The Renegades (Book 4): Colony Read online

  THE RENEGADES 4

  BOOK FOUR: COLONY

  JACK HUNT

  CONTENTS

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Also by Jack Hunt

  Synopsis

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  YELLOW BRICK ROAD

  REUNION

  RIKERS

  THE HIVE

  SIPHON

  THE YARD

  GO TIME

  FRIENDLIES

  SHOOTERS

  TUNNELS

  GODFATHER

  COALITION

  A NEW HOPE

  MOBY DICK

  INFILITRATION

  FAUX FAÇADE

  RATS

  NEGOTIATIOR

  TURNCOAT

  SOUTHAMPTON

  FINALITY

  A Plea

  Newsletter

  About the Author

  Copyright © 2016 by Jack Hunt

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  THE RENEGADES 4: COLONY is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For Dax, Baja, Specs, Jess, Izzy, Wren, Ben and Elijah

  ALSO BY JACK HUNT

  The Renegades

  The Renegades Book 2: Aftermath

  The Renegades Book 3: Fortress

  The Renegades Book 4: Colony

  SYNOPSIS

  Weeks have passed since the fateful day in NORAD ended in tragedy. When the Renegades are sent to a ‘safe zone’ in New York called the Hive, things go horribly wrong and it’s up to this daring band of misfits to stop a rogue government.

  Shocking revelations are made, new allies formed and friendships will be pushed to the breaking point!

  Enjoy the little things in life, because one day you will look back, and realize they were the big things.

  UNKNOWN

  PROLOGUE

  I LAY my assault rifle down, press record, and stagger back.

  A green light blinks, waiting, just waiting for me.

  I stare. Come on, say something.

  It doesn’t care what it records, or who stands before it.

  Or even who I am.

  It only has one job...

  To capture and hold a snippet of time that might forever be lost.

  Lost.

  Found.

  What does it mean anymore? Does it matter?

  I wince, feeling another shot of pain as I look out at a burning sky. Its fiery palette of colors forms the backdrop for a world that once held it together.

  I scoff, registering the irony.

  Was it really ever that way?

  Together, I mean.

  I cough, crimson blood trickles from the corner of my mouth.

  So when did the world fall apart?

  Some will say the minute the infection spread.

  I once thought it was when a bullet entered my best friend’s head, or when Z’s tore apart my father in Castle Rock. Hell, anyone watching these recordings right now might think Salt Lake City was a low point and, they wouldn’t be wrong. Those were some royal assholes painting the city red.

  Still others might point to the moment I placed Jess, Izzy, and Ralphie on a chopper.

  Or lost Danielle to a lunatic who thought he was making us strong.

  My nostrils flare as I inhale the aroma of ocean salt and a mix of pungent death.

  No.

  That wasn’t it.

  If you must know — maybe it was when Dax died.

  But that’s not the truth.

  This is…

  YELLOW BRICK ROAD

  MIDNIGHT. Somewhere in Kansas, minus Toto and ruby red slippers.

  “There’s no place like home.”

  I never thought I would say it but it was true, I was actually beginning to miss that shitty old town of Castle Rock. Its blistering heat, the eclectic stores and gaudy saloons.

  Anywhere had to be better than here.

  Which reminds me, you might be wondering how I came to find myself hogtied, stripped down to tighty-whities, and smeared up to my neck in peanut butter. Now I would like to say it was all part of some weird, sexy dream involving the entire cast of Baywatch but no… unfortunately Pam couldn’t make this reunion.

  But Hasselhoff’s hillbilly cousin could.

  “I want a piece of his ass cheek,” the largest of them said as the other sharpened my bowie knife on a flat stone. Okay, so they were into eating ass and they needed to cut it with something. But seriously... my knife? C’mon!

  So how did I find myself in this predicament, you ask?

  It all began with a plan. That went wrong.

  Like they tend to when Baja is at the helm.

  Actually, to be fair it all started when we ran out of ammo and happened upon a campsite owned by a trio of cannibal hillbillies. Well, we didn’t know at the time they had a sweet tooth for chewing human wieners, we just saw an opportunity to steal ammo, food, and anything else we could get our mitts on.

  And, to be honest it might have worked.

  Except it didn’t and they didn’t have any ammo.

  Oh, did I forget to tell you, I had company? Yeah, Elijah couldn’t resist joining the asinine plan. Though I think he’d just got tired of Ben talking down to him like a naughty schoolkid.

  “Now what do you want? The white or dark meat?” one of them asked the other two.

  There were three of these freaks. And like the mythical hydra, they might as well have been joined at the hip as they were some ugly ass motherfuckers.

  Elijah craned his head up off the floor. “Hey, you know they say white meat is much better for your health than dark.”

  “Thanks,” I muttered as he threw me under the bus for first pickings.

  The man’s lips peeled back to reveal a set of rather nasty-looking teeth. “Is that so?”

  “Oh yeah, there was a study done. I’m surprised you boys didn’t hear about it. It’s all the rage now. Yeah, white meat has lower saturated fats. Dark meats are not good for you.”

