What's up, everyone! This is GKC here bringing you the next chapter of "The Dead's Reaper".

Now I looked through some of the reviews and I gotta say that I like the ideas that some of you have come up with.

Oh, and to the one reviewer who asked why Saeko referred to Reaper as his cover name. Well, all of the characters at that time only know him as Dante Nocturne, they don't know him as his true call sign, which is in actuality, Reaper.

Now for the disclaimer: I do not own, except my OC, Resident Evil or Highschool of the Dead. All rights belong to their respective owners.

Now let's get this party started… BEGIN!

Resident Evil: The Dead's Reaper

Chapter 3: Escape the Undead!

Fujimi Academy - Staff Room

Reaper sat in a corner, watching the grounds below from a window while the rest of the survivors chatted amongst themselves.

The school's faculty office proved to be a lot better off than most of the other rooms. There were no zombies, for one. Nor were there any bloodstains anywhere from any unfortunate victims. The room simply looked like how it would on any given normal day.

The only difference was that instead of teachers, it was now occupied by a ragtag group of students, a nurse, and an ex-assassin. Reaper almost chuckled when he recognized most of the people in the room since they were his classmates, barring the kendo captain and the school nurse.

Reaper noticed that Hisashi wasn't with Takashi or Rei. A morbid thought crossed his mind as he wondered if the grey-haired boy perished in the ensuing chaos.

"Nocturne-san? Aren't you going to introduce yourself?" The smooth voice of Saeko Busujima spoke, seemingly flowing through the air.

The former Umbrella agent glanced at the purple-haired girl then realized that he was being looked at by everyone in the room.

"My cover name is Dante Nocturne but my callsign is Reaper. Use that from now on," He said bluntly.

"It is nice to see that you are alive and well, Nocturne-san," The kendo captain gave him a sad smile as she sat on a stool across from him. "Though I do not think that the rest of the club was as lucky as me."

"When the zombie apocalypse attends to come out of nowhere, not everybody can prepare for that." Reaper stated.

Saeko nodded in agreement while her eyes drifted towards the super soldier's handgun, "You've been keeping a lot of secrets, Nocturne-san."

"It's Reaper," He corrected, albeit coldly. "Dante Nocturne never even existed until the name was made for me."

"Regardless, I will continue to refer you as such, Nocturne-san." Saeko persisted. "And so will everyone else."

Reaper sighed then looked back out the window, "Do whatever you want."

His answer satisfied the purple-haired girl's persistence as she stood up from her seat and made her way back to the group.

The ex-assassin rolled his eyes then glanced back outside to watch the roaming undead and…

His upper body shifted with alertness as his crimson irises focused on a particular body mass that scuttled across the schoolyard. To the human eye, it would look like nothing more than a blurring mass of red but genetically enhanced vision allowed Reaper to make out every detail of the creature's body.

Dog-like and humanoid in appearance… blood-dripping muscles revealed to the entirety of the world… and a head showcasing a pulsating brain with razor-sharp teeth.

'It can't be…' Reaper thought as he rubbed his eyes, hoping it was just a trick of the light. When he reopened his eyes, he noticed that the mass was gone. "I must've just imagined it…" He said to himself but even that did little to assure him.

He was drawn out of his thoughts by a cough from Takashi, which got the attention of everyone in the room.

"If everyone is ready now, I think that we should get going," Komuro said.

"Oh, I know!" The rather energetic school nurse, Shizuka Marikawa, raised her hand in the air like an elementary school student waiting for the teacher to call on her. "We could take my car!"

"Are you sure we would all fit in your car, Marikawa-sensei?" Stepping out of the restroom was Takagi, wearing a new pair of glasses. Reaper secretly thought that the glasses made Saya look cuter.

"Ah…" Shizuka thought about it while looking outside… and stared at a small yellow car that would barely fit the entirety of the group. "We probably wouldn't." She deflated.

"We could take the school buses," Kouta suggested as he pointed at a key rack hanging from the wall. "I think the keys are over there."

Takashi nodded, "That's a good idea."

"But," The nurse rested a finger on her cheek. "Where are we going?"

'Good question… the news report from earlier had already depicted the entire situation quite clearly. The city is pretty much fucked. The entire world is experiencing this kind of bioterror attack… All major countries are burning as we speak.' Reaper thought to himself.

"I think that… it would be best if we all tried to find our families first," Takashi looked around the group. "Is that fine with everyone?"

The survivors nodded in agreement, barring the lone ex-Umbrella agent.

"That's useless."

