Retribution: Operation Z Book 2

by G. D. Szepanski

  Does he stay here safe in the control room and die of dehydration or run for it and get torn apart like the others? Tough decision, even for the man who wouldn’t die.

  CHAPTER TWO

  AMY

  Amy had hoped escape from these idiots would be easy. But it proved to be more difficult than she expected. She waited for Zachary Taylor to let his guard down and make a mistake so she could capitalize on it. The problem was, the stupid hillbilly hadn’t been as dumb or reckless as she originally thought him to be. Rather than lose her chance to escape, she adapted and played the long game. Who would have known the long game would take almost a year to complete? But her plan came together because of her continued exploitation of his pride.

  Amy’s first move had been to endear herself to Zachary by making him believe she had fallen in love with him. A few grunts and shimmies while he raped her, and he ate out of her hands. Men spend way too much time thinking with the wrong head. This bought her some freedom to move around the house without supervision. She still couldn’t go outside alone, but this proved to be a positive first step toward freedom.

  Then Amy worked on circumventing Zachary's mother’s authority in the camp. His mother justified her existence by providing Zachary advice on all the militia’s business. Mom was the so-called brains behind his brawn. A word whispered here about how important and strong Zachary was, and others whispered there about how his mom grew older and more confused did the job she needed. After a few months of Amy’s defamation, she worked her way in Zachary’s inner circle while mom found herself pushed to the outside and looking in.

  Her next major coup had been brilliant, even by Amy’s own standards. She worked on Zachary’s lieutenants to find out who could be bent to her will. It turned out his number two couldn’t, but his number three man worshiped Amy (another guy thinking too much with his wrong head). This meant number two, Aaron Burr (these guys needed to brush up on their history), had to go.

  Working with the number three man, James Polk, she set up a honey trap for poor stupid Aaron. Amy paid Aaron special attention and promised him one night alone while Zachary was out on an extended patrol. She appeared willing to go when Aaron arrived, but then Amy turned on the terror and tears when Zachary returned unexpectedly (James played the part of getting him back at the right time). Zachary's violent rage exploded toward Aaron, and he practically beat him to death in their bedroom. This beating hadn’t proved enough to satisfy Zachary’s madness, so he hung Aaron at dawn (no duel for this Aaron Burr). Zachary confided in Amy that he meant this as a warning for the other men in the militia to not mess with his private property. She had to push both the laugh and anger down when he referred to her as his property. If he only knew.

  James Polk became Zachary’s number two man, and Amy’s influence over him grew with each passing day. Amy promised him the world once they finally got Zachary out of the way. Poor James acted like a lost puppy anytime Amy was present, but Zachary had been too busy with his own plans to notice what happened between the two of them. This was fine with Amy, since it fit into her plan perfectly.

  ###

  One winter day, Amy pulled Zachary aside and said. “Darling, how about a spring wedding?” She deserved an Emmy for this shit.

  “You want to get married?”

  “Yes, sweetie. You deserve everything you’re about to get.”

  “What does marriage mean in the apocalypse?”

  “It will show everyone how much of a powerful leader you are and that I belong only to you alone. Aaron might not have attempted his play if you married me before.”

  “OK, baby. If you want this, then I’m in.”

  “Oh, I love you so much, Zachary.” Amy giggled and batted her eyelashes. She had discovered his weakness and she would use it to kill him.

  ###

  With a wedding date set, Amy planned a red wedding that would make George RR Martin blush. James Polk agreed to take on a staring role in the day’s festivities. A wink here, a shake of her assets, a tryst between the sheets, and James became putty in her hands. Like any blushing bride, her arrangements were extensive for the ultimate happiest day of her life. It wouldn’t be happy for Zachary if all her plans worked as she hoped.

  ###

  The winter lasted forever here in northern New Hampshire. Rations became short and many cold weather viruses swept through the camp. Mom caught pneumonia and died because of a lack of medication. Amy’s flirting with the only doctor assured the needed medications never made it to mom. Zachary cried, but Amy used her tools to comfort him, so he recovered quickly and forgot about his deceased mother. Amy needed him alive and well for their marriage. If he died prematurely, all her planning would come to nothing.

