Zack crouched down in the musty store, admiring the different kinds of ammunition stored behind the glass. All were equally dangerous, but only some were more than deadly. After all, you could kill a person, but sometimes torture was the best method to use. Especially for the people he had in mind.
The man behind the counter leaned heavily on the glass case and took a long drag of his shriveled cigarette through yellowed, missing teeth. Zack winced as he heard the glass squeak under the man's weight. "Well, ya decided on sumthin' yet?" the man asked because Zack had been inside the store for over an hour, picking out exactly what he wanted. One could never be too careful when it came to weaponry.
"You got explosives?" Zack asked as he rose slowly to his feet and heard his knees crack.
"Explosives?" the man echoed as the stale smoke wafted around him.
"You heard me. Grenades, pipe bombs…bombs."
The man chuckled so that his whole hairy, rank body underneath the thin, white muscle T-shirt jiggled. Zack, if he weren't running on such a tight schedule, would have considered vomiting.
"You want bombs, 'den? B'lieve me. I gots bombs."
"Let me see," Zack ordered harshly.
"Just hold on there, sonny," the man said and stuck the slowly dying cigarette back into his mouth. He waddled to a door in the back of the store and rummaged around in there for some time.
Zack, meanwhile, admired how full this little shack was. He had been here a couple times-only when he was in a real tight situation for ammunition. In fact, Zack was surprised that the man didn't recognize him by this point and call the cops. But yet, considering that the man wasn't smoking just tobacco, Zack decided that it was probably for the best.
The shack was actually an underground storehouse for some of the best military ammunition in the country. The man who lived in it got the ammunition from all over the country due to the fact that people came directly to him to trade. Yet, the man still had more enemies than he had friends.
In pre-pulse times the store would have been illegal and the man would've been jailed. But this was the post-pulse times where you survived by making your own rules and not running by the government's. You went by the government you ended up getting shot by assassins that thought you were nothing but a brown-nosed liar. You went by your own rules, the government would send out their own men after you. Either way, the situation wasn't good. This is why Zack sometimes saw himself as lucky; he was part of the government running by his own rules.
He walked back to the counter and drummed his fingers rapidly over the glass display of pistols and rifles. Why couldn't that man hurry? It wasn't like Zack had all day to sit around, waiting for that fat slug to move his hairy ass.
Finally, the man came out of the back room carrying a large black suitcase. "This is all I gots," he told Zack as he panted from sheer exhaustion.
"What's in it?"
"Whatcha wanted. Bombs."
"How many?"
"Twenty, thirty. I dunno."
"I'll take 'em."
"Whatcha gots for a trade or money? But I don't s'pose you gots money."
Zack reached inside of his jacket and pulled out the guns from Renfro and Brin, and then the remaining ammunition from Brin's dead body.
The man admired the weaponry closely. "Very nice," he commented. "But it wouldn't be 'nough to pay for all of 'deese bombs."
"Put it on my tab," Zack replied as he clutched the handle of the suitcase in his right hand.
"What?" the man asked, not understanding. But, by that time, Zack had disappeared out into the dying snow, ready to complete his mission.
