Zo8 ((Latest chapter=Chap.12))

[Volc Crescent]

No one post here, or I cut off their head. And I'm not joking. -_-

Alright, I had one of my old book on the old BBP Forum, but I gave up on that, and it's about 170 somein` pages long. So, here's my new book, not as long at all! And I'm still working on it...
Alright, this one is a Zombie one, and is pretty much unedited and unspellchecked, so don't come down too hard on me. Well, I will post a new Post for every new chapter I have. So, here we go! Don't post here, remember that! I will set up a discussion post!
I will also occasionally come back to posts and edit them. I won't change the storyline, just spellchecking stuff and grammer and wording and stuff. Okie, I'll let you go. Hope you enjoy the book!

P.S. This can get bloody/gory at times...

Prologue

It's almost the Anniversary. It's almost been a full year since It happen. Took us all by surprise, without even a hint of a warning. No one really knows what took place, or what lead up to it's occurrence, but it was crippling. Most of use were taken almost instantly. Some called it a Great Rapture, others call it an Apocalypse. The second seems more suited.

I don't really care what it's called, though. I'm only trying to survive. Nothing else. You need help, I'll be there, but that's as far as it goes. And don't expect a 'your welcome'. Those won't cut it, for me. As soon as I'm done helping you, I'm gone. Staying in one place for too long will get you killed. And that's if you're lucky.

Yeah, I know, I sound just like one of those other Assholes out on the street. And hey, maybe I am. I really don't care. As I said, I'm just trying to survive...    

[Volc Crescent]

This chapters fairly bad, in my opinion. Btw, some of my friends are actually in here, but only by first name. You'll know who you are...If you want me to change it, or take you out of it, just tell me.

P.S. The 'Dan' in this is not the Dan on here.

Chapter 1

He yawned, unfazed by the bloodied limbs resting at his feet. He swished the drug around inside the bottle, contemplating if he should actually take it now. A concoction he had made by himself, containing a few certain drugs that would kick his Adrenaline into overdrive. His breathing was labored, at the moment. He was sitting down on a small vent on top of a building.

Next to him on the table he had found, were two automatic Pistols, and an M16. He had found them while searching through the Combat 209 shop house. He didn't know why they named it '209'. It didn't stand for anything.

He glanced at the two arms, the flesh yellow and molted. He would've grimaced, but his golden, pupil-less eyes had seen it too much already. He let his golden hair fall into place, covering his eyes, darkening the moonlight roof.

He taped the blue/black Dagger on his thigh, and felt the sickly colored goo hold to his pointer and index finger. He lifted his hand up and looked at it. He shook his hand, splattering the blood to the wall next to him. He looked at himself. He needed a change. And a shower. A shower would be nice.

He shook his head; such feeble things were not possible anymore. Instead, he took the water in his canteen, swished it, and drank a bit. His thirst quenched, he stood up, holstered the two pistols to his waist, and strapped the automatic weapon onto his back. It was so light now.

He then picked up his pack, stuffed the canteen into it, and threw it around his shoulder. Holding it up with one arm, he walked up to the door. He placed his arm around the handle, and was about to open it, when he stopped.

Voices. There shouldn't be voices. Everyone was dead. And those that weren't...

He whipped out his pistol and lightly opened the door. He slid the pistol in the crack, turned on the flashlight, and looked inside, surveying the room with an unshot bullet. Training his gun on anything that moved, he did a double sweep, and moved into the staircase. He started to walk down when the stairs creaked, and the voices he was hearing quit.

Then there were footsteps, flowing away from his position. Then he heard a screech, a bone shattering crash, and felt the building shake, all in the same breath. He didn't move as he heard an unearthly shrilling, then an echo of other voices, repeating the same note, a note he heard many times before, and then someone scream. A girl scream. She sounded young.

She didn't scream for help, or in retaliation, only in pain. Again, within the same breath, there were two more screams, along with the sickening sound of flesh tearing away from bone. Then there was the sound of teeth beating on bone, and shrill shouts that sounded as if they came from an animal.

He knew exactly what had happen, and didn't even attempt to go and check if anyone had made it. Instead, he just backed back out of the door, and shut it. Forcing it locked with a chair he had found near by.

Knowing the makeshift lock wouldn't hold, he looked over the edge of the building. He was four stories up, and a three story building lay only twelve feet across the gap. He unslung his backpack, and whipped it across the gap, not caring what the 'crunch' was when it hit the adjacent roof.

He followed up with throwing his M16 over, knowing damn well what it would probably do to the weapons firing mechanisms, and then backed up to the edge of the building. He hopped once, ran forward, heard the shrilling of more creatures as his boots resounded off the walls underneath him, and leaped across the gap. He hit the adjacent roof, rolled on his shoulder, and leaped back to his feet, sprinting out of site of the things that broke through his 'lock', if that's what it could even be called.

He'd come back for his stuff. After all, he wasn't going too far. He saw the apartment complex connected to the building he was on, and didn't even hesitate to run straight at it. His eyes focused on the edge, he hit the wall with his left foot, forced a change in his momentum, and kicked up, putting his other foot against the wall, and then kicking up again, putting his left foot on the wall once more, creating a third step as he grabbed the top. He pulled himself up, and ducked behind the small shack. His seventeen year old body should have given out by this time.

His breathing was heavy; not from being tired, but out of excitement. He wondered if he really was that different from them. The chase was one of his favorite things. He loved it. And, sadly, he needed it. The drug, anyway. Adrenaline, that is. He felt to make sure the syringe and the bottle were still there. He hadn't really needed it yet, and was happy about that.

He shut those thoughts down, and focused on the creature like scream, and watched what used to be his kind slowly walk away from the building.
When they had mostly cleared out, he jumped on down from his spot, back to his pack, and checked to make sure his equipment made it.

He started to pull the stuff out. Everything seemed fine. Everything, at least, until he noticed the scope was cracked. He had pieces of a sniper rifle located in his pack, and of course, the number one thing he needed, was cracked.

He threw it aside, heard it shatter against the wall, and set back out to look for a new one. Not like he had anything better to do. If he left the city, he'd probably end up dying. Let alone that, it was almost the anniversary...

He felt a knot form in his stomach, but spit it out and slung the backpack back on. Knowing all too well where to go, he set out for Combat 209. The shop, located almost two miles west, was probably ransacked by now, he realized. That, or infested.

He had almost hoped for the latter.

Oh well, it didn't truly matter, he was destined there anyway. He did a quick over check of his M16, found how lucky he was that it didn't receive any damage, and jumped down the small edge to another roof top. Taking his time and pacing himself, being careful not to damage anything while dealing with the heavy backpack and weaponry.

When he finally touched the ground, he expertly slid the M16 out from underneath his backpack, and trained it across the road. He quickly skipped across targets, the stragglers from the recent attack on the building he had just escaped from.

Most of them were just walking around aimlessly, their eyes trained on the ground. Others were standing around, staring into walls. He slid his finger across the trigger, then stopped. His aim set on one of them closest to him, he noticed his silencer was broken. He swore to himself. He'd have to find a way to sneak around them.

That, or his bullets would just attract more of them. He slid the M16 back behind his pack, and edged close to the wall, his equipment hindering his progress.

His eyes slid back and forth between those closest to him, and came all to close to one of them he realized as he managed to get a sniff of the foul, foul stench they gave off. The smell of rotting flesh...

He instinctively whipped the knife from his thigh and slid it across the mans neck, pushing it deeper as he felt the creature shake and try to scream as he cut off the things head. The sticky goo now splashed and covered his arm and body. He could taste it. The most vile thing ever. He almost threw up on the spot, but he held it in, making sure the knife cut all the way through the monsters neck.

When he was sure it was dead, he slide the knife back in and sprinted full speed out of the street, and into a back alley. The worst places to be were the streets, and the insides of buildings. So, he quickly found a fire escape pad, and climbed up it as quickly as possible. When he reached the top, he looked back to make sure he wasn't being fallowed, and slid his backpack off.

He gagged, then almost threw up again. He spat, then dug into his backpack, pulling out something to get rid of the taste. He dug into an Apple, and spat it back out, drinking some water. He took another bite, then spat some more back out. It tasted horrible! Absolutely horrid!

When he had finally gotten rid of the taste, he felt his Adrenaline levels drop, and he felt how exhausted he was. He wanted to just lay down and fall asleep. But he couldn't. He had to lay camp down. Put down a perimeter. He looked around, noticed he was high enough, with only one way up, and moved back to his backpack.

He ripped it open, pulled two L85 spiker-landmines, the only ones he had left. He placed one two levels down, five levels from the ground, and another one on the top floor. The L85's, Spikefoots as they were nicknamed by the old Military personnel, were designed for Anti-vehicle use. When set off, they'd act like Shrapnel, the only difference is that when they exploded, they shot out spikes that could Peirce the toughest metal, and lanced out across a twelve foot wave in all directions, stabbing through anything that was in it's path. Although the mine was only a foot in diameter, the spikes thrown out grew to be four feet long.

He also pulled out a trip alarm. If anyone came past it, it would go off next to his ear. He placed it three levels down, hopefully giving him enough time to get his weapons and place up a semi-suitable defense.

He didn't have a bed or anything, but he got as comfortable as he could behind a small indent. He set his weapons up, and let himself fall out of consciousness.

Everything went off fine through the night, it didn't seem like the creatures could get up the Fire escape. Either way, when the sunlight beamed down into his eyes, he collected all his things, and sent off on his way. He didn't take the streets though. Not again.

Instead, he stuck to his way. He jumped from building to building, his four previous years of Parkour training before the attacks, and before everything went to hell, keeping his muscles and his skills up to date, and reliable even under the situations.

When he finally got the store into view, he was on top of a building. And, he was right. And happier. The place was overrun with the creatures. Why it seemed all of them loved going to the places he was always headed, was very annoying. He needed a new scope, and was running low on ammo. He only had 42 rounds left for the M16, and 120 shots left for each Auto-Pistol, a total of 240 rounds.

It'd be plenty for everyone here, but the next time he left for somewhere, he'd need more-

He was cut off from all thought as he heard someone yelling, and watched bullets just tear through the creatures in the building. A smile crept across his face. Yep, he was home. His best friend, Dan, was in the shop. And he was holding his own, as usual. He could hear his friend "Yeah, what you want? What you want? You can't stop this!" He heard a shotgun bullet tear through the wind and through the flesh, and saw four of `em fall "That's all you got?! Hahaha! Dance fucker dance!"

The kid jumped down from his building, and started to unload his bullets into the other walking rotting flesh creatures. He saw his friend turn to him, four of the creatures running toward the shop, which he could see his friend had turned into a small outpost. Dan mowed down the last of them, "Hey man what's up?!" He shouted across the closing gap as Zack walked up to them.

They touched knuckles, then they started back towards the 'base' Dan had made. After having not seen Dan since a few months back, he had lots of stories. Him, Dan, and Cody. The three decided it'd be best if they split up. But, this was the meeting spot. They could move quicker when by themselves. And, since they had reason to conserve ammo, they figured it'd be quicker if they lost each other, and tried to forget each other. They had discovered that, although the creatures seemed to lose all humanity, they did not lose memory of their previous life.

It had been almost Seven months since either of then had seen Cody, but they had promised not to regret any of the plans, and to not think of the others, so that's exactly what they did.

Now, as they entered the building and cleaned up one of the remaining that had managed to enter, they started laughing about stuff that had happened a long time ago. Zack found out that Dan was here to collect Ammo as well, but he was about to leave. He made up for what he had lost over the four and a half weeks since his last return, and collected a bit extra. He walked over to the convenience shop next to them and collected some food while Zack loaded up on his ammo. Dan brought him some food back as well, and after packing as much as they could, they ate a bit.

It'd been too long since they had a time like that. Now, Zack stood and nodded at Dan, knowing he may never see him again, but expected to meet him back here. They decided in three weeks, they'd return. Even left a note for Cody, just in case. But then they stopped, and remember the consequences of what could happen. They trashed the note, and forgot about the meeting all together. They waved each other off, and disappeared among the buildings.

The goodbyes they had gotten used to...

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 2

He sighed; half bored, half depressed. Kicking at some dirt with his foot, he started to make his way towards the Cemetery. He was on ground level, and wasn't really paying attention. He didn't have a reason to. He had heard gunshots go off almost half an hour ago, and came to investigate.

Turns out, something massive went down. There were bodies strewn out across the park. The long grass was covered in blood and bodies. The bodies rotting away with decaying flesh. Some were actually missing arms and other limbs. They smelt rancid. He had also found something that perplexed him. There was a left arm that stood out from all of the others. Probably due to the fact that it was six times the size an arm should be.

He didn't have much time to lolly-gag, though, so he walked on. Of course, he examined it a little, but after, he just continued walking. Maybe it was just bloated. He thought otherwise, but whatever. If it's arm was here, it'd probably want it back. And it'd return. They always do.

Either way, he had a long travel to make. He was exiting the park, when he stopped and noticed a shredded and broken 22. millimeter pistol on the ground. It was bloody, but there was no carcass near by to indicate who it belonged to. He knelled down on one knee and put his M16 beside him.

A 22? And this one looked old. Shot recently, but old. Looked almost as if it jammed, and backfired on whoever used it. He chuckled. A cynical chuckle that his friend had told him belonged in one of those old horror movies. It would seem as if someone didn't make it out of the park.

He tossed the useless weapon aside and stood up. Bringing his M16 to bare, and took a round about check through the street, then sprinted across the gap. No reason to lay in the open for too long, he thought, as he ducked into another Alleyway. Looking for a new way up to the roofs, he found a doorway that led into an Apartment building next to him. He brought the M16 up and flashed on the light bellow the tip of the barrel.

He eased open the door and did a quick check to make sure no one was in the way. When all he saw was a wall, he took a step back, reared back, then kicked the door down Violently. Making sure there was no one behind the door. Anyone there would've been smacked, taking a large deal of damage from the heavy door.

The kick hurt, but he blocked out the pain. He was getting good at it, and his Adrenaline was spiked again. He waved the rifle across the room, then, satisfied the room was empty, he walked in. Looking up at the dead, unlit 'staircase' sign, he opened another door in front of him.

Once again, the room was empty. Aside from the circular staircase that lead up to the sixth floor. He started to make his way up, slowly and quietly. Save for the creak that came from the fifth step on the fourth floor, everything was silent.

Perfectly silent. Just the way he liked it. Here, there was no such thing as 'too silent'. The creatures didn't act that way. They always made some kind of grunt or noise when they were about to attack. And they weren't smart enough to-

Dammit! He was wrong. Something he wasn't used to admitting. Yet he did so all the same as he unloaded six shots into a creatures head, the rotting flesh impacting on the wall behind it as the bullets caused it to explode. The empty shell casings falling to the floor as he whipped around in a 180 and unloaded another four into the creature behind him, causing a very similar effect. The two had somehow ambushed him. One from behind, one from the front; both perfectly silent. Now he had stuff to worry about. He was on the last flight of steps, stuck in the middle.

Without even hesitating, he fled up the steps, finding a door he kicked it open and shot blindly. Thirteen of the twenty shots hit a wall, denting into it. The other 7 hit a creature in it's hollow gaping chest, putting him down. For now, anyway.

He reloaded, thankful for the Silencer on the end of the gun. Though it had a tendency to tip off the accuracy a little, it was well worth it. As he crouch ran down the long hallway, he saw the emergency exit sign at the end of the hall way and ducked down while running and reloading. Not all too much of a challenge, but he had to keep glancing up and down between the gun and the door. When he finished reloading, he leaned in, and hit the door with his shoulder.

The hit jarred his teeth, and he scrambled in the small room, kicking the door closed behind him. He forgot to check his surroundings, but got lucky. This time. No one was in the room. He was breathing heavily, and smiling. He leaned against the wall in the dark room, the only light coming in from the small cracks of the escape hatch above him. Save for the flickering light of his Flashlight. The battery's were dying. No problem, he had a fresh pack in his backpack, which he set down beside him for a moment.

After a moment of catching his breath and recovering from the close call, he took a few minutes to consider what just happen. Were they getting smarter? Impossible. They were mindless creatures bent of flesh consumption. Whatever: it didn't matter. He had to keep moving.

He stood up, grabbed his stuff, and opened the hatch above him. He scanned the roof, then climbed up. It was noon. The sun was directly above him, and beating down on the building. He walked over to a large table and set his stuff down. He was getting hungry. He set the M16 next to the Pack and left his pistols holstered.

He walked to the edge of the building, holding an apple in his hand. He took a bite as he set a foot on the ledge that jutted out from the floor below him, and rested the arm with the apple on it. The park was right there. From up here, he could see much better. The grass, now standing four feet tall, was littered with corpses and left over limbs. Chunks of the trees were missing, due to gunfire. He could make out the over-sized arm as well.

He took a moment to think of it. Could've just used to have been a very, very muscular man. He doubted it, but could be. He took another bite, then looked down at the street. He couldn't read the name, but it didn't matter. He had memorized the entire city, street for street. Except for the deeply infested Mall section. He didn't dare go over there.

He may have been thought of insane for all the stupid things he had done over the years, but that was just dumb to go to the mall. All survivors knew about it. Or at least, he thought they did. They should.

He paused for a moment. Why was it always the malls that seemed crowded. He guessed it was due to the mass people who gather there, but he also thought that maybe it was because shopping really was a primal instinct for women. He chuckled at the thought. It was a stupid little joke, and he was the only one around to hear it, but he enjoyed it never the less. He needed some kind of Pick-me-up nowadays.

He finished his apple, then ducked down as he saw a creature make it's way across the street on the other side of the park. He ignored it, then continued on his way. He walked across the large apartment buildings roof while slinging on the backpack and holstering the M16.

He hopped down to the fifth floor of another building, heading South. His steps faltered and he slowed down. He was heading South, towards the cemetery... It was almost the Anniversary... Just a few more days...

He pushed away the thoughts then hastened his steps again. No time to worry, he had to move quickly if he wanted to make it on time. A few more days and he'd be there. That's all he needed. Then he could rest, for a little bit, anyway. Ironic, he thought, a cemetery being safe.

After surpassing a few more hours of passing over and around buildings, he found a Main street. No way getting passed that while still on the buildings. He'd have to get down.

He looked over the edge, now on the fourth floor. He paused, damn these buildings were big! He realized the only way down was the through the building. He didn't know which building it was, but he could tell it was infected. The mass party of creatures seemed to shine from the street below.

He sighed, he didn't really have a choice. He could of course take out his sniper and pick some of them off, but that would give away his position. They may be stupid, but they could still hear. Or, at least they used to be stupid. After the step incident, he couldn't tell anymore.

He swore silently: He had a sneeze coming on. He covered his nose and did all he could to make sure it didn't come out. After a brief moment of nothing, he recoiled and took a step back. Then headed to the large stairway door that made it's way into the building. Again, he did the same as usual, making his way down the first few flights, before irrationally deciding to head into the actual hallways.

He searched the building, now on the second floor. He made sure to remain as quiet as possible, only firing when absolutely necessary. Though, as soon as he shot, he was forced to fire another clip, dispatching four of them before they thought of screeching to their new found family.

After he cleaned out a few more rooms, and pulled some new clips from within his pack, putting some in his pockets and other easy to reach positions. Then he started down another flight of steps to the first floor, found a window, and opened it up. He looked out, found no one watching, and snuck out, ducking behind a large planter made to act like a fence. Still having to cross the creature infested street, he pulled out a frag grenade.

