Read The Walking Dead: Invasion for Free Online Page B

used by shadowy government types—which is currently parked and idling in the middle of the road. The strangest part of this tableau is that the man is smiling. Even from this distance, the man aims his big Ultra Brite grin at the convoy’s lead vehicle as though preparing to sell a new line of Fuller Brushes.
    James goes for his .38, which is stuffed down one cowboy boot.
    â€œGo easy, Jimmy. Go easy, son.” The priest takes a deep breath, waving off the weapon. Approaching sixty, Father Murphy still wears his collar underneath a worn Notre Dame sweatshirt, his hangdog face deeply lined and whiskered with a ruddy beard. His pouchy eyes radiate a certain kindness, along with the swollen lividness of a lifelong drunk. “This appears to be a group of the living, and there’s no reason to believe they’re not friendly.”
    James shoves the short-barreled pistol under his belt. “You stay here, Father, I’ll go—”
    The priest puts his hand up. “No, no … Jimmy, I’ll go. You tell Leland to keep his cool, and tell the rest of the group to stay in their vehicles.”
    The younger man reaches for his walkie-talkie as the priest climbs out of the cab.
    Over the next thirty seconds—the amount of time it takes the scrawny beanpole of a priest to climb out the cab door, struggle down the running board steps, and scuffle across twenty feet of pavement in his ancient Florsheims—a chemical reaction occurs. Unseen, subtle, undetectable to anyone other than the two gentlemen coming to face each other in the middle of the asphalt two-lane, it bubbles up within the priest unexpectedly, unbidden, and as powerful as an electrical charge passing through his brain. He instantly dislikes this fellow.
    â€œMorning, Padre,” the man standing in the middle of the road says with a gleam of neighborly congeniality in his deep-set eyes. The priest can see others behind the tinted glass of the Escalade—a woman, a couple of men, their moods and demeanors unknown. Their hands are hidden, their spines rigid, their muscles coiled.
    â€œHello there.” Father Murphy forces a smile. He stands ramrod-straight, his rheumatic joints aching, his hands curled into fists at his side. He can feel the eyes and ears of his people on the back of his neck. They need fresh souls and strong backs to help with the maintenance and fuel runs and heavy lifting involved in keeping the caravan moving. At the same time, they must be careful. A few bad apples have passed through the group in recent months and have threatened its very existence. “Something we can help you with, sir?” the priest says to the stranger.
    The thousand-kilowatt smile brightens. The man shoots his threadbare cuffs as though beginning a sales meeting. “Didn’t want to sneak up on you back there.” He sniffs and casually spits. “You never know who you’re going to run into out here in the wilds of walker country. You folks seem to have it down to a science. Traveling in that little cavalcade of yours, always moving, safety in numbers, no moss growing on y’all. It’s sheer genius, you ask me.”
    â€œThank you, son.” The priest keeps his artificial smile plastered to his face. “That’s a honey of a vehicle you got there.”
    â€œI thank you for that.”
    â€œThat a Caddy?”
    â€œYessir. Two thousand and seven Escalade XL, runs like a top.”
    â€œLooks like it’s been in some rough scrapes.”
    â€œYessir, it surely has.”
    The priest nods pensively. “What can we do for you, son? You seem like a man … has something on his mind.”
    â€œName’s Garlitz. Jeremiah Garlitz. Fellow shaman and holy soldier like yourself.”
    The priest feels a twinge of anger. “Always good to meet a fellow minister.”
    â€œHad a church down in Jacksonville, then lit out after the Turn, tried to keep it up.” He