Winter's Edge: A Post Apocalyptic/Dystopian Adventure (Outzone Drifter Series Book 1) Read online

  He drew his breath before continuing, gazing around at the crowd listening to him attentively.

  “People who want to find some other way to the city are free to do so. Every week there’s a brand new fool who thinks they can make it out of here on their own. What you need to know is, ever since the State closed the border six months ago, there’s been no one outside these gates except a bunch of cutthroat bandits. If you don’t believe me…well, that’s your—”

  “Cut to the chase, mister,” a tall man said in a loud voice, his head sticking out above the rest of the crowd. Brogan recognized him as the man who had stood at the head of the line with his wife and daughter inside the terminal building earlier. “How much are you charging to take us there?”

  The conductor stared at him without any change of expression on his face. “To board this bus, every person regardless of age needs to purchase a ticket. No exceptions. Cost of each ticket is one half-ounce of gold, or ten ounces of silver. No other currencies accepted.”

  A rumble of discontent rippled through the crowd.

  “For a lousy twenty minute journey?” a voice shouted out. “That’s daylight robbery!”

  The conductor stared at the man grimly. He indicated back toward the entrance. “Amigo, daylight robbery is what awaits you out there if you try to make it on your own.”

  “Bullshit!” It was the tall man again. He looked around to either side of him. “Listen to me everybody, this is a setup.” He jabbed a finger at the guard. “He’s in on it too. They’re all looking to fleece us. You really think the State cares if these guys make a few extra bucks out of us on the side? They don’t give a damn.”

  A murmur of assent ran through the crowd. The guard shook his head, but kept quiet. Brogan could tell he’d given up caring what people thought a long time ago.

  However, the conductor had skin in the game. He wasn’t going to let it go that easily.

  “Don’t be fools!” he shouted. “Did no one here bother to do their homework?” He gestured to the two technicals parked in the yard. “You really think my outfit drove all the way here just for show? Make no mistake about it, this run into the city ain’t no cake walk.”

  The tall man pushed his way through the crowd. He stepped up beside the conductor and raised both his arms. “Listen, everyone, it’s an hour’s march to the city’s southern perimeter. On flat ground too. If five or six of us armed with rifles band together, we can make it easy. We’re going to need every penny we’ve saved for our new lives in the Outzone. Don’t give it to these hustlers.” He gazed keenly around the crowd. “Which of you are with me?”

  A couple of men raised their hands. The tall man ushered them over to him and the two stepped to the front of the bus and stood beside him. Moments later another one joined them.

  “That makes four of us.” The tall man gazed around looking for more volunteers. “Come on,” he urged. “Who else here’s got some balls?”

  A moment later, another man wearing a light tan jacket raised his hand. His wife standing beside him clutched his arm and looked up at him apprehensively. The man put his arm around her for a moment, saying something to reassure her. Then picking up their suitcases, the couple joined the group.

  Brogan and Staunton stood several feet away from the crowd. Neither of them had budged. The leader of the newly-formed group caught Brogan’s eye and strode over to him. As he got closer, Brogan saw he was about six five, a couple of inches taller than himself.

  The man gazed sternly at the two of them. “How about you two?” he said. “You with us or not?”

  Staunton looked at Brogan uncertainly. “What you think, Frank?”

  Brogan shook his head. “Don’t do it,” he said to the man. “There’s bandits out there, heavily armed and mobile. Right now, they’re just licking their lips waiting for you.”

  The man’s mouth twisted into a sneer. “How do you know that?” he said. “You falling for their bullshit, or you just a chickenshit coward?”

  “Neither. I have it from a reliable source. Someone who knows the score. Maybe you’ll get lucky and make it through. Odds say you won’t.”

  The man snorted in disgust and turned away. Brogan reached out and grabbed him by the arm. “Seriously, friend, think of your wife and daughter. You really going to put their lives at risk?”

  The man wheeled around. He took a step forward, and looked like he was about to punch Brogan. Staunton quickly stepped in between the two of them.

