A/N: New chapter? :)
Disclaimer: Glee's not mines...
When my alarm starts blaring at five-thirty a.m. I groan in annoyance and move to slap it quiet before snuggling further into the warmth that is my bed and Quinn with a content sigh. Then the day before rushes back into the front of my mind like a wrecking ball and I groan for another reason entirely while burying my face into Quinn's chest. I hear her sleepy giggles which causes me to grin despite my reluctance to face the day, and once I feel her nimble fingers start to run through my hair I almost start purring.
"You're gonna put me back to sleep if you keep that up," I mumble out with a giant yawn, causing another round of angelic sounding sleepy giggles. She doesn't cease her ministrations though, much to my immense pleasure. If anything she makes it better by scratching my scalp lightly on each pass through.
"Good. You should," I hear her whisper almost inaudibly and I sigh before reluctantly pulling away from her warmth.
"You know I can't do that, Quinn," I tell her softly, now gazing into worried dark green orbs.
"I know," she sighs out, averting her gaze to look out of the window at the still dark sky. I gently lift my left hand up to cup her cheek and pull her gaze back to me with a reassuring smile.
"It's going to be ok. I promise. We need to get this done before things get really crazy, and then we'll lie low for a bit before leaving to my lake house," I tell her quietly before kissing her cheek and forcing myself out of bed. If I don't do it now then I'm not going to, especially with Quinn practically pleading with her eyes for me to change my mind. Once she realizes that I've got my mind firmly made up about going out today she follows me out of bed with a troubled frown and we go about getting dressed for the day.
It's now six a.m. sharp and Noah, Britt, Mike, and I are dressed and sitting at the kitchen table while Judy bustles about the kitchen whipping up a quick breakfast for us. Santana, her father, Sue, Quinn, Tina, Jake, and Kelly are also awake and sitting around the giant table as we all try to be as silent as possible so as to not wake up Artie and Mercedes. The boys are dressed similarly in a pair of faded jeans, a plain t-shirt, and their lettermans with Mike in his Air Force Ones and Noah in his tan combat boots; while I myself am in my favorite pair of skinny jeans, a white muscle shirt, my leather jacket, and my black combat boots with my hair pulled up in a bun, and Britt's dressed almost identical to me except she's wearing her letterman like the boys and a pair of chucks.
"Noah? B? While we're waiting on breakfast to be finished we should load up the bags and weapons since we didn't get around to it last night," I tell them as I stand from the table, Quinn and Santana's sharp eyes following mine and Brittany's every move. Their seemingly permanent frowns deepen as Noah and Britt stand to follow me into the basement with Mike hot on our heels.
"Whoa!" Mike exclaims in awe as he sets his eyes on the basement for the first time and I don't blame him in the slightest. It's a pretty impressive sight. Immediately to the left of my stairs is the security system that's made up of around ten monitors showing different images and in the giant area in front of that is the lounge area. My gym is in a room immediately to the right of my stairs and in the giant room next to my gym is the gun area. There's also a full bathroom down here as well as multiple rooms filled to the brim with supplies of all different varieties.
"I know, right?!" Noah asks him with a smirk as he leads the way to the gun room and walks over to the "closet" there. He opens it and starts pulling out giant duffle-bag after giant duffle-bag, not stopping until there's a pile of twelve at his feet. He then tosses a bag to Britt and I before he scoops the rest into his arms and makes his way towards the stairs to load them into his truck. Mike stands behind us unsurely, but once he realizes that Noah doesn't need help he relaxes a bit and leans casually against the wall as Britt wanders out of the gun room and I unlock the gun cabinets to begin filling my bag silently.
I'm filling my bag with some guns and ammo while Britt's in one of the rooms filled with the other supplies to fill her bag with some basic medical supplies as well as anything else we might need for this little excursion of ours. As soon as I'm through with my bag I pull out a holster and hand it to Mike along with two fully loaded and silenced M&P 9mms. He quickly puts the holster around his waist before inspecting each of the guns and sliding them into place, and then he proceeds to continue staring into my gun cabinets in awe. I pull out my custom Benelli and sling it onto my back smoothly before pulling out a Remington R–25 and handing it over to Mike, and then I pull out Noah's Mossberg 930 (Tactical) and lean it against the side of the cabinet.
Once Mike sees me close the cabinet I was rummaging in he offers to run the almost full bag upstairs to my SUV, and as he leaves I walk over to the other cabinet I opened earlier to locate my throwing knives, my hunting knife, and my sling for my bat. Just as I'm grabbing Britt's crossbow and arrows from the cabinet I hear Judy from the top of the stairs.
"Girls! Breakfast is ready."
Britt then wanders back into the gun room with her full bag to grab her crossbow while I'm placing my lucky bat into it's sling, and as soon as we have everything we're gonna need we finally make our way up the stairs.