He glanced over his position, checked to make sure they were all huddled around a car, then pulled the pin, and whipped it over to the party of creatures, only twenty meters away. He covered his ears and hugged the ground; The resounding explosion from the cars gas can shaking the ground, and playing hell with his ears.

He saw the blood splash across the highway, then he stood up and sprinted as fast as possible across the gap, knowing the sounds would attract all the other creatures who were on the street, and nearby. He hoped to be far away by the time they made it there.

And he was. He was three streets down when he finally emerged from a building. He had wasted four more clips, but still had plenty more. He had been careful to make sure of that when he and Dan had picked up some Ammo.

While he was now on top of the building, it had taken him almost an hour to get there. It was now about four in the afternoon. He was getting hungry again, but he didn't have time to stop. His heart was racing, and it felt as if his body was on fire. In a good way.

His Adrenaline was kicked up as he sprinted forward, launching off the building, landing on another one a floor down, sixteen feet away. He rolled on his shoulder, the pack coming off just before the landing, allowing him the roll. He was getting good at that timing.

He strapped the backpack back on while jumping to his feet all in one quick fluid motion. He continued jogging across the building, now on the third story, then jumped across a few more buildings, enjoying every movement. When finally reached the roof of a second floor, he hit a wall and ran two steps up it before grabbing the roof of the adjacent building, pulling himself up.

Instinctively he grabbed his rifle: The building just shook.

He doubted it to be an earthquake. Those didn't happen here. It shook again, and he felt more then heard a loud roar. Then he heard a creature scream in pain, along with the ever so familiar sound of flesh tearing away from bone, then bone on bone, then bone on teeth.

What the hell was that? It terrified him. It was the same kind of sound he had already heard, only just a few days ago. Only, the scream wasn't human. Not live human anyway. He swallowed, then heard whatever it was roar again.

Suddenly, the building shook again. Then he heard another roar, then he felt the floor beneath him give way. And he fell.

Instincts taking over again, he rolled on the landing, and felt a cold, hard, long, sharp piece of metal Peirce his shoulder blade. He screamed, not thinking. His eyesight blurred, and he fell to one knee.

Then there was the same roar. Only much, much closer. He looked up through the tears forming in his eyes from the pain, and saw a large, ten foot monster standing in front of him. It's dead, flaky skin falling off, showing strong, meaty flesh behind it. In some places, he could make out the bones and muscle below it's surface. It roared again, pieces of the building falling down upon them both.

Zack didn't know what to do. This creature was huge, and it stared down at him. It felt like an eternity until he finally tried to stand up and grab his pack, hoping to make a run for it, but he felt the pain force him back to his knees. The creature charged.

He instinctively dived out of the way, but screamed and slid on his right shoulder, holding his left as the metal shard from the building dug deeper into his flesh. The blood oozed out, and his eyesight went blurry again with tears. He knew he didn't have a choice as he ripped it out of his skin, tearing an even bigger hole. He had to move. And he had to move now. He leaped for his backpack, the creatures roar jarring his skull, messing up his view, causing him to miss.

The creature charged again, he barely dodged, feeling a massive finger graze his side as he grabbed the pack, and forced himself to his feet.

He sprinted out of the building as fast as he could, the backpack applying both pain and pressure to the wound. He stumbled multiple times before finally making it out, the creature only a step behind him. He didn't have a choice, again, he dropped the pack and dived out of the way. Shards of glass and metal dug into his face and side, more damage caused to his already fatal wound.

What was this creature? That's when he noticed something: It's arm was missing. It's left arm.

He swore as it charged him again, roaring as it did; it hit him square in the chest. He tumbled backwards, getting kicked by it's massive heavy feet before hitting a wall.

The creature roared and pounded on it's chest, now ready to finish off it's prey. Ready to finish off him.

Right then, the creatures head exploded. The brain matter, flesh, bone and blood smearing the wall that Zach lay against.

He strained to see what just happen, but his eyesight failed him, and he fell unconscious. Happy to meet the painless darkness.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 3

He woke up to shouting. Lots and lots of shouting.

"Someone get that damned gate shut! I don't wanna` see so much as another finger of those things inside my damn base!"

There was also a lot of Gunfire. More then there was of shouting.
He leaned up to take a look around, his sight still blurry. As he put his shoulders behind his head to hold him, he felt his body crumple back to the soft bed he was on. The white mattress` and bloody bandages around him hinting that something was wrong.
 
He tried to pull his head up, but couldn't move much. He didn't really even have that much control over his own fingers. Until he caught sight of a beautiful young girl cowering in a corner just outside of a window. His body reacted without his own control and grabbed a pistol that had just been flung through the air after a horrifying scream, and a splash of blood.

Six muted bullets rang from the tip of the 22mm., then the ever so annoying 'ting' of an empty magazine.

He watched the creature that was standing over the girl stagger, but not stop. The bullets didn't do anything but stick in various parts of the creatures spine. Then came the continues fire of automatic weapons as the barrage of bullets almost instantly tore the creature limb from bloody limb. Soaking the poor girl in a pool of it's own sick blood. It's must've been like something out of a horror movie to her.

As soon as the monsters limbs and organs had fallen to the floor in a disembodied heap, the gunfire had already changed direction, piercing other creatures and denting into, what seemed to be, reinforced walls.

There were more screams, then more gunfire, then everything quiet. The room was dark aside from the flickering light, and the streams of lights coming in a variety of power at the bottom of fully automatic weapons.

"Someone get the fucking lights!"

Zack managed to turn and look at who was screaming and giving orders. His eye caught on a well shaven, well armed, and army dressed individual. Obviously, this man was in charge of the operations here. Where ever 'here' was.

He figured he'd have a better Idea of where it was, but he felt someone stick a needle into his left arm. He reacted instantly, his right hand reaching up and gripping the hand that held the needle and Syringe. His other hand grabbed the syringe at his legs, which the people had apparently forgotten to get rid of and test, and stabbed the needle into his own leg.

While he felt the effects from the sedative start to blindside his system, he also felt the Adrenaline, along with another drug he didn't recognize, fight over his half lifeless form. After a moment, he felt his own drug win. The pain during it though, was unbearable. He had to let out a small gasp, and recoil into the depth of his mind. During which, he had forgotten to hold onto the girls hand.

The girl whom had held the syringe pulled away and held her hand. When he finally came too, he had three high-grade, unrecognizable weapons in his face. Along with a knife.

His own body wanted to react, to get away, but his mind and mental process was slowed, still remembering the pain from the move he had just attempted.

"Lower your weapons, soldiers!" Came another order, from the same gruff, strong voice. "Whatever was in that veil, kid, must've been incredibly strong to be able to resist and overcome our sedatives. What's in that bottle of yours?"

Zack didn't answer. He knew exactly what it consisted of, and exactly how to produce it. But, he wasn't going to give that kind of information to anyone. Especially due to the fact of who had made the first batch. Who had made it, just for him. And only him...

That's when he leaped up onto this elbows and gasped, then started to cough. The anniversary! "What day is it?! How long have I been out?" the words burst out of him.

"Um...Six days, I believe. Why?"

There's one day left! One day until the anniversary! Only one! "Where are we?" He almost yelled, not able to control how his voice shook. "Where are we? Dammit!" He tried to leap out of bed, but someone pushed down on his chest with a massive fist.

After a brief pause, he heard the commander finally answer, "We're not at liberty to disclose that information. I'm sorry."

He then walked away. Zack's eyes followed him. Then he reached for the pistol that lay on his lap, aimed, and pulled the trigger directly at the mans head. Again came the clicking of the empty magazine.

By now, the lights had come on, and after that, six men were now trained on him, along with three women, all holding the same kind of automatic weapon.  Along with them, were four men and three women, holding some kind of shotgun like weapon, six medical personnel, who were working on some injured, and a team of three that held some pistols.

Zack sighed; there was no way he was getting any info out of that man. At least, not here. Not now. Though, a plan was forming in his mind. As it did, he heard the commander tell the men to lower their weapons, and clean up the mess that lay in the room as he walked into another more closed off room.

He took the moment to finally look around. He seemed to be in some sort of medical bay. There were beds and trays of tools such as knives and other surgical items. There was a oxygen tank, and a cabinet off in a corner. Along with a sliding curtain, probably used as a window or wall. Inside the curtain, at least where he could see, was a sink. It was currently bloody.

He could hear groans and moans of dying people, and watched as they wheeled a body away on a gurney.

He then heard the people that had taken place in the fighting that had occurred not ten minutes ago.

"Dammit, they got Jones!"
"Yeah, Levi as well!"

Then he heard the plea of a friend; "Dammit Jack! Stay with me!" He looked over to find a man pounding on another mans chest. "Can we get a crash cart over here!" The man yelled, trying to save his doomed friends life.

A few doctors rushed over to the man and pulled him up onto a cart, wheeling him off to be treated.  Zack could see that the man had suffered some very serious wounds. His left arm probably wouldn't be able to be used again. He could see the bone sticking out, and he had a huge hole in his side, along with a chunk of missing flesh from his neck. A bite wound.

He also saw the one girl that had been cowering off in the corner. She was covered in blood, and was crying as she tried to wipe it off, wash it off, anything she could do to get rid of it. Three women were there beside her, trying to comfort her and clean her off as well. She looked to be at least eighteen, same with the others.

He then looked up to see the gate that the commander had been talking about at the beginning of the Assault. It was large, and looked like it lead to some kind of Garage.

Before he had the chance to see anything more, a doctor walked up to him. Her skin was a very light shade of white, as if she had been stuck inside for years.

She told him to hold out his hand. He knew what they were going to do and pulled back. They were going to take a sample of his blood, see if they could find out what was in the drug he had given himself. That, or she was going to give him more of what they had. Instead of doing what he was planning, and getting up, he saw one of the military men walk up and pull her aside, then told him to go and meet the commander in the room he had walked into.

He went to stand, not planning to argue with a room full of fully armed men and women. With him he had nothing. It would seem that they had changed him into some cleaner cloths. But, as he went to stand, he felt his body tear apart. He was incredibly injured, and remembered what happen now. The 'meeting' with that new breed of creature.

It didn't matter though, he had to mask the pain. He numbed most of it out, but with every step he was almost forced to his knees. They had also cradled his left arm around his neck, and he could feel the stitches on his back with each step.

By the time he had made it to the office, his eyesight was blurry and he couldn't stand. He collapsed against the wall, holding his left shoulder blade with his right arm. His adrenaline was wearing off, and he couldn't do anything about it.

The man looked up at him; "Please, come in. There's much we need to talk about."

As he started to make his way in and sit down, he saw the bloodied up girl run over to the door and slam it open, "Sir! What are you doing? He shouldn't be up yet!" she yelled in, wiping away some blood from her cheek. Zack noticed a few tears as well. Understandable.

"Mam, I believe that is for our guest to say. So, kid, you think you're able to stand?"

Zach looked from the girl to him, then back at the girl. "I'm fine." He said.

The girl nodded, then skittered away.

The man in the chair gave him a steel look. "That was our chief doctor, kid, and you will show her some respect!" His voice was hostile. "From now on, you will refer to her as 'mam'. Got that? After every sentence, you will end and start with 'mam'. So, that should've been, 'Mam, I'm fine, mam.' Or at the very least, 'I'm fine, mam.' Do you hear me, son?"

Zack was used to being spoken to like this. A long time ago, anyway.

He replied, guessing what he was going to say next; "Sir, yes sir."

The leaned back and intertwined his fingers on the table, in front of his face. "You seem to be well taught in this, son."

"Ah! But, I seem to have lost my pleasantries in the recent battle. Please," He said, standing, "Would you like something to drink? We have little, but what we have is good. And you must be hungry after being out for a week."

He was right. Zack was hungry. Starving, even. That was probably why his adrenaline wasn't kicking in so well.
He nodded in reply to the mans gesture.

"So then we shall eat soon. But first, we have matters to discuss. When we picked up you, you seemed to be having some..." he paused, and as if for emphasis he pointed at Zacks wounds, "Issues, shall we say? Yes, we'll rely on that. Anyway," He nodded towards one of the men at the door, and he brought in two glasses of water. After he had given one to each of them, the commander told the man to get his own, and to start passing them out to everyone and anyone who needed it. A kind order.

Zack's respect for this man grew. Aside from with holding information from him, the man seemed like a good man. To the men under his command, anyway.

The commander spoke again. "So, am I right to assume you're wondering what's going on? Where you are?"

Zack drank from his cup, but otherwise gave no intent to reply. The man took it as a sign to continue, just as Zack was waiting for.

"Well, as I'm sure you've caught onto, this building is not safe. Not at all. We need to relocate. But! Before I give you anything else, you are aware that my men and I saved you, yes? That means you are now one of my men. You belong to me now, Understood?"

Zack didn't like that one bit. "Excuse me?" He replied, setting down the glass of water and leaning forward.

The man stood up and upholstered a pistol, pointing it directly at Zach's head. "Was I unclear? Did you not understand me? You. Belong. To me. Understood?"

Zack didn't know how to reply.

"You can use a weapon, this is obvious. We found your pack, and I saw your shots. You aim quick, and your shots fly true. Now, do you think you could...Run an errand for me?" He said, clicking the pistols safety off and tossing it into Zack's lap.

"Of course, the choice is totally up to you." He added, sitting back down and swiveling around in his chair until he faced a computer monitor behind him.

Zack didn't know what to do. Had he just... threatened him, then gave him the very same fully loaded gun? He looked at it. A 32. A pretty reliable weapon. He looked back up at the man, then at the gun. He checked to make sure it was loaded, then checked the sights, then stood up. "What do you need done?" He asked coolly, holding the pistol to his side. His adrenaline had spiked again.

From behind, he could tell the man was smiling. "I need you to receive a package for me. Specifically, a comm device that we had lost in one of the recent attacks. I need you to find it, and retrieve it. Think you can do that for me, son? It'd be of a great help."

Zack was quiet for a moment. "...Fine." He said quietly, then added "Sir." to the end, looking away.

The man turned around and clapped his hands once, a loud noise resounding from the two massive hands colliding. "Good!" He said, eager and full of joy. "But first, it would seem I've forgotten my manners." He added as well, "Names Jakob Stern. Commander of the city's Military Personell. MP, for short. What's your name, son?"

Zack paused again, and he felt eyes beating down on the back of his head. "Names Zach, Sir." He said, nodding in respect.

"Zack it is indeed!" He said, a smile on his face. Jakob walked over to the door, "Please, mam, come in! Say hello to Zack!"

The woman slowly walked in, hardly able to keep his eyes on Zack.

"You okay?" she mustered up in a quiet voice. "I mean from the beating you took, you must of..." She trailed off.

Zack made a small sound, the beginning of a chuckle. "I'm fine, mam." he said, his body still facing the Commander.

"You really should go and lay back down though..." She added. "You need to rest..."

Zack chuckled again but Jakob spoke before he had a chance to answer for himself, "Well, you heard the good doctor. You best be getting some rest. We'll talk more about that errand of mine when you wake up. Around Noonish, we'll say?"

He then shooed Zack out of the small office, and the girl lead him to a comfier bed in one of the back rooms. She nodded to him as she backed out slowly. He returned the gesture, then lay down on the bunk. On the floor next to him he saw his pack of weapons and others materials he had gotten used to carrying. They were all fixed up and shined.

He was actually starting to like this place more and more. Aside from being a tool for the commanders little party he had here, he felt right at home. And just like that, he went to bed. His body still ached like hell, and he used the time he had to sleep. A good nights rest, he thought, then he'd be ready for whatever mission the commander had for him. Hopefully, when he was done, they'd let him go. That, or he'd shoot his way out. After all, it's the anniversary tomorrow...

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 4

(((P.S, This chapter is kinda` boring at first, it's just really the Captain explaining to Zack how to use the Tagging systems on the weapons.)))



The weapon, a dark blue metallic color, was very neat. Zack was checking it out, looking it over and over. It was a very advanced piece of technology. At least compared to the things he's seen.

It was easier to handle, as well; shaped a bit like his old M16, but the barrel was larger, and triangle shaped with three holes at the end, able to fire three different types of shots. The grip was thicker too, but it just felt right. When he pulled it up to test it's aim, he felt the small ear piece that the commander had given him adjust, then a small screen came from behind his ear.

As the screen covered up his left eye, he saw the six people in the room flash green for a second.

"Alright, as you just saw, friendlies will appear as blips of Green. Hostiles are Red, and civilians are white. If the target is unknown, it won't appear at all."

The man who was talking was the squads captain, Jon. Jakob had already given him his orders. He was supposed to follow along with this squad of six, and help to retrieve the device. The 'device' being a long range comm system that was cut off from them after a separate wave of attacks a while back. They didn't have the people or the weapons to search for it, but after the last scavenge run, which was when they picked him up, they finally devised a plan to reclaim the device.

They were to hit the upper floors at night, lightly armed so they could move quickly and quietly. A small party of two were to cover the first hallway that led to the steps with automatic shotguns. They were of the same metallic color, and were extremely powerful.

After that, the rest of the four, including him, were supposed to move up the steps and infiltrate the higher floors. This time, they'd have to leave three more people behind to cover the T shaped hallways while the rest of the team scavenged what they could from a few of the rooms, then head on and look for and locate the Comm System.

The rest of the team consisted of only Him and the Captain.

There was supposed to be another guy on the squad, but he was out with another group looking for survivors, or something like that. Whatever.

"Now, before we start this, Zack, you should probably be informed of how this works. Now, obviously, the weapon automatically recognizes friendlies who have the same gear, and usually enemies as well. But, if nothing pops up, as it usually won't, you'll need to hit the identification buttons at the end of your rifle, which will send the info about the target to the other friendlies with the same code in their systems. Yes, right there. Right where you're holding it with your right hand. The buttons should be easy to hit with your thumb and other fingers, if you're holding the gun right."

Zack found the small buttons, and brought the small scope up to his eyes. The scope was powerful with a small laser dot as the cursor.

"Alright, the one farthest from you is the friendlies. You should be able to just hit that with your pointer finger. Hit that if you need to designate a friendly unit near by that hasn't been recognized, or, if there's already a friendly unit highlighted on your HUD, heads up display, it'll pull up their ID tags. Right now, you do not have the proper clearance needed to access this information, only I have it, and a small 'ting' will ring in your ear piece Go ahead and try it, it shouldn't be too loud. If it is, just tell one us and we'll fix that up right ahead for you."

Zack did just that, wanting to get the full feel of the new technology before heading into combat. They had a full hour before they were supposed to be heading in, and he was using the time he had to get acquainted with the weapons and people in his new squad. Didn't want to get blindsided by a fear they had in the midst's of Combat or anything. But, as he learned, these were all war-trained veterans.

When he was done, and was satisfied with the volume of the 'ting', the captain went on.

"Alright, next, we have the hostiles button. This should be obvious, it tags any unidentified targets red, showing as enemies on the HUD. This should be the first buttons pressed in a battle, before you even hit the trigger, unless absolutely needed. I do not want you firing on anything until you've tagged as many enemies as possible, or I've given you the order to open fire. If fire is absolutely necessary, there better be a damn good reason as to why you open fired, is that understood? Good. Now, another interesting thing about the device, is that if you hit the button twice and tag the same enemy, it'll send a message to all units in your squad that you need help taking down that certain unit that you've just tagged. I advise you only do this if you have no other options, or it's an incredibly large target. Though I doubt you'll need that in here."

Zack tested it out, feeling the button with his thumb, making sure all his fingers lined up on the buttons correctly. It was hard, he realized, and he'd need some time to get used to the mechanics. But whatever.

