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

“Guys,” Jake said, sitting forward in his chair.

Far across the valley, we saw headlights emerge from the overlapping tree lines of the cleft entrance. The vehicle slowly rolled into the valley over the dirt road. When it had advanced fifty feet, a second set of headlights appeared behind it.

Billy jumped up from his chair while pulling his keyring from his pocket. “Elizabeth, you come with me right now.” He looked at Jake and me as he passed. “You two get your rifles but keep them low.”

Jake was already moving for the front door as Billy and Lizzy disappeared off the side of the porch. He came back with my rifle, his AK, and Billy’s shotgun. He laid each on the table and then handed me the Tavor. As I checked the chambers of first the rifle and then my pistol, I heard the roll-up door of the garage cycle up and then back down again. Jake had gone back inside the house.

Billy hurried back up onto the porch and picked up the shotgun to check it. He racked the pump to load a shell into the chamber, then pulled one off the sidesaddle and thumbed it into the tube magazine to top it off.

“You locked the garage?” I asked.

“Yeah. I left the keys inside with her. The locks can be opened from the inside without the key. She’s safe for now.”

Jake emerged from the front door carrying the two protective vests. He handed one to me, which I pulled on hastily, and offered the other to Billy, who turned it down. “You wear it, Jake,” he said. “Shit happens to you more often anyway.”

The vehicles were about halfway to the house by this point. The light had been low since before they entered the valley with the sunset hidden behind the rim; it was now downright dark.

Billy looked over to me: “Get inside the house and see what kind of vantage you can get in the front room. Keep it dark in there and crack a window for your barrel.”

I complied, grabbing my mag pouch hanging by the front door as I went and breathing deep to calm my nerves. I could feel my heart hammering away. I picked a window that gave me a wide viewing angle of the whole entryway and porch and then slid it open just far enough to give my rifle a good range of motion. I pulled over a footstool to sit on so that I wouldn’t have to shift around while crouched, which could cause movement that might be seen.

“Think it’s the squatters?” I heard Jake ask through the window.

“No way to tell but I’d say likely so,” Billy said.

“How do you want to do this?”

“Play it by ear,” answered Billy. “Keep that thing handy but keep it muzzle-down for now. No reason to think they’re not friendly until they prove otherwise.”

“Very well,” said Jake and I heard him work the action on his rifle. The sound of slow footsteps across the planks of the porch told me he was spreading himself out from Billy’s position.

Billy stood within my field of view off to the left, waiting. The vehicles (two full sized trucks) were just pulling up to a stop. They left the headlights on, bathing the porch and house in a harsh light that washed out all color. It was hard to see them when they got out, but I counted seven as they came to stand in front of the trucks. Positioned in front of the light as they were, it was impossible to make out any feature, build, dress, or attitude. I could see that they were armed.

Everyone regarded each other silently for a few moments before Billy said, “Well, hi there!”

I heard the sound of someone scoffing from their general direction. A disembodied voice said, “Uh… evening.”

Without missing a beat, Billy continued, “I’m guessing you were the fellas who came through this way about a week or so ago?”

“Yeah, that was us.”

“Thought so.” Billy shifted his weight over to his other leg. He was holding his shotgun out in front of him though it wasn’t pointed at anyone in particular. I couldn’t see Jake at all. I swept my rifle barrel over the entire group to make sure I could get all of them from my position (it required me swinging the butt of the weapon rather than moving the muzzle) and then put the red dot on the one in the middle. “Didn’t know if you guys would be coming back or not. Been a while.”

“We were out hunting up supplies. Didn’t occur to us that someone would find their way back here and make themselves at home. We figured it was well hidden.”

“Well, as to that,” Billy said apologetically, “I knew this place was here because it’s actually my home.”

“Say what, now?”

“This is my home. From before. I bought the land and built the place from the ground up. Been working on it for years. I was planning on retiring here. You guys must have just stumbled across it.”

“Hey, what the fuck is this?” another voice from the group spoke up. It was hard to tell where from, but he sounded like he was on my left. “Any asshole could claim that shit—how do we know this particular asshole…”

The original speaker of their group interrupted, “Hold on, Doug. Just calm down. Ain’t no call to go there just yet.” Addressing Billy, he said, “My rude friend does have a point, though, right? You could just be some random couple of guys, couldn’t you?”

“You fellas have spent some time in the house, haven’t you?”

“Yes, yes we have.”

“Get a good look at any of the pictures in there?”

“Gawd damn!” a third voice said from the right of the group. “I knew I recognized him; he’s that guy that was in the picture with the Terminator!” A few other voices muttered at this, betraying recognition.

The first speaker was silent a while before he said, “Emmet, kill those lights.” They did so, placing the porch in sudden darkness. Off to the left, Jake turned on an electric lantern we had hanging off a nail from one of the eaves. Everyone was bathed in a soft, muted glow and the men before us were suddenly a lot less menacing. They looked like a group of regular people that had been living hard on the road, just like us, with various layers of all-weather clothing and a motley assortment of firearms. Some of them didn’t even have decent rifles; they stood there with revolvers or whatever else they had managed to pick up on the road.

“Well… shit,” said the original speaker, who I could now confirm was in the middle of the group. “Look, what’s your name?”

“Billy. This is Jake.”

The man nodded and gave a small wave to both. “I’m Howard. Look, uh, I’m not quite sure where to go from here. We never really counted on the original owner of this place coming back for it, you know? The problem is we were all counting on this place for our survival. It’s not just the house; the location was a big piece of this. Being set back and hidden the way it is in this valley, I figure it will escape the notice of any passersby.”

“Yap, I getcha,” said Billy but offered no more.

“Yeah, well, right now things are kind of quiet with the exception of the odd evil asshole you run into on the road, but I have a feeling things aren’t going to stay that way. Just look at my group, here.”

“You guys are a bunch of evil…?”

“No, no, that’s not what I mean,” said Howard, waving his hands. “What I meant is that we all sort of gravitated to each other over time, see? I was on my own when this whole thing kicked off. Then I ran into Emmet, Trey, and Paul. Later, after that, we picked up Doug and his boys. Point is, people were scattered for a bit, but they’re going to start collecting back into groups again, building up their strength and such, like we did. I have a feeling we have some serious Mad Max shit in store when some of these groups get bigger. All depends on who ends up in charge.”

“And your point is you’d just as soon wait the whole process out in a secluded area to see if your theory is right or not,” Billy finished for him.