The Renegades (Book 4): Colony Read online

  On the outside the metal shutters were down. It was smothered in black spray paint and smeared with blood and shit. All a good sign, if you were mentally disturbed or just enjoyed the fragrant aroma of someone’s inner bowels. Elijah and Jess kept a nervous eye on the street.

  “What do you think?”

  “We could go up the fire escape or down the through the basement entrance.”

  He was scouting both of them.

  “You really are determined to get inside.”

  “Shutters are a good sign.”

  “Not ones covered in shit.”

  “It means someone is trying to keep people away.”

  I nodded slowly. “Or someone didn’t make it to the bathroom in time.”

  He stifled a chuckle and hopped over the metal railing that cordoned off the staircase that led down to a thick red metal door. Ben tugged on it a few times but there was no chance we were getting through that.

  “The fire escape it is then,” he muttered.

  There was only one problem with the fire escape. It led up to the second and third floors that were beside the gun shop.

  I jumped up and grabbed the flimsy excuse of a ladder. My body weight pulled it down without a problem but it wasn’t in good shape. One by one we ascended the rickety metal steps. I then used my tire iron to smash the window on the second floor.

  We entered an apartment above a restaurant. By the lack of people rushing at us with guns or looking to bite us, we figured they had abandoned the place.

  “Right, smart-ass, now what?” Izzy asked.

  Ben went up to the dividing wall and tapped it with the end of his tire iron. He continued doing this until he was satisfied that a beam or brick wasn’t behind it. Then, applying as much force as he could, he slammed the tire into the drywall. White dust exploded everywhere, sending us all into a coughing fit, except for Elijah who was using his bandana.

  “Well, don’t stand there, give me a hand.”

  Jess kept an eye on the window while the rest of us began beating the living shit out of the drywall. It didn’t take long to break through, however we didn’t find ourselves in the next apartment. There was a gap full of insulation and when we tore that away, bricks.

  Sweat was pouring down my back.

  “Another great idea, Ben,” Elijah said.

  “I don’t hear anything coming from you.”

  “That’s because I save the best for last. I just wanted to see you make a fool of yourself.”

  “Ah suck a big one,” Ben said, taking a few steps back from the wall and sighing.

  “Right,” Elijah said. Without telling us what he was up to, he exited through the window. We assumed he had gone back down the ladder as we could hear his boots clattering around. A few minutes later we heard the sound of glass shattering. I poked my head out the window and gazed down, then up. That’s when I saw him balancing on a ledge, holding onto a drainpipe with one hand while the other hand smashed the upper window to the gun store. He looked down and grinned.

  “Coming?”

  He disappeared inside.

  “At least one of us is thinking around here,” Izzy said, tossing Ben a scowl. Like a chain gang we moved in a line slowly across the ledge until we were all inside. I was the last one in. I ducked my head and hopped in. I was brushing myself off when I noticed all of them were standing up against the wall looking perturbed. My gaze followed theirs to a guy standing in the doorway holding an AR-15.

  “Glad you could you join us,” he said. “Now get over there and drop the tire iron down along with the others.”

  I shuffled off to the side and took in my surroundings. The room was dank-looking. Two lone beds, a closet, and a smashed TV set. The guy was in his late fifties. He had silver-white hair, a goatee, and a black patch over his left eye. He was swishing something around in his mouth. He spat a black glob of spit into a bucket beside him.

  “Now I have to ask myself, why is Hive security breaking into my store?”

  Baja stepped forward.

  “Well you see, sir…”

  He aimed his gun. “Boy, unless you have an itchy ass, I did not tell you to move.”

  “Right,” Baja said, slinking back into his spot like a limp dick in a haggard foreskin.

  “We are not security for the Hive.”

  “Then explain why you are wearing their uniforms?”

  I glanced at Ben.

  “Don’t look at him. Tell me why?”

  “We were sent out to find the Coalition and bring back anomalies. Those who are immune to the virus.”