  “Easy there, fellah,” he said. “My friend’s only trying to help. Do what you gotta do. No need to take it the wrong way.”

  The man glared one more time at Brogan, then turned away and strode over to join his group who had opened their gun cases again, checking their pistols and loading magazines into their rifles.

  “You sure about this, Frank?” Staunton asked. “I’d hate to be paying this kind of money for no good reason.”

  “I know for sure it’s not worth taking the chance,” Brogan replied, staring across at the man’s wife and daughter. Both looked nervous, glancing back at the other passengers waiting to board the bus. The girl appeared no more than seventeen years old. He gritted his teeth, an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach. “Damn fool’s going to get his family killed,” he muttered.

  The group were ready. They had their rifles loaded, pistols hanging by their waists, some with their spare magazines slotted into weapons pouches on their belts, others stuffing them into the pockets of their coats. It had been seven years since the end of the Great Global War, five since the end of the Secessionist Wars. Judging by their ages and how they handled their weapons, all the men had seen action. Perhaps they might make it. For the sake of the women, Brogan sincerely hoped so.

  The tall man strode over to the guards standing by the gate, talking to them and making animated gestures. Brogan caught the gist of the conversation. He wanted the group to be allowed to leave now. Why should they have to wait for the bus?

  He had to admire the man’s tenacity.

  After arguing for a couple of minutes, he got his wish. The guard shouted up to the watchtower, then went over to the control box, and moments later the gate opened a couple of feet and the group of six armed men and three women picked up their belongings and filed out through the gate, one at a time. When the last one had left, the gate closed again.

  Staunton looked across at Brogan. “Well, you did your best,” he said. “What happens to them now is their business.”

  They had started letting people on the bus. Brogan reached down, grabbed his pack and hauled it onto one shoulder. Then, picking up his rifle case, he said to Staunton, “Come on, Dan. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  Chapter 9

  Brogan was last man to board the bus. Fishing out two quarter-ounce gold coins from his pocket, he handed them to the conductor. The conductor examined them carefully, then dropped the coins into a plastic money pouch strapped to his waist. He tapped Brogan’s rifle case with his finger.

  “Keep your rifle in the case. If we run into any trouble, I’ll let you know.”

  Brogan nodded, then climbed up the steps of the bus. Staunton had taken a seat halfway up the aisle, and he took the seat opposite him. There was plenty of room inside, seeing as how a large contingent of departees had declined to join them.

  He lifted up his backpack and put it in the overhead luggage rack, followed by his rifle case. He couldn’t help noticing how the racks had been refitted, positioned lower down from the roof so that they allowed for more storage space. He had to duck his head to sit down, and squeezed his large frame into his seat. Apparently no one in the Outzone used the bus’s underneath luggage compartment, preferring to keep their possessions within easy reach.

  The conductor slammed the door shut and slid the bolts across. From his window, Brogan saw the yard gate roll open. The driver started the engine, tugged hard at the wheel, and the bus turned around. Ahead of them, the lead technical cleared the gates. Moments later,
the bus passed through them too.

  “Well, amigo,” Brogan said to Staunton as they left the enclosure behind them and the bus began to pick up speed, “welcome to our new lives in the Outzone, however long that lasts.”

  Across the aisle, Staunton grinned and raised a hand in a mock toast. “Same to you, buddy. Here’s to a brand new adventure.”

  As if to herald their pronouncements, Brogan heard a volley of shots ring out from an automatic weapon somewhere ahead. From inside the bus, it was hard to tell how far away they were.

  “Somebody shooting at us already?” Staunton said, peering out the window. “Boy, they couldn’t wait, could they?”

  Brogan doubted the gunfire was aimed at them. “I don’t think so,” he said. “There’s easier prey out there than us.”

  A moment later, the gunfire intensified as more weapons joined in. The picture of a terrified mother and teenage girl flashed into Brogan’s mind. They quickly morphed into the faces of his own wife and daughter, and his stomach bunched up into a hard knot.