The captain continued talking; "Alright, next, we have the 'civilians button, which is right next to the Friendlies button, right on your Index. This should also be obvious, and the civilians will be highlighted in white.
After that, you should have the 'Objective' button, which will highlight any objective you've tagged in orange, and then you have the 'Dangerous Environment' button. This should be hit if tagging a piece of falling debris, or a toxic room. That make sense? Good. Now, I'll show you how to reload, if you're done with the buttons."

Zack took one more walk through in his head of the buttons, then nodded.

The man went on. "Alright, to reload it, you see that button on the top of the gun, near the trigger? Yeah, that one right there. That's what you hit to open the chamber. Now, as you can tell, there are three different slots. One for each type of shot you want to fire. Hit the button next to your thumb, the one on the trigger, and that'll change which shot you're using. Each little slot will glow for a brief moment in you HUD when you change. The first one is your basic Automatic rifle shots. That slot can not be altered. The second two are customizable, and can fit whatever you wish. Right now, you're left slot fires shotgun shots, and your right fires sniper bullets. Yep, and the scope can be zoomed just like the one you used to have. For whatever reason, the commander gave you our best gun. He had said something about our chief doctor, or something... I don't remember."

Zack disregarded what he had said and figured it luck. This was almost the perfect weapon. It could fire almost any shot he chose, well armed for team based combat, everything he could've wished for. Though, it was sorta` heavy, especially the ammo cartridge near the back of the gun. Almost made it feel more like the M16, just heavier...A lot heavier.

"One more thing!" The captain added, "The auto slot holds 60 shots per clip, and your shotgun holds twelve. The sniper only has a max capacity of five. Sorry, but after that you have to reload it all."

Zack was fine with that. The gun in itself, was absolutely amazing, and it was expected to only be able to hold that much ammo in it's clips.

Either way, he looked up to take another look at his squad he was traveling with. They all had brown or blond hair, and looked to be in their twenties or thirties.

That's when a girl came running up to the door, it was the black eyed, brown haired Chief Doctor.

"You," She said, pointing nervously at Zack, "You come with me. It's important."

He got up and followed. She pulled him away into a back room, when they got in, the lights were out, and she pinned him against the wall. "I swear to god, kid, if you do anything wrong that gets anyone on that team killed, I will personally cut you into pieces!"

Zack was taken by surprise and got the breath knocked out of him, he was too stunned to reply.

"Do you understand that? I will kill you if he gets hurt while you two are out there!"

"Who are you talking about?" Zack coughed, trying to breath while she pushed him against the wall again, for the second time. Why the hell was everyone here so violent?

"Two of my brothers, Joseph and Kyle are in that squad with you! If anything happens to them, or any of my friends, I'll kill you!" She hissed again, slamming him against the wall once more. He was just plain sick and tired of this.

He grabbed her wrists and twisted, forcing her to let go of him, then, acting too quickly for her to react, pulled her closer the wall and slipped behind her. He now had her pinned against the wall in the same way, holding her wrists against the wall above her head.

He leaned in close to her ear and whispered his reply: "What happens to your brothers, your friends; means nothing to me. If they get in my way, I'll kill them myself!"

With that he pulled away and threw her arms back to her side. She was cowering again, looking down at the ground and holding herself. After a long pause, she finally held a reply, "You're... Not the same kid I used to know."

The sentence caught him off guard, but he had no intentions of showing it. He scoffed, "Good for me." He said, walking out of the room, his body shaking.

The same kid...she used to know? He had no recollection of this girl. She didn't even seem vaguely familiar. He pushed the thoughts aside, and walked back into the room.

Joseph. A stern, strong looking man. 27 years of age, part of the shotgun team. Kyle, a younger, newer recruit, looked to be the age of 23. He was also a member of the Shotgun unit. They were both supposed to guard the first flight.

He looked at the others, all ready for action, all in the primes of their lives. They had all had hopes and dreams, and they could all be flashed away in this single moment. Here they were, just waiting for the right time.

Zack would've been worrying about the Anniversary, but as it turned out, he still had one more day. They had miscounted. Understandable with everything that had been going on.

That, and now was not the time to worry. They were standing in front of the gate that Jakob and his engineers had set up to block the first hallway. Their first stretch of metal for them to take.

Two Auto slot users, as Jon called them, were standing against the wall next to the door, ready to rush in, and provide covering fire as the shotgun units took point, their weapons able to eliminate anything quicker then the auto's would be able to.

As they unlocked the door, Jon went through the set up one more time. When he finished, they all put up their HUD's, and synchronized their weapon codes. They went over the plan one more time, and Zack felt like he was going to fall asleep. The talking bored him, and if they wanted to remain quiet and move quick, they'd have to move now. Like, right the fuck now.

For most of the part, everything went perfect. Zack was currently filtering through some old papers. But, of course, then he saw the reds ping up on his HUD, and then heard the bullets fly. Along with the screeching, and the screams of pain, of course. After a brief second of silence, many more Reds came up, and then the depletion of bullets resounded through the building.

They must've been ambushed. Same as what happen on the stairs. Dammit, he should've seen it coming! He was getting faultier.

As more screams ran out, these ones coming from the creatures, he got out of the room and made his way up the stairs. He had one more room to check, and as he made it up, he launched three shotgun shots pointblank into a seven foot tall creatures chest. As it stumbled back, he unloaded thirteen rounds from his Auto slot, and still the creature didn't go down.

It stumbled back three more steps, then roared, and charged again. Once more, he switched slots and put down three more shotgun shells, the last one aimed at it's head, blowing it to shreds. During the brief assault, he was unaware of what was said into his microphone, and disregarded the new green blip that shot up in the safe room four floors below.

Dammit, what the hell was going on with them? They were getting stronger, and smarter too.

Though he wanted to question it, he didn't have time. He had to react, and so he did. Three rooms beyond his position he found the device laying on a table.

He ran in, again forgetting to check his surroundings. Bad mistake. As soon as he stepped in, he felt something slam against his back. He stumbled forward, tripping and rolling on the ground. Another one of the creatures he had just met were standing in front of him.

It roared, and he flinched as a giant hand came down on his chest and picked him up, throwing him against the wall. He heard something crack and watched his gun fly out of his hands and hit the wall.

He skidded down and landed with a thud on a desk, tumbling off. It ran up to him, picked him back up, and slammed it's massive fist into his stomach. He doubled over and threw up as the same fist hit him again and again. He felt a rib crack, then another.

The creature lifted him up higher and it flashed his teeth. This was the end. Again, this was the end. Of course, so he thought; Until the creatures head exploded.

"Dammit kid, remember when you were the one saving my ass!" Zack looked up through his teary eyes, and coughed blood as he tried to laugh.

There stood Dan in the doorway, his usual old reliable sniper positioned beneath his arm holding him up.

Zack shook his head. "Dammit, I hate you sometimes."

Dan entered the room and helped him up; "Come on, grab that device and lets get the hell out of here!"

Zack picked up his gun as they strolled out, Dan helping to hold him up. As they left, Zack switched to using the wall and the railings. He reloaded his gun as they went down some steps. As they finally reached the walkway into the main base, there were fifteen final shots heard from someones Auto-Slot, and they heard a dull 'thud' of another body hitting the floor. Then, the door was closed, and the hallway barricaded.

When they entered, he was set down on a bed, and he blacked out.

Only to automatically wake up from his sub-conscious. He had ten minutes! That's all he knew. He had ten minutes. He threw off his blankets and got up, rearing back in pain as he felt his ribs.

He didn't care though. He had to go. He had to make it to the graveyard. He had to see her grave!
...It was the anniversary, after all. At the very least, that's what he could do. He could see her grave. Tell her what has happened... Tell her what she meant to him...

He had to move, he had to get up! He had to go...

When he got up, Dan stood at the doorway. "The graveyards five minutes away from here on foot..."

Zack just looked at him as he opened the door.

"I'll watch you from here with the sniper, but you best hurry. You now have nine minutes."

He reacted without thinking, blacking out as he stood up. When he came too again, he was standing over her grave. Staring at it. He starting crying and fell to his knees. Not from the pain; but from the sorrow. From the emotional hurt that he felt. It was his fault after all... If only he had reacted faster. If only he had moved better. If only...

Deep down, he knew there was nothing he could've done, but he still felt he was to blame. There was no one else, after all. No one but himself.

He didn't know how he got there, or anything. But, he had flowers in his hand. He placed them on the grave. Then, he heard a shot fly off. A loud one, a sniper shot. He also felt blood splatter against the back of his head, and across his spine and saw it spray onto the surrounding plants and trees.

He turned and dodged just in time to watch a dead zombie fall across where he was standing, it's head and left shoulder gone, the arm making it's way to the ground.

He looked up and saw the large building he had once been in. Then, he blacked out again, only to reawaken in the hospital bed. Too much pain for his conscious mind to handle. So, again, he blacked out; tears still in his eyes.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 5

It seemed like a waste. But, it was too heavy to carry around and was just awkward when having to move with it. It didn't allow very much maneuverability. That's why he had left that Slot Gun at the MP's base.

Now he was back to his usual equipment. The M16 and his Sniper. He also had his backups and his Bag with him. He was on top of a building fourteen blocks away from the MP base. He had escaped at night while everyone was asleep.

He couldn't have stayed. The girl was probably mad at him. He could now remember what had happened. His mind brought almost everything back just a little before he had left. Everyone had been fighting and yelling. All of it about him.

Commander Jakob wanted to keep him alive, while the girl wanted him to die. Both of her brothers were severely injured. One of them died a little bit later. Apparently, it was his fault.

As for what happen while he tried to make it to the graveyard. He still couldn't remember. Didn't want to either. He blocked it out as it tried to come back.

Right now, it was noon. He had a full pack of food, and even more ammo then he had started out with. Jacked it from the MPs. Doubted they'd be too happy about that, but whatever. He had left everything else of there's behind anyway.

He also remembered something about Evacs or something. Getting a helicopter and leaving the city. He remembered something about that. But didn't see a point in it. Everywhere else was taken over. The creatures could manifest anywhere.

There was no escape from them. If there were, Zack would've found it by now. And look where he was. It's been an entire year. A whole year, dammit! A whole year of this. Killing, running, and just plain trying to survive. He was losing reason. Losing himself.

He kicked the thoughts out of his head. Then slowly let them back in. He had no where to go. No where to be. It was just him and the open. Nothing to do, nothing to fight. He was on the tops of the buildings again, back to running. All the creatures hiding in their little holes, waiting for something to strike at. He could see them walking the streets below. Wondering aimlessly, pointlessly.

Was he really that different?

For a moment, he felt like he was one of them. They had nothing to do, no where to be. No one to talk to...

God damn he was bored. He chewed on his lower lip, biting it lightly. After a moment he just decided to sit down. There was nothing to do. He looked up and caught site of a patch of dark clouds rolling in. Joy. Rain.

Looked more like a thunderstorm. He stood back up and picked up his pack. Guess he did have something to do after all. Thunderstorms created a noise and for whatever reason made the creatures angsty. They'd run more then just walk. They'd hunt, instead of just stand around.

The noise made them think there was someone nearby. Damn he hated the storms. The stupid creatures weren't able to tell the difference between lightning and gun fire.

He swore silently to himself as he checked the skyline. He judged by the sun at what time it was and noted how quickly the clouds were setting in. He had about an hour to get ready.

He looked around. There was no entrance to the building from this point. He'd have to make it down to the building below him, then try to get in VIA the fire escape route by jumping the gap back to his current building. He'd lower himself to the escape, but there was an out-ledge that covered his way down. Damn design flaw. Either way, the jump would make a lot of noise.

That or he'd have to go all the way down to ground level, and probably be seen by the creatures. There was also the choice of looking for another building, but his building was currently the highest, and he couldn't see another building with an entrance from the roof, or any other easy access point.

He again swore silently to himself and tossed his pack down, then leaped down to the next building, rolling on contact and springing back up. He was about to do the same thing to the escape when he realized something. There was an easier way. Well, actually, it was a harder way; but it was quieter. And that's all that counted.

He reached into his pack and pulled out another thing he had managed to steal from the MPs. It was shaped like a stick of dynamite, only thicker.

It was like a flare, but not only did it shine light, it rung like a dog whistle. For whatever reason, it attracted them. It was perfect. He could lure some of the creatures away with it and while it was going off, he could jump for the Fire escape.

He rethought the idea. It really wasn't actually that quiet. It was just that he'd probably only be able to throw it about two streets away. And it'd ring for about three minutes. Six if he was lucky. And after that, it'd just be a large puddle of the creatures hovering around the single spot. After that, they'd search around. And that would be when the hard part came. He'd have to set up a parameter and hold down for a while. Granted, the entire plan really just relied on if he could stay hidden after it, but it'd be worth it. If everything went as planned, they wouldn't find him. Of course, that is if everything went as planned.

Especially since the sound echoed for about half a mile, and then the creatures scream could reach pretty far, it'd have a maximum distance of 3/4th of a mile. He'd have to throw it the opposite direction of the MP's base as well.

So he did just that. If he stayed there and thought about it, it'd just be a waste of time. Acting and Reacting, that's what kept you alive nowadays.

He waited till he heard the pinging of the thing hitting pavement, then a dull moment; then the screaming of the creatures.

As soon as the screams multiplied, he threw the pack down to the fire escape. The sound of the pack and the metal colliding resounding around the building, loud enough to cover three blocks. Six blocks had it been quiet.

Next his body hit, making a sound that rang out over six blocks, which would've probably reached a distance of ten blocks. Had it been silent of course. But, due to the screaming, and the ringing that blocked everything out of the creatures head, they heard nothing else other then each other.

He quickly got inside and paused, surveying his surroundings with his M16. He checked the entire floor of the apartment, and after finding satisfaction in the fact that none of them were around, he entered one of the homes and started to make a parameter. He had to be quiet; it had already been five minutes.

He quickly set up three L85 spiker-landmines. One of them a few feet in from the doorway, and the other two near the windows beside the Fire Escape. Though he knew the creatures were usually too stupid to open doors and climb ladders, they were also unusually good at getting to places they shouldn't be.

So, along with those, he rigged both a flash grenade and a stun grenade to the door, there eyes already super sensitive to the light. Those two were really only for him though, one to wake him, the other to blind and stagger the creatures, giving him time to get ready for the attack. He'd probably have to stay there for a day, since the rain would make everything wet and slippery. He'd have to wait for tomorrows sun to dry everything up.

He also decided, to be safe, he'd board up a few of the windows with some of the stuff he found around the rooms. He couldn't do much, though. He still had to be quiet. The entire thing took fifty minutes, and he could already hear the rain pelting the roof and walls.

He also heard the thunder and saw the lighting through one of the cracks in the window. He shut the curtain and did a double check to make sure the entire home was clear, shut off all lights, and shut himself in one of the backrooms. Completely terrified.

He hated the storms. He used to love them, but now, now that people who had died have come back to life, ready to devour whoever they come across; he now hated the storms.

He hate then because she used to love them. She'd just stand out in the middle of them, staring at the sky and laughing. A beautiful laugh.

He kicked the thoughts out and gripped his M16 tighter as he sat against the wall, staring at the door.

Anything could happen at anytime. Anywhere. He could hear footsteps outside of the building. Heavy, loud, and stomping. They were now running through the building.

Storms. He hated them. They brought his thoughts back, and his emotions, usually strung back and hidden, would shine through. He hated storms.

He was crying. His memories of her playing through his head. Unrelenting, unstoppable, and unstable.

One moment he'd be laughing; the memory so stable and clear that he could hear the angelic tone that echoed in her voice. The next he'd be crying, the fear of what had happen, and what's happening too much for him to bear.

One moment he'd be mad, because of how he didn't do enough, how he'd let her down. The next he'd feel love again, cause of how she felt he did plenty, that he did all she wanted and more.

He hated storms. Because she had loved them. Because their first kiss was in a storm. And because her beautiful face was twisted in pain, pale and lifeless; all in the middle of a storm.

He hated storms.

And he hated himself.

He felt nothing again. Emotions lead to weakness. He cancelled it all out, forcing himself to regain control; to stay in control.

The storm was leaving. It was over, and nothing bad happen.
Nothing to talk about, anyway.

As the night went on, everything cleared perfectly. The night sky shone through the window as he looked through it as he fell asleep. He had had a good meal, and felt it was time to lay down. Again in control. His emotions his, not the other way around.

He had a nightmare that night though. But he wasn't going to talk about it. It was the same nightmare as he had always had. The same one. The one of her pale lifeless face.

But, he was in control now, and blocked it out as soon as he woke up and wiped the sweat from his brow.

He took a leak in the bathroom and washed his hands, then set out to find a decent meal. He pulled a granola bar from his pack and munched on it for a while, then looked around the house. Again checking to make sure everything was clear. About one o`clock he checked outside. It seemed dry enough, and so he undid he booby traps and unboarded the window to the fire escape.

He checked his rib-cage. It still hurt and had a bandage around it, but he was still blocking out the pain.

All he had left before having to leave was to undue the stun grenade. He was cutting the string he had used to make sure that if the door opened it would go off, when he heard a dull 'cling'.

He looked at his feet and swore out loud.

The bang rang loudly right in his ear. Though he had put in earplugs, the sound was still deafening, and his eyes blurred with tears from the pain.

Dammit! How could he have made such a mistake like that!

He rolled around on the ground for almost a minute before he could recompose himself and gather what had happen. The only reason he actually got up was due to row of teeth about to Peirce into his shoulder.

He barely moved in time, knocking the thing across the head with the side of his fist, putting it down and rolling back as three more pounced him. He landed next to his M16 and was forced to smack one away with the butt of the gun while dodging the other two as they desperately reached for his flesh.

He shot one of them in the head, blowing chunks of brain matter onto the others back. He melee'd one away with his gun again, then head butted the other as it grabbed onto him. He struggled to keep it from biting him as it forced it's neck down upon him.

He pushed it off as the other one pounced from the side, pushing him to the floor as it's teeth narrowly missed his shoulder, the creatures face implanting on the floor as he pulled his face to the side and let his hand go of the creatures wrist, pulling it below him. The gun was three feet to the left, but he pushed the creature off and grabbed for it.

Barely in time he shot half the clip into it's chest, and was forced to hit the other one away as they both staggered back.

Now as the first one feel, he shot the rest of the clip into the other one.

Without thinking, he grabbed the pack and jumped out of the building, landing on the one adjacent to it. After escaping across eight more buildings he rested. Then realized: He could hardly hear anything. Understandable. The Stun grenade would have that effect for a while. With how close he was and all.

He coughed. That was too close. Way, way too close. He didn't even want to think about it. He just wanted to rest now. Just give himself a moment to collect his wits.

He swallowed a lump in his throat. That was life out here. How he escaped he figured was just pure luck. There was no way. And he didn't believe in god. Who could in a time like this?

He just sat and collected himself. Sat for hours. Sat till five, until his stomach forced him to move. He ate. He couldn't think. It was still too much. At the moment he hadn't thought about it, but up close... The flesh was just hanging off, and he could see one of their jaws. The rotting flesh was just...

He couldn't bare to think about it and blocked it out.

Now was not the time...

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 6

He had never been inside a museum. It was dark, wet, and cold. And almost defiantly not as safe as being outside. Nothing looked like it should in the dark.

And the flashing lights were giving him such a headache. That was hardly important right now though, he was too preoccupied with the creature chained to the wall. It was trying to shriek, but it's mouth was gagged and muffled.

