Winchester Undead (Book 2): Winchester: Prey (19 page)

CHAPTER 42

The Basin

February 17, Year 1

Bexar heard the grumbling voices and the heavy boots kicking rocks on the trail before he could see them. His rifle and go-bag lay hidden in the brush behind a nearby tree. Bexar gripped his heavy CM Forge knife in his hands and knelt in the shadows behind a tree near the gate to the water tanks, the green blanket poncho further breaking up his outline.

“I don’t fucking know. All I know is that none of the cabins have water and these tanks might be the problem and I’m trying to get back on Russell’s good side after that botched pharmacy raid.”

“Seriously, what the fuck did you do with that?”

“I didn’t do anything. The other assholes used too much C4 and blew the fuck out of the Walmart.”

“It doesn’t matter. We need water to get started cooking down all that gear or we’re going to be in serious trouble when everyone runs out of the shit.”

“No shit, brother.”

The two bikers passed a few feet from Bexar; their cuts only had a curved patch on the back that labeled them as prospects, not full members of the club. He didn’t care. They were part of the bike gang, and therefore, they would die.

Bexar’s heart raced. He had used his knife to dispatch zombies, but he hadn’t killed a living person with a knife before. His mind flashed with a series of memories of horrific stabbing deaths that he’d worked as a patrol officer in what felt like a lifetime ago. His right hand squeezed the knife handle; Bexar took a deep breath and as quietly as he could stepped out from the bushes. The two prospects stopped at the gate to open it. Bexar took three fast steps and plunged the knife deep into the side temple of the biker on the right. Bexar’s knife stuck and was pulled out of his hand as the dead man fell to the ground in a crumpled heap. The second biker turned to face his dead buddy and stood with his mouth open, frozen in place from the surprise. Bexar’s right hand fell to his pocket and his old Emerson folding knife opened in a flash. Bexar took a step forward and jammed the full length of the blade into the base of the biker’s neck. This time Bexar was ready for the pull on the knife and kept a tight grip on the handle. The biker’s hands grasped his own neck; a sickening gurgle rattled from his mouth and the severed artery in his neck sprayed Bexar in blood as the biker fell to the ground.

Reaching down, Bexar put his boot on the side of the first biker’s face and pressed down while pulling his heavy knife out of the skull with a wet sucking sound. He cleaned the blood and small pieces of brain matter off his knives using one of the biker’s shirts before putting the knives away. Bexar searched the dead bodies and found more meth, some marijuana, and a glass pipe for the meth, and each of them had a pistol stuck inside his motorcycle vest. Bexar had no use for the drugs, but the pistols were each made safe and put in his go-bag. He then dragged the dead bodies to the other side of the tree line, shouldered his go-bag, slung his rifle, and walked through the trees to the back of the southernmost cabins. The back roofline nearly reached the face of the hill, so Bexar was able to easily and quietly climb onto the back side of the cabin’s roof. He took off his green wool blanket poncho and lay on the roof, covering himself with the poncho. The shingles were very cold against his body and Bexar hoped that the rising sun would help warm him up some more. Using the green blanket for warmth and as a blind, Bexar raised the cheap pair of binoculars he’d taken from the Terlingua store and surveyed the scene before him.

The cabins were the same, and Malachi’s Scout sat in the parking lot further down the mountain by the motels and the store. A very beat-up white van with no glass in any of the windows sat in the middle of the parking area for the cabins. A man with long hair smoking a cigarette walked out of view and back into Bexar’s old cabin, slamming the door shut. As much as Bexar wanted to bust into the biker camp like Chuck Norris in
Delta Force
, he knew better and decided to wait and observe. If he could figure out where Jessie was and pick off the bikers one by one in secret, he might actually succeed.

Marathon, Texas

Chivo stopped the Land Rover on the west side of town. The three of them stood on the roof rack of the SUV again; Apollo once again had his field glasses to his face, surveying the scene ahead of them.

“Looks like there are a couple of dozen walkers milling about in the street.”

Chivo had the laminated map square out of the notebook and in his hand. “I don’t really see a better way around the town. I think we would be better off driving through on the main road and dodge the walkers as we get near them.”

The three of them stood quietly, each trying to think of alternate plans. Lindsey broke the silence. “Well, if we’re going to do it, let’s quit waiting around and go do it.”

Apollo and Chivo looked at Lindsey with surprise and approval. It had only been a few days, but the woman in front of them was quickly changing to adapt to their new world.

They climbed back into the Land Rover, and Chivo drove them into town at a steady forty miles per hour, but slowed to thirty as they began nearing the first group of undead. Instead of trying to shoot clear a path, both of the side windows were closed and Chivo turned the steering wheel sharply left and right to dodge each new corpse in the town’s welcoming committee. As quickly as they entered, they were leaving Marathon and turning south on Highway 385, the zombies behind them left reaching for the vehicle as it vanished into the distance. Back into the open desert, Chivo pushed the gas pedal and brought the SUV up to a steady seventy miles per hour again.