  Something inside him gave way. Without being able to help himself, he stood up and walked up toward the front of the bus.

  “Hey, what the hell are you doing?” the conductor yelled at him angrily, rising from his seat. He stepped out into the aisle and blocked Brogan’s way. “Get back to your seat, pal. This ain’t no goddamned sightseeing tour.”

  Brogan pushed the conductor back roughly into his seat, then strode up to the front of the bus, staring out the front window.

  Heading west, the bus was moving fast, rumbling down an unpaved road across a small plain surrounded by a series of low-lying hills. To the north, he could make out the snowy peaks of Wolf Mountain. Twenty yards ahead, the back fender of the lead technical bounced up and down on the road’s uneven surface, and in the driver’s side mirror, Brogan spotted the second pickup following close behind.

  To either side of the road, interspersed between sparse grassland, stood clusters of rundown tin-roofed shacks made of bare cinderblock. Few had proper windows, and instead filthy semi-transparent plastic sheets were nailed across their frames. Cole had told Brogan that the inhabitants of these squalid dwellings took in the bandits who roamed the plains, allowing them to set up ambushes in return for a little money. Before the border closed, this had been a thriving area. Many Outzoners who had worked as day laborers in New Haven’s industrial zones had lived here. It hadn’t taken long for the place to become rundown and stripped of anything valuable.

  Fifty yards ahead, on the side of the road, Brogan spotted somebody sprawled face down in the mud. As the bus passed by, he recognized the light tan jacket of one of the men he had seen earlier in the enclosure. There was no sign of his wife, nor the rest of the group.

  Then he spotted them. To the left, running down a sloping hill toward a derelict building a few hundred yards from the roadside, its front door and windows long since removed and its roof torn off.

  At the front of the group, running as fast as they could, Brogan spotted the two wives and the teenage girl. Following them, stumbling under the weight of their packs, were three men. Ten yards behind them, bringing up the rear, was the tall man. He fired his rifle across to his right as he ran. He moved awkwardly, and Brogan saw he had been injured.

  From the upper window of a house up at the roadside, Brogan caught a flash of gunfire and one of the three men stumbled, then fell to the ground. The group had been caught in a classic ambush. From their elevated positions to either side of the road, the bandits had fired down on them without the risk of hitting each other in the crossfire, and the group had been forced off the road and down the hill. He knew the move wouldn’t keep them alive very much longer.

  The conductor had followed Brogan up the aisle and now stood beside him, staring out the window. “Can’t say they weren’t warned,” he said. “Damn fools deserve everything they get. Especially the big one.”

  “How about the women?” Brogan asked. “They deserve everything they get too?”

  An unpleasant smile came over the conductor’s face. “The bandits won’t shoot them, so long as they don’t handle a gun,” he said. “But they’re going to get it, whether they deserve it or not. What’s left of them will be sold up north to the slavers.”

  The bus had drawn level with the fleeing group. With a sense of relief, Brogan saw the three women make it into the shack, immediately ducking out of sight. Inside the bus, the rest of the passengers could see what was happening now, and peered out their windows. Brogan heard cries of concern from some of the women.

  “Stop! We’ve got to help!” a voice yelled out. “We can’t just leave them here.”

  “This bus won’t be stopping anywhere, lady,” the conductor said flatly, turning his head around. “It’s too dangerous out there. Those people made their choice.”

  Ignoring the conductor’s comment, Brogan said to the driver, “Hey mister, pull up right here,” he said. “We can help them make a break for it.”

  “Amigo, I have to make this run every week. Like hell we’re stopping,” the driver said, barely glancing at Brogan as the bus kept on straight without slowing. “Now you know why the fare costs so much. I don’t hear nobody complaining about that now. Hey—what the hell!”

  Brogan had pulled one of the Glocks from his holster and pointed it at the driver. “Mister, I said stop the bus.”

  The startled driver stared at him. Brogan stuck the pistol under his ear. “Do it!” he roared. “Or I’ll blow your damned brains out and drive it myself.”