  Now I would have palmed my forehead if I had a free hand.

  Instead I decided to join these great minds in a riveting discussion about whether or not they were going to tuck into my ass or my friend’s. Honestly, I don’t think it mattered at this point but when your ass is on the line, literally, you’ll do anything to gain a few more minutes.

  “Don’t listen to his shit. Sir, I couldn’t help notice you’re a little on the thin side, have a quite a bit of tooth decay going on, and your skin… ahhhhh… it’s a little pasty.”

  He narrowed his eyes and clenched his jaw.

  “Oh wait. No, that’s not a bad thing,” I let out a nervous chuckle. “It’s very reversible actually with the right amount of vitamins and a good dose of calories. Now I’m not an expert and I would never tell you what to do, but uh… I’m pretty sure they said dark meat contains more zinc than tuna and three times as much iron as spinach and… it holds a helluva lot more calories. And you know what calories mean, my friend? More meat on those bones. Oh, and here’s the best part, it can actually protect you against diabetes and high blood pressure.” I paused, nodding like a spasmodic turtle bobbing its head up and down. “And… the way that vein is popping out of your neck. Sir, I’m pretty certain you could lower the pressure a little.”

  “Really?”

  �
��Oh, you got to be kidding me,” Elijah said. “Sure, white meat has less fat and fewer calories but that’s only if you remove the skin. And everyone knows that’s the tastiest part. I mean seriously, it’s finger-licking good.”

  Elijah grinned at me. Of course I was quick to retort.

  “True, but you know what they say about the apocalypse.”

  “What?” the ugly one grunted.

  “The fat ones are always the first to go. It slows you down. No, you want to be lean. A lean, mean, fighting machine. And I got to hand it to you fellas. The reason you guys were able to take us down was because you were a lot leaner and faster than us. Yep, you got some superior genes working for you there. You don’t want to go fucking that up.”

  “Superior! Please,” Elijah exclaimed. “He’s talking out of his ass.”

  “Am I?” I jumped right back in before he could ramble any further. “Look, it’s like white and brown bread. Everyone thought white bread was so much more superior and better for you than brown. Who’s laughing now? Huh! Am I right?” I let out a nervous chuckle wondering where the hell Baja and Ben were.

  “Shut the hell up,” Hasselhoff’s cousin said, coming over and smearing more peanut butter on my forehead. “There, that should do it. Tonight, we eat like kings.”

  “Hey, Bo, turn the truck off, you’re wasting gas,” the other one hollered to his twin who was up inside a 4 x 4 Ford with oversized tires.

  “I’m listening to the radio.”

  That’s right, radio still existed. Now what station he was tuning into was anyone’s guess but with backup generators, battery power, and a country trying to communicate with anyone who wasn’t a Z, there were still some pretty sketchy broadcasts like the one he was listening to.

  The song “Cotton-Eyed Joe” was blasting out and seemed rather appropriate, and a sure sign that the world had finally gone to hell and lost the plot.

  The toothless wonder in front of me laughed. “He looks like a pig on a spit.”

  I felt a strong rumble beneath me just as Bo killed the engine. It was the sound I was relieved to hear.

  “That reminds me. You know what’s better than a pig on a spit?” I shot back.

  “What?” he said, turning again to tell his brother Bo to turn off the truck. But it wasn’t on.

  “A hillbilly impaled on the front of a battering ram.”

  Suddenly, crashing through the feeble gate they had set up around the perimeter of their campsite was Baja and Ben in a…. COMBINE HARVESTER?

  “What the hell? What happened to the Humvee with the battering ram on the front?” I asked Elijah over the noise of the hillbillies frantically yelling.

  Crawling into the camp at a top speed of 20 mph was a monster-size green combine harvester with a blood-red revolving reel that was chewing up everything in its path. The first lucky contender to be tossed around was poor old Bo. Blood, guts, and bones squirted in the air like an overpowered fountain. It was magic.

  Now, had these knuckleheads been armed with real weapons they would have likely taken out Baja and Ben with a few rounds, but they weren’t. No, all they had were machetes. Ben and Baja hopped off the sides of the monstrosity and began an assault on the remaining two maggots who looked like they had just stepped out of the movie The Hills Have Eyes.

  This was good news, at least until I realized what Baja had forgotten to do — kill the engine. So there we were lying on the floor, hogtied, covered in peanut butter, and looking to become the first human peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

  “Baja! Shut it off,” Elijah yelled.

  Unfortunately, you couldn’t hear a damn thing over the sound of sharp blades churning over.

  “Roll,” Elijah said to me as he began rocking back and forth. Yep, it was easier said than done. Try rolling when your feet are tied to your hands behind your back. But it was all we could do to try and escape. As I twisted to turn I caught a glimpse of Ben engaged in a full-out war with the Hoffmeister. My eyes widened as the combine crashed through a table, spitting wood in every direction.

  A few more feet and it would annihilate us.

  Elijah looked like a helpless turtle stuck on its back in the middle of a highway as a Mack Truck came barreling towards it.

  I glanced up just in time to see its long, sharp rotor blades coming down.