  “There is no one immune to the virus.”

  “That’s not what we’ve been told.”

  He looked me over suspiciously. “What do you know about the Coalition?”

  “Not much. They are some resistance group.” I paused. “Look, you think you can lower the gun? We don’t mean you any harm. We were just hoping to find some weapons.”

  “Steal, you mean?”

  “Well, it’s not like anyone pays for anything anymore,” Elijah said.

  “Does that give you the right to barge into a man’s home? I could shoot you right now and go to sleep with a clear conscience.” He sniffed. Right then a young girl came running up behind him, she couldn’t have been more than twelve years of age.

  “Hannah, I told you to wait. Now go on back.”

  She peered at us. She had dirty blonde hair and a hoodie on that had the word, Shooters on the front.

  “Are they here to take me?”

  The man glanced at us, nervously trying to juggle the rifle while pushing her back.

  “No, hon, we aren’t,” I replied.

  “Shut up. Did I tell you, you could speak?” He glanced at Ben who appeared to be edging his way closer. “And you, get back. Don’t think for a second that I won’t drop you.”

  “Listen, if you wanted us dead, you would have shot us by now. Now, why don’t you go ahead and lower the gun and we can just talk.”

  He narrowed his eyes, lowered the gun ever so slightly, and shot the floor in front of Ben’s feet. “The next one is going in your belly.”

  Ben tossed his hands up and shuffled back.

  “Hannah, go get me the zip ties.”

  She stood in place, her young eyes sweeping over us.

  “Hannah,” he yelled again. This time he turned. Perhaps it was ludicrous, or no longer caring if I lived or died, but I used that split second to rush at him. Now I would like to say the gun didn’t go off, but it did. He had age and speed working against him but I had the disadvantage of distance. Instead of trying to grab the gun from him, I just plowed into him like an NFL football player looking to make a touchdown.

  We slammed hard against the floor.

  His nostrils flared as he fought to stay in control but it was useless. Elijah wrestled the gun away from him while Ben and I held him down. Once he was completely overpowered he turned into a blubbering mess. I had to admit it was a little strange. Only a moment ago he was acting like his nads were made of rocks, now he was embarrassing himself.

  “Hannah, run.”

  Instead, the girl he was trying to protect came rushing to his side, telling us to leave him alone. He began sobbing.

  “Mister, we aren’t going to hurt you. We’re the good guys, believe it or not,” Baja added.

  “Now I’m going to release you, are you going to behave?” Ben asked.

  He nodded.

  Ben gestured for me to release his other arm. He immediately hugged the young girl. They huddled together tightly. As they did I noticed something on the girl’s arm.

  “She’s been bitten.”

  Elijah aimed the gun at her.

  We all backed up and the man wrapped himself around her. “Don’t you dare,” he yelled at Elijah.

  “Back away from the girl.”

  “She won’t harm you.”

  “She’s infected, now move.”

  “Please listen to me.”

  “I won
’t tell you again.”

  I pushed in. “Elijah.”

  His finger was dancing around near the trigger, the gun pressed firmly back into his shoulder.

  “Please, she won’t change.”

  “That’s what they all say.”

  “She won’t.”

  “Are you out of your mind?”

  “She’s an anomaly,” he blurted out. A silence fell over us all.

  Elijah cocked his head. All of us looked at her as if we were witnessing a new breed of human. We weren’t sure whether to believe him or not.

  “Show them,” he urged Hannah.

  She pulled back the sleeves over her arms to reveal gnarly bite marks, she then lifted her top and showed us several more on her stomach. Besides the appearance of teeth marks, and skin torn back in some areas, it looked no different than any wound that had healed. It wasn’t fresh or covered in the usual vein-popping sights that made you gag. Instead, all that remained was unsightly scarring.

  Elijah backed up and lowered the rifle.

  “How long since she was bitten?” Ben asked.

  “Since she lost her mother. Maybe a month ago.”

