Booker frowned. “It’s my town you’re destroying, Barry. That’s what brought me here.”
“Actually, it’s our town. As in, the people’s town, just in case you didn’t get the memo while sitting in your office polishing a chair with your ass. And they, the people, agreed to this.” Corbett motioned toward the commotion taking place before them. “No one wants to do it, but it has to be done. Like you’ve been told a thousand times before.” He noticed Booker’s wife, Roxanne, was with him. She was a heavyset woman with lank, bottle-blonde hair and heavy eye shadow, and had the dubious honor of being the local gossip maven. Corbett hated her, always had—she was one of those miserable excuses of humanity that every town had, one that sowed rancor and discord in situations that even Hector Aguilar knew enough to stay away from.
“Hello, Roxanne,” he said.
“Go to Hell, Barry,” she replied, her tone full of whiplashes.
“Already have.”
“It’s indecent,” Booker said, ignoring the exchange. He pointed at the police turning away the traffic. “It’s inhumane. You’re a monster for doing this.”
“Oh, I’m the monster? Well, okay. Then maybe you should leave,” Corbett said. “In fact, let me make it a real sweetheart deal. I’ll give you a full tank of gas. Hell, I’ll give you any vehicle you want, and as much supplies as you can carry. Get the fuck out of town, Booker. Take your fat shrew of a wife with you, and get as far away from here as you can.” He pointed to the horizon. “Let’s see how you deal with real monsters. They’re out there, and they’ll even eat anyone they find, even if they taste as shitty as your wife.”
“Fuck you!” Roxanne snarled. She stepped forward, a hand raised as if to slap Corbett across the face. Walt Lennon was there in an instant, and he shoved her back with the heel of his left hand. His right remained wrapped around his rifle’s pistol grip, keeping the weapon under control at all times. Roxanne squawked as she fell onto her fat ass, kicking up a small cloud of dust as she hit the black top.
“There will be none of that,” Lennon said, his voice full of ice as he backed up a step and his associate reached out and tugged Corbett away. Corbett shrugged him off.
“Hey!” Booker shouted, bending over to help his wife to her feet. “Nice, Corbett—nice, letting your thugs hit a woman!”
“I would’ve laid her out flat, and you too, you fucking pansy,” Corbett said. “Both of you need to listen to this: the people of this town are with me, not you. The world’s a different place, and surviving it is going to take a hell of a lot of work. All the decisions have been made, and you had a seat at the table, Max. Unhappy with what’s happening? Then leave, you two-faced son of a bitch!”
“You’re crazy, Corbett,” Booker said, holding Roxanne’s arm. Her small eyes were narrowed, and she made to go for Corbett again. Booker yanked her back, then hooked an arm around her neck, hugging her toward him. He glanced at Walt Lennon, how now had both hands on his rifle.
“Yeah, I’m crazy, all right,” Corbett said. “So damn crazy I’ll do whatever it takes to save this town, as opposed to just standing around wringing my hands talking about it.” He looked at Roxanne. “So what about you, Roxie? Want to leave, maybe find your way to the nearest fat farm and chill out for a bit with a bottle of Chivas while you get treated for hoof and mouth disease?”
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Roxanne shouted.
“What’s wrong with me?” Corbett stepped toward the Bookers, feeling his pulse quicken, his blood turn hot. Again, the bodyguard stepped in and took a hold of his arm, this time with more force. Just to ensure things didn’t spiral out of hand, Lennon came in close and positioned himself between Corbett and the Bookers.
“Old man, you might need to dial it back a little bit,” Lennon asked over his shoulder.
Corbett ignored him. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong with me, Booker. I’m sick to death of lily-livered scabs like yourself telling me we all need to fall on our collective sword because it’s the right thing to do, and then when I invite you to do the same—you weasel out of it. So here’s how it’s going to be, kids. You no longer have a seat at the table. Go clear out your office, Max. You’re out of a job. Someone will be in touch to put you on one of the work details. You too, Roxanne. Your lives are very, very different now, and it’ll start with you going on a two thousand calorie a day diet when you eat all the food in your house. Am I clear?”