A bit over half an hour later, Chivo slowed to pass by the white guard shack where the park staff took money to enter the park. The ranger station and the guard shack appeared to be deserted, but they didn’t stop to find out. Apollo dug out another laminated map and flipped through the pages before stopping on a topographical map of a mountainous area and tracing his finger along little gray lines, squinting to read the text next to them.

“According to Cliff, we need to check this area labeled the Chisos Basin. When the road T’s, take a right, go about ten clicks and take a left.”

A few minutes later, Chivo turned the Land Rover left and followed a sign with an arrow for the direction of the Chisos Basin.

“Pull over or drive past?” Chivo jerked his chin toward the road ahead.

Apollo squinted and looked ahead at the quickly approaching black speck in the distance.

“Drive past. We’ll see what he does.”

Chivo nodded and the black speck quickly grew in size until it roared by, traveling the opposite direction. It turned out to be a man on a motorcycle wearing blue jeans, black leather, and a vest with a bunch of patches sewn on it. Lindsey turned in her seat to look above all the gear and through the small piece of the back glass at the biker. Both Apollo and Chivo watched their side-view mirrors. The biker skidded to a stop before turning around and riding up on the Land Rover at a high rate of speed.

Apollo already had his seatbelt off and his pistol out, and he held it below the window where the rider wouldn’t be able to see it. The biker caught up to the Land Rover and pulled alongside the driver’s side. The rider reached under his vest with his left hand and drew a pistol, pointing it at Chivo. He yelled, “Pull over!”

Chivo smiled at the biker, who looked very confused at the man smiling at his pistol, before jamming on the Land Rover’s brakes and yanking the steering wheel to the left. The biker shot, but the round skipped harmlessly off the hood of the Land Rover. The corner of the bumper hit the back of the motorcycle and knocked it sideways. The biker dropped the pistol and tried to grab the handlebars, but the motorcycle turned sharply and high sided, throwing the biker off. He slid on the asphalt. The hard surface ground the skin off the biker’s left arm and the left side of his face. His right foot pointed at a ninety-degree angle away from his shin, but somehow the biker lived through the ordeal. Chivo stopped the Land Rover by the biker lying in the road. He and Apollo climbed out and walked over to him, finding him lying flat on his back in the middle of the road and yelling in pain.

“Hey guy, you should really be more kind to your arriving guests. I’m going to give your establishment a bad review on Yelp.”

The biker spat bloodily at Apollo; he kicked the biker’s broken ankle, resulting in another howl of pain. Chivo kicked the biker’s hand away from the broken ankle and put his boot on it. While stepping on the biker’s fingers, Chivo leaned over him. “So how many of you assholes are there up there?” he asked, pointing towards the Chisos Basin.

“Fuck you, wetback!”

Apollo raised his eyebrows at the racial slur the biker spat at Chivo, who replied by stomping his foot on the biker’s hand. The crackling sound of breaking bones could be heard over the man’s screams.

“OK
marica
, let’s try this again. How many of you assholes are up there?”

Gasping for breath through the pain, the biker replied, “Only eleven of us left.”

“Good. Now we’re getting somewhere. What sort of weapons do you have?”

“M-16s and a fifty-cal machine gun.”

Chivo looked at Apollo, and after years of working together, they exchanged their thoughts in a single glance. If the bikers had a machine gun emplacement deployed correctly, there was no way they could drive into the mountain basin without being ambushed.

“So those are what you have guarding the road?”

“No, no one is guarding the road,” the biker replied through gritted teeth.

Apollo smirked, “You’re a gang of idiots then.”

“Fuck you nig—”

The biker’s slur was interrupted by Chivo’s pistol firing a single shot, erupting the biker’s face and head in a geyser of blood.

“
No jodas, pendejo
. You can call me names, but you don’t call my brother names.”

Apollo grinned at Chivo. “Thanks buddy. Now what?”

“Statue of Liberty play, straight up the middle.”

Apollo nodded, and they climbed back into the Land Rover.

CHAPTER 43

The Basin

February 17, Year 1

Bexar thought he heard a shot echoing off the mountains, but it was very faint and he wasn’t completely sure. His head pounded and he felt nauseous; this was going to be a bad hangover. He snacked on a Snickers bar that he’d taken from the store in Terlingua, moving as slowly as he could to remain hidden. Bexar had never been in the military and never had any training as a sniper or in cover and concealment. All Bexar could rely upon was what he’d read in books like
American Sniper
to give him tips on what to do.

