The Walking Dead Read Online Free PDF Page A

wind chime in the breeze. She stares at the stuffed penguin. “I guess.”
    “What do you think of this house? You like it?”
    Penny shrugs again. “I don’t know.”
    “What would you say if we stayed here a while?”
    This gets everyone’s attention. Brian looks up at his brother. All eyes are on Philip now. Nick finally speaks up: “Whattya mean ‘a while’?”
    “Gimme that hooch,” Philip says, motioning at Bobby for the bottle. The bottle comes over and Philip takes a long pull, letting it burn nicely. “Look at this place,” he says after wiping his mouth.
    Brian is confused. “You said just for the night, right?”
    Philip takes a deep breath. “Yeah, but I’m sorta getting over that idea right now.”
    Bobby starts to say, “Yeah, but—”
    “Look. I’m just saying. Might be best for us to lay low for a spell.”
    “Yeah, but Philly, what about—”
    “We could just stay put, Bobby, see what happens.”
    Nick has been listening intently to this. “Philip, come on, man, they’ve been saying on the news that the big cities are the safest—”
    “The news? Jesus Christ, Nick, blow the wax outta your head. The news is going down the tubes with the rest of the population. Look at this place. You think some government halfway house is gonna have these kinds of goodies, beds for everyone, enough food for weeks, twenty-year-old Scotch? Showers, hot water, washing machines?”
    “We’re so close, though,” Bobby says after a moment’s thought.
    Philip sighs. “Yeah, well … close is a relative term.”
    “It’s twenty miles, tops.”
    “Might as well be twenty thousand miles, all them wrecks on the interstate, 278 crawling with those things.”
    “That ain’t gonna stop us,” Bobby says. His eyes light up. He snaps his fingers. “We’ll build a—whattya call it?—on the front end of the Chevy—a scoop—like in fucking Road Warrior —”
    “Watch your language, Bobby,” Philip says, nodding at the little girl.
    Nick speaks up. “Dude, we stay here, and it’s only a matter of time until those things out at the—” He stops himself, glancing at the child. Everybody knows what he’s talking about.
    Penny studies her soggy cereal as though she’s not listening.
    “These places are solid, Nicky,” Philip counters, setting down the bottle, crossing his muscular arms across his chest. Philip has been giving a lot of thought to the problem of those wandering hoards out on the golf course. The key would be keeping quiet, masking out the light at night, not sending up any signals, or smells, or undo commotion. “As long as we got power, and we keep our wits about us, we’re golden.”
    “With one gun?” Nick says. “I mean, we can’t even use it without drawing their attention.”
    “We’ll check out the other houses, look for weapons. These rich bastards are big on deer huntin’, maybe we can even find a silencer for the Ruger … hell, we can make one. You see that workshop downstairs?”
    “C’mon, Philip. What are we, gunsmiths now? I mean … all we got to defend ourselves right now is a few—”
    “Philip’s right.”
    Brian’s voice startles everybody—the way it comes out on a hoarse, wheezing tone of certainty. He pushes his cereal away and looks up at his brother. “You’re right.”
    Philip is probably the one who is the most taken aback by the conviction in Brian’s nasally voice.
    Brian stands up, comes around the table, and stands in the doorway leading into the spacious, well-furnished living room. The lights are off in there, and all the shades are drawn. Brian points toward the front wall. “Basically, the front of the house is the problem. The sides and the back are pretty well protected by that tall fence. The dead don’t seem to be able to, like, penetrate barriers and stuff … and every house on this block has a fenced-in backyard.” For a moment, it looks as if Brian’s going to cough but he holds it in, puts his hand to his mouth