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

“Shut up, back there, will you?” Rebecca snapped.

Oscar jerked in his seat but seemed to understand her anger. His voice was very small when he said, “Yeah, you got it. Sorry, hermana …”

The Ford Super Duty—an abused death machine that had once carried her cargo across two states in one of the bloodiest, one-sided battles of the newborn era—finally emerged into the Bowl just before eight o’clock that morning. Even with the new buildings they’d towed in and established last year with the help of Warren’s people, not to mention the additional greenhouses and campers serving as visual obstructions, the occupants of that truck could see something was off. Between the low, huddled white tubes of their enclosed gardens, they could see a press of people out on the communal ground, crammed in tightly together and sitting in chairs. There were others close by, standing on the outside perimeter. As they advanced, the scene shifted subtly behind those buildings that obscured it, making it difficult to take a head count or, in many cases, to even identify people. After a minute or so of rolling forward at a crawl, Jake seemed to lose his patience with this and swung out wide to the right due north toward the dried out stream bed. He gave the engine a quick squirt of fuel to jump out of the deep-furrowed wheel ruts of the trail and the truck clipped up onto the long grass like a spirited foal, rocking back and forth over the uneven troughs of earth.

He drove on in that lateral direction for a hundred feet or so before turning the Ford back toward the cabin, aiming it straight at the porch steps along the narrow alley between the last greenhouse (slightly smaller than the original three due to their ready supply of Solexx running out during construction) and Olivia Lee’s home. With their line of sight now clear, they were able to see the crowd collected at the cabin’s doorstep.

It appeared to be everyone left behind during the assault—the adults; Patty and her collection of children, Otis and Ben…

No, not everyone then. Alish wasn’t there… nor was Greg. They didn’t see Olivia either. Nor did they find, even after repeated scans, Andrew, Isaiah, or Victor. Instead, seemingly as a replacement, a ring of unfamiliar men surrounded the collection of their family; Gibs estimated their number somewhere north of fifty at a glance.

Of primary concern: everyone sitting in chairs was unarmed and unarmored. All of the men standing carried rifles of some sort; some of them even appeared to have belt-fed weapons. The directions in which the muzzles of these pointed were divided between the people sitting in the chairs and their advancing pickup truck.

Amanda’s hands and feet chilled down to ice at the sight of this; a thousand words and phrases suddenly whipping through her mind like dead leaves in a whirlwind. She reached out tentatively and pulled at Jake’s wrist. He didn’t attempt to hold her hand, knowing she would rebuke such a gesture, but he did extend his arm out for the plunging, stabbing knives of her fingernails. She plowed into the flesh of his arm like it was soft earth in her fear, her fury. He accepted this abuse silently as he drove up the alley.

In the back seat, Gibs said nothing. There came the ratcheting sound of his rifle’s action as he brass-checked its chamber but nothing more.

A knot of men broke off from the greater body and strode cautiously to the truck as it idled down to a complete stop, rifles high and eyes narrowed. They gestured at the three newcomers in the truck, mouthing silent, unknown words whose meaning was clear as the light of the climbing sun, lifting always higher into the sky to chase away the tattered remainder of the previous night’s rainclouds.

Jake killed the engine wordlessly and extracted the key from the ignition. Gibs took a brief moment to consider how they might fight this out; realized a fraction of a second later that they could not win. He thought of ducking for the radio to signal the others, but before he could act, Amanda spoke in a gasp that was almost a wail.

“Elizabeth!”

Gibs looked again and saw her, hidden back behind the others in the center of the gathering. She sat very close to Otis’s side, resolute and unmoving. Amanda exited the truck before he realized she’d opened the door, leaving her rifle behind to lay against the front seat. She was driving ahead even as her feet hit the ground, striking her shoulder on the doorframe and nearly spilling to the dirt before regaining her balance in a clumsy double-step, the awkwardness of which alarmed Gibs mightily—he’d never in his life seen Amanda appear ungraceful on her feet. She continued on past the armed men, not even bothering to acknowledge their existence, and for a wonder, they allowed her to pass. They knew it seemed—either who she was or… perhaps the look in her eyes warned them away from any interference. If some sort of peaceful resolution was their intent, it was quite possible that they realized the act of hindering this woman might forsake all possible hope of such an outcome. Despite the exhaustion permeating Gibs’s mind, seeming to dull his very soul, he found this to be a hopeful sign.

“ It’s not exhaustion ,” some voice inside of him warned. “ You know that, don’t you? ”

Shut up , thought Gibs.

“It’s the not knowing…”

Shut up.

“…not knowing the righteous act from the profane…”

Shut… the fuck… up.

The voice did, and Gibs sighed, feeling no better.

“We should leave our weapons in the truck,” Jake said. “We can’t risk any jumpy nerves out here. With such a large group.”

“Yeah…” Gibs agreed. He climbed from the truck uneasily, favoring creaking, old knee joints, and waited.

When Jake exited the cab, three armed men broke off from the welcoming committee and moved to stand close by. A voice called out from the cabin, orating in an easy pour recalling saddle soap and bourbon. Old cowboy movies. It said, “Bring those over here, huh?”

“That’s Clay,” Gibs whispered, eyeballing the man awaiting them on the porch. Clay leaned against the railing, weight of his body posted upon straightened arms, head hung low between the shoulders like he read a newspaper pinned under the palms of his hands. He maintained this position as Jake and Gibs approached, looking up only when they stood close enough that he might have reached out to touch them. He looked down on both men from his elevated vantage, eyes rocking back and forth like a tired metronome before widening suddenly at Amanda’s approach. The men who brought Jake and Gibs forward tensed at her arrival but soon relaxed when Clay shook his head at their lowering rifles. The collected knot of people on the common ground, prisoner and captor alike, were held enthralled in spectation.

“You’re the girl’s mother, aren’t you?” Clay asked.

“I want to know who struck her,” Amanda hissed.

Clay had either the good sense or the common decency to show chagrin at this; he shifted his weight and said, “If I have the last twenty-four hours straight in this addled excuse for a mind—and let me aver: that’s a close fucking thing these days—you’ve already killed him.”

He nodded at the flash of surprise on her face and continued, “I’ve come up here to get right with you people, huh? Brought back your little errant waif of angelic innocence (Christ help us all), with the intent to straighten out certain… items.”

“What happened here?” Gibs demanded. He didn’t add that he noted the absence of certain of his people, fearful they yet hid up in the mountains avoiding detection—he was wary of outing them through a careless phrase or question.