Hungry Independents (Book 2)
Read Hungry Independents (Book 2) Online
Authors: Ted Hill
Tags: #horror, #coming of age, #apocalypse, #Young Adult, #zombie, #Survival, #dystopian, #famine, #outbreak, #four horsement
A PERMUTED PRESS book
Published at Smashwords
Trade Paper ISBN: 978-1-61868-318-2
eBook ISBN: 978-1-61868-117-319-9
Hungry
Independents
copyright © 2014
by Ted Hill
All Rights Reserved.
Cover art by Claudia McKinney, Phatpuppy Art and
Jeroen Ten Berge, Jeroens Ltd.
This
book
is
a
work
of
fiction
.
People
,
places
,
events
,
and
situations
are
the
product
of
the
author’s
imagination
.
Any
resemblance
to
actual
persons
,
living
or
dead
,
or
historical
events
,
is
purely
coincidental
.
No
part
of
this
book
may
be
reproduced
,
stored
in
a
retrieval
system
,
or
transmitted
by
any
means
without
the
written
permission
of
the
author
and
publisher
.
Table of Contents
Chapter Thirty-Three: Margaret
Chapter Thirty-Seven: Margaret
Hunter
Hunter teetered on the edge of teeth-gnashing
insanity from the pain. Most of the time his shoulder felt numb and
he was able to cope. Other times, like this one, he wanted to rip
his arm from the socket and beat the pain to death. He wished he
was at home in his nice big bed next to Molly, instead of messing
around in a rainstorm.
The pain flared up as he climbed the rusty
ladder to the grain elevator’s roof in Cozad, Nebraska. A
late-summer thunderstorm lashed upon him violently in the dark
hours after midnight, while sheets of water cascaded down the white
concrete wall, making the climb more treacherous than anticipated.
At least the rain provided good cover. The kid up top would be
oblivious to Hunter’s approach in this mess.
Hunter reached for the next rung and his foot
slipped, his body dropped, and his right arm took the weight. Pain
seared through his shoulder. He clamped his other arm around the
ladder, trembling with fear from the thought of ping-ponging all
the way down the safety cage. Rain pelted the hood of his
waterproof jacket, loud and harsh in unison with his terrified
panting. The ground waited to catch him fifty feet below. Another
fifty feet of climbing and he’d reach the top where the sniper
roosted.
Five months ago when Hunter had died, all his
cares and worries had been washed away. He was saved when his older
brother, Jimmy, made the ultimate sacrifice. That gift would be
wasted if he fell and crash landed on his head.
Earlier that day, he had slowed his motorbike
as he approached the small town of Cozad, visiting as an emissary
from Independents to find out if Cozad’s food crops were also
suffering from the infestation of grasshoppers. That’s when the
shots rang out, throwing up puffs of dirt around him from the
bullet impacts. Hunter understood the message perfectly—Go
Away!
The warning shots had ticked him off. Jimmy
didn’t give up his life so some yahoo could take Hunter out by
accident or otherwise. Whatever reason the kid had for scoping him
with daddy’s deer rifle, he was about to learn the terrible
consequence of jacking with people in the Big Bad.
With his grit back in check, Hunter climbed
the rest of the way with no more thought about his shoulder. He
peeked over the top, where a hundred yards of puddles collected the
rain on the flat surface. Thick drops clattered on the metal roof
of a narrow structure that housed the spouts where the elevated
grain filled the different bins underneath. No one was in
sight.
Hunter stepped up and moved away from the
edge before he was blown off like a kite in the gusty wind. He
huddled against the narrow building and worked his bad shoulder,
lifting his arm and rolling small circles. It still hurt, but that
was expected. He could manage.
A taller outbuilding at the other end of the
grain elevator was barely visible through the curtain of rain.
Maybe the sniper was inside cleaning his gun, or maybe the kid went
home at night, and maybe Hunter would just have to wait until
morning. He had lived through worse weather out in the open.
Hunter caught a rotten whiff and pinched his
nose. Whatever remained in the grain elevator had definitely
turned. He crept alongside and peered with his right eye into the
dirty windows of the lower building and saw only darkness. He lost
sight in his left eye the day he lost his brother. He’d gotten used
to the change in depth perception, but still struggled with Jimmy’s
absence. That was going to take a while.
He closed within fifty feet of the other end,
where a dark form huddled on the edge. A loud, thunder-like crack
reverberated around the rooftop of the elevator. After a brief
fire-flash, Hunter realized he’d been shot as the bullet ripped
through his stomach and knocked him backwards into the building. He
doubled over in agony that quickly subsided, and lifted his shirt
in startled amazement. The bullet hole closed without one drop of
blood escaping.
When Hunter had been beaten to death—a
broken, bleeding and checking out for good kind of whooping—the
ultimate sacrifice his brother made involved Hunter being healed by
a little girl named Catherine. Right then, Hunter thought the
healing had some residual effect. Cool for him. Bad for the guy
holding the gun.
He advanced and another shot fired, catching
Hunter in the shoulder. He spun off-balance and landed in a giant
puddle. Hunter screamed for one excruciating moment before the pain
ceased, reverting to its normal dull ache, with no blood and no
bullet hole. The only thing he felt was a boiling desire to
kill.