Free Battle Lines (The Survivalist Book 5) by Arthur Bradley Page A

me.”
    He nodded his appreciation.
    “Sometimes I feel like I’m on a fool’s errand, a regular Don Quixote out battling windmills.”
    “Perhaps you are,” she laughed. “But think about it. Those are often the noblest quests of them all.”
    Bowie began barking, and they hurried ahead to see what he had found. The wolfhound was standing directly beneath the I-75 overpass, cars of every shape, size, and color jamming the interstate above. The shockwave had thrown a few of the cars through the concrete railing, and they now lay on Winchester Road, upside down and smashed.
    Mason and Leila carefully stepped through the minefield of broken glass and twisted sheet metal. In a world with limited access to medical care, an infected cut could be a death sentence. Bowie had his nose stuck in one of the cars that was lying upside down, and they squatted beside him to take a look inside.
    The lifeless bodies of a woman and her teenage son dangled from their seatbelts, bones poking through punctured flesh and blood pooling on the headliner of the car.
    “Poor souls,” Leila said in a heavy voice. “They survived the pandemic only to be killed weeks later by something as unlikely as a nuclear blast. It’s not fair.”
    Mason said nothing. Questions about what was fair or unfair seemed irrelevant. Life put forward challenges, and it was up to the individual to adapt and survive. He’d gotten that much from his father.
    Leila slid the camera off her shoulder and snapped a few photos of the unlucky pair.
    “I know it must seem terribly morbid, but the human suffering has to be documented.”
    Mason stood back up. “I hope you have plenty of film because, believe me, this is just the beginning.”
    “Now that you mention it, I could use a spare memory card.”
    “And the battery? How do you plan to recharge that?”
    She patted her backpack. “Solar charger. I found it in a sporting goods store. The whole thing rolls up like a small rug, and it only take a few hours to fully recharge the battery.”
    “Pretty clever.”
    She shrugged. “I’m finding my way.”
    They continued ahead with Bowie taking point. The four-lane road quickly became congested with cars, many of them flipped onto their sides or smashed into one another. The bright yellow sign for a Super-8 motel towered off to the right, and a Lowe’s Home Improvement store sat to their left. One entire wall of the Lowe’s had collapsed, and an assortment of light bulbs, plumbing fixtures, paint cans, and lumber lay spread across the parking lot. The motel had fared a bit better with only shattered windows and parts of its roof missing.
    Mason shielded his eyes from the sun and surveyed the city ahead. Hotels and restaurants lined the street for the next few blocks. Beyond that lay a small mousetrap where Winchester Road crossed over the city’s bypass. It was impossible to see much farther than that because the clean structural lines once provided by buildings had been replaced by indistinguishable mounds of rubble.
    Seeing him staring off into the city, Leila asked, “What makes you so sure that Lenny’s downtown?”
    “Call it a hunch. I’ve spent much of my life finding people who didn’t want to be found, and it usually involves understanding their needs.”
    “And how exactly would you know Lenny’s needs?”
    “He was trying to build a kingdom, right?”
    “I suppose.”
    “And what does every kingdom need?”
    She thought for a moment, and then a smile came to her lips.
    “A castle.”
    “Exactly. And the closest thing to a castle around here would be one of the office buildings downtown.”
    “Still, that leaves a lot—”
    She stopped when she saw him turn to scan the horizon.
    “What is it?”
    While Mason couldn’t yet see anything, he detected a faint thumping sound in the air. Without saying a word, he grabbed Leila’s arm and pulled her behind a nearby minivan.
    “What is it?” she repeated.
    He pointed to two black helicopters