It was a couple of years after the tragedy of Bill's death. Everybody has changed and been shaped by the death and loss of a great person and a soldier. Not only everyone changed emotionally and mentally, everybody changed in their appearance as well. Louis had grown hair on his head, Francis grew longer hair than before, Zoey dropped her favorite red jacket and took new clothes in that were more suitable to stealth and comfort. Same did Louis and Francis. Francis really didn't wanna drop his jacket and he didn't, he just switched his pants. Louis shaped most, changed his clothes and grew short hair on top of his head, following with a small beard.
The night was cold and very dark. Barely anything could be seen through the blinding fog that arose and the rain that followed with it's loud noise and the storm that was there ruined the chances of walking and traversing safely through the city. The gang stopped their travel through the city and took a stop in a small jewellery store, that was broken down and obviously, had all it's showcases broken and almost all the jewellery was stolen.
'Are we going to find any food today?' Zoey whimpered, whilst was shivering and holding her shoulders trying to comfort herself in the cold. 'We gotta not worry about the damn food right now, worry about the feet Zoey. All of our damn shoes are wet and the time isn't gonna get warmer. We can freeze to death like this, ya' know?' Louis replied, while also shivering and trying to find a dry spot.
Francis was just resting his back on a wall, but his face was not see-able due to his long hair that covered his sides. Francis has also grown a beard, but a certainly bigger one than Louis did. Francis seemed not to pay any attention to the conversation, he didn't shift his head, didn't reply, didn't do any minimal noises, it almost seemed like Francis was focusing on something else, and indeed it was. Francis was looking on a watch that was on the ground, soaked in water and the small arrows were moving on the watch.
'Dang, does that watch still work?' Louis said in a small subtle happy tone. 'What watch?' Zoey replied to the question, but with her own confused question. 'There's a watch on the ground that is still ticking. Nice.' Louis replied to Zoey's confused tone.
Louis shortly after replying picked up the watch. The watch was very cold and wet, he grabbed a part of his dirty jacket and brushed it in the jacket to clean it up. Then he proceeded to put it on his hand. The watch had no noise, no ambience, but the clock was still moving, the time was still understandable, and supposedly, the battery was still working, since it was moving forward.
'According to the watch, it's 10 o' clock.'
'PM or AM?' Francis finally said something after a long time of silence from himself.
Louis looked at him with a very frightened and a worried tone, 'PM...' Louis replied.
Francis finally got off his leaning position on the wall and moved forward to the broken window to look out at the very thick fog and seemed to take a deep breath in and closed his eyes. Francis was listening to the silent rain, the rain that he remembered back then, when in the bar.. playing pool.
The rain was very calming to Francis. The noise of water droplets dripping on the ground soothed him down after all the hard times and hard sacrifices he had to take, it almost felt like the world could go back to normal for Francis, that people could get along, that almost everything could be okay...
Then there was a groaning noise outside. Everybody instantly jumped up with their eyes looking outside in the thick fog trying to see and pinpoint anything, but it was to no avail, since the fog was too thick for anybody to pin a target they could find. After a couple of seconds, the rain noise became louder for everybody since the brain focused and found nothing.
Francis took a full stance and pulled out his Glock-16 from his pants.
'How many bullets Francis?' Louis asked,
'Exactly 10.' Francis replied while putting in his aiming stance.
Francis took slow steps, slowly reaching the door to exit the building, while trying to make minimal noise to not alert the unknown person or being.
'I got your back, Francis. I'm going.' Louis said while pulling out his pocket knife.
'Be sure not to fuck up, and keep me close and keep your knife closer Louis.'
'Zoey, stay inside, we will not go far. If you SEE ANYTHING, shout as loud as you can.' Louis said to the worried Zoey, 'Okay, guys, don't go too fucking far, don't leave me here.'
'We won't, just don't do anything stupid that will risk your life.'
Louis and Francis went out further in the thick fog and faded away from Zoey's vision. She pulled out her Colt that had 7 bullets left and went behind the counter in the corner to have a good hiding position and cover, just in case. She put her pistol on the counter table, along her hands to have a good stand to not miss alot of shots, and then she just waited with a very worried and scared face. All she could hear, was her own teeth hitting each other from the hard shivers that made her body shake and her own little movements she made when her leg or arm got tired.
