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    The Dead Road: Vol. 3 - Stockton: The Dead Road, #3
    The Dead Road: Vol. 3 - Stockton: The Dead Road, #3
    The Dead Road: Vol. 3 - Stockton: The Dead Road, #3
    Ebook114 pages1 hour

    The Dead Road: Vol. 3 - Stockton: The Dead Road, #3

    By Robert Paine

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    About this ebook

    Volume 3 of The Dead Road series!

    It was supposed to be a relaxing vacation. When the world takes a drastic, Apocalyptic turn, the trip turns out to be the complete opposite...

    Alex, Eli, Roger and Amy go back into Stockton to try and find supplies, ignoring Amy's warning that the town was overrun with evil, both human and Undead.

    The group has no idea of the danger that lies in store for them as they head into the small town - Will they be able to gather the supplies they so desperately need?

    Or will they discover that the biggest problem wasn't the Undead outbreak...but other survivors.

    Praise for The Dead Road:
    "Really liked all the books in this collection, they kept me on the edge of my seat. I would definitely recommend this to anyone that enjoys this type of book."

    "Starts out fast and furious with backseat mayhem reminiscent of Pulp Fiction and ends with a road trip to destiny...or the next town over, called Maybridge. Four city slickers go camping/hunting for a week in the woods and discover that the world around them has become zombified. This is the story of their escape from the woods. Nicely done."

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherOur Pack Press
    Release dateJan 19, 2016
    ISBN9781497747647
    The Dead Road: Vol. 3 - Stockton: The Dead Road, #3

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      Book preview

      The Dead Road - Robert Paine

      ~Volume Three: Stockton ~

      The mountain air felt good on our faces, driving in the setting July sun, the road shadowed by the canopy of trees on both sides.  They grew in the steep hillsides, some looking like they clung to nothing but bare rock, their roots embedded into the mountain itself.  These trees, nestled in rocky groves between vast stretches of rich hillside soil, they were the underdogs, and yet they endured beyond all hope.

      That was us.  So far we survived beyond all hope.  In a world full of walking corpses and the hungry dead, we were still going.

      We were in Amy's brother Parker's Jeep.  Parker had committed suicide in the face of the ruination of the world around him.  He and his college buddies, thinking Amy was dead, watching two dozen corpses circle their house like flightless vultures, broke under the pressure.  They went to the bathroom, grabbed a bunch of prescription pills, and took them all with a liter of Jack Daniels.  They got to sit silently while their hearts and brains shut down.  No desperate sprint through an infested parking lot, not worrying about where their next meal was coming from, or if they would stumble and get eaten by the people they used to think of as their neighbors.

      We took the Jeep because Eli's car was falling apart.  The windshield was broken, one of the headlights had caved in, and it was pulling to the left randomly.  Using the car as a weapon was a good idea at the time, but hitting twenty bodies, even dead ones, played hell with the integrity of the vehicle.  Roger found the keys to the Jeep in Parker's pocket.  Amy was unwilling to search the body of her dead brother.

      We should have buried them.  Amy's voice broke the silence.

      Roger was driving.  He glanced at me in the rear view mirror.  Eli shifted uncomfortably in the passenger seat.  I looked at Amy.  Her eyes were red and puffy, her face streaked with tears.  She kept staring out at the road.  I cleared my throat.  We couldn't.  Digging a hole big enough for four people...

      She slammed her fist into the seat. It was the fucking decent thing to do!

      I touched her hand and she jerked it away.  Maybe it was, but we're all undernourished and sleep deprived.  We would have ended up laying on the ground, exhausted, our muscles burning... we would be sitting ducks.

      She nodded without a word.  She knew I was right.  She knew, logically, that what I was saying was true, but in her heart, emotionally, she was wracked with guilt.  Her brother was laying dead in her parent's living room, and she couldn't reconcile that we just left him there.

      Roger looked at me in the mirror again, then said, So what's our plan?  I welcomed the change of topic.

      I leaned up in my seat so Roger and Eli could hear me more clearly.  I don't think our priority has changed.  We need food.  Not just a meal, but cans, dry stuff, beef jerky, that sort of thing.  Camp food on a massive scale.  Enough to hold us for a couple of weeks at least.  We also need supplies.  Camping gear, ammo, more guns.

      Roger nodded as he spoke, Stapleton's.  It has just about everything we need, if it hasn't been raided yet.

      Amy snapped out of her reverie, Wait, Stapleton's?  That's in Stockton, isn't it?

