Chapter 2 - Knee deep in the dead

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Screams filled the mall from the front to the back. People were in a panic, rushing anywhere and everywhere.

"Something's wrong." Erica stood up from her chair and reached into her blazer for a gun.

"I sense it too." Bobby pulled his gun from the inside of his denim jacket.

The 2 IADC agents ran out into the mall's corridors and ran towards the screaming that people were running away from. When they got to the spot, they could see the reasoning for the panic.

"Stop!" Erica yelled out.

"Come on, Quit it!" Bobby yelled at the group of zombies.

The group refused to listen, and instead, turned their interest to the IADC agents. Without hesitation, the 2 agents raised their firearms, and took aim, and fired 7mm rounds into the zombies charging at them, to take them down.

Meanwhile, Diana Prince knew what she had to do. Dropping everything, she began to transform into her amazon alter-ego, Wonder Woman. With lasso in hand, she began to lasso the loose zombies and throw them against the walls to take them out.

When that became insufficient, she began to rush and attack the zombies face to face. she would throw them over her shoulder and against the walls, throwing punches, being very careful not to hit in the jaw at the risk of getting infected herself.

During the fracas, she looked over and saw her IADC friends surrounded by Zombies. She quickly jumped over the crowd, and joined them.

"Hey! it's Wonder Woman!" Erica saw the amazon heroine face to face.

"Heads down!" Wonder Woman ordered, and Erica and Bobby hit the ground, While Wonder Woman swung her lasso around like a whip, and cleared a space for some breathing room.

"We've got to get people somewhere safe." Erica got back to her feet as Bobby did the same.

"The Electronics Shop! It's got a large backroom where we can herd survivors." Bobby informed his IADC co-workers.

"You'd pick the electronics shop, wouldn't you?" asked Erica.

"It's home to me!" Bobby ejected the empty clip from his gun, and loaded another clip.

"12 shots...Count em." Bobby said to himself, loading the gun.

By this time, the mall was riddled with zombies, front to back. The survivors that wern't infected jumped into the circle that Wonder Woman had formed.

"Let's work our way over!" Wonder Woman jumped towards the direction of the electronics shop, and began whipping her lasso to create a path for the survivors while Erica and Bobby covered her right and left flanks.

With a forceful push, the group got into the electronics shop, and were able to get to the door of the backroom...only to discover it was locked.

"Crap!" Bobby couldn't open the door.

With that, Wonder Woman put her hands on the doorhandle, and ripped the door from it's hinges and allowed the group entry.

"After you?" Wonder Woman held her arm out for her co-workers' entry.

Bobby ran into the room, and began to go to work. Erica began leading survivors into the room, while Wonder Woman held off the zombies that were wandering into the electronics shop.

"We'll need to get a message out to the colonel." Bobby began setting up a computer.

"What do you mean?" Erica rushed over to bobby.

"According to government procedure, A bio-terrorist act calls for an instant quarantine. Then they exterminate. If we can get a message out to the authorities, it might buy us some time to get out of the mall. Maybe save a few lives." Bobby hooked the Apple Macintosh computer into a modem.

"Wouldn't a phone call be easier?" asked Erica.

"You wanna go out there and find a phone?" asked Bobby, not even bothering to look Erica in the eye as he set up the computer. Erica figured Bobby had something in mind.

"What are you going to do?" asked Erica.

"I'm going to relay a message to IRA and Steve, Via the internet. The TCP/IP connection is set up in this store." Bobby turned the computer on, and waited for the connection to start up.

"You know, I hope Diana's OK. I'm worried about her." Erica changed the subject.

"Me too." Bobby turned to Erica, before turning back to the computer to set up an electronic mail message.

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Steve Trevor walked fast through the hallway down to the computer room where IRA awaited him. He was given a message from the computer engineers that there was a message for him, and that it was urgent.

He arrived at the computer room and went into conversation with IRA.

"IRA, what is this urgent message?" Steve sat down in the chair.

"Urgent message from IADC agent Bobby Sparrow. Bio-terrorism acts happening at the washington mall. There are survivors. Request you prevent counteractive measures to help rescue survivors." IRA spoke in it's robotic voice.

"Bio-terrorist?" Steve was bewildered at that word. But as he spoke, there was a knock at the door.

"Sir?" asked an IADC official at the door.

"What is it?" asked Steve.

"There's something on the TV about zombies at the mall. And no, i'm not kidding." The official spoke in serious tone.

"That sounds strange." Steve turned back to IRA "...IRA, can you send a message to the computer that sent you that message..."

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Back in the electronics shop, Bobby awaited any reply that came. And when it did, Erica jumped.

"Wow...this world's growing up." Erica was amazed. She was still using snail mail for all her text messages.

"It's not too hard, as long as you have a 56 kb connection, you can send short messages." Bobby kept his eyes on the computer to read Steve's message to him "Of course, IRA's a high-tech machine, it can make things happen quickly."

Bobby read Steve's reply through IRA.

"This is Steve Trevor. I'll send a phone call to the authorities not to pump gas into the mall just yet. In the meantime, try to round up as many survivors as you possibly can. Are there any other IADC agents with you?"

As Bobby read the message, Diana Prince walked into the room, shed of her amazon identity.

"Diana! You're alright." Erica replied.

"Yeah, I got hung up with a bunch of zombies." Diana replied. "What's going on?"

"Bobby's talking to Steve through IRA."

"...I'm here, Erica's here, Diana's here...we're all fine. There's 22 survivors with us." Bobby entered in his electronic mail, and sent it off to IRA.

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Back at the IADC, Steve was already directing traffic to his agents, telling them to make phone calls.

"Ok." Steve prepared his message for his agents in the mall. "Ok, I want you guys to escort all the survivors out of that mall, and make sure it's all clear." Steve told IRA.

A few seconds passed, and the computer did it's job.

"The message was sent to IADC agent Bobby Sparrow." IRA replied.

"Good...hopefully we can get as many people out of there as possible."

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"Hey Bobby, can I send a message to Steve?" Diana walked over to the computer.

"I already told him..." Bobby snapped his arm back to block Diana from approaching the computer. "...That you're okay."

Diana nudged back a bit.

"Are you OK?" asked Diana.

"I'm perfectly fine." Bobby didn't look at Diana when he said it.

"Wow...you're rude." Diana commented.

Just as Bobby was about to reply to that, Erica stepped in and stopped a potential tirade of insults.

"Uh Diana, I need to talk to you in the other room." Erica turned to Bobby. "Bobby, what else are you going to do?"

Bobby cleared his throat to speak. "There's a security camera set-up in the mall...i'm going to try and set it up in here to see if there are any other survivors in this mall."

"Ok, good." Erica guided Diana towards the other side of the room where the survivors were all hunkered down.

Diana was a mix of confused and a bit angry.

"What's with that guy?" Diana asked Erica. "He's rude."

"He's different." Erica motioned for Diana to sit down. "His brain doesn't work like yours or mine..."

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