Takashi leveled a glare at Reaper, who gave them all a cold stare. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"It means that if this outbreak is happening right now at the school then what chance is there for your families? For all you know, they could already be turned into monsters." The super soldier said bluntly.

"How would you know that!?" Rei demanded, angry at the crimson-eyed youth for suggesting such a thought. "We managed to survive! Why wouldn't our families?!"

A cold chuckle left Reaper's lips, "You actually thought you managed to survive through sheer skill? Idiots… it was purely by luck alone."

Saya glared at the former assassin, "Hey, you were in the same position as us!"

"Yes, but that's because I've experienced this kind of viral outbreak before." Reaper stated.

"Wait… you…" Kouta looked at Reaper in shock. "You've gone through this kind of hell?!"

Reaper nodded, "Yes, you could say I was one of the survivors of the Raccoon City Incident."

Shizuka looked confused. "But… didn't that happen almost two decades ago?"

"There's no way that's true!" Saya interjected. "Besides, if you were really apart of that nightmare then that would you-"

"Older than I look?" He finished. "You're right… in some way, I am older than I appear to be but the nature of that is… complicated."

"Well, uncomplicate it!" Rei demanded.

Reaper shook his head. "Unfortunately, that's my business. I have no qualms to tell you all my life story." He stood up from his perch near the window and made his way to the door. "Now, we have more important matters to contend with, such as our survival."

Despite the cold shoulder act he was receiving, Takashi understood the severity of the situation. "Alright then. Let's take the bus and get out of here. WE're all going to get out of here alive!"

While the others solemnly agreed with Komuro, Reaper narrowed his eyes and frowned. 'The fools are gonna get themselves killed…' He thought to himself.

[Timeskip]

'I stand corrected…' Reaper internally growled as he jammed his knife into the brain of an undead student.

During the entire escape, the group encountered little to no resistance from any zombies and those that did get in their way was soundly eliminated by those of the group that could fight.

Reaper analyzed the conflict that happened while he dealt with his undead foe. Komuro was good with a bat but his sense of combat was erratic and hot-blooded. He wasted more energy just swinging instead of actually going for the kill.

Rei did at least somewhat impress the super soldier but only because she was a practitioner of Sojutsu. Her skill with a spear was unquestionable but her behavior and emotional stability was a problem. Just the slightest wrong would set the girl off into an emotional fit.

Kouta seemed to be taking the situation rather well. Although it might be because he's suddenly developed a sort of manic pleasure of killing monsters that once were human. Reaper dreaded the sort of damage the chubby boy could do if he had an actual gun instead of the nail gun he was using with astonishing proficiency.

Takagi, being useless in a fight, would only point out flaws in team dynamics or say how stupid Kouta or Reaper were being, much to the super soldier's annoyance. Her analytical skills and sharp mind would be useful but her loud mouth would cause trouble for the group in the long run.

Saeko was probably the more competent of the survivors. Her silent approach, her quick handling of the bokken, and her swift movements made her a worthy partner to have in a bioterror attack. The only flaw of her apparent quiet behavior was the barely noticeable mindset of a sadist.

Nurse Marikawa… there was enough said about her…

'I'm starting to think that coming to Japan as a student… was a bad idea…' Reaper thought as he tore off his current foe's head.

As if the universe deemed it necessary to further his bad decision, a scream echoed throughout the semi-empty halls.

"Oh, give me a fucking break…" The super soldier cursed.

Naturally, the rest of the group, sans Reaper, had come to the rescue. The ex-Umbrella agent had no choice but to assist those with weapons in protecting a group of students from other classes, ones that Reaper did not recognize. Takashi had asked if they wanted to escape with them. Naturally, they agreed.

'Dammit… the group is too large and these idiots are kids at that. They won't even shut their mouths long enough for us to leave…' The assassin growled mentally.

Unfortunately, the means of escape seemed to be even more treacherous than ever before. The undead that wandered the halls were easy to dispatch since they weren't all bunched together nor were they fast or able to see. Gathered in groups, zombies were dangerous, which therein lies the problem… as the main entrance was flooded with undead students.

"They can't see us," Saya said confidently. "They only react to sound, so if we keep quiet, we can simply walk past them."

Takashi frowned as he stared at the rather large group of zombies loitering around the main entrance. "You want to test that theory?" He inquired.

"It's not just a theory," The pinkette said nervously, which only seemed to put the survivors on edge. "I've tested it already."

"We don't have much of a choice anyway," Saeko said in a quiet voice. "All of the exits will be similar to this. Someone will have to go."

Unsurprisingly, no one volunteered.