It attempted to jump at him, it's arms and claws flailing wildly into the air, reaching for his flesh and meats.

This one was interesting though. There was no blood on it's mouth, and it was obvious it's skin was rough and sharp.

And it was smart. It had stopped flailing and calmed down, as if it had learned that it couldn't reach him.

Zack was sure to keep his distance. But he was also curious. He slowly reached out to touch it, not thinking. Then it snapped at him, spitting the gag out, and when he barely pulled away, It screeched again, the high pitches and spittle hurting his face and ears drums.

He stumbled backwards, holding the sides of his head. His anger spiked as well, and he leaped at the creature, just before a bullet shattered the air.

It grazed his left arm; he fell screaming, grabbing it as the blood spouted out of the wound. “Again? Seriously?!” He screamed. How could all those people in the movies just walk this shit off?

“Who are you?” Asked a rough, Scottish voice.
Zack felt a thick sickly liquid fall onto his shoulder, and he quickly managed to escape it as he felt it burning straight through his shirt, right into his skin. He gritted his teeth. It was unbearable, but it got his mind off the bullet wound on the upper left of his arm.

His sights were blurred now too. Another bullet flew off and it barely missed him, this one he guessed being the 'warning shot'. He also guessed the first shot wasn't actually aimed for him.

The creatures gut was spilling out, the intestines and everything. It was almost revolting, but he turned away before it lasted long enough to imprint itself into his memory.

His attention was now back on the man above him. He was on the walkway, holding an old shotgun.

“I'll ask you again; Who are you?” He repeated, obviously careless of how injured Zack was.

At first, Zack didn't answer, his thoughts on his wounds, but as the man raised the gun again and cocked it, he thought otherwise.

“Zack!” He finally admitted, wincing as the words shot out of his mouth, shaking his body.

“Oh...” The man responded after a brief pause, as if not expecting an answer. “How did you get here?”

Zack recalled his day. From waking up on the roof, to traveling down through the streets, and slowly making his way here. For no reason, what so ever. The story really wasn't that exciting. Aside from when he almost slipped and fell off the roof. But he didn't think to add that part.

“So, you just walked in the front door?” The man concluded, his shotgun now at his side.

Zack nodded, paying close attention to the mans fingers, which were currently playing at the trigger of the rifle. The gun wasn't pointed at him, but it wouldn't take much to tilt the weapon and fire.

But then his eyes flashed back to where the creatures guts were, as he noticed the steam rising from the blood spill. The fluid was burning the ground beneath it.

“Just a simple concoction, really.” The main explained, “ I added a few elements here, and a few chemicals there, and look what happens! Perfect Mutation! To an extent, anyway.”

Zack didn't take his eyes off the acid. He was thinking. The old man planned on killing him, but not right now. He was too proud of his accomplishment, and he'd want Zack to have to hear all about it.

So, while the man droned on about how he did it, Zack's thoughts started racing. He'd need to get away, and get back to his weapons. The only way out though, seemed, to him, rather far-fetched. The man was sure to have some traps laid out, waiting for him. And he had the power, as well as the high ground.

Zack was surrounded by Statues and Exhibits, unable to move efficiently. But, it would seem he wouldn't have a choice anyway. The mans story was ending, and Zack was directly in the sights of the shotgun.

To add to it all, his arm still burned. Both from the bullet wound, and the apparently acidic blood. He was still losing a lot of blood himself, too.

As the man finished his rant, he let a final threat run loose. Then, he raised the gun, and let loose a barrage of bullets.

By the time the shots arrived at Zack's position, he was well out of the way. Timing his movement perfectly, he had dived out of the way at the last second, narrowly avoiding the fatal rounds.

“Aw damn you!” The man exclaimed, pumping his shotgun, moving to get a better shot.

Zack was hidden behind an exhibit of a horseman, just out of view of the man, or Jack, as he called himself in his long and annoying speech.

He ducked down as another volley of shots ricochet off the exhibit, a few piercing into the metal body. He laughed a little, his adrenaline spiking again.

As soon as the third volley shot off, he dived out again, hiding behind another exhibit.

There was no way he was getting out of this one. He was losing too much blood. His sights were worse. And to add to it, his evasions weren't even remotely helping. This was the end.
He chuckled to himself, tears in his eyes. Wow... He really had no faith in himself. So? He wondered; who's going to save him this time?

He waited a full ten seconds, then passed out.


The storm was horrible. The sky was a dark blue, and the rain was numbing. The buildings were translucent, and everything glowed green. He could make out figures behind the walls, all glowing a hazardous orange.

They were people, fleeing down streets, carrying cases and packs and luggage.

His hand was warm, as well. He was holding someones hand. He was holding her hand. She was driving, he was directing. Rather not so much driving, as trudging slowly along the over crowded road, trying to escape the city and the traffic.

The vehicle's top was open. A convertible. Red; her favorite color. She was wearing a yellow tank-top, and dark blue jeans. Odd clothes choice on a day like today. But she looked oh so beautiful in it. Her steel eyes were on the road, concentrating on the luminary effects of the lights flashing off the wet streets.

Her lips were a light pink, and her skin a deep pale. Her hair was long, reaching her mid-back, purple and glazed in the flashing of the lights.

She turned to him and smiled. He returned the gesture, aside all that was happening.

Then her eyes shot behind him, and he felt a big hand grasp around the collar of his shirt, pulling him out of the vehicle.

He kicked, and tried to pull away; tried to escape, but nothing he did helped. The man was too big, and too powerful.

As soon as he was pulled from the vehicle, the man flung him across the sidewalk, where his back slammed against the wall, knocking his breath of him. He skidded to the ground, and watched as the driver of the vehicle was pulled out, and tossed out of the seat, landing with a thud next to him.

With that, they heard a scream, and quickly retreated into a back alley, where they were entering through a door. As soon as she put her hand on the handle, the door blew ajar.

The door, slamming into her, pushed her back and she stutter stepped back to the wall, where she slid down the wall to the ground. The man who opened the door continued to run away from the building, and as the women recovered, both her and blond haired boy entered the building.

He was yelling not to go in there! In his head, he was screaming. He knew what lay in there, and he could see it with his minds eye. But the two didn't know...

They slammed the door behind them, and he locked it with a large dresser. It took a minute or two to push it in the way, but he got it. That's when he realized how fatal of a mistake it was.

Just as he finished, a man turned the corner, brandishing a Shotgun. The eight shot burst pierced straight through the women's stomach, blowing a hole in it.

The man realized what he did, but not in time to react to the creature as it morphed from the darkness of the hallway aside him, pinning him to the wall as he screamed and shouted.

It tore into him, ripping his flesh apart, then shoving it into it's mouth. It's teeth beating on bone as it tore off his hand, his screams still echoing outside the building.

The old man barely had time to toss his shotgun at the weeping boy, who almost failed to catch it with one hand. Just as the creature turned to him, he launched off the eight round shot, the bullets blowing a hole in it's chest.

It didn't fall. The gun raised a little, and another flash went off. Then the creature dropped, it's brain matter stained on the wall behind it.

The man turned to him, his eyes begging for mercy, for him to kill the man. Now, with his minds eye, he could see himself look straight into the mans', and he could see how much hate was there.

The kid cocked the weapon, the man gaining a smile; all his pain was about to be relieved. The final shot in the clip went off, and the gun bounced to the floor with a clang.

His hate becoming numbing quickly, he picked up the girl. Her strong body now frail, her skin managing to become lighter then it once was. He knocked over the heavy dresser, and pushed his way out the door, where a team of medics had heard the shots. He wouldn't let go of his loves body, even while they tried to force him to him to.

He took one last look back through the door where he had once been, and saw the man staring back at him. Still bleeding, still in agony, and still able to feel every ounce of blood lost... The bullets were stuck in the walls next to him.


Everything else was blurry.

Then he realized he was crying. Tears streaming down the side of his face, falling to the floor.

He couldn't avoid it. He remembered now. Him and the three medics drove off, leaving the man behind to die. The three didn't know it, it was his secret. And while he stared at his loves lifeless body, he couldn't help but lift the shovel and drop the dirt on the coffin less grave.

He pulled his arm up to wipe his tears from his eyes, but stopped abruptly. He couldn't reach. He was shackled to the wall.

“Fuck!” He swore, unable to respond rationally to his predicament. He looked around, fear taking over. He tore at the chains, trying to pull away.

Then he stopped. Telling himself to stay calm. Stay in control. Stop making noise, that would attract far too much attention, if it wasn't already on him.

He needed to devise a plan. He looked around. He was chained to a wall. The floor was damp, and he there was a small stream of mucky water in the middle. It registered; A sewer. Shit.

He had never been in the sewers.

And moreover, it was the stench that he loathed. What it was, he didn't know, but it smelled horrible. No, wait. He knew it. The smell of moist rotten flesh. Gross.

He looked at the chain, and pulled away again. It snapped off. He stared in a mixture of puzzlement and amazement. The wall he was chained to was that old and weak.

He laughed, tugging the other chain away from the wall. How simple...

He froze. Too simple. The man wouldn't have noticed, but it was obvious the creatures would. If Jack had locked any thing else down in these sewers, they would probably have had escaped as well. The thought wasn't really that logical. It was more thought out of fear.

He heard another screech, and covered his back with the wall. He reached for his thigh, grabbing where his knife should've been. He swore to himself and rolled his eyes; of course the man took his weapons.

The screech echoed again, the loud sound dampened by the distance. He slid away from the wall, stepping over the steady stream of green sludge in the middle of the sewer street.

He judged by the sounds on which way to go. There was machinery to his left, same way the screech came from. That would be his destination.

Ten minutes later, he was turning the corner into a large, disgusting room. The huge, vast area, was covered in the creatures. Some strapped to the wall, others strapped to the ceiling. A few were even hanging from the ceiling, their blood pooled at the floor beneath them.

He heard the scream again, and realized there were at least twenty rock slabs spread out in the room, and many of them had the creatures spread across them, medical tools laying on nurse tables next to them.

Jack really was using them as medical specimens. They were his experiments. His play toys.

He started to walk past them, looking at what had been done to them. A few of them had their limbs missing, still holding onto life. Another's ribcage was wide open. He counted fourteen dead ones, and then he came to the one that was screeching.

It's stomach was cut open, and there was an old rusty saw blade laying next to him. The 'doctor' had been experimenting on them all this time.

It growled at him, and then spasmed. Zack stepped back, alarmed. Instinctively he reached for his M16, but came across nothing. For a moment, he relaxed as it stopped. Then, it shot him a gaze, and in an quiet, eerie, sudden movement, it said “Kill me.”

Zack didn't know how to respond. Was it still actually alive? Was it still human? It wasn't important. It needed to die. Nothing deserved this kind of pain.

Out of reaction, he found the knife laying next to it, and slid it across the creatures throat, spinning away to escape the spurt of blood. As it bled out, he heard the other creatures start to scream, thirsty and hungry from the smell.

As they started screaming, he realized he needed to get out of there. The noise was loud enough to get anyone's attention, if they were near enough. He found a stone staircase, and quickly ascended it.

When he tried to open the door, it hardly budged, so, he did the only thing he could think of; he persisted. After a few good slams against the door, it opened just enough for him to slip into.

He closed his eyes as he took a huge breath of the fresh air. It felt so good to be breathing clean air again. He knew he'd enjoy being out in the open again as he opened his eyes. But, of course! He always had to go and piss off large groups of people. And the groups, were always the ones with the biggest guns.

And eight of those big guns were pointed in his face.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 7

He couldn't help but call himself lucky. After all he'd been through, that's all he really was. If they hadn't picked him up, he would've been stranded in the middle of no-where with no idea where to go or what to do. No weapons, no medicine; Nothing. He would've been dead. Easy.

But, as always, when you're 'lucky', you're never lucky. The commander had yelled at him. Go figure. And oh boy, did he hate getting yelled at by Temperamental Army Man. Brought him back to his family days.

That wasn't the worse part, though. The worse part was tomorrow's mission. They had to infiltrate the Mall. And there was no escaping this time. He had body guards. And Command must've known him well. The body guards were girls. He couldn't hit a girl.

One was named Lexa, a brunette girl with matching eyes. She carried two 9mm handguns on her waist. She was laid back, as far as he could tell. Didn't seem to really care at all. She wore a dark black mini-skirt, with a matching long sleeve that made her look like she was a school kid.

The other one was named El. She wouldn't give her full name, and seemed a little on edge. As if she didn't want the job. She wore a long, kinda bell-bottom jeans, boots, a dress shirt. Silver, chin length earrings, cut on a slant. Short back, dark blue and purple hair, and dark blue eyes. Both were intimidating. And the Commander must've had some kind of special training for them. They both wielded dual pistols.

Only one thought ran through his mind. 'Don't piss these two off'. Short, sweet, and simple. It was more like a law. These two seemed like they wouldn't hesitate to snap his neck. He'd have to walk on glass around these two.

He lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. They had locked this place down tight. Like, really tight. As they brought him in, he'd taken note of the metal fence, and, the ceiling mounted Chain guns.

He was told not to worry about where they got them, or how much ammo they had left, but to just focus on tomorrows mission. Which he wasn't even told what they had to retrieve.

He didn't even get the chance to think about sleep. Doc came in. Yeah. Same Doc that wanted him dead.

His first reaction was 'reach for the gun'. He didn't even get the chance. She was on top of him, pinning his arms to the bed. She moved with exceptional quickness, overpowering him.

She was in control. And not in a good way.

She held a gun three inches away from his head. She was smiling. He understood why. Adrenaline.

“It's your fault!” she yelled, “They're dead, and it's your fault!”

What could he say? It was obvious she honestly thought whatever happen was his fault. It wasn't. He knew that much. But, she didn't. And neither did her gun.

He swore. There was no getting out of this one. She clicked off the safety, and pushed the gun harder against his temple. Yep. He was dead. He was so dead.

He closed his eyes and waited for the bullet to pierce his skull.

He heard the click and made a noise of fear. Then he heard laughter. Lots, and lots of laughter. She got off him and said, through breaths, “Nah, I'm just kidding' with ya'. But in all seriousness, get up. We gotta' go.”

He was breathing heavy. Seriously? What was wrong with this girl. He looked up. Great. Even Lexa was there, laughing. Of course. He was turning red. This was really going to fuck with his manipulation of the team.

He'd have to find a way to take control again, but that could wait. They were rushing him up and out of the room. While in his pajamas. The pink ones. With the puppies. The ones that, he was sure, the commander gave him to wear, knowing this would happen.

More of the punishment. It was fair. He understood.

By the time he arrived at the commanders room he was failing to hide a red face.

The Commander smiled, and tossed a set of Military clothes at him, which he took thankfully, aware he was going to switch to his old clothes just before they left.

But while he stood there in the puppy jammies, the laughter from the girls was absolutely irritating. It wasn't even a quiet laughter. It was an explosive hysteria.

The Commanders grin wasn't helping either. He did his best to keep a fake smile on. Till Dan entered. His pause, followed by another hysteria of laughter, caused more laughter to erupt.

When it was over, the girls, Dan, and Jon, which he had failed to notice, were wiping tears from their eyes.

The Commander finally looked at him seriously. “Alright, Zack,” He said, holding in some laughter. “You are aware of what is to happen next, yes? The Mall. We need it Secure, and we need a certain device from it. Again. You'll know what it is when you get there. For now though, El and Lexa have been briefed on the mission objective. You will obey them, and you will follow their orders. Is this clear?”

He nodded. It was clear enough. He understood.

“Good,” The Commander continued, “That's all that I needed to say.”


They left that night. He wore his clothes, positioned his weapons, secured his backpack, and rendezvoused with Lexa, El, and Jon at the back entrance. Felt good to breath the air again. It hadn't been longed, but oh did he hate being inside for so long.

He looked at El, who seemed to be in charge the most. Lexa was second in command. And Jon was Third. He took note of the chain, and took insult to how he was bottom.

He knew that last fact wouldn't last long. He was easily the best shot there. He would prove it first chance he got.

The three looked at him, bewildered. They were wearing armor, and Jon had a customized MP Slot Gun. He was wearing clothes, and was equipped with his M16.

He wasn't sure what they found so amusing, but they snickered at him. He brushed the chuckle off, and shook Jon's extended hand.

El looked him over, and then paused past him and nodded as the Doc showed up. “Are you ready, Mackenzie?”

She nodded, “Where's everyone else?” Everyone else? Zack was under the impression it was a four man squad.

“Jason and Neil are up ahead, scouting the area. Amelia and Amy are with Karen and Philip are the rooftops,”

Zack cut in, “Everyone else? Who are these people?” The anger he was working to cover up dig itself in. Too many people will only cause issues.

El's stare was like a bullet. He actually winced. “'These people' are trained specialist in their areas. Who are you, anyway, kid? Some punk who thinks he's all that?”

“El!” The simple calling of her name was more like a command to shut up. And the Command was followed.

Zack turned to the Doc, or, Mackenzie. He was surprised, to say the least. So the Doc was the lead dog here. Great.

El backed down, but keep a glare on Zack.

She put a hand on his open shoulder, and he slid his Backpack up on his other, without bothering her hand.

“Alright, Zack, I know how much you hate large groups. I'll presume that's why you left. Last time we chatted you also made it obvious how willing you are to let someone fall behind, but I also presume you know how far it is to the mall?

She was right. The Mall was a good distance away, and he could see where this was going.

“It's going to take quite a bit of time to get there, and we're going to be crossing through some deep shit territory to get there. We'll be split up, but when we settle down for nights we're going to be needing a main camp, and that's going to need to be guarded while we sleep. You know the drill.”

He nodded. She made a good point, but his core instincts still settled hard. Unable to shake them, he pushed them aside. He noted that her hand was still on his shoulder, and that she pulled it away slowly as she walked by and up to El. The Doc pulled her away.

The four of them were on a newly made platform that jutted out from the building and down a fire escape. Jon nodded at him, and then out to the open night. “How we doin' this, Zack? I know you're not first in command, but I've seen you work. You're good. I haven't seen them.”

He didn't consider this a matter of being in control of a team. Not yet. Jon was a friend, not someone he needed to control. And he was right, too. He hadn't seen them either.

He was also about to answer when a controlled burst of silenced fire sprayed out from three floors below them, one alley away.

All of them turned, and El and the Doc came back, as well as Lexa, who had joined them in conversation. El and the Doc looked over the edge, where two dark dressed men emerged from the same Alley that the burst whispered out of.

The five of them made it down, and the four others greeted the two men in silence. Zack stood back and studied the two. One dark brown haired, the other was shaved. They were both middle aged, and both wore military helmets, alike to the one Jon had on, and had the MP's head gear strapped on tight.

Zack quickly tapped his ear, and let the eyepiece filter into position. He had forgotten that he had to wear it while with these guys. He smiled as the HUD reappeared, and enjoyed the lights that blinked on.

The shaved man looked at Zack and nodded towards him, extending his hand. “Neil,”

Zack shook, and repeated the same action with the other man; Jason.

He took a moment to regret that he couldn't check their info with a slot gun. In fact, there were a lot of things he couldn't do without the Slot Gun. But he also took joy that there were a lot of things he could do without it.

It would also appear that Jason and Neil had taken note of this as well, cause their next question was about his Attire and equipment.

He felt no need to explain it, considering the Doc had already answered for him. As soon as his position was explained, the two nodded respectfully. Then they turned their attention back to El and the Doc, and started to explain the situation.