  On their auspicious day of wedded bliss, Zachary agreed to extra rations, excessive decorations, and a fancy dress which would conceal her Sig Sauer P365 XL. He knew nothing about the pistol as part of her scheme. Zachary had forbidden anyone from carrying weapons during the ceremony. Except for Amy’s treacherous crew, everyone obeyed his last order.

  Robert, who had been a Catholic Priest before the dead walked, performed the ceremony. He wouldn’t be conducting a traditional ceremony, but some bull shit Zachary came up with by himself. Amy gave him this privilege since she considered it his last dying wish. James Polk stood up for Zachary, and he knew his role in this charade. One of her brother’s apocalypse brides, Jennifer, stood up for Amy. Amy discovered Jennifer’s desire for revenge and exploited it for her own advantage. Jennifer had been treated just as badly as Amy had.

  Zachary’s wedding dialog would bore anyone with any signs of intelligence because he possessed a peanut-sized brain along with the ego the size of Mount Denali. Robert finally delivered the important line as part of this joke of a ceremony.

  “I present the new King and Queen of the Republic of the White Mountains. King Zachary and Queen Amy. May they live forever and prosper.”

  This line from the ceremony signified their call to action. Amy’s followers drew their concealed weapons and took aim at each of their individual targets. She was thankful for thinking ahead and putting the foam earplugs in her own ears, because the gunfire in the confined space proved deafening. Zachary turned to look at Amy with his eyebrows squished together. Amy stood with a big smile on her face and pointed her pistol at his center of mass. The smile turned to a sneer as she pulled the trigger five times, unloading the nine millimeter projectiles into his torso. No one better have used head shots on them.

  “Gather the bodies and put them in the corral. We start building our zombie army today. If you disagree with me and my actions, then you can join the undead army at anytime.”

  Shoulders slumped and feet stumbled as the survivors dragged and carried bodies to the fenced off corral in the center of the farm. This had been the masterpiece of Amy’s plan. Defend the camp and advance their borders using an army of undead soldiers. As the group finished loading the new recruits into their barracks, James caught her eye and gave her a wink, along with a toothy grin.

  “When do we get to move in together,” James said.

  “About that. Do you think I’d trade being raped by one stupid brute for another?”

  “Um, uh..” He said while tilting his head to the side like a dog who didn’t understand what you just said to them.

  Jennifer drew her gun for the second time of the day and fired four times into his midsection. There’s a new lieutenant in town now.

  “I guess I forgot to tell you, James, you’ve got the honor of leading my new zombie army into battle. So long now.”

  ###

  Even with the population reduction resulting from Amy’s brief marriage ceremony, they struggled to keep up with the demand for food. Scavenging parties had to travel farther out from the camp to find any new supply stores. They emptied all the big and obvious targets of their wares. Amy’s crew now focused on over throwing other groups camped in the area and taking what they had. If the survivors provided worth
, they assimilated them into the Republic. If they proved to be unworthy, then they became new recruits in her growing zombie army. Even with this strategy, Amy found they needed to go far from home to find new camps to raid. She needed a major supply score or a move to a more temperate location to grow their own food. Could they transition from warrior to farmer, or would it prove too difficult a change?

  One day Amy hiked through the woods of southern Maine with Jessica, her trusted lieutenant. She preferred scouting out new locations to raid herself. It would do no good for others in her crew to get tempted by greener pastures and not return. A not unattractive man with a military buzz cut walked down the path, oblivious to his surroundings.

  “Jessica, hide over there while I deal with this jackass. You know what to if I need you.”

  “Roger boss.”

  “Hi stranger. Are you lost?” Amy said.

  “What? Who are you?”

