A/N: Before I start, I'd like to say that it's been...what, three years since I had one of these? Heh. Yeah. Well I originally was only going to keep this story on DeviantArt, but I decided, hey, why not. So Ellis, Coach, Nick, Rochelle, and Keith belong to Valve. Everyone else is mine.
"Gettin' late, Ellis."
Two men sat by a wooden table topped with a small white TV in an abandoned auto garage. A beat up car sat idle near the wall, rusting from dirty water that leaked from the roof.
A late night breeze was blowing in through the open garage door, ruffling papers and rattling empty beer cans. The sky was filled to the brim with stars, some red and some yellow.
But something in the air stunk; though neither one of them had noticed. They were used to stink, working in a garage all day and night.
One man had a mechanics suit on; the other had a yellow T-shirt under a pair of overalls. On his head, he wore a blue baseball hat with a picture of a truck printed on it.
The suited one walked towards the TV and turned up the volume. His speed-suit had Keith embroidered onto the chest.
"You goin' home?" Ellis watched him pull up a seat and start flipping through the static-blurred channels.
"Nah, not today. My girl's still mad at me," he pinched the skin between his brow. After a minute or so of holding his breath, he exhaled and looked at his friend. "Can you believe it? Alls I did was look'it another chick. Not my fault she was wearin' short-shorts and a thong. Bitch kicked me out of my own home."
"Ya'll should learn ta' hide it better."
"Ah, hell, I don't give a fuck. Now shut it, Simpsons is on."
Ellis sat and watched. He stole glances at Keith every once in a while, keeping his head low so as Keith wouldn't notice. Keith laughed at the TV, and nervously Ellis did too.
The two mechanics sat through the whole marathon without saying a word to each other.
Half an hour later, the sun was starting to stain the sky a deep navy blue. Birds usually started to get frantic this time of night, but not today; the streets were dead silent.
"Keith?" Ellis said carefully during a commercial.
"What'chu want?"
"Turn on the news."
Keith switched the channel and a black woman was shown through a white snow of static. Ellis adjusted the antenna until the picture was clear, and she could be seen standing in front of a green plastic tent, her form illuminated by a street light. The sun seemed to be hidden just under the horizon.
"This is Rochelle, reporting from downtown near Liberty Mall. It is unknown what is happening here in the Savannah, but we're trying our best to figure it out. It seems a disease is spreading around the country, but doctors are unable to figure out the cause."
Keith smirked and licked his lips. "Mm, I'd fuck that."
Ellis snickered and stood to fetch a beer. "Tha's why you can't hold down a girlfrien'. Didn't even know you were into them types."
Keith held his finger to his mouth and turned back to the TV.
"I understand it's incurable, is that correct, Rochelle?" The anchorman spoke to Rochelle as she held her earpiece to her ear.
"That's correct, Tom. Now, our news station is the only one with a reporter on duty, even if it's a rookie like me. My first report, and I'm standin in the middle of a quarantine."
She shook her head in shame.
"Anyway, it seems that friends and family members are viciously attacking one another. We've not been able to obtain an infected person to test antidotes, but we do know that they are dangerous. Stay away from infected individuals. If you think you are infected, barricade yourself from your loved ones. Contact the police, and await further instruction. Hopefully this won't go too far."
"Agreed, Rochelle. Alright, back to our weatherman. Sounds like rain sometime the next week, am I right, Jeff?"
Ellis returned and tossed a can to Keith. "You stayin' here the rest o' tonight?" Keith asked his friend. Ellis shrugged.
"I spose. I ain't got nothin' better to do."
"Ain't chu got a girlfrien'?"
Ellis chuckled and took a gulp from his beer. "Nah. I'm too afraid of them chicks at those crazy bars you tol' me 'bout, an' I don't think I got the guts to ask out Michelle."
"Tha's okay, Ellis. You too young for a girlfrien', anyhow."
The sound of an engine echoed through the alleyway outside. The men glanced at each other and switched off the volume on the TV. Strangely, they hadn't seen a customer for days. Keith was beginning to think that their business was doomed.
A rusty car rolled in slowly and sat next to the other car for a moment, filling the garage with the rancid smell of gasoline and mold. Then the engine switched off and someone opened the driver's side door.
Out stumbled a man, blood gushing from every hole in his face. He staggered forward and red splattered all over the cement.
Ellis gasped and dropped his beer, which spilled across his own feet.
"The fuck?!" Keith shouted as the man stumbled towards the ground. He stepped backwards out of fear and the man pummeled to the ground. "What the fuck? Is this what they're talkin' bout?"
Ellis watched in horror as the man on the floor squirmed and thrashed. He was moaning in pain and exasperation, but all they could do for him was watch.
"We gonna call the police or just stand there an' stare?" Keith yelled, jogging to the back room where they kept an old phone. Ellis heard the door open and Keith viciously dialing the keys.
Ellis kneeled down. "It's okay, man. We goin' to get you some help. Can you tell me what happened? What's your name?"
The man rolled over and looked at him without responding. Keith started yelling from the back room.
"Shit! Are you fuckin' serious?!"
Ellis, out of curiosity, dug the wallet out of the man's jeans and peeked at his driver's license. It had a nice looking picture and the name stated 'Dan Small'. He was thirty-four.
