It wasn't a slow crawl, a sloping increase of the numbers that overtook us. It went from one, to one hundred, to thousands, over the course of the year. Eventually, we were outnumbered. We shouldn't have been surprised really. T hat was the beginning of the apocalypse.
"Did you bar the door?" I asked Jaune, yet panting with my hands on my knees, having ran to the safe room.
"Yeah. I placed the bar and dead-bolted it." He replied, setting down his rifle, dubbed Crocea Mors, and swat shield.
Nodding my head, I walked over to a safe bed and sat down looking around to see who survived the horde. There were still about 10 of us left. We had made it then with only a few casualties. That's good. Ruby and her group of survivors, along with Jaune's, had made it alive with me, Jared, and Mako.
Standing up I addressed our small company, "Okay, we made it out of that scrap alive ,but we still have to be careful from now on. We're low on medical supplies and fuel for the plane right now."
'Well, what do you suggest we do then?" Questioned Weiss Schnee, former heiress to the Schnee Demolitions Company. She had one hand still on her rapier(she had scavenged from a dead survivor and effectively named Myrtenaster), and a small pouch filled with chemicals and various solutions.
"Maybe we can keep on trekking towards Vale(one of the four last safe places in the country),and make it there before the horde catches up?" Offered Ruby Rose hopefully. When no one answered back, she hung her head down low(I felt sorry for her; especially after she had lost so much ammunition for her sniper rifle Crescent Rose).
"We're on our last three grenades. We just need to make them count and we can clear out a section of the horde!" Nora exclaimed, somehow keeping a small smile on her face, even during these times.
"We could cover you three with sniper fire, while the rest of you take refuge and make for Vale?" Offered Pyrrha Nikos thoughtfully while pointing to herself and Ruby.
"Absolutely not. We've already lost Penny when she fought them off and let us escape the first time. If it hadnt been for her scientific development we wouldn't have been able to survive the first attack." Argued Blake Belladonna.
"Okay." Phyrra relented and sat down, sitting Milo down next to her, and laying down her short spear against a bedpost.
"We could always try and blow up a building, and cause it to topple over, effectively blocking the horde from further advancement." Mako suggested from his corner of his room where he had taken refuge. His bow, Hanbow, was resting against the wall with his quiver.
"Yes, but how would we even find two buildings close enough to each other to make sure that we create a barrier to block them off?" Questioned Jared. He stood against the grey wall, his Lariat assault rifle and bayonet propped up against the wall.
I thought about what he had said, and understood where he was coming from. There was only one place nearby…
"Glenn city." Spoke Lie Ren. His soft voice cut through the air while his hand were held limply by his side, his two Uzi's Storm and Flower magazines nearly spent after shooting at the horde.
"It would work. There may still be supplies left over from before, and we can blow up a skyscraper too, with a Yang!" Yang Xiao Long offered her two cents(and pun which we all groaned at).
Nodding my head in affirmation, I leaned back, and closed my eyes; feeling myself drift off into the abyss that was sleep. It was a dark and dreamless sleep(for once). I woke up the next morning, with a sudden jolt, and a chill up my spine. My sidearms had fell to the floor in my sleep I noted, yet when I looked down at the floor, there were still perfectly fine. Sighing, and stepping out from under the covers; I picked them off the floor and checked for damage, just in case. I stood up and looked around at the rest of the company sleeping in their beds. The couples had, of course, slept together, with Yang and Blake tangled in a mess of limbs on one bed, Ruby spooning Weiss in another, Jaune and Pyrrha cuddling in another, and Ren holding Nora gently in her sleep. I smiled, glad to see my friends finding solace in each other, before walking over to our pantry, and pulling out a can of Campbell's soup from our rations. Walking over to a small portable propane stove(thanks to Yang, our un-insane pyro), and flipped it on. Placing a small pot on the stove, and opening up the can of soup; I dumped it's contents into the pot and stood as the flame warmed up the cold soup.
"Good morning Lost. You ready to set out?" Asked Jaune from behind me, making me give a small jump; before I settled down and found myself face to face with a slightly sleepy Jaune; his sandy blonde hair greying, and his light blue eyes still holding a small light in them.
"Yes. Please ask Yang and Nora to take inventory of all explosives, Ruby and Pyrrha can check our weapons and ammunition, Weiss and Ren….you're in charge of making sure all medical supplies and radios are working. We need to see if CVFY's group of survivors made it safely to Vale." I listed off their names, and assigned them their duties; watching as they went off to take care of their jobs. I still wondered sometimes how'd I been so lucky to gain their trust and friendship. But let that thought slide off my shoulders, and continued on my way over to rouse Jared and Walker from sleep.
"Walker….Jared. Wake up! It's almost time to go!" I yelled out at them, and surprised Jared; causing him to jump out of his top bunk and topple to the floor.
"What the hell Lost?!" Jared cursed out at me groggily, still getting over the initial fogginess of sleep.
"You weren't waking up. So I had to resort to different tactics." I replied non-chantally. Standing up, Jared walked over to the wall where he had placed his Lariat assault rifle, and picked it up, and strapped it across his back. Darting his eyes over in Mako's direction, he signaled to me to also wake him up. Nodding my head, and silently tip-toeing over to Walker' rest mat; leaned in close to his ear and prepared myself to yell. Then before I knew it; a sudden set of small jaws clamped down on my nose, a small lizard hanging onto my nose, and biting down for it's(soon to be short, if I had any say about it) life.
