hadn’t fallen, she had been pulled down. She hit the FJ’s horn frantically and Jessie and Sarah turned to look, seeing Brit on the ground with a reanimated corpse clawing at her. Her hands pushed against its face and neck, trying to keep the rotted gnashing teeth away from her. Jessie ran to Brit and kicked her boot hard against the corpse, knocking it to the ground while raising her rifle and firing a single shot into its skull.
She reached down and helped Brit up, yelling over the wind to be heard, “Are you OK, are you hurt, are you bit?”
Brit shook her head and angrily stomped off to the Suburban to sit in the back seat while the rest of the group finished packing up the antenna. Ten minutes later they were driving back towards the facility, the wind rocking the vehicles as they drove.
“Brit, that was close, are you sure you’re OK?”
“Yeah Bill, I’m fine, I’m just shook up. It’s been a while since I’ve had to deal with one of those … those things.”
For a man who loved HAM radio, Bill wasn’t much for conversation unless via radio, so not prodding any further, he drove in silence, the wind whistling through the PVC sections on the roof. The FJ ahead of him led the way down the dirt road, which was hard to see for all the dust, back to the hangar and the comfort of the underground facility, Brit looked at Bill from her spot in the back seat, making sure he was watching the road before gingerly pulling the glove off her right hand. The side of her hand and her pinky finger was bleeding from deep teeth marks in her flesh. Her hand ached badly like a bone might be broken. Frowning, she carefully pulled her glove back over her hand and stuffed both hands into her coat pockets.
Safe from the wind in the hangar, the group climbed out of their vehicles, Jessie, Sarah, and Erin slapping the dust off each other’s clothes. They watched Brit get out of the Suburban. “Brit, are you …”
Brit ignored Jessie and walked past her towards the open blast door to the underground facility, Jason standing inside the entryway to the facility, the greeter once again.
“What a bitch.”
Erin and Sarah looked at Jessie, surprised she’d said what they were all thinking. Bill shrugged and walked past, thanking them for trying. After they all were inside, Jason closed the door and locked it into place.
St. George, Utah
With daybreak they saw the damage wasn’t as bad as it could have been. Angel used some fireworks as a distraction to get some of the dead away from the house. Guillermo opened one of the heavy steel shutters and the window it guarded. Chivo sat in a chair, his M4 propped on the window frame, and slowly picked off nearly forty undead as they shambled about inside the fence. The gate was damaged but the group was able to rig it into place temporarily. Miraculously
the horses were unhurt in their pen behind the garage.
With the courtyard cleared and secure, the group took to the task of pulling the corpses into a pile next to the fence. They hadn’t planned for such an occurrence, so there was some discussion as to what they should do with the bodies. For Doc’s body there wasn’t any discussion. The group took turns digging a grave near the house in the hard soil. Once dug, they had a small service and buried their friend. Hugs were exchanged, and one by one each of them thanked Chivo for doing his best and Bexar for his quick reaction, but they both felt like intruders in a private family moment. After the burial, Bexar followed Chivo across the courtyard on his crutches. Chivo flexed his hand; it obviously hurt him, but he didn’t utter a single complaint.
They stopped at the gate, where Chivo surveyed the damage and the temporary repair. “This will probably hold against a few undead, but another swarm like last night and it’s coming down again.”
“Think that’s how it failed last night?”
“No, see here and here? This was sabotaged. Someone set the gate to fail, then corralled the dead here, pushed them through like cattle and shot Doc. No, mano, we need to see if my other rifle survived, get some wheels and get the shit out of Dodge before this gets any worse.”
“What about these guys?”
“Your call, mano. Remember, I ride with you.”
“No brother, we ride together.”
###
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
My name is Dave Lund. I hail from Texas and am a former Texas “motor-cop.” My family and photography round out my usual day-to-day passions, but post-apocalyptic zombie stories really fire me up. Before my previous stint as a motor-cop, I was a full-time skydiving instructor and competitor (in Canopy Piloting, aka swooping) with over 3,000 skydives. I am no longer an active skydiver so I can focus on my family, photography, and writing.