'Louis, you still here?'
'Yes Francis, I'm here. I am checking your back. You see anything?'
'No, Louis, I don't. If I saw a goddamn thing wouldn't you think I would shoot or tell it to you already?!'
'What the fuck Francis? Why'd you get so damn mad for me being worried about our own safety?'
'Because it is such a stupid question, Louis! If I see a damn thing, you'll hear it from me.'
'All right, shut up now, let me focus.'
While Louis and Francis were taking steps that slowed down to not go too far off, they didn't hear a bit, the rain was too loud to hear anything, nothing except for the rain. After a bit of slow walking through the rain and thick fog, they suddenly heard a noise, the same growling noise, but closer and a little bit louder this time. It was a notification to them, that they were closer than before to what they were trying to investigate and kill. The thick fog still preserved the being's position secret location and Louis became a bit more worried and scared while Francis seemed to gain no more emotion just a little bit more looking around the place, trying to find something or somebody.
'Francis, we need to leave now. We don't know where this fucker is and we might just die now, it can sneak up on us. Hell, we don't even know if there are multiple of them!'
'Louis, calm the fuck down. There is only one, if we heard more there would be more noise like a horde. It seems to me we have stumbled upon a Hunter, but I'm not totally sure about that one.'
'Let's get the fuck outta here.'
'I hate Louises'
'Francis, this isn't funny anymore... let's leave, NOW.'
'Keep your shit together, Louis. Bill wouldn't possibly wanted us to give up on preserving our safety now, huh?'
'DON'T BRING BILL IN THIS!'
'YOU TALK ABOUT HIM SO MUCH WITH ZOEY WHY DON'T I HAVE THE CHANCE TO MENTION HIM, SEEMS LIKE HE IS YOUR ONLY THING THAT GUIDES YOU TO DO ANY FUCKING SHIT, SO MAYBE I'LL HAVE THE RIGHT TO SAY SOMETHING TOO.'
The monotone became loud and very angry. Both of them became pissed at each other, and lost the whole idea of why they left, to find the thing that was making the noises. They both had an angry stare at each other and couldn't stop looking at each other, it looked like they had a whole fight of storms of words transmitted through their minds, but they didn't say a thing, just stared at each other angrily.
After a couple of seconds passed of this angry stare fight, they heard a slight scream from Zoey. They both immediately got out of their angry stare mode and rushed back to the jewellery store track they memorized. Walking towards the door, they didn't see Zoey or anything that possibly caused her to scream or make her emit any sound. Francis and Louis stared at each other very worried and scared, because they thought Zoey got killed.
'ZOOEY! WHERE ARE YOU?' Louis shouted. He was the most worried and showed it the most. He began to panic and so with his panic he rushed inside the jewellery store, not caring about his own safety and began to scan the area for her or possibly her body.
Francis didn't walk in, though. He was still standing there, looking around and seemingly, was thinking of something. Suddenly something popped up in his head.
'Smoker...' Francis whimpered with a worrying tone.
Louis snapped back to him immediately and asked, 'What?'
'A smoker got Zoey, Louis, Zoey got fucking pinned by a Smoker!'
'Shit..SHIT, SHIT, SHIIIT!' Louis screamed while frantically thinking what to do.
Louis quickly ran out of the jewellery store and started frantically looking around while being outside, trying to hear anything or see anything, but not being able to as much as he tried to focus himself on that task. Francis was also doing the same thing, but less frantically, thinking what to do..
Francis suddenly had very worrying thoughts, which is pretty rare to see from him, 'Is Zoey dead?', 'Did she kill the Smoker?', 'Why can't I hear her?', while slowly losing hope to do any next decision. Seconds counted further and further.. and it seemed like the watch suddenly became louder than the rain for both of them, the arrow moving each second, the tick, TICK, TOCK, TICK, TOCK. Seconds started to slow down and they both started to lose their minds in thoughts, and became very worried for what could happen to Zoey.
They bought had no idea what to do and what would be their next move. Louis just standed there with Francis, not caring about the rain, not the cold, not the watch freezing the wrist for Louis, nothing. They just, seemed to think, that all hope was lost. And all they could focus and hear most, was the watch and it's arrows, slowly ticking... counting seconds, possibly the death of Zoey...
