Chapter 21
No Trespassing-Violators Will be Eaten
By now, the city had quieted down. For most people, the battle had been lost, and the zombies were now the dominant predator. As they roamed the streets, hunting for more prey moans could be heard in some areas, and then silenced a few minutes later. Humans still occupied the city, desperately trying to hunt the predators, or to escape them. Few had survived, even fewer continued to retain hope.
A street lay in ruins. Parts of the sidewalk had been chipped off and lay broken in the gutter. Automobiles had been crashed into walls or simply abandoned in the street. Corpses littered the street, some still clutching weapons, others . The sun blazed overhead, illuminating the ghastly scene below.
Two shadows advanced through the street, followed by quiet footsteps. Had anyone been watching, it would have been hard to notice the slow, steady movements in the street. But no one, alive or infected, was interested in the street, or anything in it. Of course, this was perfect for Bill and Jon, who were the ones moving through the graveyard of corpses and cars. Bill was trying to keep in the shadows, and move smoothly through the area, but Jon was acting like it was a casual stroll. He quietly walked with his gun aimed at the ground, and his head nodding to some unknown tune.
After a few minutes, he suddenly stopped and pointed. Across the street was an abandoned and damaged gun store. Jon asked "Do you feel like stocking up on ammo," but Bill was already moving towards it. He took out his crowbar, but found it was unnecessary, the door to the gun store already had its lock broken. He and Jon slowly pushed the door open and walked inside, guns raised. Unsurprisingly, the entire store had been looted and trashed. There were even a couple of blood stains here and there, but no bodies. Jon walked over to and empty case, reached down, and pulled out a black suppressor. "Typical," he said, "they take all the weapons and ammo that they can find, but they don't bother to think about stealth. Oh well, our gain." He tossed it to Bill and said, "It should fit your PSG, try it." Bill caught it Jon and tested it. As expected, the suppressor fit perfectly.
Bill and Jon found nothing else of interest in the store, and left. Their next stop was a fenced off vehicle lot next to a four story building. The gate had already been broken open, and lay in three pieces in the road.
A sign stood at the edge, planted in a small patch of dirt. It read "This property is protected by Guardog Security Inc." Lying next to the sign were several corpses and bullet shells. Unfortunately for the owners of the property, security cameras were not very helpful when the police force was already distracted by a zombie attack.
Jon moved to the few cars in the parking lot, and began to check them to see if any were in a good enough condition to hot-wire, while Bill stood at the edge of the lot and let his gaze sweep back and forth across the streets. Zombies didn't have enough intelligence to bother with stealth, but he never knew when hostile survivors might decide he was a good target.
His guard duty was interrupted when he heard Jon say, "Y'know, I've been thinking."
Bill partially turned around and asked, "About what?"
Jon was standing next to a red pick-up truck, his hands still on the opened hood. He said with a rare serious expression, "About the response to this infection. How much warning did you have before it, and then during it? For me, I had practically no warning, until the zombies were scratching at my door, and the T.V. was telling me to evacuate the city. The change in alertness just went too suddenly, if you ask me. One second the media is telling you zombies don't exist, the very next second they are telling you exactly how to kill them. How did that happen? How did they get accurate information so quickly?"
Bill, surprised, said, "I hadn't noticed that, but you're right. ...The problem, is I don't see how that works, logically. How did so many people find out about it at once? It's not likely that they already knew, you couldn't keep a secret from the masses while telling a huge portion of them the secret."
Jon simply stated, "Someone obviously has some sort of secret agenda, but who, what, and how? Also, if you are right, why? What did they gain by telling the secret almost immediately?"
Bill said, "Maybe the secret was spread out more than we thought." He hesitated, and then asked, "For example, did you know about zombies before this... infection?"
Jon looked him squarely in the eye and asked, "Did you?" The result was a long, awkward silence between them.
The silence was eventually interrupted by the sound of metal being knocked over a few blocks down. They both turned and looked down the street, but only saw a trash can lid roll across the street before bumping into the sidewalk and falling down. "Well, we should probably move," Jon said as he pulled a street map out of the truck. "At least, now we know where to go."
Bill nodded, and began walking around the edge of the building, his back to the wall. However, a pipe attached to the outside of the corner partially blocked his vision, and forced him to step away from the wall in order to pass it.
Bill stepped out around the corner and froze. A cold metal cylinder was pressed against the side of his head. There was no need to guess what it was.
A/N= Wow, what has it been? Three, four months? My procrastination was terrible. I blame camping, schoolwork, and StarCraft II.
It also took a while, because I was (and still am) reluctant to release this chapter. It just seemed too random, and the dialogue was too awkward, but I wasn't able to think of a better way to write it.
So, as usual, R&R. Hopefully the next chapter won't take me four months.