Camp Zero (Book 2): State of Shock Read Online Free PDF Page B

reality. We weren’t just up against dangerous people. They were trained and there had to have been more than ten, perhaps twenty to have taken out everyone in camp. I thought about the men on the road. Was it them? Were they associated with the ones we had met in the woods? Why would they have killed some but taken Murphy? What if we did manage to get them back? Where would we go? Where could we live? My mind churned over at the endless array of questions.
    “I know one thing for sure, we need to be extra careful. Tomorrow we’ll get close to the town of Hayden and see what is going on. Find out who’s taken them and if they are still alive.”
    As I finished saying that Ally’s chin dropped.
    She knew that there was a good chance they were dead. Why would they have been kept alive? I scooped some of the grain that we had cooked into my mouth and warmed my hands by the fire. From where we sat we could see right over the valley. A few fires burned in the forest. Survivors? Or had they been started by those who attacked the camp?
    “Try to get some sleep. We are going to be up early in the morning, before sunup. Those of you who want to stay here tomorrow, let us know tonight. We don’t all have to go down.”
    “I say we do,” Luke opposed what I said as if I needed to be challenged. “I’m just saying we are going to need more eyes.”
    I was tired, my body still ached from being thrown around in the river that morning and after what we had witnessed I didn’t want to get into an argument. I nodded and watched Ally and Kiera move over to a tarp they had set up on a section of rock. They huddled together and pulled the tarp down to block the wind from freezing them.

Chapter 8
    A s we sat around the fire, listening to the wood pop, Billy tried to change the mood from somber to upbeat by cracking a few jokes. No one laughed. One stare from Corey and he didn’t need to be told that he was out of line. I poked the flames with a stick and gazed into it as Billy settled down for the night, choosing to sleep in the truck.
    Once Corey had turned in, Luke spoke. “You know what we are going to have to do.”
    “We are going to find them, Luke, we are not going to start a war.”
    “They’ve already started it.”
    I shook my head.
    “Frost, what is your problem?”
    “You. You are looking for any reason to kill. That’s how you were back in Mount Pleasant and that’s how you are now.”
    He leaned towards me while puffing a cigarette in the corner of his mouth. “Don’t you want them to pay?”
    “Of course, but I want to live.”
    He chuckled. “Live? The odds of surviving what has happened to this country are slim. If they don’t get us, someone else will and if they don’t, you can bet starvation or radiation will.”
    “You heard what Dan said. He believed it was safe.”
    “Yeah, and he believed in UFO’s. The guy was a loon and you know that.”
    “Watch it.”
    He flicked his cigarette out into the night. “What?”
    I stared back at him unable to believe that he had the nerve to talk shit about someone that had helped us survive the past six months. But it was no mystery, he didn’t like Dan one bit. They had been butting heads ever since the wilderness camp. Both were as stubborn as the other.
    “Look around you, Luke. We are all you have now. If you want to talk shit about someone that helped you out, then keep it to yourself. I don’t want to hear it.”
    “I’m just saying that if we don’t strike back soon, they will.”
    His words cut into me as they brought back a memory from when I was eight years of age. I had been with a foster family living in a trailer back in Georgia for over seven months. They already had four kids of their own and they didn’t like having a fifth. I was a paycheck to the family, nothing more. They fed me the basics, they clothed me with whatever was handed down from their brats and when I wasn’t at school, I spent most of the time cleaning up their