Takashi released a breath and raised his left hand into the air. "I'll go then."

"What?!" Rei quietly exclaimed worry etched all over her face. "You can't, Takashi!" She grabbed onto his sleeve, fixating her eyes on the boy's face.

"It's fine, Rei," Takashi nervously smiled, "Takagi said she already tested it out."

"No, I'll go," The Kendo Club captain offered. "I believe I will be able to fare better if Takagi's theory is proven to be false."

'Oh for God's sake…' Reaper rolled his eyes in annoyance as he pushed his way through and made his way down the stairs.

"Nocturne-kun, what are you-" Shizuka's eyes went wide. "W-wait, Nocturne-kun!"

Everyone stopped talking when they realized that the super soldier had already left the staircase. Their jaws dropping in shock.

Reaper still his breathing and kept his footsteps quiet as he weaved his way through the horde of blind undead. He stopped walking and looked back, noticing that everyone's nervous eyes were fixated on him. He did not miss the looks of fear that appeared when they realized they would have to do the same thing to escape.

'Damn, I know I'm gonna regret this later…' He thought to himself as he reached behind his waist and pulled out his handgun, taking off the silencer since he figured that the insides were already damaged enough by bullets. He flicked the safety off then tossed it down an empty hall with his enhanced strength.

BANG!

The loud kickback of the pistol rang down the hallway after the gun impacted against a wall, discharging a bullet safely away from any survivors. The zombies slowly followed the source of the echo. The survivors waiting with bated breath as the undead disappeared down the halls, leaving no trace of their appearance save their troubling moans and groans.

Reaper kept a close eye on the disappearing horde then with one hand signaled the rest of the survivors to start moving. His ears caught the tell-tale signs of quick yet quiet footsteps making their way down the stairs and past him. His sight not once leaving the hall in which the undead disappeared into.

"Hurry up, Nocturne!" Saya quietly hissed. "This isn't the time to space out right now, stupid!"

The super soldier glanced at the entrance, noticing that Saya was waiting for him with her usual scowl. With nothing left to stop him, he followed after the pinkette.

The survivors made it to the bus without too much trouble. After everyone had seen what Reaper did to confirm Takagi's theory, it was easy for the group to sneak past the dead.

They were all seated, simply waiting for their school nurse to start the engine.

"U-uh, this is different compared to my car…" The buxom blonde woman frowned as she looked at the controls from the driver's seat. "Uh, that's the clutch, I think… and that's the brake? Ugh… Where's the ignition at?"

Reaper, hearing this, marched over to the driver's seat, took the key from Shizuka's lap, and puts it into the ignition socket. Giving it a small twist, the engine of the bus roared to life.

"Ah, thank you, Nocturne-kun!" The nurse said with a bright smile.

'How is this woman alive after all this time?' Reaper thought dryly.

"H-Hey, I think that just attracted all of them," Rei stood up from her seat and pointed out the window, gesturing to a few zombies that had turned in their general direction. "We need to go, now!"

"Wait!" Takashi exclaimed with a frown as he looked back at the main entrance. "There are more people coming!"

Hearing this, the super soldier looked out the window and spied a group of students along with a teacher, Mr. Shido if he remembered correctly, who were running towards the bus.

"We need to go, now!" Rei said, almost desperately. "We don't have to help them! Just leave them!"

"I agree. The fewer people to worry about the better…" Reaper agreed bluntly.

Apparently, Komuro didn't like this and decided to hold the door open. "What the hell are you two talking about!? Of course, we have to help them."

Rei gritted her teeth. "You'll regret helping him, Takashi…"

Reaper didn't miss the amount of venom in the girl's tone. While he didn't have any personal history or any interaction with Rei Miyamoto, he didn't expect her to have a vendetta against someone within the approaching group.

Checking outside, the former assassin noticed that a student had fallen to the ground and was begging Shido for help…

...he received a foot to the face as a response.

Reaper glared at the man, 'He'll be trouble down the road… I might have to kill him soon.'

Looking back at the fallen student, who was holding his busted nose with both hands as he cried in pain, the clone watched emotionlessly as the zombies approached him, eager to sink their teeth into fresh meat.

Then another factor emerged… one that shocked the super soldier all the way down to his core...

A long, pink tongue whipped out from above, snagging the student by his neck as he choked then with hardly a yelp he was dragged up towards the surface of the main school building… and towards a creature that Reaper had hoped with all his soul shouldn't even be alive…

"A Licker…" He muttered under his breath.

[Flashback]

"Command, we've entered the security room," Lupo said into her radio.