“We're pretty much clear-” Jason started
“-For a few blocks-” Neil cut in,
“-After that we're not so sure-” Jason,
“-To be fully honest-” Neil again,
“-We're not so sure-”
“-About the first few blocks-”
“-Either,” Jason ended.

Zack was actually a little bit frightened. But also a little excited. The two obviously just proved their excellence as a team.

It was actually phenomenal. It was like they had rehearsed the entire statement. He considered the option.

El and the Doc nodded, while Jon and Lexa retreated to Zacks position, whom loosed his M16 and checked the sights. Obviously aiming down the alley and away from the group.

The night sky was clouded, and he was unable to see. He realized that he also couldn't activate night vision for the eyepiece.

He breathed lightly, and let his eyes adjust to the dark. “They're not lying,” Jon commented, his Night Vision up and running.

“Correction. They weren't lying.” He knew how easily it would've been for some of the creatures to sneak in behind them, and, apparently, set up an Ambush.

Jon nodded in understanding, and trained his gun down the alley.

The four, El, the Doc, and the two scouts were still in conversation, which it would seem Jon, Lexa, and Zack didn't care for. Though Zack listened for keywords, he heard nothing special, and ordered, through hand signals, Lexa and Jon to check the other alleyways. It was good to see that Lexa had already moved into position to cover the flanking one, and that Jon followed suit.

There was a giggle in Zacks ear. “Oh, don't worry sexy, we got ya' covered,”

The women's voice was unexpected and seriously caught him off guard. He almost accidentally unloaded his gun. Luckily the movement of his finger tightening on the trigger was subtle.

He also almost replied before the same voice echoed in his ears again. “No, no, don't reply babe. And don't look for us. We're on a secure channel. Amy made sure of it,” Another cute giggle in the background.

“Heard no one explained to you what's up. Seriously, what's up with that? So, here's the deal: Me and Amy,-”
“-Hey!-” He assumed that was this Amy chick,
“-Are your squads Sniper Support. Don't expect to see us. We're good like that,” more giggling. “We're both you're age, pretty damn hot, and find you very exciting, if you catch my drift. You'll be hearing from us when we make camp.”

“My names Amelia. See, the other-”
“-Not so important, because they don't have you,-”
“-Squad, is being covered by Karen-” There was a sound of disgust that he suspected came from Amy, “-And Phillip. They're okay, but not as good as us.”

“And not so good looking,” Amy added.

Zack wasn't sure how to reply to these two, and instead focused back on the alley, and, sadly, El's voice telling him to take point, and to use only hand signals and tags as they moved from this point on.

He raised the gun's sight into position, and move down the alley, stepping over the bloody mess of two of the creatures and their limbs lay in different positions around them. He smiled at the handiwork of the two scouts.

By the time he reached the end of the alley, he paused and held up an outstretched hand, warning the others to stop. They did so. He did a quick look and found Jason on the wall opposite his side, checking the other way. They looked back towards each other, nodded, Zack pointed for the open store, and they both sprinted across the deserted street.

Zack vaulted a ruined car, and paid close attention to the number of feet that rained on the over grown cement behind him.

By the time he and Jason had made it, so did Neil, with Lexa not far behind. Zack and Jason crammed themselves next to the shops window, and Jason entered first. They two moved in unison, without speech. Jason understood that Zack had no night vision, so he entered first. Checking the darker corners, and letting Zack cover him while he try to stay in the light.

By the time the two were done checking, the rest had made it and they all moved toward the back exit, letting Jason and Neil take point this time.

They continued the like procedure for three more blocks, before Zack found himself on top of a dumpster, taking a guess it would hold his weight. They paused for a moment, and the Doc pulled out the map.

Zack held his rifle's sights down range of the Alley again, and used his height advantage to locate a single stumbling creature, slowly making his way past a old unrecognizable car.

His eyes had adjusted fairly well, and he motioned for Jason and Neil too check it out. The two moved quickly and quietly, staying in form while covering themselves amazingly well.

He trained his sights across the five man long alley way, and waited in case of an ambush. When the two made their way down, they each clicked on their silenced slots, and he barely heard the inaudible muzzles flash bullets into the rotting flesh. He heard the quiet thud of the bodies hitting the ground, and made another mental record of how many shots the two fired.

He lowered his gun and checked the above. He was just a few feet below the buildings roof, and looked around quickly. El and the Doc were preoccupied with the map, Jon and Lexa were covering their tails, and the two scouts were busy with the front, making sure nothing heard them.

He silently pulled himself up onto the roof, and took a moment to look around. He left his pack on the dumpster.

This seemed to be the only one story building for a ways. He looked up at the sky, and watched a few birds fly by. Lucky bastards.

He heard a screech. A loud one.

Then an explosive shot ring through the air, and he was unable to pin point it's position.

Next his ear piece went all to hell.

“Fuck!” the voice was male, this time, “You guys got incoming! I'm counting a dozen, maybe two.”

A horde. It was always a horde.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 7 (Continued)

Then El's voice below him, “Where's that damned kid?!”

He almost slipped a smile, moments before landing back in the Alley.

“He ain't kidding guys,” Amelia's voice. “They're about three blocks away, coming in on your six.”

Three more sniper shots, and Zack figured they had about thirty seconds before they were over run in the alley. So he waited while everyone ran out. Neil and Jason already across the next street, El and Lexa right behind them, the Doc in-between the two. Jon was right beside him.

Zack nodded for him to go, and he slipped onto the roof with his pack. Disobeying the direct order El had yelled out to him.

His hand flew into his pack, and he could hear Amelia and the other sniper shots taking out what they could. When his hand came out, he could hear a giggle from Amy. He held a frag, and pulled the pin, waiting a brief moment and letting it roll off the edge of the building, amidst the chaos that was unfolding in the alley. As soon as it clanged onto the floor, he was already playing with the pin on the other.

A deafening bang. Then Blood, Guts, and other tissue erupted from the alley, along with a small spout of flame. The second grenade had a very similar effect. Only that one was followed by El yelling some more, instead of silence and shock.

Then he pulled one more thing out, and could hear Amelia and Amy high five, and the male give a questioning grunt.

He whipped it in the direction he knew the snipers were not. Or so hoped.

The pipe-like ordeal ringed again, and Zack leaped off the building, landing, rolling, then springing up to his feet, a meter and a half away from El, who had a very, very unhappy face upon her.

He winked at the Doc, and Jon shook his hand again, very respectful of the action. Jason and Neil stayed in their position however, scanning the entrance they stood at while Lexa pointed her dual pistols down the alley.

El had no time to yell, and she knew. The Doc winked back as El turned around, and they fled away from the scene.

It was sunrise by the time they made it to the top of a three story building about sixteen blocks from where they had last been. In all honesty, not very far when you looked at the over view.

This was to be their camp. It was also to be where El yelled at him. A lot. He ignored most of it, and focused more on picking out his L85 Spikefoots. He had made sure he had plenty of these this time around.

He tossed them to Jon, who knew exactly what to do with them. While Jason and Neil were asking questions. By the time El finished her yelling, the four had almost finished setting up base when the door, the final route in, opened, and in walked two people.

The first two to enter were a male and a female. The female was a red-head, with deep blue eyes. She was mid-aged, same age as the male. He had curly red hair as well, and green eyes. Both were military uniforms.

The Doc walked in and greeted them both, embracing one another. She pulled the girl over, and the guy headed off to where Jason and Neil were. Jon was over on the edge, looking over.

The Doc introduced her, “Zack, this is Karen. She's one of the Snipers,” Karen extended a hand, and Zack knew the drill, “She's like, one of my best friends. You've met her before,” Zack remembered. She was one of the people there when he saved  the Docs life. After a brief exchange of hellos, Karen left and joined the guy. The Doc stood very close to Zack now. “That's Phillip. He's Karen's husband, and her spotter. They're some of the best snipers I've ever seen.” She had a smile on her face. As if she had just met with an old friend she hadn't seen in years.

Then it vanished. “Oh, and they're two more snipers that are probably almost here. They're names are Amelia and Amy-”

“I know,” He cut in, and the Doc stood almost insulted.

“So... You've talked to them?” she concluded, crossing her arms, as if she was cold and shivering, even with her heavy sweater.

“Yep,” He replied casually, hiding his sudden concern, which he knew shouldn't exist.

Then the door slammed open, and the next two to enter were the ones that caught him off guard.

One had dark, dark brown hair, crazy hazel eyes, and a complexion that totally wowed him.

The other held the same features, but her eyes were a deep green.

The two strutted in, all high and mighty, and Zack already had them pegged as self-righteous stuckups. Only way he could put it. It was obviously Amelia and Amy. And it would seem the Doc didn't approve of these two at all, for what he guessed would also be obvious reasons, considering they're lack of coverage.

They wore loose fitting clothing, which Zack knew would only cause trouble, considering who was all there. They eye flirted him as they walked by, and he paid no attention as they tried to show themselves off while walking by.

Amelia even blew him an air kiss.

He rolled his eyes when the passed, and turned to find out the Doc had managed to slip away. He looked around for a moment.

The roof was, so far, large open space, with air conditioning units large enough to hide behind, and a few chairs they had stolen, along with a couple of sleeping bags the guys had laid out.

He yawned, and stared up at the sky, joining Jon on his perch over the street below. He thew his pack on the ground, and Jon offered him a piece of bread.

Zack thanked him and let his teeth sink into a bite. He savored the taste.

“Anytime,” Jon replied. Zack turned to his left, and caught Amelia and Amy staring at him.

They didn't look away like he expected, only winked. He easily pulled his eyes away. He really disliked overly flirty people. Especially people like that.

Jon placed a hand on Zack's shoulder as he stood up, and mentioned something about getting some sleep.

“In due time,” Zack replied as Jon patted his back, and slid into the morning air.

Zack gazed out on the open sky. The clouds had cleared, and the orange/red horizon was phenomenal.

His thoughts retched back to her. He knew the tears were about to come back again, and he reached for his backpack, pulling out the sleeping bag, ready to head off to bed, when he felt another hand on his shoulder.

The Doc slid into Jon's seat, and Zack swore to himself, closing his eyes to hide the water forming.

“Mind if I sit here?” she asked, already pulling her hand away and settling down.

Zack didn't mean to, but he took a moment to answer, “Yeah...” He replied, hiding the tears by wiping his eyes and faking his realistic tiredness. His voice quavered.

“You okay?” She asked,

He just turned away, giving no answer.

“Hey, about earlier,” she started, figuring she wouldn't get an answer to her previous question. I just wanted to apologize. That was a mean joke, and I know it's not your fault, that...” she slowed, and stared off into space. “Well, you know. I just wanted to apologize. Sorry,”

With that she left. He blinked repeatedly, and realized he was holding his breath. He swallowed a lump in his throat, and threw down his blanket, knowing they were set on defenses. Plus, it wasn't his turn to take guard duty. Not to say he didn't sleep on edge...

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 8

He took a deep breath to control his racing heart, letting the facts sink in. It was obvious he had, once again, made a mistake. He had left while they sleep. Ditched. Gone. He wasn't coming back. He wasn't going to be a guinipig for the commanders little charades.

But now he felt bound. Both physically and emotionally.

He had left because he was bored, and desperate to be somewhere else. He wasn't going to come back.

But after the gunshots, and the screams.

He did come back.

And almost wished he hadn't.

He found three bodies, not counting the dozens of used-to-bes,  and recognized them instantly. Amy, Phillip, and Niel.

That was all he could find. Not including the hundreds of bullets scattered across the ground.

He twiddled one between his fingers, the empty shell-casing rolling lightly. What could he say? He was half to blame...

Fuck it. It didn't matter anymore. His fault or not, he needed to find the rest of the squad. If there was anyone left. He tossed the casing over the ledge, rising from his kneeling position.

His pistol immediately unslung, and the bullet exploded through a creatures head as it twitched. If they twitched, he knew, it was highly likely they would be getting up. That one wouldn't be getting up. He made sure of it.

Before he left, he checked each and every body, putting one more bullet through the head of any which didn't have holes in their skulls. Waste of Ammo? Maybe. But he was pissed, and this helped him.

Thirty minutes later he was on their tracks. There was a trail of blood leading away from the battle. He assumed it was theirs. If it wasn't, oh well. What could go wrong, right?

He threw his thoughts away, hearing a scream. It sounded as though it came from an uninfected, which he found nearly impossible. Nearly.

Sliding his M16 out from underneath his backpack, he slid open the door that led down into the three floor hotel. What he found boggled his mind.

He found his way to the origin of the scream. Taking every precaution he normally would. Entering, he flashed the flashlight on and pointed his muzzle at the single lone girl standing in the room. The single lone girl had her own M16 aimed right on him.

The two stood silent for a moment. Zack wasn't sure of what to do, or what to say, and before he could chime in with the sarcastic statement that was forming in his mind, the girl spoke;

“Aww, how cute! You've come to rescue the damsel in distress.” She paused and laughed a little laugh that Zack found eerily alike to his. “Listen, kiddo', I can guarantee you that I can pull this trigger faster than you can pull yours.”

At that very moment, Zack did pulled his trigger; and the girl didn't even flinch as the bullet whizzed right past her ear. That wasn't the part that he thought she'd flinch at though. The part he thought she'd flinch at, but didn't, was the splatter of dead tissue that soaked across her back.

She did, however, lower her gun. “For the record though, I could've killed you before you did that.”

He didn't lower his gun. He couldn't, not considering who she was. He keep the light trained on her face, knowing that the flashlight on the tip of his rifle would make him appear as a dark black figure. “That so? Guess we'll have to find out some time, huh?”

She put a defiant hand on her hip, obviously agitated by the light, though she didn't blink or close her eyes in the slightest; “Yeah, I know the eclipse effect too. Light shining in your targets face denies them the luxury of seeing your face, yet you get to view them just fine. Now really, can we put the gun down, or am I really that pretty? Or are you just that ugly?”

He hesitated. He knew this girl. He knew her well. The dark brown hair. The brown eyes. The complexion. Alyssa. The first girl he ever had a crush on. They had been good friends, but he had realized what was happening and folded under the made-up pressure he was putting himself under. But that was long ago.

He lowered the rifle, and to his relief, it seemed as if she didn't remember him what-so-ever.

“Great. Thanks,” she changed stances and relaxed more. She was wearing dark clothing, as he guessed, was for camouflage. It was about 9 P.M., and the sun was far from down. “So, what do I call ya', kid?”

“It doesn't matter,” He replied, keeping his voice steady, “What are you doing here?” he asked, attempting to switch the conversation.

She smirked, “Doesn't matter,”

“Right. Well, I gotta' get out of here,” He shut off the flashlights power and slid the M16 back underneath his pack, then turned to leave.

“Whoa there, cowboy,” she added, “Where do you think you're going? Mind if I accompany you?”

He stopped dead in his tracks, digging through his vast amount of sarcastic remarks and replies, but found none that he was willing to say. He looked over his shoulder, said nothing, and continued out the door.

He paused, about to shut it, when she slid through the small little crack. He noticed the backpack, which was similar to his, as well as the two 10mms on her waist, and the knives at her ankles. The M16 was strapped in the very same way as his.

She stood at nose height with him, and looked up at him. “So, where we goin'?”

He sighed and let her go ahead of him, being the gentleman that he was. The real reason, which he keep to himself, was that as he closed the door, he had taken a triple take of the dead body in the room. Not the undead he had shot. No. The dead male that lay on the floor, no sign of infection anywhere on him that he could see.

The glance lasted not even a moment; but he had gathered what information he had needed. He moved ahead, taking the forward position in front of her.

For thirty minutes, not a single word was said. Yet oddly enough, they had exchanged many more glances than he could count, and they understood each other without a hitch. The two moved in perfect unison. He stayed on the left side of the paths, and she stayed on the right. Him being right handed, he could aim around the corners easier, and her being left handed, or so it seemed to him, she could aim around her corners easier.

Twenty of those minutes were spent in perfect silence, aside from the patter of their feet on the solid ground below them. The other ten minutes had the silence broken by the sounds of two silenced rifles firing upon unsuspecting creatures.

The only words spoken between the two wore so simplistic, yet would stay in Zack's brain forever. The only three words spoken between the two were spoken at the same exact time, with the same exact expression. The words were, “I love Adrenaline,”

What made the words so amazing was not just how they were said, or what they were, but the reason. They were said just moments after their position had been overrun and they were forced to flee to higher grounds. When that part was overrun as well, Zack was forced to leap over a gap and leave the girl behind. Or so he thought.

At the very same time as he looked at her, she had looked at him, and they both looked at the ledge. He sprinted, performed a 90 degree turn, 'ninja stepped', and performed a side-flip over the gap, landing and running without the need to roll, or the loss of momentum.

In the middle of the trick, he found Alyssa doing the exact same thing.

After six more minutes, they were away from the battle, and Zack managed to completely forgot about his team. Him and Alyssa were having a sort of staring contest.

“Free Running?” He finally broke the silence with the only question he could think of. Though the answer was painfully obvious to him.

“Live to Move,” She replied. “See you practice the same art,”

All he could do was smile. “Live to Move.” he repeated.

'Live to Move' was a quotethat spread through the Free Running community like Wild Fire. It was a short saying that signified how much Free Running meant. It was as the saying meant: Live to Move.

That very thought jerked his mind back to her yet again, and he immediately pulled his mind away from such thoughts, and instantly was brought back to his problem at hand.

He stood back up from his position at the edge of the three floor building, and started to head towards the mall. Same place he knew his team would be. They wouldn't just quit.

Apparently Alyssa caught onto where he was heading, “Wait a minute!” She called out to him, just before he stepped off the buildings edge. “Are you really going where I think you're going?”

He played with an expression he knew she couldn't see. “Maybe,” He replied, knowing she already knew.

“Bullshit!” She screamed, “No way! Are you seriously just stupid, or what? Why the hell are you even heading there?”

He couldn't waste any more time. He 180'd, smirked, saluted, and back-flipped off the ledge, landing on the building one story below. He landed facing the opposite way he jumped and hit the ground running, positive he could hear the girls feet pounding silently on the pavement behind him.

He sprinted across three connected buildings before hitting a wall and switching his momentum, getting two steps up the wall before grabbing the ledge and pulling himself up. Third story building. He repeated the action again, moving up to a four story, then again onto a fifth story.

On the fifth he paused, just at the edge. He damned himself as he stared off into a distance, still unable to see the mall, but able to see the highway below him, and the two story buildings that continued for three blocks.

He sighed and turned around, walking towards the middle of the building. Alyssa was standing in front of him, and she was very, very unhappy.

“Gonna' tell me what the hell you're doing now?”

He moved his lips back and forth, thinking. He was impressed. Very impressed. This girl could actually make a very good ally. But nothing more. And he could tell just by looking at her that she felt the same way.

What the hell, really, why not? So, in a matter of one minute, he told him the story. Leaving a few key details out, such as locations and a few names.

When he was done, he looked out over the ledge once more and down to the highway, where even in the midnights moonlight, he could make out the small group of people making their way down the highway, managing to sneak past any and all of the creatures on the highway.

Again, Zack wasted no time to find the entrance on the roof top that lead it's way down through the building, wishing there were other entrances on the smaller buildings.

With the knowledge that Alyssa was right next to him, he copied her idea as she turned on her flashlight. Zack took in their surroundings, and did his best to make up a mental picture of what he believed the building looked like on the inside.

The two took a deep breath, and clicked their safety's off. Nodding at each other, Zack slid the door open, and Alyssa took aim, ready to fire.

As the two entered the hallway, Zack providing covering fire, Alyssa took point, quickly yet quietly passing all closed doors, and stopped just before the open ones. As Zack arrived, he realized she was performing the same method he had always been using to enter or cover a room. Military style. The very same way he was raised.

