Don't worry people, I'm back. I was lazy for a month, especially with winter vacation. I also had to replay Underbelly to familarize myself with the level to write a story about it accurately. In this chapter you'll get to meet David, Mark, Yoko and Alyssa. Also expect those god damned giant ticks.

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James rushed down the stairs, quickly followed by Tonaka and Amy with Max and Sadie lagging behind, not wanting to get caught in whatever was happening. James looked ahead onto the platform, and under a light saw a man in tan overalls being covered by what looked liked a giant... tick? He saw a heavy, bald black man standing next to him in a security guard uniform, trying to get a shot at the tick without shooting the man. An asian girl with shoulder-length hair, a green shirt, blue pants and a backpack was trying to stab the thing with a small knife, but it was twitching too much for her to do anything. A blonde woman in a red uniform was trying to grab the tick and pull it off the man, but to no avail. He decided to take the risk of hitting the man, and took his Desert Eagle, ducked, and shot the tick through the back. The bullet went straight through the tick, through the head, and just skimming the air over the man's face. The tick went limp on the man's body. The three people standing around it looked at James, just now noticing him.

"Nice shootin'." Said the black man. The blonde haired girl sat with her back to a support beam, sighing. The asian girl looked around, still obviously paranoid, but James noticed that she also had a haunted look about her, like she'd been in some kind of traumatic situation earlier in life. The man threw the tick off his body, and jumped off the platform to look for something.

Tonaka took a moment to look at the black man, then shouted with glee "Mark?!" The black man looked at him and yelled with equal glee and shouted "Tonaka?!" They went up to each other and gave each other a brotherly hug. Everyone looked at them in confusion. They released the hug, still with each other's arms around their shoulders Tonaka said to his group "This is Mark, I was in the same squad as him in Vietnam." Mark said to his group "This is Tonaka, and as he said, we were in the same squad in Vietnam." They gave each other a kind of smile that a little kid would get when he successfully stole a cookie from the cookie job.

Then the man in the tan overalls came back onto the platform, wielding a shotgun, which must've been knocked off the platform when the tick tackled him. He also noticed the face of the person. "David?" James said quizically. David looked at James, raised his eyebrows, and said "James?". They gave each other the kind of hug war comrades did. Both groups, knowing their perspective members of the hug, and along with that knowing it was better not to ask questions about their past, looked at them as they did with Mark and Tonaka, but quickly went back to their business. Max said under his breath to Sadie "Quite a reunion, isn't it?". Sadie giggled a bit, but when David and James looked at her with the same glare James had been giving her, she stopped.

Tonaka said "Well, I guess we better introduce ourselves. I'm Tonaka Mikashi, university professor." Mark said "Mark Wilkins, security guard." Amy said "Amy Natice, student" The asian girl said timidly "Yoko Suzuki." The blonde said, to the suprise of James, more egotistically than Max and Sadie combined, "Alyssa Ashcroft, journalist." Max said with his pipey voice "Max Olber, student!" to which Alyssa looked at and could barely keep herself from laughing. Sadie said, in her still annoyingly egostical to James voice, "Sadie Maran, student." James noted off that if you changed the a's in her name to o's, you'd get moron. David said in his gruff voice "David King", and in a tone as if he wanted to get introductions over with and to just get down to business. James said in in the same tone that David used "James Locke."

David was the next one to say something. "Now that that's over", which he said in almost disgust,"Let's put our weapons together to see what we have." Alyssa said before anyone could react "Wait, just because we met up with them now we automatically trust them completely and want them to join us?" in her voice which made it seem as though she thought she knew best. Sadie said "Yeah, why do we have to team up with these guys?" as she looked at David, who just seemed like another James to her, and that was something she didn't want. Max said with a simple, almost as if he was just conforming to the current wishes of everyone else "Yeah!" David and James glared at their respective partners. Amy, Tonaka, Mark and Yoko all stood aside as this unraveled. The situation would almost have been humorus to them if it hadn't been for the current situation.

James started with the humiliating outwitting with "Well let's consider our situation here." David responded, almost as if he was thinking the same thing James was with "We're surrounded by zombies, and now these giant tick things." James continued with "We have two pairs of people who know each other well." "Not to mention even if we were strangers it would be in our best interests to work together." "Safety in numbers." Max, Sadie and Alyssa all looked at each other, dumbfounded. Max sighed and tossed his pipe on the ground, in the middle of the group. James place his Desert Eagle on the ground near him, being careful to try to keep a weapon which was actually his. David laid down the shotgun, Mark his special security pistol, Tonaka his combat knife, Amy her pistol, Yoko her pocket knife, Sadie her piece of concrete. Everyone looked at Alyssa who hadn't yet thrown anything down. She sighed, pulled a can of pesticide spray from her jacket, tossed it into the pile and said "Better than nothing." David studied the pipe and concrete, and picked both up. Max said in his squeaky voice "Hey! Why do you get two weapons?" David looked at Max, then looked at James. James responded "You trying being in a class with him." James glared at Max, and Max walked away, and sat on the steps. Sadie followed, and sat on the stairs opposite him. Amy, Tonaka and Mark studied the pile of weapons, testing each weapon. Yoko looked around, with that haunted look James had noticed earlier. David took out a piece of duck tape, and tied the pipe to the concrete. Max looked at him, and said with his "unique" voice "I should've thought of that!" David and James glared at him again, with a look that said "Well why didn't you?" David laid the new hammer down in the pile. Mark picked it up, and tested the weight. He swung it around a few times, and decided to keep it. James picked back up his Desert Eagle, before anyone else wanted it. David picked up the pesticide spray, and said "Anyone got a lighter?" Tonaka replied "Ah! Right here!" He pulled it out of his jacket, and handed it to David. He tied it to the spray, flicked the flame on, and tested it on open air. A flame came out, lighting up the subway. He laid it down, and Max subsequently almost dived for it, even though it looked like everyone else didn't care for it. James looked at him suspiciously, hoping he wouldn't burn him or anyone else with it, but then went back to looking around the subway. David picked up Tonaka's combat knife, testing it out. James looked at him, and remembered when David had shown him knife fighting moves. He never questioned where he learned them, but he knew David had secrets. Tonaka picked up the pocket knife. Yoko looked at Amy, until Amy looked at Yoko. Yoko motioned her eyes to the pistol, in a questioning way. Amy smiled, and gave a look that said go ahead. Yoko picked up the pistol, and held it close to her. Amy picked up the shotgun, getting used to it's weight. Mark picked back up his pistol, securing it in his holster. Sadie and Alyssa, who had previously been oblivious to the weapon situation, looked at the pile to find nothing.

"Wait a minute!" Alyssa said. "We don't have any weapons!" Sadie said, following Alyssa's lead. James and David looked at each other's respective team member, and said in unison, making it almost seem as though it was one voice if it wasn't for David's gruffness "Good." Both women scowled, but sat back down.

"Well," Tonaka said, "Where do we go from here?" Everyone looked around the subway. Most eyes drew to the subway car. "Well," Said Mark. "The car looks good. There might be something in there to help us out." David held his knife in a combat stance, and advanced into the subway car, the rest of the group following him.

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Well, if I am not mistaken, I do believe that is one of my longest chapters, if not the longest. So, now the first four Outbreak characters to be introduced have been introduced. Hope I represented their personalities well. I think I may have overdone David's cynicism a bit, though. Also note that all item positions in this story WILL BE IN RELATION TO NORMAL MODE! Also, last names for our characters now! Yay! Next chapter: God damned annoying ticks.