"There should be a console in there. Use it to override the security lockdown," said Command.

Four Eyes and Spectre did that while the others stood guard.

They finished.

"Good. Now you can access the server room and destroy all of the city's records." Command told them.

Before they could leave, one of the monitors caught Vector's attention and he gazed upon it like he was hypnotized.

"Check out that monitor," he said to his teammates and they huddled together to see what content the screen had to show.

"That is a security feed from earlier today," Spectre said after noticing the time and date on the side of the screen.

The monitor screen showed footage of Nicholai inside a different room of the same building Wolfpack were in right now. He was seen opening a door and getting ready to exit through it when he turned around and saw someone or something coming toward his direction. It was a U.B.C.S. member and was possibly under Nicholai's command.

Without hesitation and with an evil look on his face, Nicholai whipped out a handgun and shot the running man in the leg, crippling him. Wolfpack couldn't believe that the man they ran into not too long ago would turn against his own men.

Two more U.B.C.S. personnel tried to catch up to Nicholai, but he quickly stepped out of the room and closed its door. One of those soldiers banged his fist against the door and tried to open it, but it was no good because the door was now locked and the soldiers were trapped inside.

The wounded man who was injured by Nicholai was crawling away frantically and the other one beside him appeared to be shooting at something off-camera. Pretty soon, it was revealed to be zombies and they were closing in on the trapped men.

The one Wolfpack assumed was cursing Nicholai for his treachery (the footage was muted so none of them could hear anything from it) turned around and saw the creatures. While his two comrades were swarmed and attacked by the zombies, he climbed up on top of the room's large machinery outlets to escape through a vent shaft to avoid becoming zombie food, but one of the zombies, dressed as a security guard, grabbed him by the leg and dragged him back down onto the floor and he met his grisly end as the zombie crowd began eating him and his comrades.

Wolfpack was stunned by what they saw. Normally, they didn't give a damn about the U.B.C.S. but seeing Nicholai's cruel act of treachery against his own team was unexpected and barbaric. Some of the Wolfpack members were truly shocked by that.

"That's Nicholai and his team . . ." said Four Eyes.

"They didn't put up much of a fight," said Vector.

"Isn't that against company policy?" Spectre asked.

Reaper looked at Lupo, "I told you we should've killed him."

The French woman ignored the super soldier, "Less talking, people. We still need to destroy that evidence."

They were about to exit the security room when the door they were going to take suddenly burst open and zombies poured in. There were about 12 to 15 of them.

"More infected! Let's move!" Spectre yelled and the group started shooting the creatures in an instant.

Vector delivered a kick to the back of a zombie's leg and proceeded to slit its throat with his knife.

Beltway grabbed one zombie and heaved it over using a suplex move, causing the zombie's body to snap several bones in its body due to its decaying state.

To end it quicker, Lupo targeted the nearest zombie she could find and used a powerful punch to it that knocked it back along with every other zombie near it in the vicinity. With the zombies off their feet and easier to kill this way, Wolfpack executed all of them with headshots and left via the stairs behind the zombie corpses.

More gunfire came from a closed door just a few feet of their view. Spectre used his Sonar Vision mode to see through the door and he detected more Spec Ops soldiers making a stand against another zombie mob.

"I see more B.O.W.s and enemy soldiers together beyond that door," he told them.

Armed with the new info, Wolfpack approached the door, opened it slowly and saw, as Spectre said, a few Spec Ops members shooting at zombies, a third of them Crimson Heads. The soldiers were entirely focused on their problem that they didn't even notice the Umbrella squad standing just behind them.

Rather than kill the distracted troops immediately, Four Eyes instantly thought of a way of getting rid of their enemies without risk to them. She grabbed one of her pheromone bombs, activated it and quietly slid the object near the Spec Ops soldiers' feet.

One of them discovered the bomb and Wolfpack, but was too late to say or do anything about it as Delta Team closed the door and locked it, sealing themselves from the carnage that was to come.

"We'll let the B.O.W.s have a little fun with them before proceeding forward." Four Eyes said and they approved of her plan. With this in action, the team was conserving their firepower rather than just spending it.

Back outside, the bomb began spraying its red gas all over the Spec Ops men and this made the crowd of zombies even more determined to rush at the soldiers in a vicious rage.

"Oh shit!" one of them yelled and they started shooting wildly at the incoming, hungry horde and they were all eventually overpowered and eaten alive.