As they passed through the entire floor and found a staircase that, for whatever reason, lead only to the third floor and some kind of gymnasium full of blow-up equipment that Zack recognized as military obstacle courses that would be put up for kids.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 8 (Continued)

As they attempted to pass one of the slides and boxes, the worst thing Zack could ever have done had to have been done. Sadly, it wasn't the first time he was forced to have to do it.

Alyssa was jumped, and Zack had to fire. He had to. And to his regret, Alyssa had to watch the little boys head explode, and the brain tissue and blood splatter across her face and chest. To add to it, the limp body had to smack into her, and she stumbled backwards.

Instantly he was standing over her, training her rifle around the vast space. He fired two quick three-round bursts, which made contact with two more little used-to-be childs, causing their heads to explode.

After ten seconds of absolute silence, no sounds of running, Alyssa's response to the situation stunned him once again. Oddly enough, he couldn't help but laugh.

In the most child-like, yet underplayed voice ever, she said, almost in a whisper, “Ewwwwww,”

And that was it.

After a brief moment of trying to hold in a laugh, he extended a hand for her to take, and she did. Pulling her to his feet, he gave her a perplexed look, but wiped it from his face and handed her her gun that she had dropped when the childs body hit her.

He shivered. Another child... The body count rose to six. He recounted. Eight.

Whatever. No time to think about it. He had to get to his team. By the time he zoned back into existence, Alyssa was ahead of him, waiting by the door, covering his ass as he sprinted for the door. Almost as if she knew what he was going to, he slamed through the door, rolled, and shot up to snap off a shot at a creatures head.

He didn't get the chance. It was already dead before he even hit the ground to roll. He smiled.

The two made their way down the last two stories to, as he found out, the hotels entrance. They kicked open the final door that lead to the desk and the huge open room.

Zack wasn't sure what to do when he entered. Of all the things to encounter, this was the last thing he expected.

“Holy...” Zack didn't move his eyes, but knew exactly what Alyssa was thinking. At the doorway stood another mammoth creature alike to the one he encountered before the MP picked him up. Last time he dealt with one of them it only had one arm. This time, he counted two. He also spread his M16's lights across it's flesh, and took note of how little flesh was on it. Only bone.

Zack wanted to see Alyssa's expression, but was too scared to look away. He just had to hope she was holding herself together.

He switched the thought and focused on tactic, but didn't get the chance. He'd have to think and move at the same time. After a single blood-lusting roar, it charged, and Zack dived to his left, while Alyssa dived to the right.

By the time Zack got back to his feet, Alyssa was already up and shooting. The creature roared and turned away, only pissed off by the bullets that dug into it's back. He aimed to get a shot, but It charged Alyssa, and Zack watched in horror as Alyssa, who would take fire if he shot, charged it back, reaching just only stomach height on the behemoth.

Moments before contact, she dived right, landing and bouncing off a couch sofa. As it slammed into a table, and the table broke apart, Zack open fired, pissing it off more. He threw his backpack aside, the weight starting to hinder him.

He braced himself to dodge, ready to avoid a head on hit from the creatures massive frame, but instead had to dodge an incoming pillar of wood that the creature chucked at him. As he rolled and pounced back to his feet, he found the creatures hand reaching and taking him by the shirt, and hammering him into the wall, once again. Though unlike last time, he felt nothing break.

Instead, he witnessed a fully automatic spray fire into its face, and the creature was forced to let go of him and back off, covering his face with both hands.

While Zack slid down the wall, the firing stopped, and Alyssa started to reload her clip.

The thing took it's hands away from it's face, and Zack showed no emotion to the graphic view of the blood pouring out of the open spaces that were left by the bullets, which a few stayed lodged in.

It roared in pain and anger, and Zack fell to his knee to pick up his own M16, flipped the thing to Auto fire, and sprayed a continues burst into it's face yet again, which caused it to back off once more. As he stopped and made a motion to reload, he gripped the situation with full bearings, and looked over to Alyssa, who was a step ahead of him.

For whatever reason, the creatures bone was too thick for their bullets to break through and enter the brain, so Alyssa stole Zack's idea. Or came up with it first. Zack wanted to keep the first one so he didn't feel like a complete idiot.

Though he still did feel stupid cause what Alyssa took from her pack Zack didn't recognize at all.

She threw the plate shaped object into the air, and caught it with better gripping. Zack, pressing one last clip into the creatures face, managed to relay his question, “What's that?” though he had a hope he already knew.

Zack barely noticed her wink at him, hit a button on the disk, and Frisbee toss it at the creature. He saw the blades come out just after she tossed it, and stopped firing as it spun and dug into the creatures face, causing it to scream again.

She tackled him to the floor, just behind the desk, and after a three second delay from the toss, heard her whisper the very thing he would've whispered, “And...Bo-” The rest of the word was canceled out by the actually 'Boom'.

She rolled off and onto her back and rolled back, putting her hands on the floor, she then pushed up and kicked, launching herself back to her feet. When she stood, she turned back to him and wordlessly extended a hand.

After a pause, he took the hand and smiled; “Well done, Alyssa,” he replied, forgetting she never introduced herself. By the time the name came out, he realized that he had actually said it, and waited for her to yell at him.

The yell never came. Instead, she smiled back, and said in a almost hushed voice, “Thank you,”

Now on his feet, he was relieved she hadn't noticed that he knew her. Or at least didn't show it. But again, he couldn't waste time dwelling on it and picked up his pack. He nodded to her, and she understood. They both fled out the building at full sprint.

As they exited, Zack burst past three creatures, managing to pull his Daggers off his ankles and kill two of them, one after the other, not getting the chance to execute the third one. Had he been alone, he would've worried about it, but he had already adjusted to having Alyssa around, who just as swiftly killed the last one, and was able to keep pace right next to him.

After half a block, he jumped on top of a car, spotted his team, and Front flipped off, sliding his daggers back into place on his legs. He'd have called out to them, but it would seem Jon had already spotted him and had stopped four blocks ahead. He knew the team wasn't as quick as him, so he sped up.

After five minutes, he and Alyssa had caught up. They both were sweating, but neither was panting. Zack's lungs were used to it, and it would seem Alyssa's were as well.

While the jog was underway, though, Zack's emotions had completely changed. When he arrived, he knew what was to happen. He had been thinking about it the entire way.

“Where the fuck were you?!” El screamed, raising her pistol to his head. This proved to be a bad idea, as Alyssa drew her gun much faster then El had been able to, and El stood stunned by her speed, unsure if she should switch targets.

Before he had a chance to reply, Amelia whispered something incoherently. After just one look, Zack could tell it was just as  he expected. She had lost her mind when Amy died. Or somewhere in between then and now. At this point, after the jog, Zack had gone numb. Forced himself actually, cause he knew what would happen. And now he knew what would happen if he allowed her to unravel during the mission. It didn't take much to be able to read her and Amy. So, before anyone had a chance to react, he drew his own pistol, aimed instinctively, and let the bullet tear through Amelia's skull, causing it to explode.

No one dared move now. No one but Zack, who lowered his own pistol. After his shot went off, he closed his eyes, knowing exactly how the game would play out. After six seconds, he opened them.

El and Jason had their guns trained on him, Alyssa had her gun trained on El still, and Jon had his gun trained on Jason. Lexa stood to the side, unfazed by the ordeal, and Mackenzie was wide eyed, just staring at Amelia's missing head.

As the blood pooled around their feet, no one said a word.

Finally Mackenzie broke the silence with a whisper, “Y-you... You just... killed Amelia,” Her eyes stayed on the body until El's voice exploded.

“What the hell, Zack?! Explain yourself!” she roared,  taking a step towards him, her gun almost able to reach him. He slid his gun in the holster, ignoring the question, and let Alyssa disarm her before she had a chance to pull the trigger, which she was about to do it.

“You know just as well as I did that it had to happen,” he replied, no emotion anywhere in his voice or on his person. While he spoke he was also counting. Karen was missing. Good thing too; he would've had to have killed her as well.

El gave him a look that would've shattered him, but he was too numb to feel it. She held out her hand as to ask for her weapon back, and Alyssa handed it back. El understood, and Zack could tell Jon already knew he was going to do. Jason stood down, and Lexa just had her hands on her guns, staring down the street. Mackenzie was the only one who couldn't accept the outcome. Or at least not at first.

She stood staring at Zack. “You... Zack, you...” she was crying, “You just... Zack, why?! I don't...” she wrapped herself in her arms. If Zack could feel, he would've felt his own heart break at the fact that he had broken hers. But instead, he felt nothing as she broke out in quiet tears.

“She was going to break. She was already half way there,” He replied, walking right past her, “She was a liability to the mission. It was nothing personal.”

After about five steps he turned around and found El throwing her hands down after having been holding her head, “Alright, alright, whatever!” she said, controlling herself once again. “But who the hell is this bitch,” she had her gun pointed at Alyssa without realizing it.

“Excuse me,” Alyssa said, putting a hand on her hip. Zack noticed El's clip in Alyssa's other hand, the gun back on her waist. “But I'm the one who saved your little friend here. Zack, right?”

El sighed, “Whatever,” she put her gun away. Zack's mind wasn't on what they were talking about anymore, but more on why it was so quiet. There was yelling, and gunfire. That always brought the creatures. He had his hand on one of his pistols. “Fuck it all...” She whispered, “Alright, alright. Let's get going. Zack's right. This missions not done yet.”

Zack slid his M16 out instead of his pistol. 'Fuck it all' was right. Alyssa and Lexa had already saw them, moments before Zack had. In the direction they were headed a horde was coming towards them. Three dozen, by Zack's guess. “Great...” she heard Alyssa mutter.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 9

While the group was busy exchanging glances, Alyssa and Zack already had a plan. In fact, they were executing it. Alyssa threw down her backpack, and Zack let his drop over his shoulder. He pulled out two of his eight remaining Spike-foots, and she pulled out one of her seven remaining disks.

Priming them, Zack ran forward twelve meters, now only thirty seven meters from the creatures, tossed them to his sides, backflipped off the vehicle he was adjacent to, and 180'd, knowing the oncoming hoard was advancing too quickly. As he landed, he heard the deafening sound of the 'Booms' of Alyssa's disk contacting with the hoard, obliterating what he hoped may have been a 1/8th of them.

Now arriving at the group, his exploded, and he backflipped once again off the vehicle he jumped onto, catching a glimpse of the 3 Dozen still charging after the group. While running, he exchanged glances with Alyssa, and the two split up. Alyssa ran on ahead. Zack jumped onto a car, spun around, brought his M16 to bear, took sights, and started to fire into the oncoming hoard. As he shot, he crouched onto one knee to get a better aim. He knew what this would do to his maneuverability.

His group, however, was not so ready. Jon managed to follow Zack and Alyssa's lead. The rest of the group was still attempting to walk backwards and shoot at the same time. To include to the issue, Lexa was no where in sight. And to make matters worse; his sight was getting blurry.


 She blowed the hair out of her face, curses repeating in her mind. She had at least thirty seconds left, and that was it. Thirty seconds, and she'd have to be gone. Long gone. She cursed again, now starting to bite the hair that slid into her mouth. Unable to taste it, her mind too preoccupied on the task at hand.

The task at hand being the only damn thing that could save everyone outside. The only possible thing that could also potentially kill them all, too. Sliding her hand across the pad, tapping each key, she continued counting. Twenty-five seconds.

Her mind distracted herself with the art of the building. The walls were sliver, and metallic. Shiny and new. Which was odd. The place was so dusty, yet it still managed to gleam. The architecture was a parking garage. A medium sized one, full of abandoned cars, and the occasional infected, which she ridden of.

She breathed a sigh of relief, and let the sounds of the gun shots fade into her hearing. She then sprinted towards the exit. She was, in fact, on the first floor. She had ten seconds. It was enough. She was fast, and lithe. She would make it. She always made it.

Five seconds.
Four.
Three.
Two.

She was out, and took the moment to veer to her right, where she knew the group was. Had she glanced left, she would've caught sight of the hoard that was a mere six feet away from her.

As she veered, the explosions resounded. The shrapnel flew about inside the building, and the infected behind her turned to it's attention. It's attention-and her task-having been bringing down the building on top of the great amount of creatures that were headed towards the squad.

Had she stopped, she very likely would've been crushed underneath the massive weight of the building, brought down by the C4 charges she had placed at key points along the buildings interior. However, she did move, and there for was able to join with the rest of the group, who stood motionless and mouths gaping wide open as the dust flew into their mouths.

She cocked her head, “What?” So she liked explosions. What about it? Her eyes flashed open. Why was the boy on the ground coughing up blood? No matter. They had to go, and they had to go now. One of the men dressed in the same groups Military outfit that she had encountered a while ago holstered him over their shoulder, and the group headed out.

While they went forward, she went left, into the building. Fuck the streets. Streets were for those who wished for death. The rooftops were where it was at. Pulling her M16 out from under her pack, she flicked on the light and entered the staircase. Closing her eyes for a moment, she listened. When she heard nothing, she pulled her pack to her front, and reached in to pull out a claymore, planting it at the door. She then raced up the steps, careful to watch her corners. Thinking to herself all the while.

When she managed to escape the building and breath the fresh air, she ran to catch up to the group. Free Running to catch and exceed their position, she set her pack down and reached into it, pulling out a sniper, and shoving her M16 back in.

She checked her surroundings before, and found it suitable to lay flat and cover the group as they approached. Which, of course, was slow, and very boring. Nothing came, nothing happen, and as she assumed, nothing would. But stayed. Assuming was stupid. And deadly. She counted. Then she recounted. Then she recounted once more. And she realized one of the girls was gone.

The one with the brunette hair and the black mini-skirt. The one that looked like a school girl, but with two 9mms. Alyssa scanned the road way with both her naked eye and through the scope. She found nothing. No sign of her anywhere.

She rose to a knee, setting the rifle against herself side, thinking. Pulling it back up to check the sights once more, she realized the group was catching up. Not seeing anything, she strapped the Sniper to her back and put her pack back on, Free Running away from her position.

She felt light, as she always did while moving. The air in her lungs felt like the greatest thing ever, and the serenity that followed each breath was magnificent. The way her feet pounded on the pavement, and the wind brushed through her hair. She loved every waking moment of it.

Her feet slammed quietly onto another rooftop, and she rolled, launching to her feet, grabbing her pack as she stood. She skidded to a halt, and her Pistol was the first thing that raised into her sights, directly at one of the creatures heads. Her finger tightened on the trigger, and it's mouth opened up.


Her voice was too real. Too close. Too alive. He was crossing the veil. He was slipping away.

He forced his eyes open as a gunshot rang dully in his mind, barely able to even hear El's yells over the pounding in his head. “Someone-” He blacked out again, only to open his eyes to hear “Where the fuck is-” and again to fade out.

Her image looked right. Her complexity, her laugh, her voice. It was all right. The darkness was soothing. The way she held her warm hand against his cheek. It was all right.

He was losing. They had won. It was game over. He felt his lungs shut down, then restart. “Come on Doc, you got-” He had awaited this moment. He had wanted it. Begged for it. Lived for it. He had wanted it.

It was all over. It was finally over. The light no longer hurt his eyes. “Dammit Zack! Stay with us, please! For me, at least!” Her tears were cold. While her hand was calming. He finally felt close to her again. He finally felt a reason returning. He finally felt happy.

He opened his eyes for one last time, and took in the surroundings. He was finally dying. He was finally gone.

He opened his eyes to see Mackenzie standing over her, crying uncontrollably. He opened his eyes to the cold realm of the MP's base. He opened his eyes to have everything wavering a sickly green color. And so, he closed his eyes, and let the warmth rush through his body. And let  himself die.


“No!” Mackenzie screamed, unable to control herself as Alyssa and Lexa pulled her out of the room, the machine beeping as the patient flat-lined. “No! No, No... Just... No...”

He sighed. What the hell were they to do now? Continue fighting. That's what. Jon stared into the ceiling, having answered the question himself. “That's what we'll do. Keep fighting.” He closed his eyes and picked up his gun, and started walking for the door. He had a job to do after all.

Dan stopped him at the door, barring his entrance. Dan. The one Zack had known himself. He was famous among the MP. And he had been here longer. Jon knew exactly what Dan would want.

“I'm coming with you,” He said, not taking his eyes off Jon. Jon simply nodded in response. And then Commander Jakob came in, and Jon snapped to attention, saluting, as well did everyone else. Except Dan.

“Sir!” He barked, keeping stance. Commander Jakob stood silent. After a minute, that felt like an eternity, of his old teammates death shaking the entire room, Jakob closed his eyes.

“Jon, I'm assembling a new Team. Dan, get ready, you're new team is shipping out at midnight tonight. Get some sleep if you need it. His funeral will be the usual. We'll light him up after you guys leave.”

Jon waited for Dans answer. He once again already knew it, though the response took a minute. “Burn the body, and scatter the ashes.” He kept his voice steady. Kept it solid and emotionless. Kept it like a soldier in the mists of battle.


It was unacceptable. Completely unacceptable! It couldn't be real either. It couldn't be... She was right. Mackenzie was crying. She was crying, crying, and crying. And she didn't want to stop crying.

Emily had wanted to talk, but she couldn't. She had started to like Zack. Apparently a little too much. And Zack... And now... Now Zack was dead. He was gone! She had barely knew him, but the impact he had made... And now he was gone.

Forever. They were to burn the ashes, and she... She volunteered to be the one to light the body. Tomorrow, she would burn the boy she had come to have more then a crush on. She would set him up in flames, and make sure he didn't become one of those blasted creatures.

She swallowed the lump in her throat. Why couldn't she do anything? How did she fuck up the much? She may have been able to save him! She should've! She should've known a way!

A thought crossed her mind before, but now it sunk in: What happen? He wasn't attacked. What happen? His wound tore open. Why? She knew he was so active, and had used their best material. Was it not good enough?

Then the bigger question came over her. Why was he coughing blood before his wound tore? Why was he so out of it before it all? Why did he suddenly zone out?

Why did he- “Doc! Get in here!” not say anything when it started to happen? “Doc,” She was right next to Jakob now, “I've sent Kaitlin to join their group. Your medical staff has been reduced, but I'm sure you'll make due with what we've got.”

Commanders voice was steady, as if he didn't care. And she doubted that he did. He shouldn't. Zack was just another person to him; to everyone in the MP. She understood, and got her mind back on her work. Which, didn't last long, because her 'work' was in the same room as Zacks dead body. She was the chief doctor; she was used to seeing friends and colleagues die before her.

In fact, she actually caused the death of a friend and colleague before. But this...

She was too young for any of this. She was only eighteen! She would deal. She focused, and numbed her broken heart out. She would deal. She had to. So she got to work.


Alyssa aimed down the street, keeping right in front of the group. She fucked up. She fucked up! She refocused. Her sights on her M16 swimming through the shadows, as the new team behind her followed close. She was told not to be with them. The MP hated her. Probably for all the ransacking. She smiled. That was fun. The ransacking.

At this point she was just distracting herself. Zack was dead. The only other Free Runner she had ever met out here, was dead. And she was the only one she could blame.

Her silenced rifle settled on a target next to a car, and Jon and Dan moved up right next to her, setting their rifles on the other targets. El slid up against the car all three of them stood next to and whispered, just loud enough for only them to hear. “Toss 'em,”

All three of them fired. Alyssa heard the five infected flail for a moment, then crumple and fall. She moved up, hating obeying orders, but she was hating herself too much to not to. She distracted herself again, thinking of that acronym. T.O.S. Take'em Out Silently. Rather genius. Rather annoying. She missed Zack again. Why? Why did she miss the bloody kid? She felt no attraction to him. She felt no want for him. But she missed him...