We walk into the kitchen to an awed chorus of, "Wow," from Dr. Lopez, Sue, Judy, and Tina; as well as a breathy, "Hot," from Santana and Quinn. Britt and I both glance at each other with smug smirks as we take our original seats at the table and dig into the delicious looking spread that Judy's created for us. Not long later Noah walks into the kitchen and I wordlessly hold out his shotgun and bat for him, which he takes with a grin before slinging both onto his back and taking his own seat at the table. Mike appears seconds later and retakes his seat next to Tina, and we all eat in a tense silence
At exactly seven o' clock we're pulling away from the safety of my house much to Quinn, Santana, and Tina's dismay. We've decided to go to Santana's place first thanks to it being the furthest away from my place and town, and I remember something just as we're approaching her neighborhood.
"Noah," I call to him over the walkies that we're using to stay in contact.
"'Sup, hoss?" He replies back and I roll my eyes.
"Must you call me that, Noah?" I question him with a sigh and I hear him laugh over the radio so I press on before he has the chance to comment and derail my train of thought even further. "Whatever. What I wanted to tell you is that we need to be extra vigilant once we arrive at Santana's. Her house was the one that all of the walkers were attracted to yesterday," I remind him.
"Gotcha, hoss. Damn clowns," he mumbles out darkly. Britt and I chuckle at his antics before we spend the rest of the drive in nervous silence.
As we pull onto Santana's street I'm happy and slightly relieved to see that it's clear compared to how we left it yesterday. There's only about five walkers aimlessly shuffling around and I love those odds. Noah and I back into Santana's driveway and as soon as we're settled we all hop out of the trucks on my cue. We each silently take out a walker, with me being an overachiever and going for two, before we all quickly secure the perimeter around the house and head inside.
"Ok. Noah, Michael? You guys go secure the second floor while B and I make sure we're good down here. Turn your walkies on low and only use them to let us know if it's clear or if it's urgent," I order them in a whisper. At their nods we split up at the stairs and B and I slowly but carefully go through each room downstairs, making sure that the back door is still locked and that all the rooms are danger free. Once we're absolutely certain that we're in the clear, and having gotten the all clear from the guys upstairs, I head back to Dr. Lopez's office to collect the rest of his medical supplies and books that I wasn't able to grab yesterday while B heads into the kitchen to load up on the food and water there.
About twenty minutes later we're regrouped by the front door and ready to load up and head out, so I silently open the front door to peek outside and once I make sure that there's no immediate danger I slip outside to have a better look around. There are a few more walkers that have wandered over near the house, but it's nothing that we can't handle so I motion for the others to make their way outside as well.
We manage to get everything loaded up with no issues, but with Noah and I being ourselves we just have to take out the walkers that are hanging around. We decide to turn it into a competition, obviously, and as we pull away from Santana's place to head over to Will and Emma's I'm currently in the lead with six to Noah's three.
As we're pulling into Will and Emma's neighborhood we quickly realize that we're not going to have the same easy entrance and exit as we did at Santana's. Their cul-de-sac is straight up crawling with walkers shuffling around and bumping into each other, so I bypass their street and keep driving until I'm a couple of streets over where the coast seems to be clear.
"What's the plan, Rach? Cause that place is crawlin' with those damn clowns," Noah questions me on the walkies and I scowl at the road ahead of me as I take a few moments to think. I look over to Britt who's worrying her upper lip between her teeth anxiously before letting my eyes scan the areas around us and suddenly coming up with an idea. It might not be the greatest idea, but it's looking like the only viable option at this point. "Hoss?" Noah questions when I take a little too long to answer him back.
"We circle back around to the street behind theirs that seemed pretty clear and check out their backyard. If it's clear then we park the trucks as close as we possibly can to their house and try to slip in on foot unnoticed," I tell them and see Britt nodding in agreement out of the corner of my eye.
"Aye, aye captain," I hear Mike tell me and I smile slightly as we begin to make our way back towards their house.
We park as close as we safely can to their house, which is in the backyard of the people right behind them and we do our best to make it into their house unnoticed. There are a couple of different close calls with some adventurous walkers almost wandering into the back from the front, but thankfully we manage to get inside safely.
"Noah, Britt," I say as soon as the backdoor is shut and locked behind us. "You two go and gather their clothes and the things from their list, Michael you go and look for anything useful in the house, and I'm going to go and search the kitchen for supplies and collect what food I can. Make sure to clear the place as you go and please be careful. Go," I order them while trying to keep my nerves at bay and we all break apart to complete our tasks.
I've got my duffle-bag full of food and what little miscellaneous supplies that I've found from the kitchen on the floor at my feet while I wait on the others to finish up. I see Mike lugging his own seemingly full bag over his shoulder and walking towards me, so I decide to look through the blinds on the backdoor to check out the backyard when my stomach drops and I start to feel sick.
"Son of a bitch!" I whisper out harshly.
"What? What's wrong?" Mike questions me uneasily as he stops behind me and I hear Noah and Britt walk up as well. I grit my teeth to try and keep the panic at bay as I turn back to them seriously.