Screams and groans were heard and Delta Team, under advice from Four Eyes, waited a couple of minutes before making any moves. Four Eyes told them that her chemical takes a while to fully wear off and if they were caught in it before completely dissolving, then the creatures would try to do to them what they just did with the soldiers.

When time was up, Lupo gave the order to reopen the door and killed the feasting zombies as soon as possible. The bodies of the Spec Ops troops was a real mess, but Wolfpack didn't care.

Eventually, they were on the same balcony that led right to where they first entered the City Hall building. It was also there that they ran into more Spec Ops and battled them as well as a few zombies. It was becoming clear that the entire building seemed to be invaded with the Spec Ops guys and the Wolfpack soldiers were now finding them to be a nuisance.

After getting both their living and undead foes out of the way, Wolfpack navigated themselves around the building's upper balcony and came to a place that looked familiar to them.

Where they were standing in was the same room they saw on the tape footage back in the security room where they witnessed Nicholai betraying his men and leaving them behind to die at the rotting hands of the undead. There were bodies in the room wearing U.B.C.S. uniforms that proved it.

"This must be Nicholai's team," Vector said.

"What is he doing? Why allow all these people to be devoured? He has gone mad." Spectre said.

"You're right. Who knows how many people he has fed to the infected. His mind has been warped." Lupo commented.

"The guy's a fucking nutjob if you ask me," said Beltway. Somehow, he had a feeling that if they ever ran into Nicholai again, he would surely pull a fast one on them as he had done to the dead soldiers in that very place.

"Ooh, looks like fun, but we have a mission, yes?" Bertha said.

Lupo kicked one of the corpses and nothing happened. Although dead, from the manner of how they died, the bodies could rise up at any time from viral infection. To ensure that didn't happen, the team simply fired off a single shot to each of their heads. Now they were completely dead.

"Quit stalling! Concentrate weapons fire on those servers." Command ordered.

"Right. Let's take care of them," said Lupo.

Having no time in deactivating the server machines with the computers, the group decided to just destroy them all with gunfire.

When they finished, U.S.S. Command contacted them.

"Good. Now proceed to the records room and finish the job."

Their next objective, as Command put it just now, was to find the documentation in the building's archives room and get rid of everything there by any means necessary.

All of a sudden, the room was breached by zombies and attacked Wolfpack.

In a similar way with how they dealt with some of the Spec Ops guys earlier, they chose to conserve ammo by using two frag grenades, borrowed from one of the U.B.C.S. corpses rather than using their own, to blow the undead party to smithereens.

Now the room and hall where the zombies emerged from were doused in zombie blood, organs, and rotting flesh. It looked as if the room was rotting and bleeding from the inside-out like a Halloween decoration.

Minutes later, the team arrived in City Hall's records room.

Piles of documents, in both paper and digital form, were everywhere gathering dust and untouched by anyone for days since the virus leak. The only documents Wolfpack were after here were the ones that mentioned Umbrella Inc and those were to be relinquished on sight.

"We're here. The records room." Vector said.

"Alright. Now find that evidence and get rid of it!" said Command and Wolfpack began their inspection of the area for their targets. According to their resources, there should be five documents in the room.

They encountered one of these aforementioned documents on a table in front of them in the forms of large scrolls and blueprints. They contained zoning plans and were ripe for the picking and eventual destruction.

"This must be what we're looking for. Let's torch it," said Beltway, even though he nor anyone else had any actual flammable products or weapons on them.

Spectre found a dropped box of matches near the table. He opened the box and saw that only four matchsticks were already used before by someone else and several more remained unused.

He broke one stick off, lit his match on the box's side patch and lowered it onto the document papers. Within a few seconds, the papers were fully ablaze and the fire consumed every ounce of it.

"One down, four more to go." Four Eyes said. Getting an idea, Spectre instructed the others to find the remaining documents and bring them all back to the table so he could burn them altogether. While they split up to search, Spectre stayed behind to watch for enemy soldiers or B.O.W.s. After all, he did have the tools for that attached to his face.

Bertha found a document that was meant for electric plans and she took it.

Vector discovered the sewage plan documents and he too snatched it.

A document designed for staffing plans were seen and taken by Beltway and the final document was found by Lupo.

After gathering all the documents, they each regrouped near the entrance and they piled the documents onto the same table the first document was burned on.

Lighting another match, Spectre simply tossed it onto the pile and the papers were all set alight and were incinerated until nothing remained. It was a good thing for Wolfpack that the room's smoke detectors were down otherwise that would have brought on problems for them.

With their task complete, Vector made contact with the group's CO.

"Command, the evidence at City Hall has been taken care of," he said.

