Read America The Dead Book Two: The Road To Somewhere for Free Online

changed. His legs
stiffened. He crouched slightly, his neck lowered and his growl
returned, rising to meet the pitch of the thing in the
shadows.
    'The thing... person... mother-father...?' he
wondered. '...Master?' It stopped moving and seemed to be waiting
to see what the dog would do.
    Another dog yipped from somewhere out in the
field, and he shot his head up quickly and looked in the direction
the yip had come from, waiting to see if she would yip
again.
    She was a stray that had been
hanging on the fringes of the camp. He had caught her scent the
night before, and again earlier this morning. The yip said, Where are you? I am here... Come and play... I
need you.
    His head dropped back to the thing
in the shadows for just a second, but it suddenly seemed far less
interesting than it had been. The other dog yipped once more,
louder, more insistent. And that yip said, If you're not coming I'm leaving... it said, I called
you.. . it said, Why are you there? And it was too
much. His head came back up, and he leapt away a second later,
running through the winter blighted wheat of the field, following
the other dog's scent on the air.
    In the shadows, the boy settled
back down. He had been tempted to go after the dog, even though
Donita would have been.... would have been displeased, he decided.
It was not displeased, but displeased was the best he could come up
with. It seemed the longer he thought about a thing, the more
abstract it became. He lowered himself back to the ground and
pressed more tightly to Donita's cold flesh, taking comfort from
it. She was like... like a mother, he decided. He could not precisely remember what
a mother was, but he was pretty sure his thinking was
correct.
    He closed his eyes, and the darkness slipped
over him. The small death... The respite from the living death...
The place where the constant hunger did not drive everything. The
smell of her death came through to him, and he spiraled down ever
deeper.
    ~The Camp~
    “ I never thought of something like
a Hummer, Jeff,” Mike said.
    “ There was a National Guard base.
About twenty of these things just sitting there,” Jeff
explained.
    “ We were right next to a big
military base and never even thought to check it out,” Mike said.
“Drove by that base all the time. Saw them. Most of them were like
yours, the H-1, version, but I know there are other versions that
aren't military. The H1 and the H2 both,” Mike said.
    “ And three and four,” Bob added.
“But the three and four versions are not really military trucks,
not really even off road trucks. But they are really good off road
vehicles, and what about all those Jeeps? One of those new four
door models. I should have thought that, and I didn't,” Bob
said.
    “ Well, next time we need a new
vehicle we'll look in that direction,” Mike said. “But the ones you
guys are building are probably going to be damn hard to beat when
you're done with them.”
    There were a few of them sitting around
talking. The rest of the camp had drifted off to begin the projects
they had planned to do the day before. Lilly had taken all five of
the children to the toy store to keep them occupied. Jessica went
with her.
    Molly, Tom, Tim and Annie left to go to the
garage, and it looked to Mike like Bob was looking for an excuse to
get his hands greased up again. It was probably why, Mike thought,
Bob came up with an excuse to leave a few moments later.
    “ Well, Jeff,” Bob said extending
his hand. “It was good to get to talk to you, but if I don't get
over to the garage there's no telling what those kids will build...
or take apart,” he finished with a laugh.
    “ It was good to meet you, Bob,”
Jeff said. They shook hands goodbye, and that left Patty, Ronnie,
Kate and Mike as well as Jeff, Sharon, David and Arlene.
    “ So,” Mike said in the silence
that fell, “have you guys thought about how far you might actually
go? I mean, all the way to California or just west?”
    “ Well, when I