“You’re insane,” Booker said, the shock clear on his face. “You’re absolutely insane!”
“No, Max,” Corbett said. “I’m just not going to play the victim role for you.” He pointed at Booker. “Go back to your house. Wait there until someone comes for you. Stay out of my way.”
“You can’t do this!” Booker shouted. “I’m the legally elected mayor of Single Tree! We’re not going to be your subjects, Corbett!”
“Then the open road beckons, Booker. Get out. You can either leave on your own, or I’ll have my men toss you on the other side of the walls. Alternately, you can shut the fuck up and stop getting in my face about things that have to be done. Your call.”
Booker pulled Roxanne after him as he turned toward his car. A BMW, Corbett saw. He snorted when he saw that.
“This isn’t over, Barry!” Booker shouted.
“I think it is,” Corbett responded. “You have a choice to make.” Fuming, he watched as the mayor and his wife retreated to their car, climbed in, and drove off. Lennon raised his rifle, and Corbett wondered if he intended to shoot them.
“What’s with the combat stance, Walt?” he asked.
“Just in case they decided to circle back and maybe do something dumb, like mow us down,” Lennon said, watching as the BMW headed for the rear exit. He relaxed minutely. “You were pretty hard on them, old man.”
“That was nothing,” Corbett said. He turned and watched the misery playing out on the highway. “I’m being a whole lot harder on a bunch of other people.”
“Having second thoughts now, are we?”
Corbett considered the question for a long moment. Closing off the town of Single Tree was the hardest decision he had ever made, but no one else was going to do it. If it was going to happen, he would have to assert himself and see it through. Though he wondered if he was truly strong enough to live with himself after it was all said and done.
“No,” he said, finally. “No second thoughts. But I sure do wish it didn’t come at such a damn cost.”
SINGLE TREE, CALIFORNIA
TWO WEEKS LATER
The walls had finally gone up around the majority of the town, and all the roadway approaches had been fortified. Now, the plan was to extend the walls out to the airport, which was only surrounded by razor wire and temporary fencing on top of a large berm. Neither of those would be able to hold back a dedicated attack, but the work was coming along much more slowly. The work crews were exhausted, even with townspeople helping out with the more mundane tasks, such as loading and unloading supplies, driving trucks, delivering food and providing security. Corbett was worried about the slowing pace. While he had no immediate plans to use the airport, it was their final fallback point if things truly went south. If it wasn’t properly secured, then it would be of no value.
But since the majority of the town’s perimeter had been hardened, other work was able to commence. Temporary housing was erected from modular units that Corbett’s people had brought in. All around the high school and the eastern side of the town, single-story dwellings were popping up behind the twenty-foot steel plank walls. The first ones were used by Corbett’s workers, so they had a place where they could eat and sleep in the presence of their families. The later ones were for Victor’s people from the reservation, which was a necessity Corbett had recognized early on. One thing he hadn’t anticipated was the chilly reception some of the townspeople gave their neighbors from the reservation. That was an unwelcome surprise, and Corbett was taken aback to discover that not only had there been some violence bet
ween the two groups, but that Jock Sinclair had dutifully recorded some of it. When the preening Englishman had proudly shown his footage to Corbett while declaring that the townspeople had started it, it had taken a substantial toll on Corbett’s patience not to lash out, starting with Sinclair himself. His first reaction was to accuse Sinclair of editing the footage to present a specific bias. He was further infuriated when Sinclair showed him the raw captures, which while longer and a bit more ham-handed than the “finished” product, did nothing to diminish Sinclair’s assessment of the situation. For sure, a group of young townies had jumped a smaller group of Native Americans, and had gone so far as to break one man’s arm. The man was in his eighties, and now, some dumbass kids had left him in a condition that was only going to be a burden for everyone. The good news was, they’d been able to track down the kids using Sinclair’s footage. They were a mix of white and Latino high schoolers, underachievers and incubating low-lifes all. The Single Tree PD already knew most of the actors involved, so it wasn’t a big problem to pick them up. There had been some consternation amongst the parents, but in the end, justice was served.