"Dan?" Ellis touched his face. "Dan, stay with me now, ya hear? You gonna wanna fall asleep, but I can't let you do that. I ain't goin'a let chu die. Just stay..." he grunted and pulled Dan into his lap. "...awakey-wakey."
Keith came back with his fingers entangled in his sandy blonde hair.
"Disengaged. Fuckin' hate cops."
He stopped and looked at Ellis for a brief moment, who was stroking Dan's hair with one hand and holding his wallet with the other. Keith crossed his arms and moved closer.
"He got any money?"
"What?"
"I said, do he got any money?" he repeated slowly.
Ellis looked at him with those beautiful, confused green eyes. "Keith, I don' think tha's entirely right-"
"Look, Ellis. We don't got many customers comin' in here. This is the only job we got, so whether you like it or not, we takin' this faggot's money." Keith stepped closer and snatched the wallet out of Ellis's hand.
Ellis slowly looked from his empty hand to the man on his lap. "Oh...awright," he said as if in realization.
"He got two hundred bucks. This oughta hold us for a month 'er two." Keith tossed the wallet onto Dan's chest. "Hehe, gotta wonder what kinda pimp this man was."
He pocketed the money and moved back to the TV. The volume returned.
"And here's Rochelle once more, with breaking news."
"Thanks, Tom. We have just received instructions from the government that civilians are to immediately be evacuated from homes and apartments. Nowhere is safe anymore. We have been told to head towards one of the many CEDA evac stations around the state."
Ellis turned towards the TV to watch, when suddenly, a man tackled the african-american reporter to the ground, along with her camera. All that was seen were his legs on top of her grey boots as she struggled and thrashed against him. Her screams could be heard as she called for Tom to send help. There was no reply from the anchorman and the TV cut to the rainbow bars that indicate the signal has dropped.
The two looked at each other nervously.
"You reckon we go ou'side?" Keith asked, brow furrowed in worry.
"Dunno, Keith. Whattabout poor Dan here?" Ellis smiled and Dan coughed blood onto his shirt. He frowned and Ellis wiped it with his wrist, his childish grin broadening. The sick man could only blink in gratitude.
"I'm going to see whu's going on." Keith walked towards the gaping garage door. He stepped onto the concrete of the alley, looked left, right. Ellis watched him carefully.
"I don' think anythin's out here-" he was cut off mid-sentence when a deafening roar echoed through the small alleyway. Ellis quickly stood, just as Dan's open jaw tried to clamp down on his tattooed arm. Dan fell to the floor, blood from his broken skull splattering everywhere.
The monster's scream was mimicked by Keith's own as he was suddenly charged at by something huge. He was forcefully grabbed by a giant arm and carried towards the right side of the alleyway, the side that led to a huge main street. As Keith's voice started to fade away, Ellis yelled for him and sprinted out of the door. He could only watch as his friend disappeared into the early pre-dawn fog.
"Oh, Keith, whut have we gotten ourselves into this time?"
The bright Georgia sun wasn't far above the horizon, yet Ellis felt the heat of the day coming on. His overall straps were now tied at his waste. He kind of thought they made him look like a dork, but in the end it didn't matter. Everyone in the whole city of Atlanta seemed to be gone.
He continued to trudge on through the empty streets in the way he thought his friend had gone.
"Heh, 'member that time when you got kidnapped by the mob? Yeah, I found you that time, Keith. That wus the most fun gunfight I done ever had."
He chuckled.
"Or was that a movie we watched? Aw, hell, Keith, I can't remember. Shit, I wisht you were here to help me." he pouted, his full lips pushed to the side and the inside of his cheek between his teeth. "Shit, shit, shit."
He looked up, shielding the sun with his right hand. "I mus' be goin North," he muttered. "Boy Scouts sure helped me wit' life."
Ellis stopped in the shadow of a Burger Tank sign, gathering his bearings and surroundings. It was still hot, but grey clouds were gathering in the East, perhaps threatening rain. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow. Didn't matter. Weather was unpredictable in the Savannah.
Interrupting his train of thought, a strange scream was heard from inside the restaurant. It wasn't a scream for help; it was one for hunger. Lust. Ellis stared wide-eyed at the glass door, waiting for something to help him move his frozen muscles.
And there it was. A short, pink being burst through the glass and launched onto his face. He started screaming, stumbling back and forth, blinded by the claws of his rider. It was leaning forward, influencing the steps he took.
It drug him through the door, all the while Ellis screaming for help, and around the white tables a few times. The claws were beginning to dig into his broad nose, but they wouldn't come loose no matter how hard Ellis pulled. After several minutes of blind resistance, he stumbled over a chair and fell face first onto the floor.
He moaned in pain, rolling over and searching for the monster. His eyes began to swim in red as he planted his palm on the filthy tile. He struggled to crawl away from a pair of legs near the kitchen, assuming they were the legs of the creature. They looked blurry, red, but he could see a pair of black shoes. They looked kind of nice, Ellis could imagine them on a person, a real person.
They started to walk towards him, slowly, one foot at a time. Ellis was fighting the black mist that begun to sneak into the corners of his eyes. He blinked, opened them wide, blinked again. But as the shoes reached his fingertips, he lost the battle and tumbled into darkness.