"Great work, Delta Team," said Command.

"Now let's fucking beat it before those things show up," Beltway said.

Wolfpack exited the records room through another door on the other side of the area.

When they arrived at another destination, a large room, they found nothing but more useless records and junk. No zombies or Spec Ops were present anywhere. However, it did not mean that the six Umbrella soldiers were safe and out of harm's reach. Trouble could spring out and jump them at any given moment and they had to be ready for it.

Apparently, that trouble came to them in the form of Nicholai Ginovaef. He was seen standing on the other side of the large room just above the floor, staring at Wolfpack with a sadistic grin on his face. Although he was the only one other than the Delta Team members left in the building, something told them that he had something sinister planned just for them.

"Nicholai! What's the meaning of this!? Why did you kill your team!?" Vector demanded angrily.

The U.B.C.S. member and traitor laughed evilly.

"They served their purpose most excellently," he said and grabbed his pistol and aimed it at them. "Just as you will!"

He fired a shot at them and they reacted by moving away. However, he missed and didn't fire again. Wolfpack got the message that he missed his shot intentionally, which was part of his plan because before any of them could return fire at him, a sound was heard and Lupo told the team to hold their positions.

Harsh growling was heard coming from somewhere within the room. It sounded more menacing than zombies or Cerberus dogs.

They heard a screech and Wolfpack prepared for battle with the upcoming threat.

Spectre's mask technology informed him just exactly what the new danger was and just before he could tell the others, a group of B.O.W.s was seen crawling out from the room's ventilator shafts and ceilings.

These creatures were different from anything Wolfpack faced in the city or in Dr. Birkin's former lab. Their bodies were nothing but muscle tissue and they had large talon claws on their hands and feet. Their tongues were slimy and extended in length and their brains were exposed on top of their heads and they had no eyes, meaning that they were blind, but they had strong hearing to compensate for their lack of vision. They were Lickers.

"Lickers!" Lupo expressed.

"Have fun!" Nicholai taunted and made a bolting exit from the room, dodging one of the Licker monsters along the way and locked the doors behind him, trapping Wolfpack inside with the blind yet deadly creatures.

The Lickers turned toward Wolfpack's direction and attacked.

Now the team was determined to escape City Hall, but to do that, they needed a keycard for the doors Nicholai locked as they were electronic.

The Lickers inched closer to them and were immediately shot at and they leaped down to the floor and started searching high and low for the keycard while at the same time struggling to keep the skinless B.O.W.s off their tail.

One of those creatures leaped to the floor from the ceiling, wrapped its tongue around Beltway and tried to drag him toward itself, but his suit's weight outmatched the monster's tongue strength.

"No tongue, bitch!" Beltway shouted and raised his weapon at the opposing enemy and fired. The bullets penetrated the Licker's body and it died.

Another Licker pounced onto Vector and tried to keep him pinned down for a kill move. The pounce also knocked his assault rifle out of his grip.

Vector struggled with the Licker long enough to grab his handgun and fired off most of its rounds at the monster's underside. Four of his bullets struck the Licker's heart organ, causing the creature to squeal, thrash around a bit and die.

He shoved the body off himself and quickly stood back up. It was there that he realized their weak spot: their hearts.

"Everyone, go for their hearts! They'll die faster that way!" he said aloud and returned to fending off another Licker that heard him.

Giving it a shot, the Wolfpack soldiers followed Vector's advice and targeted their weapon directly at the Lickers' unprotected hearts.

Pretty soon, most of them dropped (some of them literally) faster than they would have if they were shot at other parts of their bodies.

A Licker shot its tongue at Reaper, who raised his left gauntlet to allow the appendage to wrap around his arm. The two briefly struggled for a bit before the super soldier's enhanced strength won out and pulled the bio-weapon towards him. His hand lashed out and grabbed the Licker by the face. It struggled futilely by swiping its claws at the clone, only succeeding in leaving scratches on the armor. Without even flinching, Reaper slowly crushed the Licker's head until it was nothing more than bloody mush.

All of the invading Lickers were now dead and Wolfpack took this time to reload and sweep the area for their only means of escape before more showed up.

Reaper, however, contacted Command in secret, " This is Reaper… Delta Team's combat data against Lickers have been studied and processed."

"Excellent work, this will allow us to improve on B.O.W production. Continue with your mission, Reaper."

"Roger," The assassin nodded before following after the rest of Wolfpack.

[Present Day]

Snapping back into reality, Reaper watched as the struggling student was torn to pieces by the Licker. Blood and body parts splattered across the earth, staining the ground crimson.