She had just met him. Why would she miss him? Because he was the only one like her... Because he was the only one who could travel and work right next to her. He had somehow managed to become her best friend.

It was bullshit. She lined her sights up again, counting mentally as they came across another group. Thirteen.

She looked behind her, where Dan had just shown up next to her, as well as Jon. Lexa was covering the back, once more, and El was right there as well. The other team, as Jon explained to her, was on another street. She turned back ahead, and lined her sights up once more.

She checked her shots, and hoped the others covered their sections as well as Zack was able to. “Toss' em,” the command was given, and once again they all fell.

She lowered her gun for a moment and checked the streets. Looked behind the masses of cars where her teammates couldn't, and they did the same. After another moment, they all advanced again, and El motioned to head into one of the buildings designated on her map.

The sun was going to come up soon. They'd need to get to a camp. They'd need to set up and... Zack was dead. He was burnt by now. He was dead, and she was to blame... The poor kid... Her only true friend for years was dead...

She turned the corner of the building and smacked the creature in the face with her rifle, hearing the 'crack' of it's chin as it flew off and splattered against the wall. She wasn't sure how, but next it fell to it's knees-where his legs should've been, but where shot off- and out of reaction, she kicked it over and shot it in the head.

She turned around, and Dan hissed in her ear as he passed, “Pay the fuck attention to your surroundings.”

She sighed a sigh of both depression and relief. That shouldn't have happened. The kid had distracted her. The kid she had killed... She should've been able to do something! Maybe had she not left to plant the explosives, maybe had she not- had she not, they all would have been killed.

Lexa gripped her shoulder as she walked by. Alyssa had stopped moving. After the grip, a thought crossed her mind; Where had Lexa gone?

She 180'd and checked her sights, then spun back around and sprinted to catch up with the group.

Good thing she stayed behind though. A creature slid out of one of the rooms just behind the group, and Alyssa slid her knife out and grabbed it by the mouth, slitting it's throat, and stopping it from screaming. She wasn't done though. To make sure it was dead, she continued to cut a clean cut through it's neck, and slit off the head.

Before the blood splattered all over, however, she dived into the room it had came from, and swore as she waited for her eyes to adjust. And they did adjust. To the stomach of one of the creatures as it rose it arm, about to reach down and grab her. When it did, her hand came up and grabbed it's at the elbow, and pulled enough to straighten it. She then pulled her fingers in, and palmed it at the bone, breaking it through the skin.

She stood up and spun, still holding the broken arm. It hissed, and she felt it's head move, about to take a bite. She crouched, and pulled it's arm hard, throwing the body over her back. She then proceeded to stand up, unholster her pistol, and fire.

After the one second encounter, and thanks to the muzzle flash, though dulled by the silencer, she found two more infected in the room. Both the shots went off without a hitch, though it was awfully too close.

She finally looked around at the single hotel room she was in, and checked the bathroom mirror. She was bloody, and noticed she had been crying. A lot, by the looks of it. She didn't even realize it. She wiped away some of the tears left overs, and some of the blood with the towel she had found, really wanting to change into some better clothes. Her T-Shirt was absolutely disgusting.

She finally decided to focus. She took a deep breath, and finally thought about the job on hand. And the people involved. She wouldn't let it happen again.

She blew her nose quietly, then went to meet up with the group, stepping over the bodies. By the time she had found them, they had made their way to the top of the building, and she was told to spot for Dan as he covered the other teams approach with his sniper.

Dan made no remark when she arrived. Hardly acknowledged her existence. She had no choice however, on what to do. She actually decided to sit down cross legged, and watched as they approached.

Dan sighed and she could tell he rolled his eyes. “Here,” he said, handing her a set of Night-Vision Binoculars. “I don't want you fucking this one up, too.”

The comment stung, but she showed no sign of it. She bit her lip hard, though, without realizing it. She looked into the binoculars and saw the two women and three men approaching the building they were on. The street was crowded with cars, but little infected. She took the binoculars off for a moment, and counted what story they were on.

Three floors up. Not too high. She brought the sights up again, and found the three infected that were running out of the building, about to attack the group. “Da-” He fired three shots before she could even finish her sentence, and all three of them fell.

She was astonished, if anything. The silencer attached made it perfectly silent, too. The only ones who knew about the kills were in fact her and Dan, and the group which may have heard the bodies crumple to the ground.

She could hear both her earpiece and his go off-The MP forced her to put them on- “Thanks for the assist, Dan. Great shooting.” He rolled his eyes again.

“Whatever. Just get the fuck up here.” He responded, cold and icy. Alyssa looked back through the binoculars, then put them down. She scanned the street; they'd make it fine. The street was clear. They'd be fine...



No.
He couldn't.
He wouldn't.
He won't.
Because he can't.
So he breathed. And when he breathed, he could just barely make out the words of her as she whispered into the depths of his mind.

He took another breath, and heard a dull beep. No. He wouldn't die. He'd stay alive. Cause that was all he had left to do.

Another breath.
Then another. Then another beep.

He would live. No matter the cost. Because he had nothing else to do. He opened his eyes, and the beeping started to become rhythmical.

He took one more breath, and made it count. He rose to a sitting position, and brought a hand to his eye, to settle his headache. The air in his lungs felt good. As did the lips on his lips. Wait, what?

He blinked multiple times. That beeping was becoming annoying. The lights were far too bright. And he felt oh so cold. Someone covered him with a blanket.

That wasn't a blanket... It was someone. There was much yelling. An excessive amount. He coughed. The lights were starting to calm down. And the green was leaving. And Mackenzie sat on the edge of the bed, hugging him and crying. He would live. He would live, because he decided he would.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 10

Everyone was being so over dramatic. So, he woke up, what's their point? Oh, right, everyone who wakes up after being dead wants to eat everyone else. That would make sense, yes.

Zack was sick of the doctors wanting to run tests, and the military men wanting him dead. If they wanted a test, he'd give it to them: Catching up with the squad. That would be the test.  He would not just lay down and let them go. No. He would catch up with them. That would be the test, and no one would argue.

Or so he hoped. In fact, a lot of people argued. All the while, Mackenzie was sitting next to him, swinging her legs that hung off the bed. Zack rolled his eyes mentally, but otherwise showed no indication of his annoyance. If she liked him, so be it, but he could feel nothing for her, and didn't plan to.

Currently one of the doctors and one of the Military men were arguing about what to do. Zack was getting sick of them.

“He flat-lined! You saw it yourself! The only way he's up right now, is because he's infected! He needs to be killed!”

“Yeah, fuck you too, bud,” Zack whispered, referring to the Marines comment. When the hell did a Marine show up?

“Exactly! So, why isn't he eating anyone? Look at Mac, she's just sitting next to him, and he hasn't even moved!”

“No...I moved a bit...” Mac was the only one able to hear Zacks side comments, though she said nothing.

“He was dead for twelve hours! You were about to cremate him! He's not even a he anymore, he is now a thing. One of those things out there, that have rampaged all over your god forsaken town for the past  years! Or do you not remember all of your friends you've lost to this, this... Plague!”

Zack started whistling a tune to himself; he really didn't have time for this shit.

“Fuck you, sir! I have in no way forgotten about them! But if he were infected, he would've acted by now! He hasn't! He hasn't even become delirious! We need him! Not only as a possible cure, but as a solider! He's the best we've got.”

Zack spotted the pistol at The Docs waist before the Marine had even reacted. The Individual pulled his own firearm and took aim. By the time he had aligned the sights, Zack already had his shots on the Marines head, and was ready to pull. Though, he wasn't sure he could take the shot before the Marine could take his own.

Zack could see it in the mans eyes. He had been through just as much as Zack, and more. He was well into his Thirties, yet still held the stance of a man ready for combat.

Thing was, Zack held the upper hand. Mackenzie jumped in between the two's shots, and the Marine lowered his gun.

“What the fuck is going on out here, men?!” Commander was up...

Zack lowered his weapon, and checked the ammo. It may have felt right, but he still checked to make sure Mackenzie didn't fuck anything up. As he slid the ammo cartridge out, Mackenzie held a hand out, as if asking for it back, her innocent look on her face.

Zack looked at her, then at the gun, then back at her, then back at the gun, and slid the ammo back into it. He then leaned up and slid the gun underneath him, encase he needed it later.

She pouted a little, then turned away. The commander was confused as hell, “Zack, why the fuck are you awake? Shouldn't you be dead? You ain't one of those god damn creatures, are you?”

Zack searched his mind for how to reply, and ended with “Nah, I don't think so,”

“Oh, good. Who the fucks the Marine?”

The Marine, or Trevor, as he had called himself, looked just like the Marines in the old movies. Shaven, buff, able to kickass, and ready to do so in a heartbeat. And Marine here looked like he had done enough Asskicking to last a life time, and was ready to continue to do so. If the need came.

The Marine saluted, “Sir! Are you commanding officer, sir?”

“I am indeed, who are you?”

“Trevor, Sir! Just arrived with my squad, came by to check if this city wasn't hit by the Infection. I can see it was. We found your Distress beacon, and came to see if there was any way we could help. Rest of the teams in the Heli, but we're low on gas. Got any, sir?”

The commander rubbed his chin, trying to read the man. “We got a bit, but none we can spare. Listen up, though, you and your squad can have a bit. If you get Zack here to the Mall with the rest of my god-damn team!”

Trevor stood motionless for a moment, then saluted, and motioned for Zack to follow him, “Sir, yes sir!”

“Get yo' ass on the move, kid!” Commander yelled back at Zack as Zack got out of bed, having gotten some clothes on, and was thrown his weapon by an MP that was pacing by.

“Kick some ass, kid!”

Kicking ass was what he did.


Holy, shit. The MP was nothing compared to these Marines. Even Zack was nothing compared to these Marines. The way they moved, their aim, their perfect shots. These bastards were god-damn special ops.

They were moving so efficiently and quickly, he himself, one of the few last Free Runners on the planet, was having a hard time keeping up with these Marines. They were trained, and they knew what was up.

The way they handled each alleyway, each street, each building. It was phenomenal. They even all had nicknames. Trevor was nicknamed Blue Fiend, and appeared to be the leader of the six man squad, his Silenced UMP at the ready.

He didn't get to learn the true names, but he learned a few of their nicknames that he traveled with. Shatter Noise was a heavy weapon specialist. Bulky, thick eyebrowed, and a toothy smile. He carried a PKM, with the ammo cartridges strapped around his body. He rarely shot, for good reason. The gun was loud.

Diaphanous was second in command. He played with his knives like they were merely toys, designed for kids. But they were indeed not. Diaphanous was silent and deadly, like a needle in a haystack. Zack queried his own analogy for a moment, but went on anyway, as it fit. Diaphanous was shadowing the teams sniper, whom Zack hadn't seen nor met.

The last two members of the team were left back at the MP's HQ, as a security detail. While these four were split into two groups, Shatter Noise was with Zack and Trevor, or Blue Fiend, while Diaphanous and the sniper were off somewhere, hopefully covering their backs.


Zack, Blue Fiend, and Shatter Noise were sprinting down a highway, full speed, as they had been for the past three hours. They were making quite some distance. Zack guessed they had covered at least Eighteen miles, possibly more. His lungs hurt, and he was getting lightheaded, but he couldn't stop. How did they do it? It didn't make any sense.

Blue Fiend slid to a halt, looking confused and baffled as to where to go. There was a blown-out building Thirty yards in front of them, right in their way. Zack recognized the street now, and turned to his right, where Alyssa and he had encountered the Behemoth Infected.

“Well, Shatter, you know what to do,” Blue Fiend crouched, setting his sights down his UMP. He motioned with his fingers, and Shatter pulled out a few blocks of C4. They had planned to go straight through the building. There were ways around it, Zack was sure, but he didn't really want to argue with these Marines.

Blue Fiend covered Shatter all the way during the priming, and Zack watched their six. After Shatter primed it, ran back, and ducked, Zack and Blue Fiend did the same. The resounding 'boom' was ferocious, and was sure to rock the city for the next few blocks.

“Get your asses in gear, let's go, let's go, let's go!” The captain hollered, putting a full on sprint through the falling debris and chunks of metal that flew through the air. Zack and Shatter followed instantly, the screeching from Infected echoing through the night.

That had to have gotten not only the creatures attention, but possibly his teams, were they close enough. He could only hope...



“What the fuck?! What the flying fuck?! What was that?!” Oscar screeched, the loud sound of C4 piercing the night, followed only by the creatures cries.

“Shut up, Oscar,” Dan hissed. The noise had just woken all of them up from their nap. They could all see the smoke, and the chunks of rock still falling to their North.

Lexa and Alyssa exchanged glances. They both knew where that had came from. The building... It was about half a mile away.

Alyssa turned her attention to the glaring El, and merely twitched her nose. She wasn't afraid of El. Alyssa had a big sister, and El was a lot like her. She couldn't say the same about Lexa, however. Alyssa hadn't even said much of anything to her.

“Alright, ladies,” She spoke to all members of the team, which did in fact consist half of females, “I want to know what that was. Everyone, pack your shit up! Alyssa, Lexa, you two take Oscar and get me a clue. We got all the time in the world here, but that doesn't mean we should take it up. Let's get a move on!”

Alyssa bit her tongue, alright, okay, whatever. Lexa wasn't a bad shot, but she couldn't trust her. And Oscar... Well... Oscar may just be bad news.

Shifting her attention to her rifle, she turned off the safety. She and Lexa had already packed up, they were just starting their mid-night watch, however, Oscar... Bloody Oscar.

Alyssa stared blankly at her watch, the rhythm of the hands on her left wrist merely forcing the time to drag on. She was just waiting for the guy to finish. Finally El commanded him to get on their way, the screech of the creatures still filling the air.

The sprint to the place was the hardest for Alyssa. Every step she took forced her mind on Zack. Every single breath was another battle she had to endure. The way her feet ricochet off the pavement, only to be followed by Lexas, and Oscars strained breath.

They were keeping up, as they traveled through, over, and under buildings. Yeah. Under. It happens. Alyssas head was spinning, and she couldn't focus to save her life.

They were closing in, passing a building that had it's windows blown out, and as she passed, she looked through one of the windows, and there, on the opposite end, a teenager with long blond hair, solid gold eyes, was running by at the opposite end of the building. His hair whipped through the wind, his body moving like water through rocks, forging it's own path. His stained daggers cutting the air like his hair, his blood soaked face smiling through her soul.  And he hadn't even noticed her.

She fell apart.
Because of what she was told. Because she had blocked it out, and it flooded her thoughts.


Hot damn! This was turning into a real cluster-fuck. The entire team was in such a hurry to get away from that ruined mess. He wasn't even sure what had happen to the other half of the Marines Squad.

Shatter and Blue Fiend were just ahead of him, and Shatter pulled a 180, spinning on his heel, aiming, and Zack didn't even turn around to see what the bullets entered.

He just continued on, full sprint, to the next doorway. When he reached it, he himself turned around and covered their approach. Zack took aim and fired upon three of the creatures from a thirty foot distance. First burst hit the one on the left in the chest, slowing it down. The second burst blew it's head off on the second bullet.

He switched targets. He took note of how quickly these three were, and shot it in the legs, aiming just below the knee caps. The burst of the three shots spread upward with the recoil he had allowed to go off. The first bullet was on his aim, second one crushed the actually bone of the cap, and the third one hit above it. Each one did enough damage for Zack to hear the body drop with a thud.

He switched targets again, but Blue Fiend had already caught up with Zack, and blew the creature away with his own burst from a fully automatic.

Zack turned to him and nodded, then himself took point, sprinting through the building. They were being chased, and this area was incredibly infected, thanks to the Marines theatrics.

Kicking the door open in front of him, the three had to slow down and Zack switched on his Flashlight. Fiend and Shatter were all over him. Fiend grabbed the tip of his rifle and covered the light, and Shatter slipped on a pair of Night-Vision goggles, scanning the room.

Zack flipped the switch off, and waited for Fiend to let go. When he did, Fiend took the time to slip Zack a new pair of Night-Vision goggles. Zack took 'em and fitted them to his head, slipping them on.

The room lit up green, and he found Shatter waiting by the door, and Fiend waving for Zack to follow. Zack bit his tongue, the technology bothering him. Checking his aiming through the oversized goggles, he joined them, deciding to say nothing about the cheat.

His mind started to drift. Cheating? During an apocalypse? How absurd. In all reality, he should be playing with as much high-tech stuff as he could find. Dilly-daddiling with old age technology would most likely get him, and others around him, killed.

He was wasting time with his stuff. Though it fitted to him, like snakeskin on a viper, like all snakes, they shed. His head was starting to hurt. He pushed it away.

Where was the team? Where did this sensitivity come from? He shouldn't care! He doesn't! He... doesn't want to, anyway. Damn them! He grew attached to a team. A Family. A place where he finally belonged again. And he couldn't accept that.

He slid to a halt. Breathing deeply, trying to get his bearings. He was... In a meadow? Why was he... No. Impossible.

He tried to open his eyes, hoping reality would be back. Closed them, then opened them. His breathing got more erratic. He was... in a meadow?

He waved his hands through the luscious, tall multi-colored weeds, the smell of various flowers overwriting his nose. Daises, Tulips, Roses, Snapdragons. Any and all flowers he could think of were there. Too tall, and too colored for them to be real.

He must've been hallucinating. He wadded through the brush, strolling up to an unknown bush. He picked one of it's fruits, and tasted it. Why not go the whole mile, right?

Bad idea. It tasted rotten. He spat it out, and all the grass and growth turned to dust, transferring the field into a desert. Everything started to turn a hazy green...

Oh, bloody hell... Zack swore, his eyes bulging as he turned himself in circles, looking for an escape. His heart started to race, and he could feel the blood beat.

Everything turned cold when his 360 finished. There she stood. Head cocked, as always, as if she didn't recognize him. He was paralyzed. She didn't like right... and what she was saying...


He stood in the middle of the building, now back to reality, tears pouring down his face. His foggy eyes focused ahead, on the beautiful, oak haired, mud eyed girl, who stood staring steel faced at him, the pistol barrel an extension of her arm. She had aimed, with every intention to kill. Tears seemed to be mutual. As was the understanding of the following action.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 10 (Continued)

Just for clarification purposes, this chapter even baffled me. So Don't ask.



She took the shot, and Zacks shoulder erupted in a flare of torn tissue and blood. The metal bullet following a path through the bone.

Zack spun left, the searing pain in his shoulder keeping him pinned as his face connected with the concrete. He didn't want to move, anyway.

Alyssa slowly closed in, having missed her target. Her steps were slow, and agonizing. “Zack... Zack, you bastard... Why... Why did you... Zack, you bastard!” She raised the gun, this time instead for his head, not his heart.

Lexa fired into the concrete before her first, shaking her ears. “Don't,” She spoke, “We can't.”

“Shut up... Just... Just, shut up, Lexa! You don't know what... You don't know how he...” She rose her gun again, having let her guard down. As she pulled the trigger, the metal weapon in Lexa's hand exploded, causing her to falter again.

“Mam, I can't allow you to do such things.” The voice was male. “Alyssa... Do it.”

The floor beneath Zack caved in, where Zack fell to the floor below. His body reached the ground, his eyes failing him. He muttered nothing, unable to open his mouth. The physiological destruction far beyond his physical.