The characters in the Winchester series comprise some personality composites of people I have known or met in my life, but no character is based on a single real person or even two people combined. They are a complete work of fiction and do not represent any actual people, living or dead. Yes, that includes Bexar! Many of the themes, objects, weapons, tactics, and locations in the Winchester Undead series are pulled from my past and experiences, as many writers are apt to do, including my love of Big Bend National Park in Texas; although I have to admit there is no secret cache site in the small Texas town of Maypearl. At least none that I had any hand in creating. Although the secret base from the SSC is probably true ...
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
When I first began writing Winchester: Over it didn’t even have a title; it had a plan, a story and a process, but it was rough. I dreamed of someday publishing it and maybe selling one hundred copies to friends and family who might be kind enough to buy a copy. The idea of actually writing the sequel, much less having the opportunity to see the whole story arc through each place I wanted it to go was only that, a dream. However, here we are and thank you for joining me on this journey. All of you who reach out to me on my website, via social media, e-mail, at events and leave reviews, I can’t thank you enough for the encouragement and support. None of this would have happened without all of my friends, new friends and readers getting behind a story with excitement, telling their friends about the Winchester Undead series.
My wife Morgan. Without her love, support, and faith in me I could have never even started on this journey, much less made it to this point. Her willingness to not only say “go” but to be in the trenches as my front line first rough draft reader, biggest fan and cheerleader when I needed it most is a big reason you have the fourth book of the series in your hands. She is my rock and my best friend and without her help the first step of this journey would never have been taken, nor all the steps since then.
Numerous friends have reached out and helped me chase down details and given advice. Thank all of you, James, Mark, Jerry, Jason, the other Mark, Brains, Freeflier, my friend I gave a promotion to, DFA 1 and DFA 2 … the list continues. Thank you, thank all of you.
So far the characters have been right as they have led me down this rabbit hole in directions I didn’t realize it needed to go. I hope as the series continues that the characters become your friends as they have become friends to me. The foundation of the story began twenty years ago, blessed by campfire smoke and star-filled nights camping with my close friends who still remain my close friends, finding new tales of adventures with our families around a campfire to this day.
Keep your go-bags packed and be ready, I ride with Bexar!
-Dave
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OTHER WINLOCK BOOKS YOU'LL LOVE
Winlock Press has a stunning range of post-apocalyptic adventures.
Be sure to click on the links below and enters the worlds of:
J. Rudolph’s The Reanimates: The Complex,
first in The Reanimates series!
It took no time at all for Shelton’s Disease to spread from an ugly rumor on the internet to the end of the world as Cali Anglin, RN, knew it. Now the half-abandoned gated community that she has taken for granted is all that stands between her family and the endless, ravenous hordes of reanimates. And with the government gone, electricity extinguished, and the food supply dwindling, she has to face questions she’s never asked herself before: just how far would she go to save her family, her friends, her rapidly collapsing community? Would she kill for them? Would she die for them? She’s about to find out.
In the terrifying tradition of George Romero’s Day of the Dead and Mira Grant’s Feed, Julie Rudolph gives us a fresh and frightening look at the zombie apocalypse from the ground level, when ordinary people like you and me are forced to face extraordinary evil… and survive.
Tristan Vick’s Bitten: Resurrection,
first in the Bitten apocalypse series!
Rachael Ramirez has always been tough. Raising a son on her own in Newcastle City has made her that way. Alyssa Briggs, a Newcastle veterinarian, has always shown a gentler side. But when the world went crazy, and she literally ran into Rachael Ramirez as the risen dead overran them, everything changed. Now these bright and beautiful women will build a team of strange, courageous survivors, including a schizophrenic nymphomaniac, a narcissistic playboy, and a ragtag group of hardened soldiers: just what they need to stay alive in this weird new world. And none of them know that Rachael holds a shocking secret to the Resurrection Virus that may be the key to humanity’s salvation… or prove to be its worst curse.
Strong women and smart men in hand-to-hand combat with the walking dead, deep in the Big City. What more could you want in an apocalypse?