Once the last person had gotten aboard the bus, Takashi slammed the door shut. "Okay, hit it!"

Reaper braced himself when Nurse Marikawa decided to put a new meaning in "putting the pedal to the metal". However, his sight never left the intimidating figure of the Licker as it thoroughly tore into the dead student's body like a ravenous animal.

'If there are Lickers… then this whole situation definitely isn't coincidence…' He thought before quickly sitting down when Shizuka ran over a few zombies, nearly sending him tumbling to the ground. 'Where the hell did this woman learn to drive!?'

Sometime after their escape from the high school, the survivors all managed to take a much-needed breather while Shizuka drove the bus down towards the city.

"Why the fuck are we going into the city!?" Tsunoda, a punk kid with dyed blonde hair, stood up by using the seats for leverage as he made his way to the front of the bus. "If you all haven't noticed from the smoke, the city is up in motherfucking flames!"

They all suddenly lurch as Nurse Marikawa harshly hit the brakes. "Okay, that is enough!" After stopping the bus, the buxom blonde woman got out of the driver's seat. "I can't focus on driving if you're just going to keep complaining; so be quiet!"

Tsunoda seemed to be momentarily taken aback. He frowned before muttering something incoherent and walked back towards his seat.

Reaper, watching all of this from his own seat, merely scoffed. 'Imbeciles, the lot of them…'

"What the fuck are you looking at, gaijin?"

The super soldier raised a brow at Tsunoda, who was now standing directly in front of his seat with a scowl on his face.

"Hey, knock it off, Tsunoda." Takashi intervened, causing the blonde-haired boy to scowl even harder.

"Fuck off, Komuro! You ain't the boss of me. This is between me and him."

Reaper stood up to his full height as he glared coldly at Tsunoda. "Then by all means… let's make this between us." He clenched his left hand as his joints popped with eagerness.

"Children! Please, cease this infighting at once!" Shido walked over towards Tsunoda and put his hands on the boy's shoulders, "Come now, Tsunoda, there's is no reason to fight, is there?"

The punk's scowl deepened before sulking back towards his seat, muttering curses along the way. Reaper narrowed his eyes at the retreating high school student then glared harshly at Shido, who didn't seem to have noticed.

"This is why we need a leader!" The rat-faced man raised his hands into the air. "Without a leader, there will only continue to be conflict! We need someone with experience! Someone with poise!"

Saya sighed. "Let me guess, someone like yourself?"

If the man noticed the sarcasm, Shido didn't show it. "Why yes!" He said with a grin as he looked around the bus. "I am a teacher, therefore I have experience. It is only natural for me to be the leader. Why just mere moments ago, I saved the very same students that are riding in this bus right now!"

'You? A leader? You'd get everyone killed in five minutes flat…' Reaper thought with a mental scoff.

Shido spun around so that his face was now visible to everyone on the bus. "So what do you say, guys? How about it?" Shido's speech was initially met with silence. Then one student stood up and began clapping. And then another, and another. Soon enough, more than half the bus had thrown in their support for the teacher. "Well now, I guess that does it!" The man's grin grew wider. "The majority has elected me to be the leader."

Suddenly, to the surprise of everyone (even Reaper), Rei kicked open the door to the bus and leaped off.

"Rei!" Takashi jumped out after her.

'Goddammit!' Reaper silently cursed as he followed the two outside.

"No way! I a not staying here with that bastard!" Rei yelled.

"Get back in the bus, Rei," Takashi grabbed the girl's wrist. "At least until we get back into the city, okay?"

"Leave her, Komuro," Reaper said bluntly, surprising the survivors. "If she wants to be stubborn and go out on her own then that's on her. She can kill herself for all I care."

"What the hell's the matter with you, Nocturne!" Takashi yelled at the ex-assassin.

Shido shook his head in mock disappointment. "Well, there's nothing I can do if you don't want to act in accordance with all of us."

"You, shut your mouth before I cut your tongue out," Reaper warned the man as he brought out his combat knife, shocking and frightening the snake of a man.

"H-Hey, Marikawa-sensei, we need to go!" Takagi said, alarmed. "There's a bus coming straight at us!"

The ex-Umbrella agent frowned when he caught sight of the approaching, out-of-control bus then looked over at Takashi and Rei. Neither of them was paying any attention and were still arguing with each other.

"Fuck!" Without even thinking, Reaper dived forward, grabbing both of their hands as he dragged them away to safety.

"W-wha-?" Rei gasped in surprise. "N-Nocturne-san?!"