His mind was filtering through words that couldn't be true. They had to be lies... They... The walls started spinning at a high speed, the walls blurring together into a sickly green mist.

Was he really traveling quickly? Or was the pain too great. A pair of feet landed into his view, which was a mixture of debris and broken ceiling. A second later, he heard the dull thud of another pair of feet on his other side.

The words they spoke were buried beneath the rubble that was his decaying psyche.


His jetblack eyes, and dark ebony hair flung behind him as he sprinted down the hallway. He hit the corner with his foot, kicked off, and continued down the next hallway, where he saw Zack collapsed, surrounded by two figures.

One, a dark, brown haired girl, with dark eyes, and another, golden haired boy.

The two turned to him, and Diaphanous drifted out of view instantly. Trained in the art of silent movement, and hidden killings, it was impossible for the two to have found him, especially in the darkness of the building.

He was on the move again instinctively when they turned away, and the girl raised her gun. She was the one who must be stopped, but she was further away. The boy would have to go down first.

He turned to him, and Diaphanous acted. The kid did as well. The young man jabbed with his left as he turned, as if expecting Diaphanous.

The breath happen first.

Hostile attack coming in on right. Basic Jab. Hostiles target... Jaw. Defensive action, stop attack, then counter. Counter move, left palm to elbow. End result, break.
Execution.

Attack foiled by hostiles right block. Hostile jab connection in .34 seconds. Reduce stagger with use of twisting from force of punch. Counter move, Spin Kick. Target, chest. Reaction time of hostile rounded to point six seconds. Time for kick to connect rounded to one second.
32 percent chance of attack connecting.

Target in sight, left leg extending. Hostile acting with right arm, contradicting original attack. Judged reaction time of hostile increased to point three seconds. Kick caught by hostile left arm. Hostile weapon has been located on waist. Left side.

Hostile right arm jabbing for jugular. Attack connection in point six seconds. Reaction, left leg escape, dodge jab with use of backward roll.
Execution.

Complete. New tactic required for survival. Personal sidearm strapped to waist. Second hostile weapon located on hostiles right waist. Analysis of weapon, 9mm. Right hand is unclicking holster. Time for hostile to raise estimated to point sixty-six seconds. Estimated hostile aim time estimated to point thirty-four seconds.

Diaphanous realized he couldn't react in time! He rolled to the room on his right, the only doorway with no actual door. Kid's work is impressive...

He started to control his breathing as he slid against he wall. His attacks were blocked and countered, and he couldn't do anything about it. Diaphanous was actually shaken.

He recomposed himself. He needed to get his head focused. He closed his eyes and let his hearing take over.  The blonde one knew his position, but it distracted the two long enough for Zack to survive for a moment, but Diaphanous was the only one who knew their location. He had to save the boy. Twas his orders.

He flashed his eyes open and took another breath.

Footsteps. Location of hostile, directly outside door. First strike percent chance estimated to fifty-six percent of succession.. Action to follow, spin out doorway, fake left jab, follow with right.
Execution.

Left jab blocked and caught by hostiles right hand. Right Jab on course for nose. Hostile has performed a left arm swing, deflecting right Jab.

Hostile following with Left uppercut. Personal left fist still held by hostile right hand. Right arm has been disengaged and thrown to side by left swing.
Left arm is free, no time to react, attack connection inevitable. Darkness resulted from blow to jaw. Personal left wrist has been caught again by hostile. Waking up.

Assessment of situation. Incoming weapon attack. Assessment of weapon, sword. Target of weapon, neck. Kill chance, 100%. Time till connection estimated to roughly point thirty seconds.

Reaction time, dulled. Reaction option, second backward roll. Predictability high. Reaction option trashed. Secondary reaction option, right arm palms hostile arm holding left wrist, then duck. Predictability is high. Options to counter increased.
Execution.

Hostile swing miss by estimated .42 inches. Hostile predicted dodge. Incoming left knee. Assessment of muscle control. Ability to block estimated to low. Reaction, catch knee with both arms.
Execution.

Succession. Both legs of hostile have left ground. Upper-hand is now held. Reassessment. Incoming Right kick. Target of hostile kick, face. Dodge chance, zero percent. Block chance, zero percent, both arms used to catch knee.  Hit in point twelve seconds.

Roll with kick. Stop bodily contact with wall with use of left arm. Incoming follow up spin kick. Attacking leg calculated as hostile left leg. Block with right arm impossible, incoming attack too powerful. Reassessment. Kick is diversion, incoming downward slash.

Forward roll, up to feet. Sword caught into ground. Time to reassure, zero. Next action, stop girl. Full sprint, followed by tackle, then disarm. Girls location, 2.3 meters. Plan chance estimated to 86 percent.
Execution.

Mid-air dodge impossible, girl tackled. Weapon taken from both hands. Clip released. Incoming hostile left jab from pinned girl. Dodge by rolling to personal left. Attack dodged. Incoming sword from male hostile. Target of sword, waist. Personal location, wall behind, attack coming from front. Dodge option, left dive, followed by roll.
Execution.

Succession. Sword has impacted into wall. Incoming female hostiles right Jab. Personal location, wall to left, male hostile behind, attack coming from right. Male hostile priority one. Priority due to weapon.

Reaction option to right Jab, bodily backward lean, followed directly by breaking of elbow. Breaking of elbow done by personal right palm. Action success estimated at eighty six percent chance. Greatest danger, sword attack from behind.
Execution.

Dodge successful. Break stopped by attack on back of left knee. Attack unknown, damage moderate. Collapsement to knee inevitable, loss of legs. Incoming kick from front. Chance to dodge, zero. Possible incoming attack from behind estimated to sixty-three percent chance. Sound of sword from behind. Guessed target, neck. Kill type, recognized as execution style. Respect of kill, high.

The sound of bullets were the greatest thing Diaphanous could've heard. Trevor turned the corner with his UMP and had open fired upon the two Diaphanous had been struggling with.

He could hear them taking off and escaping. Trevor sprinted over to Diaphanous and put a hand on shoulder, “You alright?” He queried.

Diaphanous took a moment to answer, his breaths contained and slow. “Yeah, I'm good.” He said, nodding his head to Zack. “He's the one you gotta' take a look at.”

Trevor wasted no seconds to get to Zacks aid, who lay among his pooling blood, his eyes lifeless, and his breathing shallow. He looked drained. Diaphanous scoffed. Really? Twas only a bullet...

“What the fuck was that about?!” Trevor screeched, “Who the hell were those two?”

“Possibly raiders?” Diaphanous brought up. “Does it matter, really? We gotta' get this kid back to his base.”

Trevor started wrapping the wound. “No fucking kidding,” he rolled his eyes. Diaphanous knew it wasn't at him, just at the situation. “Go figure, huh, bud?”

Diaphanous laughed it off, “Yeah. Go figure...”

He started to stand, the strain on his leg causing him to squint for a second, before blocking the pain. Trevor threw Zack over his shoulder, and the two started out the building in the direction of the MP's base. The two would have quite the talk with them.

[Volc Crescent]

Chapter 11

With the way the wind was blowing, the smell of fresh flesh could linger in the air for hours. The moon, lit as it had just been negatived by a camera. The way bodies seemed to glow, miles off.  Places were open to his sight. Places that shouldn't be. He was not breathing, anymore. Oxygen had left his body. Blood no longer circulated, merely pooled and overflowed through his veins. He could not feel his muscles contract, nor expand. They just obeyed his struggled efforts to move.
 
He stared blankly off into the distance, picking up whispers and sounds, none of which could be identified. He was not hungry, but the food that carried him would taste good. The need to devour, such instinctive action, he could not resist. But there was a small part of him that would not allow him to bite. To flex his jaw, and smash his teeth upon the meat.
There were words that seemed to echo across a plane he had yet to adapt to. A female voice. A queen, he only wished to obey. A friendly voice, in a world he did not recognize. A place he must go to. A place he needed to be, shinning in the distance, marked by a radiant green mist. A beacon for him to follow. To arrive at.
 
His leg muscles twitched, and he groaned, attempting to act. The creature next to him made a noise, and he collapsed to the ground as it laid him down upon the cement. It backed off, and he stood up. It pointed at him with it's metal arm, and he cocked his head. He worked to turned around, and started to make a motion towards the green haze. In the attempt to move down the street, his body bounced this way and that. He fell to the ground, unable to move. Sounds again surrounded him, and echos of loud bangs and unidentified voices screeched. A shadow crawled over his face, where he found a large pair of feet before him.
 
 
 
Mackenzie twisted in her seat, biting her thumb. Zack... Her Zack was alright... He was out again on a mission, but... He was alright...
 
"Mackenzie, focus!"
 
The commanders voice shocked her back to reality. Stopping her spinning, her usually wide eyes were watching the commanders'. He rolled his eyes, and tapped the map that was hung up on the wall. The whole building was crammed into the strategy room, while Jakob tried to explain another mission they were needed to execute.
 
Supposedly, they had just received word from a group of scouts that there was a small family cornered in a warehouse a few miles North, two of which were identified as ex-seals. Because of their groups lack of members due to other recent missions.
 
Mackenzie took a moment to look around the room. There were eighteen able-body people who could actually use guns, six medical personnel, two engineers, four cooks, two of the Marines, and three Commandos. The six scouts were resting up in their quarters.
 
Considering they started with over sixty people total, they were running really low... She remembered operating on a few of them, but not being able to save all too many. Their medical supplies were falling short.
 
That was another thing Jakob brought up. From what the scouts who had located them had said, they were held up in a drug store. The scouts were going to check it out, but were unable to because of their own lack of supplies. The family that was holed up was that far off. They had scavenged so much already...
 
Jakob droned on, and Mackenzie zoned out. Thinking of nothing but empty thoughts, then of Zack and how he was doing. She could only assume he was Live and Well. Because, after all, he was Zack. Nothing could happen to Zack. Even from when they were kids, at Day Care, Zack had always been willed up and ready to do anything and everything he wanted.
 
That's just how he was. Nothing could bring him down, and nothing could stop him. She could even remember watching him grow up, and all his time practicing his Parkour and his movements. He was also behind her house, at the park. He didn't even realize she was there. She thought about how stalkerish it was, now looking back.
 
"Mackenzie, you ready?"
 
"Yes, sir!" She responded, not a clue what he had said.
 
"Good, pack up then."
 
She got up and hurried out of the room. Along side her strolled Abbi, an taller girl with long, naturally curly black hair. She was 26 years old, and had been a part of secretive operations which consisted primarily of Covert Intelligence Gathering. In other words, she was a spy. She never shut up about her 'CIG' Times. She was a sort of story-teller. The story she was telling right now, while Mackenzie packed up, was about how both of them, Joshua, Joaan, Paul, Henry, David, Jerold, Billy, and Jeffory, were to embark on the mission to get the family out of their hell-hole.
 
Fuck. Mackenzie should've been paying more attention. She grabbed a new pistol, because Zack took hers, and strapped it to her waist. As well, she requested Abbi to go pick up some medical supplies. Yes, she was focused now. As she put in a few rolls of gauze into her bag, she picked up her earpiece and turned it on. There was already speak on the channel Abbi told her to switch to.
 
Joshua and David were exchanging insults, and Joaan was telling them to shut the fuck up. She flipped on the Eyepiece, and watched their location pop up along with a stream of data. She pulled out a datapad that one of the scouts had found and given to the engineers to fix and play with, until they made it perfect for Mackenzie to keep track of each member of the team, and give specific commands without making noise, as well as keep an eye on each members medical stats.
 
She slipped into a dark black coat, that matched her jeans, as the night was getting cold. As she zipped it up, she slid the datapad into the coat pocket, and buttoned the coat pocket up to keep it safe. Abbi then entered, and handed her the medical supplies she requested, then started into another story about her CIG times. Carefully fitting the medical supplies into her bag, she, just like everyone else, ignored Abbi's rant.
 
She zipped up the bag, and spoke into her mic on the earpiece. "Alright, everyone order up at the door. We're leaving in six minutes!" As she started out of her room, she pulled the backpack over her shoulder, and let it rest there.
 
While waiting for the rest of the team to line up, she twiddled her thumb. Maybe, just maybe, when she got back, Zack would be back as well. She knew it was doubtful, he was going a much further distance then she was, but maybe...
 
 
As their mission dragged on, it proved uneventful. They encountered few of the creatures, and had used very little supplies. It was already the night after they left, and they were packing up from the nights rest. Mackenzie brought up the Map on her eyepiece with the help of her Datapad, and started to play with the distance. From the approximated numbers and mathematics, she estimated they would arrive at the Family at around midnight that night.
 
Course, that would only be if everything would end without a problem. And, everything had a problem.
 
By midnight, they were at the place marked on the map as the location of the Family. This part of town was more of the lower buildings, with less people and places around it. The stores and houses were more spread out, and the Drug Store the Family appeared to be in was a single story, boarded up with planks.
 
The group decided to split into three squads. Henry and David were to provide sniper cover from the Gas Station across the street, while Billy covered them and acted as a spotter.
 
Jerold, Joshua, and Paul were to sneak around the back and cover the back entrance to be sure they did not have any episodes and run out the back, as well as nothing acted the same way.
 
Jeffory and Joaan were to provide machine-gun cover as Mackenzie and Abbi advanced and confronted anyone inside. Sounded fool proof. They had enough people to cover everything, and it didn't appear anything could go wrong.
 
Or so, Mackenzie thought. While waiting behind a car with Abbi, who also was a trained interrogator, manipulator, and Negotiator. Mackenzie played with the datapad and checked each squads sightline, as well as listened in on Joshua and Davids conversation about what their favorite meal was before the apocalypse started.
 
They agreed on steak.
 
Joaan once again told them to shut the fuck up and focus.
 
Once everyone was in position, Mackenzie and Abbi approached the building. When they arrived, Mackenzie knocked on the door.
 
"Hello in there? My name is Mackenzie, and with me I have Abbi. We are part of the MP, Military Police, and are here to help. Our team has this building and the surrounding block secure, it is safe to come out. Is anyone in there?"
 
There was silence. No one answered. "Hey in there, sweeties," Abbi decided to give it a go, "Come on, we just want to get you all to safety. You boys can't be doing so well all alone in there. We know you're all ex-seals, so you must know who we all are."
 
Finally there was noise inside, "Military Police? You expect us to believe that? There's no way anyone out there is even still alive, and any Army personnel are gone!"
 
"Come now, don't be like that!" Mackenzie shook her head as Abbi spoke. Should've known this wouldn't be easy, "How about this; We play a game. If we win, you open the door. If we lose; We're coming in anyway. Far as you know, we're just two people. Far as you don't know, we do in fact have well-armed personal ready to come in on the given word. So, what do you say, unboard this place and let's get the hell out of here. Besides, Mackenzie here is a great medic"
 
There was more sound inside, "Fine. We'll let you in, but be warned, we got weapons too! And there's a condition! My grandson, Lucas, is sick! We ran out of supplies...  Can you help him?"
 
That worked? Mackenzie was stunned. She could hear wood clatter on the ground, then the door slowly creeped open enough for the barrel of a shotgun to stick out. Neither moved, though only because Abbi didn't flinch. Mackenzie's eyes kept jumping back and forth between the deadly tip and Abbi. If she moved, Mackenzie would move. But, Abbi just stood with a hand on her waist, as if there wasn't anything about to happen.
 
As the door opened, a whiff of a nasty order escaped the building and found its way into Mackenzie and Abbi's noses. Again, Abbi did not react, but a tear came to Mackenzie's eye. Inside stood a balded old man whom wielded the 12gauge with one solid hand. The old man walked with a limp and lead Mackenzie to the sick Lucas. As they entered a backroom she found another old man, the Lucas boy covered with blankets, what looked to be his Mother, a Father, a younger Sister about the age of 6 held onto the Father, and a thirteen year old brother who stood off to the side. The Lucas boy was at least 16, maybe 18.
 
At first glance, she could tell the boy was dying. When Abbi entered, just after Mackenzie, she knew as well. Mackenzie was instantly on the mic, ordering Joaan to get in there with the pack, which they had left with them, and commanded Paul to join Jeffory at his post to cover the entrance.
 
Mackenzie leaned over the boy, brushing some of the greasy, unwashed faded blue hair out of his eyes. It stayed where it was moved, dry and crusted from the months of being unwashed. None of the people in there had even taken a shower in a long time.
 
The boy, pale from sickness, attempted to open his eyes, and Mackenzie saw the blank stare in his bright Hazel pupils. Abbi instinctively grabbed the boys arm, which had reached up to touch Mackenzie. Within' a moments notice, she had tied both the boys arms, and sat on his legs.
 
"It's alright, Abbi, the boys not infected," The younger Brother, as well as the Father, and two grandparents had pulled guns, but let go when they realize why Abbi had acted. Mackenzie continued, "It's alright. He's just ill." Turning his focus to the parents, "How long has he been this way?"
 
"Couple of weeks now. He's just been getting worse. It started as a little fatigue, then he turned hostile, and we thought the same thing your friend did. Then, though, he just started to not respond, now he's like this."
 
Joaan came in with the pack, and knelt beside Abbi, "What's going on?" She spoke, brushing her own dark hair out of her eyes.
 
"The boy's sick, I'm going to need you two to help me," She said, rummaging through her pack for the needed equipment. As she grabbed her stuff, she ordered for the team to take up better cover and firing positions closer to the buildings entrance.
 
 
After an hour of doing on the field tests, and checking his vitals, she finally gave him drugs she believed suitable until they could get him back to the base. It was 1 by now, and the stench of the building was getting to her team. The family inside may have adapted to it, but her people weren't. And they needed to leave.
 
While she had been working, Abbi was explaining the situation, and the plan to get back, and now Mackenzie gave the order to head back. Everything was going to okay, she reassured the family as she pulled out a stretcher. It was going to take a while longer to get back with the group and the sick Lucas.


However, the day after, they were almost there, and the poor Lucas was improving. Nothing had happen! Mackenzie was excited to get back. For the first time, in the longest time, nothing had happen. They were safe. They were lucky.
They hadn't encountered anything dangerous that put a problem on the mission.

From their flank there was a scream, and the entire group pulled their weapons. They were a block away from the base, and now they were being ambushed? What the hell?

"Mackenzie! Abbi!" The scream of their names caused them to pause, and their hearts skip a beat. It was a shrill scream, full of fear, and Ariia came running full sprint at them, a sheer look of terror on her face. "Mackenzie, Abbi, the base, it..." She was breathing heavy, and their was blood on her face and soaked into her shirt. "It's been..."

She didn't need to finish the sentence. Jakob, Jack, and Travis came sprinting out of the alleyway she had came from, their arms flailing wildly, screeching at the team. Mackenzie froze. She couldn't react. No one could.

Not even Abbi. Mackenzie stood where she was, only hoping the matured women would do something. Shoot. Run. Something. Just so Mackenzie could feel the bravery to act herself.

But she didn't. No one did.

Not until random bursts of fire came from within the teams group. None of the bullets from the first volley hit her Commander or her friends, but it did start the next volley, which did happen to hit and rekill the three charging them.

After a pause, and when the bodies finally stopped flinching on the ground, Mackenzie turned to inside of the circle where the bullets had came from. Her eyes locked with the pale hazel eyes of the Lucas kid, who let an Uzi slip from his hand and onto the ground underneath his stretcher as his eyes closed again and he fell unconscious.

"Everyone's dead..." Ariia's words lingered in the air. "The base is gone."