ONLY THE DEAD DON’T DIE
FINDING HOME
An Apocalyptic Saga – Book 4
A.D. Popovich
ONLY THE DEAD DON’T DIE
FINDING HOME
An Apocalyptic Saga – Book 4
Copyright © January 2021 by A.D. Popovich
All Rights Reserved
First Edition 2021
License Notes
This book or any portion of this publication may not be reproduced or used in any manner without prior written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations in a book review. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, organizations, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), business establishments or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book is dedicated to those who lost their lives to the pandemic.
And to the Covid-19 Long-haulers—wishing you a speedy recovery!
Books by A.D. Popovich
ONLY THE DEAD DON’T DIE: An Apocalyptic Saga – Book 1
ONLY THE DEAD DON’T DIE The Hunger’s Howl: An Apocalyptic Saga – Book 2
ONLY THE DEAD DON’T DIE Last State: An Apocalyptic Saga – Book 3
ONLY THE DEAD DON’T DIE Finding Home: An Apocalyptic Saga – Book 4
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Author’s Note
Chapter 1
Scarlett Lewis surveilled the plain’s golden grasses from the Stanwyck’s rustic bunkhouse. Ironically, she and her friends had found refuge at the same horse ranch she and Twila had stumbled upon after escaping Last State’s degrading buy-a-wife auction last October. At the time, survival had seemed impossible with a child to protect. But now, they had Ella and Justin’s newborn to safeguard as well.
She found it hard to believe she was once again reunited with her California post-pandemic friends. So much had happened since her vagrant Scarlett-from-Roseville days during the Super Summer flu’s initial onslaught on humanity. Despite their dire circumstances, she could not deny her sense of relief for not having to face this undeadly world on her own.
Regrettably, friends came at a cost—the more the deadlier. The icy-hollow burrowing into her soul from losing Mindy and Starla tortured her still. Had they died because Zac and Luther left the lodge to rescue her?
After the X-strain army had overtaken Zac and Shari’s Ghost Creek Hunting Lodge, Scarlett and her friends had driven across the lower panhandle for hours outrunning hordes and avoiding roadblocks.
With nowhere else to turn, Zac had cashed in a favor with Mr. Stanwyck, explaining his team needed a place to crash until Enforcers sanitized the lodge. Stanwyck had offered them shelter in the vacant bunkhouse on the far west end of the property, unaware Zac harbored women and children in the truck’s camper.
The overwhelming events of the last twelve hours made Scarlett’s head spin. She had gone from the King of the Undead’s bony arms—one death-kiss away from turning creeper—to the loving arms of Zac. Even more astonishing, she and her friends had somehow escaped the X-strains’ Army of the Undead.
They were safe. For now, she kept telling herself. The bunkhouse sat in a plowed area about forty acres from the magnificent Big Valley mansion. The one she had brazenly stolen food from last year. Beyond that, surrounding the building’s perimeter, the wild knee-high grasses of May swayed at the mercy of the restless wind.
In alert-mode, they monitored the windows on each side of the room: she the west, Luther the east, Dean the south, and Zac the north. Oh, Zac. They had found each once again. Would she awaken merely to find her lover a fading remnant of her dreams?
Through the M4’s scope, Zoat’s metal-reinforced embankment glinted in the sunlight. Far too close. But it wasn’t Zoat’s foreboding presence threatening her sanity. No. It was the intermittent flashbacks of her recent abduction that tormented her. At least she had changed out of the medieval burgundy velvet gown, thanks to a pair of Zac’s rather baggy military fatigues.
She must have scrubbed her face raw, erasing every trace of the goth makeup she had adorned herself with for the king’s bizarre tea ceremony. The monatomic tea’s trippy lingering aftereffects had her wondering how it had affected the creepers.
Scarlett shoved away the flashbacks one by one, not ready to confront yesterday’s troubling reality, much less their current predicament. She eyed her ringless hand again to make sure she wasn’t still wearing the garish ruby ring the King of the Undead had so adeptly slipped onto her finger—claiming her.
Zac had assured he had rescued her in time. Before the marriage ceremony. But the king’s callous smile and those fiendishly perfect teeth taunted her beneath closed eyelids.
She preferred dwelling on Zac and Luther’s rather dramatic action-hero-like rescue. What little she remembered. Unfortunately, a grenade explosion had ripped a hole in Zoat. Hundreds, if not thousands of creepers had escaped, roaming the plains. Meanwhile, the western Texan panhandle had been ordered to shelter in place until the hordes were neutralized.
It seemed as if she and her friends hopscotched from one crisis to another. It didn’t take a psychic to see they each battled their own demons of immortality. Since the pandemic had ravaged the earth, the living struggled for day-to-day survival as did the undead. And while life was fleeting, knowing that once one died, one devolved into a flesh-eating cannibal—the eternal nightmare lived on. There was no solace for the living. The dead. Or undead.
A pensive silence settled over the sparsely furnished bunkhouse equipped with unvarnished bunk beds and mirrorless dressers, a long picnic table with benches next to the small kitchen, and a soot-covered fireplace. That was it besides the rather large locker-room-style bathroom.