  This was it! This was how I was going to die.

  And all because of Baja’s need to play the all-American hero.

  Now most sensible people would have at least tried to avoid having their light snuffed out but something had clicked in me. Call it what you will, survivor’s guilt, insanity, or the effects of watching one too many Jerry Springer shows.

  But I didn’t move.

  In that final moment, as the combine blades got closer, I welcomed death.

  REUNION

  THE STRANGE THING with facing imminent death in this new world is it’s not as bad as you might imagine. Unless of course it comes at the hands of your harebrained compadre, then it’s just plain ridiculous.

  When I pried open my eyelids, I imagined I would see a colorful display of unicorns and a harem of naked women. Unfortunately, I was still very much alive, and staring up at Baja who was grinning like a complete buffoon.

  He offered us a hand, which considering our situation seemed a little absurd and quite frankly, insulting, so yes, in answer to any questions about what I would have done if free from my restraints — I probably would have kicked him in the dick if it wasn’t for that fact that I was still tied up like a Thanksgiving turkey.

  One slash of a knife and the pressure of rope against my skin suddenly loosened as the bonds dropped. Instinctively Baja backed up, anticipating that I would go all Jackie Chan on his ass. But, when you’ve been bound for over an hour, the joints tend to seize up.

  I groaned, untangling myself from the awkward yoga bow position with all the speed of an old-age pensioner.

  “You idiot, you could have killed us,” Elijah screamed, hauling himself up and slamming Baja hard up against the side of the now stationary combine. Ben immediately intervened.

  I didn’t say anything. I got up, brushed off dust, and went about finishing the search we had begun on the property before the hillbilly triplets bamboozled our plan.

  “Johnny, why didn’t you attempt to move?” Elijah asked.

  I wasn’t sure what had pissed Elijah off more. What Baja had done or what I hadn’t.

  “Siphon the vehicle, we need to leave,” I said, not answering his question. The truth was I really wasn’t sure why I didn’t. As that blade rushed towards us, I kind of wished it had rolled over me. The loss of my brother had practically turned me into a shell of my former self.

  Daily, Dax’s words echoed in my thoughts.

  “What we are fighting for?”

  “Each other,” I had replied. Now I wasn’t sure.

  We left camp hillbilly with zero ammo, zero food but a large amount of gasoline that would hopefully last the remainder of the twelve-hour journey. Elijah wanted to take the 4 x 4 but that thing was a gas-guzzler if I had ever seen one. Even with a full tank we wouldn’t have made it much further than Kansas City.

  We drove east, taking I-70. It was the most direct path to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. It would take us through the cities of St. Louis and Indianapolis. Of course like Kansas we had to take a few detours to avoid large herds of Z’s. It had slowed us down but allowed us to find food in small towns along the way.

  The world had gone to hell. The further east we drove the fewer living people we met. Between Cheyenne Mountain and Wright-Patterson our days became a routine of putting in as many miles as we could, stopping in tiny, off-the-beaten-path towns and scavenging for food. We bathed in rivers, and hunkered down in buildings waiting for large groups of the undead to pass.

  I would have to say it was a miracle that we made it to Wright-Patterson with all our limbs intact but we did. Not that the world around us hadn’t attempted to anally probe us at every turn i
n the road. It had and what a fuckfest it was.

  As we approached the entry point to Wright-Patterson just east of Dayton we fully expected to find no one there. Our track record for coming across people alive since leaving was low. To our surprise that wasn’t the case here.

  Four military trucks came rushing towards us before diagonally blocking the entrance road. Out of the back at least ten military personnel jumped out wearing camo fatigues and aiming assault rifles. They barked their orders loud and clear, making sure that we knew if we made them nervous we’d be eating bullets for breakfast.

  “Get on the floor now.”

  One by one we hopped out with our hands behind our heads and hit the tarmac. The ground was slippery and wet. The sky had opened up only half an hour earlier, turning the roads into slick death traps.

  “Identify yourselves.”

  “Friends of ours are here at the base.”

  Several of them removed our assault rifles from the jeep while the others zip tied us. Not that it mattered, without ammo we were using our weapons as baseball bats. But the zip ties, that I objected to. The sweet memory of the triplets was still fresh in my mind and I began to feel myself choking up with pure emotion. One of them got on the radio and spoke with his commanding officer.

  “Who are your friends?”

  “Jessica and Izzy,” Baja yelled.

  We couldn’t be certain that either of them was alive. We were going on a hunch and a message scribbled in blood. He relayed back what we’d told him to his superior. For a moment I had a feeling they were going to cut us loose and send us on our way with a bullet in our ass. Thankfully that wasn’t the case.

  “Get up. Let’s go.”

  They strong-armed us back to their idling trucks and one of them drove back our jeep. In the back we bumped around, looking at each other wondering how this one was going to pan out. Truthfully, I really didn’t care as long as it didn’t involve peanut butter or combine harvesters.

  “So which one of you is Iceman?” Baja asked, grinning. “I feel the need, the need for speed, right?” He nodded his head up and down as if they hadn’t heard that before.