Victor had intended to lock them up for a hundred and twenty days, but there were too many of them. Plus, the three prisoners already locked up were taking all the room—there weren’t enough cells. In response, Corbett lobbied the policeman to turn the hooligans over to him. He could use extra hands in the field, and working off their debt to society was preferable to them sitting in a holding cell doing nothing. Victor readily agreed, as at the end of the day, he didn’t want to be responsible for them. The parents of the youths complained—well, most of them, anyway—but their protests went unheard. Even Max Booker didn’t take up their cause, and that was one of the most telling things of all.
Corbett essentially owned the town, now.
The work continued. Single Tree still had power, thanks to the multitude of generators that were spliced into the electrical system. Solar arrays were also erected, some inside the walls, some outside. These solar farms served to charge a vast bank of batteries which could be used to power water pumps, lights, and the like in the event the emergency lasted longer than their fuel supplies. The batteries offered substantially less output than diesel-powered electrical generators, but they were better than nothing. Corbett hoped things wouldn’t come to that, but if they did, then Single Tree was about as well-prepared as it could be.
Slowly, the walls extended toward the airport, buttressed by coils of razor wire, trenches that were five to six feet deep, and tall earthen berms that would hopefully serve to slow any attackers’ advance. And enclosed observation towers were erected, each topped with solar panels that would power ventilation to keep the occupants from baking to death during the heat of the day. In each tower were panes of mirrored glass, through which observers could regard the approaches to the town without fear of being seen.
Gunfire rang out from one end of the town. Those townspeople who wanted to become certified in firearms were getting the opportunity to prove themselves at the gunnery range. For several hours each day, dozens of people were hard to work improving their shooting skills. It was known that the only way to drop a zombie was to shoot it in the head. Doing that repeatedly took practice, and well over a hundred townspeople had signed up for the opportunity. Corbett knew this especially galled Hector Aguilar, not to mention Jock Sinclair. Both were rapid gun control fanatics, and Sinclair was especially troubled by his wife availing herself the opportunity to learn how to fire a rifle and a pistol. That pleased Corbett to no end.
Slowly, the town pulled itself together. The last open air broadcasts from the local television stations had ended days ago, replaced only by sporadic broadcasts from the National Emergency Broadcast System. These messages were not particularly informative. The entire nation was under a state of emergency, and all but the most essential interstate travel had been banned. Air and rail travel aside from that required by the military or other government agencies was suspended. The US Navy and Coast Guard had established a maritime blockade around most of the major ports of entry, thereby preventing anyone from entering the nation without permission. Corbett wondered if that meant people couldn’t also leave, but the broadcasts didn’t go into that.
More informative were the ham radio broadcasts. Unlike the majority of the government transmissions, these yielded substantially more information. The zombie epidemic was now a coast-to-coast affair, though there was an apparent east to west migration occurring. No one knew exactly why, but millions of zombies had mostly vacated the east coast and had progressed all the way to Texas, clustering around Odessa. It had provided the government with an opportunity it could not pass up, and a nuclear weapon was deployed. The majority of the zombie horde was incinerated, but by no means were all of them destroyed. Thousands more stumbled out of the nuclear morass, many horribly burned, but still able to function despite the grievous injuries and the exposure to radiation. Just the same, word was being passed around the ham community that a good number of these surviving zombies did in fact expire. No one knew exactly why, but it was presumed the radiation had something to do with it.
Well, that’s fine and dandy, Corbett had thought upon learning this. All I need now is a nuke, and I’m all set.