  The driver slammed his foot on the brakes and brought the bus to a skidding halt. Out of the corner of his eye, Brogan caught the conductor reaching for his pistol. He swiveled the Glock around toward him.

  “Don’t even think about it, fellah,” a deep voice growled from behind him.

  Tickling the back of the conductor’s head was the muzzle of a nine-millimeter Sig Sauer pistol. Its owner, Dan Staunton.

  Brogan signaled his thanks to Staunton, then turned back to the driver. “Turn this thing around,” he ordered.

  The driver shook his head in disbelief, then drove the bus slowly forward to where the road widened by a grass verge, and started making a three point turn.

  Brogan looked down the aisle, facing the passengers staring at him open-mouthed.

  “Listen up, everybody. We’re going back to help those people. Our priority is the women. Anyone else is a bonus. Those that got rifles or pistols, get them out. We’ll need shooters on both sides of the bus. Get yourselves into position, armed and ready.”

  With a busy whir, all around the bus both men and women began pulling out their rifle cases and checking their weapons. While they prepared, something John Cole told him the other day popped into Brogan’s mind. Seemed like his friend was right. There were good people in the Outzone.

  They got back in under two minutes. As they approached the shack three hundred yards to their right, Brogan spotted several men making their way down the slope toward it. They moved confidently, using the cover of trees and a few abandoned vehicles to get into position. Brogan could tell they had done this a dozen times before.

  He tapped the driver on the shoulder and pointed past him out the window. “You need to get off the road here,” he said. “We’ve got to get closer to them.”

  The driver slowed the bus to a crawl. He looked across at Brogan, his eyes widening. “Are you crazy, mister? We’ll bust an axle for sure.”

  “Just do it.”

  The driver muttered something under his breath then, swinging the steering wheel hard to his right, he drove the bus over the bank and down the hill, bouncing violently over the rough terrain and jostling everyone on board.

  While Staunton kept an eye on the conductor and driver, Brogan went back down the aisle to his seat. He pulled down his rifle case from the rack and took out his HK419 rifle. Grabbing a 20-round magazine, he loaded it and charged a round in the chamber.

  It was a weapon he had used many time
s before. Though not as accurate as a bolt-action rifle, it was effective up to twelve hundred meters and perfect for urban combat, allowing a shooter to stay sighted and continually fire on a moving target until it dropped.

  He stared out the window. Up at the roadside, one of the technicals had followed them back, though careful to remain out of range. The gunner stood on the load bed staring down at them, his machine gun dangling on its mount facing in the opposite direction. It didn’t appear he intended on being much help.

  At that moment, the bandits started firing at the bus. Bullets pinged off the body, then came the thwacking sound from a heavier caliber weapon, probably a .50-cal rifle. Now he knew why they put such heavy armor on the bus. Without it, the bullets would easily pierce it. From inside the bus, the passengers returned fire.

  They had been moving slowly down the hill across rough scrubland. Suddenly the bus swung around hard to the right and came to a stop parallel to the shack, still over a hundred yards away.

  “Hey, keep going!” Brogan shouted up to the driver. “We’re not close enough yet.”

  “That’s as far as I can take you!” the driver yelled back. “That’s a waterlogged hollow straight ahead. Any farther, we’re gonna get stuck in it.”

  Brogan stared out the window and scanned the ground ahead of him. What the driver said was true. A few yards away, the land dipped down into a shallow hollow, and he could make out dark pools of water among the cattails. The bus would never get out of there; its wheels would skid helplessly in the mud.

  “Okay!” Brogan shouted. “This’ll have to do.”

  Inside the shack, he spotted someone at the window. At least now, those trapped inside knew help had arrived.

  With the bus no longer in motion, it made shooting easier. Soon the bandits were pinned down behind the trees to either side of the shack. Brogan crossed the aisle to the far window and scoured the hillside, checking out what was coming from behind them. He used the butt of his rifle to smash out the window, poked the muzzle out through the metal grill, then crouched down on the seat.