Joshua Gayou - Commune - The Complete Series - A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Box Set (Books 1-4)

A few more shots came our way, but they were being stingy with them. Billy noticed this too. He said, “I don’t think they have that many bullets.”

I crab-walked down to the end of the line and peered through a break in the machinery. There was just enough of a gap through the steel framing, drums, and wheels of our machine that I could see the end of one of their asses hanging out from behind their own cover across the way. I waved at Billy, pointed in their direction and mouthed the words, “get… ready.” He nodded, pulled a few shells from his belt, and started thumbing them into his weapon. When he was ready to go, he nodded to me over his shoulder.

I steadied myself as well as possible and rested the barrel of my rifle on a nook of the machinery frame. I positioned the dot of the rifle’s optic on the backside of the man in the distance. I took a breath and squeezed the trigger. The gun jerked back against my shoulder, and I heard a scream from across the warehouse (strangely, I can’t remember hearing a gunshot when I did this). The man’s back end was replaced by a complete body sprawling along the floor. I repositioned the dot to the newly discovered head and pulled the trigger again. I didn’t miss.

Billy was already running along the shop floor by the time I got off my first shot. The man who had not been hit was distracted by his buddy sprawling across the concrete just long enough for Billy to get in and blow a hole through his ribs.

I ran to meet him where he crouched over the two. “Done,” he said and moved to the door through which they had emerged.

On the other side, the room was dark enough that we had to slow our pace down considerably. I heard screaming now in the distance ahead; the screaming of a little girl. I pushed past Billy and started running blindly down the aisles. He shouted for me to wait but I wasn’t hearing it. I heard my baby screaming.

It wasn’t long at all before I saw a dimly lit enclosed office in the distance. I could see Jake standing up in the window with a revolver pointed down at the floor. Just beyond him was Elizabeth’s head.

I grabbed the handle and pulled the door open. I heard Jake say something that sounded like, “…eye kid.” It was hard to make out because I was in the process of opening the door when he said it. Maybe he said “bye kid,” because he shot her in the face right after that.

Billy pushed into the room behind me, looked around at the mess, and said, “What the hell, Jake?”

Jake collapsed into an office chair. He slumped there, panting. “I… could use… a drink… of water.”

“We don’t have a lot of time,” said Jake. He was still sitting in the chair, leaned forward over the desk with his head in his hand. “The one who stole the van… she said she’d be back to pick the rest up.”

I was just cutting the rest of the plastic wrap off Elizabeth. I was taking my time, afraid I would cut her if I moved too fast.

Speaking of cuts: “You have a nasty cut on the back of your hand,” I said, looking over at Jake. “We might have to sew that one shut.”

“Later,” he mumbled, panting heavily. “Billy. Go around and search everyone. Get the guns. Bullets. Want my damned Glock back.”

“What happened here?” I asked as Billy went out the door.

“Ambushed. They were in this building the whole time. Snuck up on us after you left. Someone hit me with a bus or something.”

“And the van?”

He took a few breaths before continuing. I started getting really worried about him from the way he was acting. “So, one of them, a female, came out and drove off in the van. Said she was going to unload it and come back to pick everyone up after sundown.” He took a few more breaths. “What happened to the other two? What’d you do with them?” He wouldn’t look up when he spoke to me, and he slurred his words like a drunk.

“We ended up shooting them both. Look, are you okay?”

“Nope,” he said promptly. “Knocked me out I don’t know how long. Think I’m concussed.”

Billy came back into the room just then with a couple of pistols in his jacket pockets and an additional rifle. “So how about my van?” he asked.

Jake pointed at me with his left hand and then made a throwing gesture at Billy. I updated Billy on what had happened as quickly as possible. Lizzy looked like she was torn between holding onto me and checking on Jake; she kept stealing glances in his direction. Finally, she went over to him and rested her hand on the back of his neck. “You’re bleeding, Jake, from your head,” she said.

“Just a day fer… good news!” Jake rumbled and gave her a pat on the knee.

“So, she’s coming back with the van. I suppose we could wait for her.”

“Billy, no,” I said. “Look at Jake. He could have a concussion already. He’s in no shape to fight; he can’t even lift his head up.”

“Can,” Jake grunted. He lifted his head an inch and then put it back in his hand. “Uh… shit.” He burped softly.

“We don’t know if she’s coming back alone or with friends. I don’t want to have any more gunfights with my kid around, okay?”

“Think we killed enough people today already, Billy,” Jake said. “You get her a car?”

“Yeah,” Billy said. “Nice one.”

“Well, good. Let’s call this a draw and get out of here.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. It’s just…” Billy fanned his hands in the air, “there was a lot of good hardware in that van, man! It just galls the hell out of me. It’s galling.”

“Forget it,” Jake said. “We got the kid. Good enough. We get settled in Wyoming, I’ll drive all the way back to Nevada and get another load myself. We didn’t clean that whole place out by half.”

Billy brightened up at that. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

“Course I am. Now help me out of here before what’s-her-face comes back.”

Billy and I each took an arm and lifted Jake onto his feet. He grunted and moaned—some very unsavory things came out of his mouth. I felt naked walking out of there like that, with Jake draped over both of us and our weapons hanging uselessly from their slings. Goosebumps ran up my back as we passed through the door into the loading area with the line machines. That would have been a perfect time for a hidden someone to come jumping out at us. Such a thing never happened, thankfully.

When we got outside, the sun was sitting on the horizon under a red sky. Billy said, “He’ll ride with you. Put him up front and roll the window down. Don’t let him recline. Don’t let him fall asleep. Soon as we get a ways out of town, we’ll pull off the road, and I’ll see about cleaning him up.”

We almost made it to the Jeep before Jake stopped us to vomit. He couldn’t stand on his own, so we had to hold him up by his arms but let him bend over to have it all out. There wasn’t a great deal for him to get rid of, I imagined he hadn’t really eaten all day. While I was waiting for him to finish, I asked Lizzy to go grab a few bottles of water out of the pickup truck.

“What all was in that van?” I asked Billy as Jake was finishing.

“Mostly weapons, tools, ammunition and body armor, that kind of thing. It’s nothing we can’t live without, but it still hurts. That van constituted a major advantage for us in the way of gear and equipment. The loss of ammo truly hurts.”

“We’ll make do,” Jake groaned below us. We straightened him up. “We’ll find a way. Besides, we’re not totally helpless. Still have the duffel bag.”

“Sure, that’s fine,” Billy said as we started walking him slowly toward the passenger side of the Jeep. “We’ll have to get you set up again, though. Your M4 was in the van.”