Zombie Road: The Second Omnibus | Books 4-6 | Jessie+Scarlet Simpson, A. (pride and prejudice read txt) 📖

as they headed west, then watching the signature of dozens of fires spring up every night. Carson had made it clear that they wouldn’t have the satellites for much longer. He had no way of controlling them, he could only access what they were downloading. Without the gentle nudges from the engineers, or the computers keeping them on their path, their orbits were slowly getting out of sync. Only a little at first, but a few centimeters out of route became a few meters, then a few kilometers, then one by one, they would be pulled back into the atmosphere to burn up on reentry or hurled out into space. He had a few more months, Carson had said. After that, nothing was guaranteed. Systems started breaking down, minor glitches became major problems, and all they could do was watch some of man’s most advanced creations wind down and end an era that may take centuries to be duplicated.

Another month, Gunny thought as he used a screwdriver to dig chunks of old meat out of the undercarriage. No more. I need to get a posse together and go after him. Casey couldn’t be allowed to leisurely build an army, then come at them when they were blinded, when the satellites were gone.

Jessie had done a pretty good job of beefing up the car, making it zombie proof with the few resources he had on hand, but they were going to do it up right. Gunny knew the boy had to get out. If he tried to make him stay, he’d just take off in the middle of the night, half-cocked and unprepared. This way, if they built him the best car they possibly could, he should be relatively safe. Even from Casey’s band of idiots, or that group up north who had beaten him so badly then gave him a miracle medicine. He would make a good emissary and they needed to start banding the settlements together. Making the nation whole again with pledges of mutual support and trade between the fortified towns.

The old Mercury body was in decent shape, it had been a southern car and only had a little rust around the fenders. Gunny had gone through the mechanics over the years, replacing the tired flathead V-8 with a 429 Cobra Jet he pulled out of an old police car. Mechanically the car was sound, they’d tinkered with it all winter. He’d rebuilt the engine to run on pump gas and it would run forever. Nothing too radical, just a healthy cam and some headwork. Parts were easy to find and it was easy to work on with just basic hand tools. There were no fancy electronics to fail, no engine fault codes to cause it to shut down for some unknown reason. It was old school and dependable. He had a top loader four-speed transmission mated to it, so even if the battery was dead, it could still be push started. He was satisfied with most of the drive train, he wanted to reinforce the body and then improve the running gear. He wanted it to be able to take off-road punishment if needed. Jessie had used a hacksaw on the fenders to cut away metal so the oversized Jeep tires would fit, but Gunny wanted something better. Something a little more industrial. Captain Wilson was bringing in a handful of Hummers from the McAlester Army Ammunition Plant on his next run down and Gunny wanted the tires from one. They were run-flat and Jessie wouldn’t have to worry about hitting a nail, or in a worst-case scenario, having them shot out by one of Casey’s goons. Another thing he’d asked for was flack vests. S-4 would have crates of them over in supply and he wanted to line the car with a triple layer. Especially the doors and fenders to protect the driver, the motor, and the fuel supply.

Tommy was already busy up front unbolting the gold plated, blood-encrusted, push bar Jessie had installed. He was going to weld one up that looked a lot better, fit the contours of the car, and was tied into the frame. Julio and Sammy were wiring in the three stage wet foggers for the Nitrous Oxide system in case he needed a little extra go power. They’d replaced the gas with medical grade NOS, it didn’t have the sulfurs in it like automotive grade did. It still came out of the bottle a hundred degrees below zero, it still added hundreds of raw horses, but in an emergency, it could be used for other things besides making the car go faster.

Gunny caught Lacy’s eye as she measured for drapes and they shared a look. A little sad, a little happy. Their boy was spreading his wings. They couldn’t keep him in the nest any longer, but at least they were preparing him the best they could for what was out there. Unspoken between them, they were doing everything possible to put off the inevitable. He had agreed to wait until spring, the middle of winter was no time to be testing out new equipment and new routes. They had worked on the car for the past few months, getting it right, and he’d continued training with the militia. It couldn’t be called the army because the Marines had refused to be a part of it, threatened to start their own branch if it came to that, so they had settled on Militia. Everybody was happy. Sort of. But they made it work.

Jessie already had real-world experience, now he was learning from some of the best soldiers left alive. They were teaching him heavy machine guns, long distance shooting, hand to hand combat, field medicine, and train, train, train on his preferred weapons. Day in and day out, they drilled. Many of those that joined the Militia as full-time members hadn’t been infantry, many of them had been out of the service for years and were out of shape,