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

It was labeled ‘lights’ in a panel of a dozen other switches. Hidden in plain sight. Nobody would be driving away with it and he actually took the key out of the ignition, where it had been since the first day he drove it out of the garage in Atlanta. Liars are thieves and thieves are liars, he thought as he latched the door, hoping the keys worked the locks to get back in. He’d never tried them to see.

“Um, one other thing,” the colonel said, half apologetically. “We can’t allow anyone to be armed inside the walls. I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave your weapons in the car.”

Jessie looked at him, then pointedly at the three men with the rifles, none of them slung, two of the men with their fingers still on the triggers.

“No,” he said and held his eye. “That’s not going to happen.”

He saw the other men tense and grips were tightened on the rifles.

“But surely, young man, you don’t need all those guns inside the walls. It’s safe here. My Lord, you have two on your hips and I see bulges under your jacket. How many guns do you need?”

“All of them. But I’ll leave the grenades and rocket launchers in the car. How’s that?” Jessie asked and the colonel wasn’t sure if he was joking or not, but could see the kid wasn’t going to be bullied. They really did need help, despite what he tried to portray. Otherwise he never would have contacted Lakota. He needed to get something going or his people were going to desert for greener pastures, and he couldn’t have that. He was in charge and he was going to stay in charge. He couldn’t have everyone abandoning the compound. He’d worked too hard for too long to give it up now.

“Well,” he said magnanimously, “I guess we can make an exception for a presidential representative. I guess you are your own bodyguard, after all.”

Colonel Norris led him to his study and the guards followed, posting themselves outside the door. It had previously been the manager’s office, a grand space with windows overlooking the valley and views for miles.

They talked about the world situation, and more importantly the United States situation, for hours. The Valhalla Compound, as the colonel called it, had over a hundred survivors. They’d been a separatist group, living in a couple of cabins and some RVs on some land they’d bought. They were militant doomsday preppers and had a plentiful supply of guns and food and ammo, just waiting until the government declared martial law. That’s when they would have risen up with the rest of the Patriots and taken the country back from the globalist scum and the Democrats. A second American Revolution. When the liberals didn’t take over and the zombies did, they had fled to the hunting lodge and commandeered it. The colonel had generously taken in all of the surrounding people and organized the building of the wall. They had a five-year supply of food for his militia, but with all the others he’d saved, they were getting low. They only had a few months of the freeze-dried left.

The story came out in bits and pieces, the colonel giving out information grudgingly at first, but his tongue loosed when Jessie pulled a large flask of Crown Royal from his jacket. One of the bulges the colonel had been concerned about. Jessie was discovering he had a knack for ferreting things out and putting them together. He was learning to read the tales on people’s faces, when they were holding back, when they were lying. People seemed to think he was a little dense, maybe because of his scar or youthfulness. Maybe they thought they were getting the boy drunk when he matched them shot for shot. Whatever the reason, he learned things they probably didn’t mean to divulge. The conclusion he came to was the survivalists were a little nutty and had been living out their “we’re going to save the Republic” fantasies in the wilds of Idaho. Mostly harmless, the local law hadn’t found any reason to shut them down. They hadn’t been affected by the zombie virus, they were living off their long-term storage food and poaching. When they realized what was happening, the colonel had taken over the lodge, but he’d also taken in any survivors. Even the democrats. He might be an ass but Jessie couldn’t forget that he had saved a lot of people, even if he did run his compound like a mini dictator. Jessie also deducted that the so-called Colonel was a title he gave himself. Neither he, nor any of his militiamen, had served in the military. After training with soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines all winter, he had learned military discipline, the certain way a soldier carried himself, or moved in a certain fashion. These guys got all their training from YouTube videos or war movies. It took all kinds to make the world go ‘round, he kept telling himself. The guy wasn’t all bad. Just an ass. If there were laws against that, there’d be a lot of people in jail.

Dinner was a somewhat somber affair and the food was plain. Like the other places he’d visited, it was served cafeteria-style. It just wasn’t practical for everyone to cook for themselves, it was too wasteful.

Jessie sat at the head table, on a raised dais, with a few of the other “important” people. Although the food was bland, it was plentiful, but the people were kind of grayish. Many of them had on well-worn clothes, probably what they’d been wearing from the start, washed over and over again. The colonel hadn’t been kidding, they really didn’t go outside the walls. His militiamen had rigged up some sand filters for water, and there was a small spring-fed pond at the back of the property. They didn’t have power, everything was done as it was a few hundred