  She smiled and shook her ass before responding. “My name is Amy, and I’m the supreme leader of the Republic of the White Mountains. We’re rebuilding America as it should have been, and you can play a part.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The powerful elite ruled the America of old. Now it will become a nation created for the free people. This reset rid us of the old corruption and dead weight. It will allow a better way forward for us all. You look well fed, so I assume you came from somewhere well stocked. We need supplies to assure these new freedoms and we look for people like you to contribute.”

  “Yes, the place I came from has all the supplies you’ll need, and I’ll get it all for you. Plus, I’m a former Marine.”

  “We can use a well trained, robust man like yourself. You can be a general in our militia. Now, let’s form a plan.”

  Amy seduced him while developing a plan and pumping him for details about his camp. Men are so stupid when they think with the head between their legs instead of the one on their shoulders. Part of her wished to kill him right there and then, but the time to do so would come soon enough. The details he provided would be invaluable to their continued survival as a nation and provide a chance for her to revenge her brother’s deaths.

  ###

  “What was that all about?” Jessica asked.

  “Splendid news! He’s staying at a camp owned by my old friend Donald, the hero boy. He’s the one responsible for the death of my brothers and my imprisonment and continued rape. Soon he’ll be dead, and his stuff will be all ours.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  RON

  The first time Ron ate human flesh, he gagged and almost puked it up after discovering what they fed him. Now he thought it tasted like an oven roasted pork tenderloin. Tender and juicy. Ron would imagine eating a well-seasoned pork tenderloin to ease his guilt of where the meat came from. It was survival of the fittest during the apocalypse. A minor sacrifice by the weak to assure the strong survived. No big deal. Plus, he had lost so much, so Ron deserved to survive. He would do whatever it takes to be the last man standing in this story.

  Ron arrived at the camp on death’s door, but he recovered and even became stronger within the last year because of their care. Maybe eating human flesh provided the key to his healing and new found strength? His beautiful red-haired nurse, Rosie, became his lover after he recovered, so Ron felt he won the apocalypse lottery when they found him.

  One day they introduced Ron to Vincent. Dr. White credited Vincent with saving Ron’s life. His blood flowed through Ron’s veins, granting him a new life. Vincent’s limbs provided the feast where Ron ate and regained his strength. When they meet, Vincent had been only a torso and white as a sheet. His last sacrifice for the greater good would be the feast of his internal organs. A delicacy for them all to enjoy. All except Vincent.

  He didn’t identify with the strange beliefs of this cult, but Ron played along to stay alive. The sect claimed a brotherhood with the zombies. Killing a zombie would be a religious hypocrisy and punishable by death (kind of ironic). By consuming human flesh, they had discovered the ability to walk unnoticed among the dead. Cannibals and zombies strolled together with no concern for each other. A symbiotic relationship.

  Most of his life, Ron had been the alpha male. The camp only had two other adult males, a big ugly gent named Mac and a wiry slob named Jacob. Mac led the search parties, looking for new victims, and did all the butchering chores once they found one. He considered Ron a threat to the group and made it known to Ron at every opportunity. Jacob followed Mac around like a lost puppy. Ron thought Jacob lacked any working brain cells. Abigail, a middle-aged tall woman, led the camp, and everyone bowed down to her as their priestess. She treated all the men, including Ron, as necessary evils. Besides Dr. White and Rosie, the cult had six other members. Three adult women, a teenage boy, and two preteen girls. One big, human flesh-eating family untouched by zombie hands.

  ###

  Ron hadn’t ever encountered a winter as icy and long as this one. The building had been a summer residence for a long, closed camp. The walls lacked insulation and the wood stove proved inadequate at maintaining the temperature of the building above freezing. He spent his waking hours securing more wood to burn, to fend off the hypothermia, which threatened to claim them all.

  With the extreme cold and mountains of snow, the search parties found no living humans to eat. They were lucky to find a family of five before the first snowfall, and they provided meat until the end of January. Abigail sacrificed the two preteen girls at the beginning of February to assure the food supply would last until spring. Ron readied to take out Mac for a meal, but then they found two adult men traveling alone. They were all saved for a little longer by these new victims.