It was hard to keep count of the number of bikers in the basin; the binoculars just weren’t powerful enough to see the details down by the motels very well. Bexar also didn’t have anything to write on and was relying on his half-drunk encroaching hangover brain to keep track. There were the two he had already killed, but they didn’t matter anymore. Another had left on his motorcycle towards the exit of the basin about twenty minutes ago. There was the one he saw enter his old cabin, and so far he had counted seven others milling about doing various things. Mainly, he saw them drinking beer and smoking dope in small glass pipes. Bexar wasn’t sure what they were smoking, but from a distance it looked like either crack or meth.

Two mostly naked women went into his old cabin about thirty minutes ago, as best Bexar could tell, but they hadn’t come back out yet. Bexar guessed that that was the leader’s cabin since it was one of the nicest, and he hadn’t seen any women entering any of the other cabins.

Movement caught the corner of his vision, and he panned his binoculars towards the road entering the basin to see an old Land Rover driving up the road. The vehicle drove slowly and turned off the road behind the basin store. Bexar assumed it was more bikers and they were too far away for him to engage. So he continued to watch the store until two people moving slowly around the far side of the building caught his eye. He glimpsed a man in BDUs moving west, using the buildings for cover, carrying the largest rifle Bexar had ever seen. That kept Bexar’s attention until the man hit the low scrub of the desert floor and vanished like a ghost. Bexar held his breath and scanned with the binoculars, nearly convincing himself that the mix of alcohol, Vicodin, and the gunshot wound had him hallucinating. But he scanned back towards the store and saw the other two in BDUs moving up the road in a half jog before melting into the woods on the east side of the basin. He could have sworn that behind the black guy was someone with a blond ponytail, but it was hard to see with all the gear that guy had on.

Bexar was still trying to figure out who those new guys were and if they were a threat when he heard a woman scream. He panned his binoculars back towards his old cabin where the scream originated. One of the bikers he had killed with a knife had reanimated and was lumbering towards three women. Two of them were the ones that had gone into the cabin a while ago; the third one was completely nude and had her hands bound.

Bexar’s heart nearly stopped when he realized that the nude woman was Jessie. She was badly beaten, but she was there and she was alive! Bexar dropped his binoculars and pulled his AR up from his side, took aim, and fired a single shot through the skull of the zombie biker. The woman nearest the re-killed biker was splattered with fragments of skull and diseased brain matter, which she responded to by freezing in her tracks and screaming again. The rifle’s report echoed across the mountains. The biker with the ponytail erupted from the cabin and walked to the body of the biker, looked at the splatter of brain matter, and followed the path backwards and up the hill, seeing Bexar lying on top of the low cabin roof. The biker gang’s president locked eyes with Bexar’s before growing wide in surprise and then narrowing in anger.

The biker grabbed the first woman in reach and pulled her in front of his body, using her as a shield. He started backing up towards the cabin. Bexar looked at Jessie and at the retreating biker, and decided that if that woman led his nude wife into the parking lot bound by a rope, then she was a party to the gang’s violation of his family and friends and deserved what she got. Bexar lined up the reticle of his ACOG and squeezed the trigger. The woman’s head exploded in blood and brain matter. The biker fired his pistol wildly towards Bexar before Bexar could line up his follow-up shot. Four trigger pulls of the AR later, the biker with the pistol lay motionless on the asphalt. Jessie also lay on the ground, unable to move her hands. She rolled in pain on the ground, one of the biker’s pistol rounds having nicked her in the calf. Blood began flowing from her wound onto the pavement.

The bikers smoking dope ran towards the two dead bodies. One drew his pistol and started towards Jessie; Bexar shot him a half-dozen times before he fell to the ground. Bexar threw the poncho aside, did a tactical reload of his rifle, and slid down the front of the roof to the patio to run down the walkway as quickly as he could, limping along the way. The adrenaline was so high that the hangover seemed to vanish instantly.

Breaking into view from between the next row of cabins, Bexar saw that the white van on the other side of the parking lot was smoking. The other biker must have shot it as well as Jessie by mistake. Bexar slowed and knelt, shouldering his AR now that he had more shots on the other bikers, when the head of the biker lined up in his reticle exploded in a red mist. Then another and another before Bexar realized that the guy with the big rifle was taking out the bikers. Bexar lowered his AR and scanned the pavement for other threats. The remaining two bikers ran down the hill to his right; Bexar began to turn to line up shots on the escaping bikers when he heard the staccato fire of an AR being fired rapidly.

“Well shit yeah,” Bexar said out loud. He began to stand and noticed the white van had flames pouring out of the open holes where windows used to be. Suddenly, it felt like a giant punched him in the chest and knocked him off his feet onto the walkway behind the first row of cabins. Bexar’s mind had just started to process the roaring sound of the explosion that rolled over him when he felt a blank curtain fall over his eyes and mind. Then, blackness.