"AH! Get it off me!" I yelped out in surprise as I tried to pull the cursed little beast off of me. I yanked on it's tail, and pulled my hand back in pain; because apparently the dang thing had sharp barbs running along its tail. I decided to put my index finger and thumb on the sides of its neck and squeezed gently while tugging down. Finally, the little beast let go and fell on Mako's shoulder, but scampered back under his covers for safety.
"Eh? What's going on, ay?" Came the sound of Mako's voice, slurred by sleep, and his australian accent was only adding to the trouble of deciphering what he was saying.
"Lost over here was about to wake you up, but then your little pet lizard bit him right on the nose." Jared quickly explained.
"Well, that explains quite a bit." Mako exclaimed; before jumping out of his bed and grabbing his bow( he liked to call it "Hanbow" thinking it was a very ingenious term, but everybody else just rolled their eyes).
Mako was of the standard build you would imagine of someone who'd spent a large portion of their life out in the sun, and working to capture(and release) the dangerous reptiles he had loved to spend his days with. Unfortunately, after the virus had taken over majority of the North American continent; Mako had no choice but to leave behind his study and take with him the few reptiles he could. He always had some giant snake or lizard hiding around out of our sights, but always coming when he beckoned. It was honestly more terrifying than those that had been taken over by the "Grimm Virus" and hungered for our flesh now at times. Nonetheless, Mako was a nice guy, but when in a tight squeeze; he knew how to find a way out. I guess that makes him a good survivor, but in reality; all of us that are in our small traveling company are. Might as well explain about Jared while I'm at it. He always loved to wear a matching outfit of khaki shorts and a tan safari shirt with slight tears in it from past conflicts. Go figure the australian would wear that.
Jared was your classical backwoods hacker. Give the guy some electricity and a phone, and he could hack into your bank account, Facebook, you name it. The guy was turning computer security companies on their heads. Of course, that was before the Grimm virus overtook North America. Afterwards, with the general need for any form of advanced technology unneeded outside of the four kingdoms, and electricity being a heavenly luxury, Jared quickly applied his knowledge of computers and used them to hack into what was left of the military drones and decimate the majority of a large horde of those infected with "Grimm", and saved us a lot of casualties. He now traveled with our group, hacking into whatever technology still standing we found along the way. He had a nasty habit of keeping his Lariat assault rifle(with a dark black military knife as a bayonet) strapped across his back, yet he still had a small arsenal of weapons hidden across his body( hidden under his clothes), and used hidden stun gun up a sleeve, a shortstop pistol, butterfly knife, and so on and so forth.
While I'm at it, should I explain who I am? Should I really? Nah. Ok fine, I will. My name is Grey Lost, whilst most just call me Lost. I use to work for companies that gave me jobs that were, let's say, frowned upon by the general public, to put it nicely. I stole projects, eliminated higher-ups, and specialized in sabotage. I wasn't proud of such skills, yet in the end; I had come to use these multiple times to save mine and other's lives. Anyway, what else is needed to know about me? Oh, that's right. I worked alongside Jared a few times on a few "jobs", until we decided to work together as a "mutual partnership", and made our own way up the chain of hitman's and hackers. It got to the point, we actually became known as small time "terrorists" and had the CIA and FBI on our tails. Now, I'll give them credit where it's due, they are some intelligent people, but we luckily escaped their grasp, and hid out until the Grimm virus drove us to group up with everybody else in our small company. I have a fondness for side-arms, and love my Thalestris-C and my Devil We know, two perfect engineering marvels, with the first one delivering a rapid burst of 9 incendiary rounds; while Devil had a huge-ass kick that made it hard to deliver rapid fire, but the rounds from it would tear through infected(and any other kind of adversary) like wet newspaper. I wear a black hoodie(identical to the one Jared wears), and khaki shorts similar to Mako's, but don't bother cleaning out the blood stains.
"Hey guys! Are you ready to go? Let's move it or lose it! I'll race you all there!" Came the chipper voice of Ruby's, and simultaneously snapped out of my monologue.
"Yeah, we're ready." I replied while looking over to Mako and Jared to see them nod in approval. I nodded back, and walked out to the center of the room where everyone had gotten their rucksacks and stuff ready for the next(and hopefully final) leg of our journey. Clearing my throat; I prepared myself to speak.
"Okay everyone. We're going to set out again, and our main objective is to make it safely to Vale. Now I know there's going to definitely be some opposition along the way, but we've made it this far and can't give up now. Not after what Penny and Torchwick did to save us and buy us time." The majority of us looked down at the ground, holding our silence in respect of our fallen comrades.
"Well then, let's move out already! We need to get to Vale, and I'll make sure take as many of those undead fuckers with me as possible!" Came the reply of Yang; clearly eager on the prospect of setting ablaze some Grimm and finding sanctuary, and thus killing two metaphorical birds with one stone(or in Yang's case, two Grimm with one flamethrower).
"It's decided then. Let us go." Came Ren's soft voice, while he loaded his double Uzi's.