  “You’re her father?”

  He nodded.

  That’s why he was crying; he was trying to protect her. He must have thought the Hive was coming to collect. We spent a few minutes just staring at her. It was hard to believe that anyone could survive but right now we were looking at the first sign of real hope. Like a candle’s flame flickering in darkness, it was a glimmer. But that was enough.

  “If you need weapons I have some but I’m going to need you to board up that window.”

  I glanced back at the mess we had made. It would have made it easy for more Z’s to get through. At one point it wouldn’t have mattered but after seeing the way those mutated Z’s had climbed like spiders, it brought a whole new level of fear into the mix.

  We helped him up and spent the next twenty minutes boarding up the window with a large piece of drywall and chipboard. It wasn’t ideal but it did the job. Elijah banged on it hard just to give it one last check.

  As he led us down into the gun store I asked him a question.

  “Have you seen Hive security pass through here before?”

  “Every day. They don’t usually stop.”

  “What about the Coalition? Do you know where we could find them?”

  “I don’t, but I know a man who can help.”

  We continued on down the staircase. Outside we could hear the sound of Z’s banging against the metal shutters, eager to get inside. Their snarls and moans reminded us of the risk. We were stranded in the middle of one of the biggest cities in America, surrounded by the undead.

  TUNNELS

  WE’D HIT the mother lode.

  Initially Chuck Raynor, the owner of Shooters, took us into the main store on the ground level, which carried all your regular-style handguns and shotguns. Though, most of them were gone. He told us that police and military were the first ones to scoop them up. We learned that before the infection went crazy, police made most of the purchases. However, he had a hidden stockpile of weapons stashed away behind a false wall. It was packed with AR-15’s, machetes, and Magnum revolvers.

  When Chuck said police had been his top customers, I think Ben felt vindicated.

  “So you don’t remember this guy?”

  “Different owner back then,” Ben muttered as we feasted our eyes on a buffet of weapons. It was a tough choice. I picked up a Mossberg 500, 12-gauge pump-action shotgun and peered down at the front sight before laying it down and selecting a different one. I felt like a kid in a candy store.

  “You’re going to need new clothes too,” Chuck said.

  “I was just getting used to this,” Baja said.

  “You might as well paint a bull’s-eye on your back, no one will trust you in those clothes.”

  Chuck nodded his head in the direction of a small turnstile rack of sandy-colored tactical pants, jackets, and ball caps. By the time we were kitted up we all looked as if we were about to head out into the wilderness. But in reality we were. Outside, the city barely resembled anything like what you would see on a postcard or in a travel brochure. It was full of predators that would tear us apart.

  “Tell me, what happened to the city?” I asked Chuck.

  He got this faraway look in his eyes as if he was recalling a traumatic event. “When it all kicked off there were riots. People looting stores. I guess the average person didn’t realize what was going on. I had pulled down the shutters to prevent people coming in. Then I saw those things clawing into people. My wife was still out at the time with Hannah.” He paused for a minute to compose himself. “I went to meet her at one of the local stores but it was just overrun with people running into each other, biting and tearing one another apart. I barely made it out of there with my life. That was the first time I shot someone. He just kept coming at me. I told him to stop. He couldn’t have been more than sixteen years of age. I blew his head off.” He breathed in deeply. “Anyway, I located my daughter and wife but she was already dead. She had managed to get our daughter into one of the washrooms before she took her last breath.”

  “Did you kill her?”

  He looked at me as if I was insane. “No. I grabbed Hannah and ran. That’s when I noticed the bite marks on her. My wife died defending our daughter.”

  “And the buildings?”

  “A month passed before planes flew over and started bombing. I guess they thought that was the only way they could wipe it out. They were wrong.”

  “Do you know anything about the Coalition and what they are doing with anomalies?”

  “Vinny Carlone does.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Before all of this, he ran a protection ring here in the city.”

  “A mobster?”

