Hey guys, Grim here. Another chapter! Yay! But time has passed, so what will happen?
It had been nearly a year since this group let me join. Things were ok, we were running low on town resources but Morgan and Deven set-up a farm, since they were the only ones who remained in the building and had the time to do other things. Everyone sort of followed Dylan, since he was the guard, but there wasn't a determined leader. People never showed up aside from this group. It was just us.
"Are you gonna go scouting soon?" Deven asked.
"We've searched everything, except the red zone." I said. The red zone was a place where we set off an alarm that didn't stop. Corpses swarm that place now and it was far too dangerous. Only yesterday did the alarm stop.
"Well, That alarm stopped, maybe you could check the place out. I have a few traps set up there, if they are needed." Deven handed me the trap map. We took that old map with the Xed out building and marked where our traps were.
"I'll check the place. Make sure you keep the defenses up on the north wall, they're falling apart again. You can open the door there." I left Deven and went to the roof. Dylan was keeping watch and Russel was sitting in a chair looking at his katana. He was still upset about Orlando. None of us talked about him anymore, they were all a bit hurt from their loss. Russel was hurt the most though. He stated that he killed his corpse, but we all knew that he couldn't turn that fast.
"Russel, come with me. We're going to red."
"Ok." Russel stood and we grabbed our bags. I took two every time now. We hadn't used those ammunition boxes since I found them, but I knew we'd need it on this run, so I grabbed one. We reloaded and headed out.
When we got to the red zone we climbed up to a roof using the pipes on the side of the building. We could hear the moans of the withered windpipes of the corpses. It was creepy, like a ghost horror movie. I pulled out a flare and looked around for the mansion that the alarm resided in.
"What if we pull the freaks to another place, the same way this alarm did." Russel said.
"I don't know if there is a place for us to do that." I started thinking about what to do, then I saw the mansion. The corpses still hadn't got in. "Come with me, we might be able to get the alarm or at least the generator."
"Solar powered, look." Russel pointed at the roof.
"There might be something we can use inside."
"What about our guns, we aren't short on ammunition. You brought a box, right?" Russel suggested.
"Yeah, I did." I turned and walked to where we climbed up. "We can put them here, there is traps set up everywhere there." I pointed at the map.
"That's the coffee shop, Morgan, Deven, and Dylan go there for coffee every morning." Russel said.
"There isn't any power though." I scratched my head.
"Deven starts a fire in a camping stove he found in a supermarket."
"Oh. Well lets just gather as much coffee products as we can and bring them to the depo, than we swarm that area. When we're done we can decide whether or not to live in the mansion or stay in the depo." I said.
"Live in the mansion?"
"It kept the corpses out. It should do."
"I guess its a nice place."
As we were walking to the coffee shop we saw a truck pass by. Instantly we followed it but could not keep up.
"It's going to the depo!" I shouted.
We ran for a few minutes and got lost. I looked into the sky and saw smoke. I ran towards it. It took us an hour of losing our way and finding it again till we got there. Me and Russel saw the depo, a burning building. Dylans body lay on the rubble, a bullet wound in the head was visible even from where I stood. We shouted for the others but got no response. Who the heck came here and killed the group, and why? I waded into a place where the rubble wasn't aflame. Russel came behind me before I got in.
"What are you doing." His voice was shaky. He held his sword to my chest.
I pulled up my gun. "I'm grabbing whatever I can and looking for survivors of this. If we find no one we still need to get what we can."
"Yeah. Hurry." We waded and found nothing but a few burnt corpses. Four bodies were there. Four? Who was the fourth? I searched all the husks while Russel wasn't looking. I found Deven's hammer, Morgan's pendant she wore on her neck. I also found a ID of someone else, Janice. She had to be with the people who raided here.
"Their dead." Russel said, shaken.
There was something wrong about this, the bodies seemed completely out of proportion to their supposed owners. "They're not dead."
"Yes they are! We can't hide from-"
"Look at Morgans 'body'. Its that of a muscular woman, Morgan wasn't that fit. Deven's 'body' is that of a woman's." Russel looked closer and saw what I saw. "They aren't dead, they've been kidnapped."
"Why?"
"How would I know. It could have been bandits."
"We need to find them." Russel left and I followed him. We got out just as the roof fell.
"Where are we gonna start looking?"
"There's only one exit from the city, since it's surrounded by either mountains or water."
"Well lets hurry." I said as Russel started in a direction. "We might be able to track them, cars leaving paths in leaves or grass."
"Only if we're lucky." Russel had a different spirit about him. I could tell he didn't want to lose another friend. I couldn't blame him, the group is valuable.
We traveled on the one street that left town for maybe two hours. We came across a couple forks but both had corpses that were obviously hit by a car recently on only one side. They were leaving a bread-trail. But the sun was setting, and Russel and I we're tiring. We would have to sleep soon. Russel collapsed an hour after the sun set. He was too hard on himself, but he didn't pass out, this was out of depression. I offered my hand and took him into the forest. We took up shifts then, so were weren't attacked. It was a near sleepless night.
