Free Infected Freaks Volume One: Family First by Jason Borrego

remember how to use it, Dad.”
    “A nuclear war?” Abraham gazed at Robb’s arsenal and then back to his somber son. He loved Robb, but the conflict had made his boy crazy. I think you need to leave, he thought, but couldn’t say the words. All he wanted was for his son to stay. Abraham couldn’t process the information fast enough. His eyes sunk a little deeper in his sullen expression. The red shade of the planetary object brought a fevered mien to his stoned appearance. He returned his eyes to his humming wife. “Did you hear him?”
    “I heard him,” Beth hummed, rocking Emme.
    “I don’t want to die,” Emme whimpered louder. Emme must have felt protected, sandwiched between her grandma and her mother. There was no safer place on the planet.
    “Take care of your sister,” Robb said to Hunter. “We’ll be back.”
    “What good are guns in a nuclear war?” asked Abraham, interlacing his fingers behind his head.
    “Don’t go, Mom,” moaned Hunter, climbing into her familiar arms.
    “I don’t have a choice.” Tori sobbed, running a hand through his messy hair. Abraham could see she didn’t want to leave her babies.
    “There will be no home if we fail,” added Robb. He touched his boy gently across the shoulder and then turned for the door with Abraham hot on his heels.
    Standing next to a rusted pickup truck was Tori’s father, Glenn. “Come out here, boy. I want to have words with you,” the crude rancher said, smacking his thin lips. Abraham watched Tori rush out the door. She pleaded with her drunken father. The whiskey breath must have burned her damp eyes by the jerk reaction she presented.
    Robb followed his wife out and down the porch steps. Glenn had family serving in the Northern Republic. Everyone knew he hated all ties to Southern Liberty. The slender farmer scowled as his brow rose. He opened his pinkish eyes and stared. “I’ll tell you something, Robb. You try and run off and join the South, I’ll kill you.”
    Robb smiled like a playful boy. “You don’t understand. They need brilliant minds to fight what’s coming.”
    “Fuck you, and your alien talk.”
    “It’s the spores that are going to change the world. It will make you wish for death, but it will never come.”
    Abraham didn’t like the tone of the conversation. He moved back for a moment to the arsenal of weapons. He hadn’t fired a gun since his days in the service. The Neutral Zone Federation had a weapon ban it enforced with an iron fist in the city, but in the sticks, their presence was limited.
    At first, Abraham thought about heading to Mexico. He believed the weapons ban was ploy for something sinister. He didn’t like the idea of living amongst a government of unarmed civilians. But he felt this place was the only way to keep his family out of the Civil War. Screw the rules, he thought as his fingers scratched the glossy gun metal of a pistol. He pressed the magazine release and frowned at the stack of .45 rounds, ready to do some damage.
    The shouting outside intensified. Tori called for Abraham to join them outside. The fear in her tone gave him the balls to stuff the gun into the back of his gray pajama pants. Muttering sinful curses under his breath, he strode out into the crimson night.
    “Hold on, Glenn,” he mumbled, taking in his wily neighbor’s unpredictable eyes. It was grandpa verse grandpa.
    “I never liked your son. He’s weak like you, Abraham,” Glenn spat with a stream of chewing tobacco dripping out of his mouth.
    “I’ve pissed harder than you’ve ever fought.” Abraham took another step closer, watching a new set of headlights dip through the thicket of trees. “That’s going to be Benjamin Heinz,” he suggested, watching Glenn turn back to the rumbling sound of the vehicle. “How many times did my son kick your son’s ass? Close to a dozen if I remember right. Funny, your boy was two years older and a good foot taller. What do you think he’s going to do to