In the midst of this, there was talk of a cure. The rumored vaccine apparently couldn’t reverse the effects of zombieism, but it could prevent those who were bitten from turning. More importantly, it also served to short-circuit the virus replicating inside patients who had contracted the disease during the original outbreak. It was believed that the United States, Canada, and parts of Asia were still functional, despite the arrival of the zombie apocalypse, so the vaccine would be of some use. But for Europe and the Middle East, it was possibly too late. The die off and ensuing reanimations had resulted in millions upon millions of zombies which now roamed throughout Europe and western China. The Middle East was completely dark; if there was any life remaining there, it was hunkering down and staying completely off the grid.
No one knew exactly how many zombies were in the continental United States; estimates seemed to range from three to four million to as many as sixty million. The nuclear strike in Texas had certainly destroyed millions of the dead, but that was obviously not going to be a continuous application of force; the side-effects of such weaponry were counterproductive. Destroying all the zombies in the country wouldn’t amount to much if the entire environment was so heavily irradiated that human beings couldn’t live in it.
The migrations though, those were concerning. Corbett had planned on Single Tree eventually being besieged by thousands of zombies, and the layers of defenses they were erecting took that into account. But millions? There was talk of heavily fortified military installations being overrun. If that was the case, then Single Tree was living on borrowed time.
But there was nothing to be done about that. The workers were working, the townspeople were preparing, and Corbett was overseeing it all. He delegated what he could, and pressed Gary Norton into service as being the face of the operation. This allowed Corbett to coordinate things from his home, and tool around town in his truck checking on all the construction developments. Every evening, Norton would give him the run down on what was happening among the town’s former leadership—even though Corbett was running things in a de facto manner, Booker and Aguilar and Gemma were still the town council, advised now by Victor Kuruk as the primary manager of the towns’ emergency responders. The people still looked to them for official guidance, which suited Corbett just fine. They could render their decisions and do what they thought was right for the town, and so long as their decrees didn’t interfere with what Corbett and his people needed to do, he was eminently good with that. He didn’t even bother going to any meetings that might be held any longer; he left that to Norton, though the Hollywood producer was beginning to lose a bit of his edge. He had severe issues dealing with Hector Aguilar, which they all did—the pharmacy owner was just a big PO
S that squatted in the middle of the room and stank it up. Corbett found himself leaning more on Victor. The Indian leader was good to report back what had gone on, and even though he and his old friend disagreed on some of the particulars, Corbett was secure in the knowledge that Victor had his back.
Not that there was a lot for Corbett to worry about as far as the workings of the town went. He had been able to position a generous amount of supplies that would see them through at least one year. In fact, Raoul’s diner was still open, cooking up food from Corbett’s larders. Everyone would have enough beans, bullets, and fuel to get them through the coming winter, which had been one of Corbett’s major planning points. Once the defenses were fully configured, the town would have a fighting chance.
And if that miracle vaccine the feds had come up with actually worked, he hoped a year might be long enough.
###
Part of the job was working the walls, which didn’t particularly suit Officer Mike Hailey all that well. While one could hardly claim patrolling the town of Single Tree in a squad SUV was the pinnacle of excitement, it had been enough to keep the young policeman’s professional life in perspective. If someone was in crisis, he would drive to where they were and help sort things out. Single Tree was a small establishment, and with lights and sirens he could get from the southern edge of town to its farthest most northern tip in less than three minutes at sixty miles an hour. He’d had to do that a couple of times in his career, usually late at night when he was one of four officers on duty, and only one of two out in a squad. It was what he lived for, but the excitement had certainly run out the night that Chief Grady had been killed.
Since Victor Kuruk had taken over the department, the Single Tree PD had been pressed into the business of supporting Barry Corbett and his grand plan to turn the entire town into a fortress. Hailey hadn’t really thought such a thing was possible, but he had to admit, he was impressed by the transformation the town had undergone in just a few short weeks. Once the flow of civilians had been stemmed, the work had really taken off, with walls rising, trenches spreading, and thousands of sand bags being filled. Even the loss of power hadn’t been an impediment. The batteries of generators and, later, solar arrays had filled in that gap. Now, everyone had power for the normal things they’d taken for granted before the main grid failed.
The Last Town (Book 5): Fleeing the Dead Page 12