Dead Highways (Book 3): Discord by Richard Brown Read Free Book Online

sighed and hit the accelerator.
    I nearly fell off.
    Did I mention the carts had pep to them? Once moving, I realized trying to aim and shoot one-handed was going to be a challenge I’d certainly fail miserably at, assuming I could even hold onto the gun in the process. Sally didn’t look like much, at least not compared to the cannons Ted carried around, but still she had some kick to her. It was rare that I shot her without having both hands around the grip. Thankfully, we weren’t going far.
    Not fifteen seconds later, we were on the northwest side of the park, on the corner of Dublin Street and South Claiborne. Peaches stopped our cart next to Robinson and Bowser. Ted was already up and out, using a large tree for cover, scouting the highway from this end. Even from farther back, I could see the white van Aamod had said to look out for. The cleaning company mascot painted on the side looked even more ridiculous than he had described. The van sat dead in the middle of the intersection with one-half of its front end climbing the rear bumper of a four-door sedan. One of its tires hung elevated inches off the ground, flat and falling off the rim. It had most likely blown when the crash occurred.
    Like before, we all hunkered down next to the carts.
    Ted tiptoed over a moment later.
    “You think we can make it through?” Robinson whispered.
    “Gonna be a tight fit, but I think we can,” Ted replied. “It’s hard to say for certain without getting a closer look, and as you can see this is about as close as we’re gonna get. But I’d say there’s about six feet between the van and the car parked catty-corner behind it. These carts can’t be more than five feet wide.”
    Robinson frowned. “That’s not much clearance.”
    “No, but it’s enough. I’m more concerned about the other problem.”
    Ah, yes, the other problem, heading west down Claiborne. They shambled by like a parade of town drunks walking home after a night of heavy drinking at the bar. I spotted many in the crowd way under the legal drinking age of twenty-one, not that there was such a thing as a legal drinking age anymore. One thing I didn’t spot, however, were any of the old infected variety. The post-coma awakened infected who could plan and scheme and communicate in some unspoken way like the group that had surrounded and stormed Robinson’s house weeks ago, after my Grandma had woken up during the night only to leave first thing in the morning. Those passing by us now were all of the post mutation period. In other words, the reanimated dead. In fact, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen a living breathing infected person, or fast runners as I had begun thinking of them. Maybe a week ago, back at Brian and Cathy’s house. Since then it was only the slow stinking dead all day and all night.
    The zombies had become like that annoying neighbor you try to avoid at all costs, but instead of killing you with their boring work stories, these tried to kill you by brute force—by putting you on the dinner menu and taking a bite out of whatever part of you they could get between their bony-fingered claws.
    “How long we gotta wait here?” Bowser asked. He was carefully stretching his bandaged bad leg.
    Robinson shrugged. “As long as it takes.”
    I glanced back the way we had come. “You’d think he would have done something by now. Though he could have been waiting for us to get into position.”
    “And here we are,” Bowser said, smirking. “Waiting…in position.”
    Normally cooler and calmer than a glacier, Ted now had a look of mounting burden on his face. I could sense the pressure—the responsibility—of being the default leader of the group was starting to weigh on him. We all looked to him for answers. For guidance. For protection. We needed someone to follow, and we followed Ted as close as we could, even if it meant sometimes tripping all over his imaginary cape. No, Ted wasn’t the superhero guy we all needed him