  ###

  Ron knew Tim died at the hands of some unknown gunmen before he became a zombie snack. He never knew how his sister Amy died. Who were the gunmen that attacked them in the woods near the bridge? Who were the men on the bridge blocking the road? Were the two groups of attackers working together? If Rosie hadn’t been pregnant with his child, he would have headed out to find answers to these questions. Instead, he found himself too comfortable to leave the safety of the camp to find out who took his sibling’s lives. Leaving now would cause his unborn child to become their next meal without his protection. Better to stay close and take control here than die trying to complete a fool's mission.

  ###

  They finished eating the last hiker during last night’s feast. Today Mac would take Jacob, Kim, and the teenage boy out hunting for fresh meat. With any luck, they would return with new victims to keep them all nourished for the upcoming months. When Mac headed in to butcher the victims, it might finally be the right time for Ron to make his move. He would be the last man standing with Rosie and their child by his side. Then he would dispose of Abigail and her crazy ideas.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  BETTY BOWMAN

  Betty knew little about Natasha’s background or how she ever hooked up with Dr. Taylor, the loser drunk. Natasha wouldn’t talk about her past, only how to survive the future in this bleak world. She knew Natasha was a total bad ass. Natasha could shoot any gun she picked up with deadly accuracy, use a knife to kill with the effort of buttering toast, fight hand to hand with opponent three times her weight, and plan strategies to remain alive. For the last year, Betty had been her protégé and became her closest friend. With Tom’s increased bizarre behavior, Donald leaned on Natasha’s guidance around the camp too.

  Even with their friendship, Natasha never took it easy on Betty. She pushed her to run, do strength training, spar, shoot, and perform escape drills. Always be ready to run because there would be a day when running away would be their only option to survive. They packed several bug out bags and hid them in various locations around the camp. Natasha believed the scout’s motto of be prepared more than the scouts ever did.

  Today they ran miles through the woods while Natasha quizzed Betty for what felt like the millionth time. “What’s edible here in the fo
rest? How do you prepare a deer? How do you kill a deer? This world came down to kill or be killed. Never forget it or let your guard down for a moment. It could be deadly.” Natasha was cheerful when she ran.

  Matthew’s birthday had arrived, and Donald and Gwen took him on a camping trip by the lake. Betty thought about tagging along with them, but Natasha didn’t want to crash their party, so Betty stayed behind with her instead. The three of them had become a family over the last year, like Betty and Natasha. Neither Betty nor Matthew experienced the childhood they had expected to have only a year ago. Both could now kill a zombie, clean and prepare game, and breakdown, clean, and oil a weapon. Others were worse off than her, Betty guessed. She had food, shelter, and remained among the living. What more could one ask for during the apocalypse?

  They made it to the two-hour mark for today’s run. Both of them knew the woods around the camp, inside and out. Their current location put them around a mile away from the camp’s outer walls. As her mind drifted while enjoying the warm summer day, the ground shook and an explosion roared through the air. The sound came from the direction of the cabin inside of the walls. They both stopped mid-stride and turned to face each other. Betty knew terror filled her face, but Natasha still looked calm.

  “Grab your gear from location Charlie and then rendezvous at point number four.” Natasha said before she turned back toward the camp’s walls. She ran off with no further comment to Betty. Per their training, they left stores of supplies in locations designated by letters and rendezvous points with numbers.

  Betty carried with her their standard equipment for a run through the woods. Her pack out included the hunting knife on her belt, the holstered Glock G43, and hydration pack filled with water, a water filter, purifying tablets, and homemade protein bars. This section of the forest had been cleared of zombies for months now, so she wondered where this one who approached her came from. With a well-practiced move, she drew her knife and pierced its skull without breaking her stride. Fear for both herself and those who had become her family this past year grew after she dropped the third zombie within a dozen steps. Something had gone very wrong.