      Roger said, Yeah.  Just on the edge, on 67.  We used to shop there all the time.  Only place in Vermont you can get a fifty dollar bottle or Merlot, the country's best cheddar cheese, a brand new rifle and a full box of ammo.

      But, Stockton.  Stockton's gone.  It's a mess.  Overrun with those... things.

      Roger shrugged, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. Well, may be worth the risk.  It means we only have to worry about one stop.  Otherwise we'll have to hit a few different places, in a few different towns.  A gun shop here, a grocery store there, a camping place there... that's a lot of miles to cover.  Even so the next decent sized town is fifty miles from here.

      Eli nodded eagerly, That's right, man.  We go to this place, fight our way in, get what we need, and get the fuck out.  We head for the mountains and don't look back.

      I nodded, looking over at Amy.  Her eyes were wide.  She looked haunted, the idea of going to Stockton making her hands ball in to fists to contain the shaking.  It may not be the ideal plan, but it’s the best we got.

      She looked back out of the window, crossing her arms in front of her, not saying a word.

      ****

      Roger pulled the Jeep over as we reached the edge of Stockton, Vermont.  It was a plain T-intersection where a one two-lane road ended against another, wooded hills to each side.  Roger looked back and forth.  The road to the left went in to Stockton, a layer of sparse houses and small shops selling antiques or bait, then the town center, a tight collection of shops and restaurants catering to the small population of locals during the spring and summer and thousands of skiers and outdoorsmen during the fall and winter.  To the right was a straight stretch south, twenty miles of quiet roads dotted with reclusive houses eventually leading to Interstate 91.  The road was empty, without a living soul visible to either side.  Roger looked to the right for a long time.  We can run, you know.  Just put our foot to the floor and go, get to the highway, and put all of this behind us.

      I shook my head. What happens when we get to the highway and it's clogged with wrecked an abandoned cars?  All of those people that tried to make it on may now be a wandering horde, circling the highway like a flock of vultures.  If there's a military border it's going to be bottlenecked for at least a couple of miles, which we'll still have to cover on foot, and probably have to fight our way through.  We're on the wrong side of the wall, Roger, one that's been built to keep things in. If there is a place we can just drive through, it won't be the highway.

      Eli said, If there is even a wall.  This may be it, man.  This may just be how the world is now.  Big cities just mean more zombies, man.

      I have to agree with that, I said, at least until we see some sign of life, that civilization hasn't just collapsed.  A helicopter, a plane, something concrete.  I want to see some sort of proof that there's a world worth going to.  Otherwise, we're better off out here, collecting survivors.  Find a cabin or a ski lodge out there, make our own little commune for the winter.

      Roger gave the right turn one more look, then put the Jeep in gear and turned to the left.  What happens after the winter?

      I couldn't help but shrug. We'll figure that out when we get there.  The truth was I had no idea.  If the world was truly overrun, weren't we just delaying the inevitable?  How long would it be before we, the last living humans for a thousand miles, were sniffed out and surrounded?  Even if we find no one else, how long could we four survive on our own?  We need fresh water, constant food, and wood to burn for heat.  The power was still on, but that wouldn't last.  In another few days the grid will fail without anyone manning the stations, and then the world will truly take a giant step backwards.  He prayed this was a localized event, that there would be some hope of finding civilization again, finding a place where humanity stood its ground.  He wasn't sure he was up for rebuilding society one generation at a time.

      The road in to Stockton was empty.  I kept looking into yards we passed, or up driveways and into parking lots, but there was no sign of anyone or anything.  For a town that was supposedly overrun in the first day of the outbreak, it looked like all of the infected had moved on.  Even Eli noticed the odd quiet, and he looked back at me with questioning eyes.  You think they went looking for food someplace else, man?

      I can't even begin to guess.

      How close do you want me to get, Alex?  Stapleton's is only a couple of miles up the road.  Roger asked.

      Well, we don't want to just pull right up to the front door.  If the place is overrun, that's a recipe for getting surrounded, and I don't trust the Jeep's rag top to keep us safe, even if the off road suspension is a lot better for running through a mob of them.

      Stapleton's is at the bottom of a hill, around a gentle curve.  We can park at the top of the hill, get a good read on what's what.  Maybe even pick a few off from a distance.

      I gave Roger a thumbs up and started going over my rifle.  It could probably stand to be cleaned, but I didn't have the supplies or

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