I thought about this for a second. Rock and a hard place, for these people. I made a decision. “Where is their base?”
The man on the left, a shorter, heavyset man of around sixty said, “We don’t know for sure. They tend to head back in a northerly direction, so we figure they’re up that way, but the last guys to go looking came back as zombies.”
“What protection do you have from the occasional zombie or three.?” Charlie asked.
“We use garden tools, even though the group said they would protect us. The attacks have been less, lately, but there’s still one every other day or so.”
My response was interrupted by the sound of a vehicle coming down the road at a high rate of speed. Charlie and I sidled into the store so as not to be seen. I could see Tommy slide out of the truck bed and work his way into the ditch by the tracks so he could see under the truck. Charlie opened a window up on the store and knelt down, aiming his rifle in the direction of the noise. I waited by the door to see what was going to happen.
I didn’t have long to wait. A black truck barreled around the corner, screeching to a halt in front of the general store. The three men out front looked very scared and tried to keep their eyes down.
The truck belched out four men, all in various clothing, most of it black. Two of the men wore t-shirts that had large skulls on them and the other two, teenagers, wore typical youth dress. All of them sported earrings and necklaces and all of them were wearing black leather jackets. I was reminded of the dead man we found at the farmhouse and the cold fire began to burn again. All of the men were armed with a pistol in their belts, ala Pancho Villa style, with two of the men carrying AK-47 variants. I was a little disappointed, since we wouldn’t be able to use the guns once we dealt with this.
The leader of the group immediately started screaming at the men at the store. “What the fuck is going on? Whose truck is that? You know the goddamn rules, no fucking strangers! Do I need to make an example out of you, you old fuck?” The screamer was a man about twenty-five years old, with dirty blond hair and what I called ‘trouble eyes’. His tirade caused the men to flinch, but he didn’t notice the fist the oldest man clenched at being addressed by this punk.
“No, sir.” came the reply.
“I better not, you useless piece of shit. Boxer!” the leader called.
A small specimen by the truck spoke up. “Yeah!”
“Check out that truck. Tell me what you find.”
“You got it, Van.” The little guy ran over to the truck, opened the door and brought up his rifle dramatically to cover the interior. I nearly laughed. I could see Charlie just shake his head in my peripheral vision.
Van, the leader, shoved his nasty face into the oldest man’s face. “Where are the people who drove that truck?” No answer. Van‘s face got red and he pulled out his pistol and aimed into the face of the man next to him. “I don’t like to repeat myself, fucker. I’m counting to three, then I’m killing your friend and feeding him to the zombies. Got it? One…”
I stepped out of the store and pointed my rifle barrel at Van’s forehead. “Two,” was all I had to say. Behind Van, the other two men were caught off guard and fumbled for their weapons. I could see Tommy coming around the black truck, his gun up and ready. Behind him I could see the inert form of Boxer on the tracks.
To his credit, Van didn’t flinch. “I’ll still kill this fucker, unless you drop your gun, hero.” Van sneered at me.
I pressed the barrel of the rifle into Van’s head. “What makes you think I’ll let you live one second after that gun goes off? Kill him, he’s nothing to me.” That earned me a panicked look from the man under Van’s gun.
Van worked that one around in his head and I could tell he wasn’t good at math. “Boys! Shoot this asshole!” Van yelled to his men.
Nothing happened. Van was becoming confused. Something was wrong, but he didn’t dare take his eyes off me. Behind him, Tommy had effectively disarmed his cohorts and they were kneeling on the ground, hands on their heads, mumbling threats I couldn’t hear.
“Question for you, Van,” I said.
“Fuck you.”
“What comes after two?”
Van’s eyes got wide and it finally dawned on him that he was going to actually die if he kept this up. He reluctantly lowered his gun and I used my left hand to take it from him. It was an engraved, ivory stocked Springfield. 45. Very nice. I wondered who he stole it from. I passed it over to Charlie who came out of the store aiming his gun at Van as well. I figured Van’s eyes were going to pop out of his head if we offered up any more surprises. Resistance was the last thing he expected. Instead of tired, scared old men, he was suddenly facing battle-hardened veterans of the Upheaval. I’m sure had he suspected we were there, we would have had a more serious disagreement.
I shoved Van out into the street where he landed unceremoniously in front of his men. He jumped up immediately, but I was ready and slammed a fist into his head, knocking him back face first against the truck door, denting the panel. Van slid down, holding his nose, which seeped blood through his fingers.
I hunkered down in front of the two men and they stared hatred at me. “Howdy,” I said. “I need to know where your base is and if you tell me, I’ll let you go warn them. If you don’t, I imagine things will go badly for you.”
“Fuck you,” the older of the two said. “We’ll kill your punk ass. Who the fuck do you think you are? We own this area which includes you.”
I was unfazed. “Okay. The hard way it is.” I stood up and Charlie and I gathered up the weapons. I walked back to the men at the general store, and handed them the guns.
“These are yours. Do what you want, but I would suggest you get everyone out of here. Head down the tracks and get to Verona. They’ll take you in.” Several people had wandered over from the fields and were standing in the distance.
I addressed the people. “My name is John Talon. You people need to decide how you want to live. If you stay here, you’ll likely be killed by the group that has been terrorizing you or fall prey to the next gang that comes along. Verona is alive and so is Coal City. Take the tracks and move quickly.”
I started to walk back to the truck, Charlie following with Tommy bringing up the rear. The old man called out, “What do we do with these guys?”
I turned back and smiled at him. “They’re all yours.” I watched the people of the town surge forward and as I climbed into the cab of the truck, I could hear a high pitched scream as the people took their revenge against their oppressors.
“Three,” I said to no one in particular. Charlie chuckled and Tommy looked at me like I was nuts.
18
We found more of the same in Ransom with the populace being cowed by the group of renegades. Ransom had actually put up a fight against the group and had several people hanging outside town as an example to the rest. Another score to settle.
Ransom had about three hundred or so people living in it and they were all looking for a way out. I pointed them in the direction of the tracks and when we pulled out, a long line of people and belongings was headed northeast. None of the gang showed up, so I imagine they were in for a surprise when they came back to a ghost town.
Kernan was similar to Ransom with the exception that we managed to get into a little firefight with the representatives of the renegades. Charlie took a graze to his upper arm and I got nicked in the leg because I wasn’t bright enough to get myself fully under cover, but neither was serious. We killed four of the group with the remaining two beating a hasty retreat to the north. I came to the conclusion that we were not going to finish this unless we went after the rest of the gang, so after a brief powwow, it was decided that Charlie was going to take the survivors of Kernan over to Streator, if anything was left of it, and establish connections there. We did manage to find Tim Harlan, who was overjoyed to hear his brother was still alive.
For Tommy and myself, it was time to go hunting. We had a pretty good idea where our quarry was, but it