Twila lay on the lower bunk next to the window Scarlett monitored either asleep or in deep-meditation mode. She didn’t always know which. The poor girl had lost her usual spunk since escaping the creeper-infested lodge. Depleted was the best way to describe her. This life was too harsh for a child, especially a sensitive empath.
A dark energy crept around the fringes of Scarlett’s inner vision. Something wasn’t right. The tension was so tight her attempts for deep breaths reduced to feeble gasps. Nevertheless, she refused to relinquish her internal Merkaba shield of protection.
Besides the Ancient Ones’ invasive probing, she also blocked the creepers, for they sensed her vital and yet impossible role to save humanity from total annihilation. Their kind were learning at an incre
dible rate—evolving into a super-species.
Her mysterious spirit guide, the Silver Lady had explained: Free from society’s social and economic pressures, constant in-fighting, and reckless ambition, creepers had tapped into their innate collective consciousness as had early mankind. The undead were learning to exploit the power of the hive mentality. Heaven forbid, if the undead collaborated on a global scale—humanity was eternally damned.
Rapid gunfire sent everyone into a frenzy.
“Where’s it coming from?” Justin jumped out of Ella’s bunk and darted from window to window.
“Gotta horde on my end!” Luther yelled from his window. Artillery blasted the plains. “Correction. Was a horde.”
“Overkill. Watch for the crawlers,” Justin said without the slightest touch of sarcasm.
“Luther, any Enforcers coming this way?” Zac asked from his window.
“Nope.” Luther sighed with obvious relief. “They took off for the big-ass house.”
Muted cries from Ella’s bunk sent Justin rushing back to her side. Ella was recovering from giving birth during last night’s hellish horde attack. It must have been harrowing. She tried sending Ella a gentle wave of peaceful energy, but Scarlett’s own angst prevented it.
“What’s on your mind?” Dean asked from his window, looking directly at Scarlett. Did he sense the paranoia strangling her?
Her delay in answering had everyone turning to her. “Something’s not right,” Scarlett finally said.
“They’re coming!” Twila bolted up from her bunk. Was she referring to creepers or Enforcers? Either way spelled trouble.
“For the record,” Dean interjected, “my gut’s twisting like one of those dirt devils back at Boom Town.”
“This isn’t a safe place!” Twila’s words fell flat onto the knotted-pine flooring.
“Yup, that’s the vibe I’m getting,” Luther confirmed.
“Okay, okay! So, what are we doing about it?” Justin chided. “I’m not gonna sit on my ass and wait for Enforcers to take our son.”
“Think it’s time we hash out our options,” Dean intoned with calm confidence. “Might want to cover every possible scenario.” They could always count on Dean to stabilize a volatile situation. Perhaps that was the special ability this new world had gifted him with. For common sense wasn’t so common these days.
Justin butted in. “Guys, guys. Don’t overthink this. Let’s just leave. Like now.” He didn’t bother keeping his voice down now that Twila, Ella, and the baby were wide awake.
“And how do you propose we do that with dead-heads and Enforcers combing the plains?” Dean shot back, irritation creeping into his voice.
“A tunnel,” Justin stated firmly.
Zac’s eyes lit up. “Where’s this tunnel?”
“Tent City has tons of smuggler tunnels,” Justin exaggerated.
Zac shook his head. “Too far to go in lockdown—”
“Since when did that stop you, Mr. Hotshot?” Justin snapped with bated breath.
“Ouch . . .” Luther drawled.
Dean flashed Justin a stern look. “The timing’s got to be right. Remember, we’ve got the little ones to think of.”
“Exactly”—Zac took over—“after the HAZMAT crew sanitizes the neutralized zombs, I’ll barter for a tank of gas from old man Stanwyck. Then, we leave . . .” He paused. “Provided the lockdown has been lifted in this Sector.”
“How many miles you reckon it is to Tent City?” Dean inquired.
“Let’s see. We’re just outside of Lubbock.” Zac tapped his upper lip. “About three hundred miles if we take the highway. Longer if we take the backroads.”
Dean pulled out the map from his back pocket. “That’s doable. We just need to get to Interstate Twenty-seven.”
“We can be there in five freakin’ hours,” Justin exulted. “We can even take the truck through the tunnel. The one I know of is super wide. Not like that wimpy one behind Boom Town.”
“And go where?” Ella huffed. “Hon, we have to think of mijo.”
“Any place is better than here,” Justin brooded aloud.
“Look, I’ll be honest,” Zac said. “Tent City’s risky. Ruthless gangs run amuck.”
“Duh, remember, I lived there for a while,” Justin spewed. “I can handle those low-life smugglers.”
Poor Justin. Scarlett had never seen him so upset. The stress must be getting to him.
“It’s one thing lone-wolfing it. But with a baby, a child, and two women—” Zac left it at that.
“Ol’ Luther’s tired of winging it. The baby changes things.” Luther turned to Justin. “You seemed to forget how quickly shit can go from bad to hella-bad.”
Justin ignored Luther. “Meh, Zac can use his vision quest superpower.”