In the nick of time, the other bus crashed straight into a parked car, causing it to flip and land directly in a flaming heap, right where the two were standing mere seconds ago. Reaper brought Rei and Takashi down as the car exploded into a giant wall of fire, which now separated them from the rest of the group.

"Damn it, you two are gonna be the death of me one day…" Reaper growled as he stood up then noticed some of the undead breaking out of the burning bus that had crashed. They didn't last long as the fiery embers soon melted away at their flesh.

"H-holy shit," Takashi said as he gulped at what could be compared to as a scene straight out of hell. "T-thanks for the save, Nocturne. I owe you one."

"What the hell were you two thinking!" Reaper snarled at the two teens, who flinched back with a bit of regret. "If you hadn't of jumped out of the damn bus, we'd already been in the fucking city by now!"

"But I-" Rei tried to explain but the icy glare from the super soldier silenced her pleas.

"This is why I work better on my own. I wouldn't have to worry about idiots like you getting yourselves killed," Reaper coldly stated. "I should've escaped on my own. Less troublesome people to worry about… Unfortunately, your deaths would come back to haunt me. So try not to pull another stunt like that again."

"H-hai!" The two replied hesitantly.

"Nocturne-san! Komuro-san!" Saeko Busujima's worried voice cried out. "Are you guys all alright?"

"A-at the police station!" Takashi shouted, hoping his voice reached the kendo captain. "Meet us at the police station!"

"What time?"

The bat-wielding boy took a quick glance at his watch. "Tonight at 7!" He coughed, the smoke from the fire beginning to thicken. "If not tonight, then tomorrow at the same time!"

"T-Takashi, we need to go now!" Rei shouted, concerned. "Before the fire starts to spread anymore!"

"Then we don't have a moment to spare," Reaper said, passing by the teens. "Let's move!"

The trio had taken off running, leaving behind the fiery wall that burned any unfortunate undead down to the bone. All the while, a large figure dressed in a dark grey trench coat and a fedora hat walked out of the flames with heavy footsteps.

Soulless, milky eyes watched the humans flee for their lives… before it strolled slowly through the street, following after the trio of survivors that ran…

[Later…]

After a good deal of running, Reaper and the two teens had stopped by the riverside to rest. The ex-assassin less than the others since he was used to running long distances. His enhanced hearing caught the sound of an explosion, drawing his attention along with Takashi and Rei.

The orange-haired girl grew a bit paler at the sound. "Oh my God…" She stared at the site of the explosion for a little while longer. "Nocturne-san, thank you for saving us."

"No problem," He replied bluntly. His crimson eyes landed on his KM2000. The blade had gotten a bit dirty with some of the infected students' dried blood. Reaper reached into his pocket and pulled out the slightly damaged silencer of his pistol.

"What's that thing, man?" Takashi asked with a raised eyebrow.

"A silencer for a handgun. I took it off mine earlier to provide a means for escape," Reaper said before tossing the useless tool away. "No need for it now since I don't have a gun on me."

Takashi nodded in response, frowning. "Yeah, it's been one hell of a day…"

The former assassin looked over at Takashi then at Rei. A thought had bothered him for a while and now seemed just as good as any to mention it…

"What happened to Hisashi?" He asked.

Takashi scowled as Rei choked back a sob. No one said anything for a while as the girl began to cry.

The brown-haired teen looked away, "He's dead." There was a hint of bitterness and guilt in his tone. Obviously, the topic was still pretty painful for him.

"Was he eaten?" Reaper asked out of curiosity.

The two remained silent, save for Rei's crying, but Takashi shook his head.

It took Reaper only a moment to think it over before he came up with a conclusion, "He was bitten… He was turning into one of them… So you killed him, didn't you?'

The dam had finally broken from Rei as she sobbed and wailed at the loss of her boyfriend while Takashi gripped his fists so tight that his knuckles turned white.

Reaper sighed, "I see…" He checked their surroundings and found no enemies in sight. "We should get moving… We're not out of the woods yet."

The rest of the walk between the trio was silent. Neither of them willing to start a conversation to pass the time, especially with the Hell that they've all been through…

A/N: And there's the chapter. Thank God I managed to finish it over Spring Break before college classes started back up.

So, I introduced the Lickers a little early as well as a certain stalker as well. Down the road, the survivors will be meeting with the new BOWs known as the Breeders. And to some of you with active imaginations, they are exactly what you think they are.

Anyways, review and comment if you like. Love it, hate it, but just know that you've read it, fool!

Peace out, everyone!