  He nodded. “Yeah, something like that. Anyway he works deals, knows people, if anyone can tell you about the Coalition it will be him.”

  “You trust him?”

  He laughed a little. “I should do, he’s my son.”

  “Your son? But your last name is Raynor.”

  “He’s my son from another relationship. When we split up she didn’t want him to have anything to do with me. Out of spite she changed his last name to hers.”

  Ben came out of the weapons room with a bag over his shoulder. Both thighs had Glocks attached. Elijah followed suit but with Sig Sauer P226’s. At least we would stand a chance against what lay beyond the door. No matter how terrifying it was.

  “So where can we find him?” Ben asked.

  He smiled. “The penthouse, Four Seasons Hotel. The most expensive hotel in New York.”

  “What? Why is he there?”

  “Where else would he be? He has a taste for the finer things in life.”

  “That place is still standing?”

  He nodded.

  After what we had seen so far, I couldn’t imagine anything was still in one piece.

  “Do you know where that is?” I asked.

  He chuckled. “You folks really aren’t from around here, are you? Where did you come from?”

  “Castle Rock, Nevada.”

  “You are quite a distance from home.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  As the others continued to gear up and make sure they had enough ammo, I asked Chuck if he knew about what the Coalition were doing with anomalies. He nodded. “They think they can create the cure.” He laughed before getting all serious and looking over at Hannah. “I just don’t want anything to happen to her.”

  “Why not take her to them? I mean if she can end this…”

  “That’s what they all say. Including the Hive and look at that. People leave every day with them in trucks and never return. Now don’t tell me they have all of them stored up on that island. They are killing them one by one until they find the anomalies.”

  Jess stepped forward. “Isn’t that reason to take Hannah to them?”


  “The Hive?”

  “No, the Coalition.”

  He shook his head. “Listen, I will take you to the hotel but I won’t be coming in.”

  “I would have thought seeing your son would be a good thing, now this is all happened.”

  “You don’t know my son.”

  I was beginning to wonder if it was a good idea to go and meet up with him. Ben went upstairs to keep an eye on Z’s before Chuck rolled up the shutters and we all streamed out. We waited for Ben and then Chuck turned around and locked up.

  “Right, follow me,” he said.

  “Please tell me you have a car as I don’t fancy walking for an hour.”

  “Good to see one of you knows the city.”

  We hustled around back trying to make sure the undead didn’t spot us. We weren’t that lucky. There were ten milling around across the road. The smell that permeated the air was putrid. We each held up an arm to our face to stop ourselves from hurling.

  “Save your bullets.”

  I yanked out a mean ass machete that was longer than my thigh. We rushed down the street and turned a corner and were faced with even more. Chuck was fiddling with the keys when several of the Z’s heard us. That caused even more fear and he dropped them. It wouldn’t have been bad if they were slow but these were the fast-moving suckers. The same ones we had come across down in the subway. They bounced their way down the street towards us with all the speed of an Olympic runner.

  “Fuck this shit,” Baja said, pulling around his AR-15 and unloading round after round at them. Unlike the other Z’s that would just drop, these were harder to hit. It was almost as if they had become wise, evolved even. Was that even possible? What was that biological weapon? Was it meant to kill or turn their people into some kind of super-soldier? Either way, these fuckers weren’t messing around. They were bolting towards us at breakneck speed.

  Before they could reach us, Izzy and Jess raced at them. I had to admit we were all absolutely dumbfounded. Machetes out and swinging at them like they were trying to beat candy out of a piñata. Those women didn’t have any fear. They had grown in leaps and bounds. What had they witnessed inside of NORAD? They didn’t shrink back the way they did in Castle Rock. To be quite honest if someone could have tossed us a bag of popcorn, we could have laid back on one of the cars and watched them do their business. It was fucking epic. When they were done they strolled back covered in blood and shit. I had to admit, it was quite a turn-on seeing my lady take care of business. However I opted not to kiss her lips.