Besides saving damsels in distress, Zac’s ability was finding safe routes. He had guided several wagon trains of hapless immigrants, who had hoped to find refuge in Last State, across the perilous Lost States of America. The cruel reality: Last State had turned out to be a dystopian dictatorship, controlling every aspect of one’s life.
“That’s a given,” Zac retorted under his breath. She knew him well enough to know he didn’t think Tent City was a good idea.
“Moving forward,” Dean pushed on, back to business before the heated discussion went awry. “That’s Plan A. Zac, what’s going on in that cagey brain of yours?”
Zac offered an endearing smile. The kind that made her melt inside. “Honestly, I want to contact my handler.” The room went stone-cold silent. “And arrange a mission.” He gave Scarlett a long look. “My last one.”
“Are you cray-cray?’ Justin stormed off. Scarlett’s sentiments exactly.
“Not at all,” Zac remarked full of his usual smuggish-optimism. “A mission means—helicopter. Once I secure a helo”—Zac carefully avoided her disapproving glare—“it’s adios amigos. We bypass the hordes, gang lords, and Enforcers.”
“Interesting.” Dean rubbed his chin. “How do you go ’bout arranging a mission?”
Zac’s grin widened. “I waltz into the Capitol like I own the damn place and offer my highly valuable assets. Meanwhile, you crash here and hit the Zhetto Market for dried goods. Once the mission’s a go, I’ll hire a pilot.”
“Bro, don’t tell me the man of the hour here can’t fly a helicopter?” Luther ribbed.
Zac laughed. “Never got around to it.” He purposefully made eye contact with each person. Finally, his eyes reached hers. “Clearly, it’s the best option given our logistics.” He nodded toward Twila and Ella.
“But, where do we go? No place is safe anymore,” Ella murmured from the bed.
“The market’s only open on the weekends,” Justin spouted to the ceiling.
Luther looked at his Rolex. “You think we can hold out here that long?”
“I don’t see why not. Stanwyck owes me. Bigtime,” Zac said, back to monitoring his window.
“Scarlett, give us your two cents,” Dean pressed.
An unknown force seemed to consume her lifeforce. It had to be the Ancient Ones trying to home in on their location. At least the probing hadn’t started. “Sorry, I’m so out of it. I feel like a fly on the wall.”
“No worries,” Dean said. “Just listen in. Now, for Plan C—”
Twila crossed her eyes emphatically. “It’s stupid to stay here! Can’t you see—”
The whup-whup-whup of a helicopter echoed in the distance.
“They’re coming! For you.” Twila pointed to Zac. “You have to hide this very second.”
“Probably just a recon flyover,” Zac countered, downplaying it.
“I’m not liking this,” Luther insisted. “It’s landing at the Stanwyck’s house.”
Zac strutted to Luther’s window.
“Dude, why didn’t you remove your chip?” Justin chastised in obvious contempt.
“Hey!” Zac raised his hands at the accusation. “I went dark just before we escaped through Boom Town
’s tunnel. I’m officially MIA. One of Stanwyck’s men must have reported me to the Capitol,” he said without apparent concern.
But Scarlett sensed Zac’s apprehension. He pulled out a pocket-sized notebook and leaned over the dresser and jotted down something.
“The helicopter’s taking off,” Luther announced as if it were good news.
“I told you already. They just want Zac!” Twila yelled. “But nooo, no one ever listens to me.”
“Aw, shit!” Zac groaned. “It’s coming this way. Looks like I’m going to the Capitol sooner than I thought.” He ripped a page from the notebook and handed it to Dean. “Get to the Frito-Lay distribution warehouse on the Y-zone side. From there, you can get to Quinton’s safehouse—just inside the Forbidden Zone. And watch for drones.”
“Don’t think about it!” Twila ran to Dean. “The Ancient Ones might see.”
“Dude, are you for real?” Justin bellowed over the helicopter’s thuds, which reverberated against her chest. “You do know the Forbidden Zone’s sealed-off for a reason? It’s full of Zs!”
Zac’s eyes narrowed in concern. “Look, no matter how you slice it, it’s going to get dicey. Twila’s right. They want me. But if there’s a mole amongst Stanwyck’s men, they might snoop around the bunkhouse.”
“And, and”—Justin apparently wasn’t finished with his tirade—“the border wall has enough juice to take down a T. rex.”
“There’s an off-grid section. You’ll find it,” Zac stated rather dismissively.
Scarlett knew only too well. Women and children were worth millions. And a baby? Who knew when a baby had been born in Last State?
Dean patted his chest and said, “I don’t even want to speculate what would happen to Twila and Mateo . . .”
“Actually, this could work in our favor.” Zac sorted through his duffle. “Last State’s security will be pushed to its limits. Neutralizing the hordes and reinforcing Zoat will be their numero uno priority. Illegal citizens, not so much.”
Justin scuffed his sneakers on the floor. “You’re probably right. I used to monitor the Zones. The entire force is probably working twenty-four seven. Hordes are always priority.”
Only The Dead Don't Die | Book 4 | Finding Home Page 1