"There are about twenty of those dang things milling about in the backyard now and I really don't want to have to use our guns. They'll just draw more unwanted attention to us," I tell them in frustration while forcing myself to keep the whine from my tone. Noah stands up straighter before smirking at me in challenge.
"We've got this, Jewbro. Even if we do draw attention to ourselves with the guns we don't have that far to run. Plus, Chang's silenced up so we've got that advantage going for us," Noah reassures me.
"Ok…Ok. We make a run for it on three," I say with more confidence than I'm currently feeling before turning to Mike with a small smirk. "Let's hope that all those trips to the shooting range has made you a perfect shot," I tell him before taking a couple of deep breaths and starting the countdown. "One."
"Two," Noah mutters with a look of concentration.
"Three," Britt finishes and I throw the door open wide. We all take off towards the trucks in a sprint, but being weighed down by the bags and our weapons slows us down significantly. I throw one of my knives and smile when I see it hit its mark on a walker that was trying to blindside Mike, who's taking down any walker that's waiting in front of us. I then twirl around while using one of my Desert Eagles to quickly take down a few that are getting too close for comfort. Thank God that these things aren't very quick on their feet. I end up turning to my left just in time to shoot another walker that's gaining on Noah before double-timing it back to the trucks. The original herd of walkers is now almost double thanks to the noise of my gun, so when I see a walker trying to grab Britt from behind I quickly throw another knife to avoid more noise and smirk cockily as it drops.
We finally reach the trucks and jump in without bothering to unload the supplies from our backs. There's just not enough time to bother when the herd is closing in on us by the second, and it's not until we've got a good few blocks between us and them that I breathe out a sigh of relief, take the bag that's semi-choking me off, and have Mike toss it into the backseat for me. On to Finn and Kurt's place we go…
It's now a little after two and we're pulling up to a convenience store to fill up our tanks and scrounge around inside in hopes of finding some extra gas canisters to fill up and add to the few we already have, as well as any other supplies we can use. Thankfully we haven't run into anything remotely close to what we did at Emma and Will's place, but we did have a very close call at Sue's place with her housekeeper that still has me sick to my stomach. She managed to blindside and pin Noah down, and she was literally inches away from sinking her teeth into his neck when Britt skillfully put her down with an arrow to the head.
"Britt, you keep watch while Mike fills up the trucks and canisters," I order as soon as we're all out of the vehicles and Britt and Noah are making their way towards Mike and I. B just gives me a nod of acknowledgement before shouldering her crossbow and hopping in the bed of Noah's truck to make her way onto the roof. Noah keeps advancing towards me with a raised eyebrow and I just jerk my head towards the store and he understands to follow my lead. Mike immediately starts pumping the gas into the trucks and goes about taking the empty gas canisters from the bed of Noah's truck while Noah and I make our way towards the seemingly abandoned store with our empty duffle-bags in hand. We make sure that the immediate perimeter is clear, having most definitely learned our lesson after the disaster at Sue's, before we head into the station cautiously.
After doing a thorough sweep of the inside of the store and finding it walker free we decide to split up with Noah grabbing the food (if you can really call all of the junk food, candy, and processed crap food), and me grabbing the drinks. We make quick work of clearing out the majority of the front of the store and I make my way into the back-room of the store to grab some more waters after clearing out the coolers. I'm only in the room for a few seconds before I hear scratching noises and I freeze in place mid-step. I strain my ears to hear better while raising my bat and moments later I hear the sound again only louder and more frantic. I slowly turn in place, my eyes roaming over every nook and cranny that could possibly hide any threat before jumping out of my skin at a low whimper. I hear the whimpering again, this time louder and gaining volume and I relax slightly cause it kinda sounds like a dog.
With my curiosity now piqued I carefully make my way over to where it sounds like the noises are coming from and gently move a few boxes out of the way using my bat. I then blink a few times in shock before squealing quietly in excitement at the adorable little pitbull puppy that's sitting impatiently in front of me wagging it's little tail excitedly. It's all black except for it's paws, over it's left eye, and it's right ear which are white. It can't be more than five months old.
"Hey little cutie," I whisper to it as I slowly kneel down and reach out my hand for it to smell. The puppy then lays down and slides cautiously along it's belly towards me, sniffing my hand enthusiastically for a few moments before releasing a sad whine and licking my hand a couple of times. "You are absolutely adorable," I gush happily. I've always wanted a dog, but seeing as my daddy was allergic I was never allowed to have one. I'm extremely thankful to have come across this one though, because we need all of the anxiety calming help that we can get in these new and trying times. "Let's see if you're a little girl or boy, shall we?" I coo to it as I gently pick it up and look underneath it. "Looks like you're a little boy," I say to him as I scratch behind his ears and under his chin, and I can't stop the grin that takes over my face when he nuzzles his little face into my hand. "You need a name, little one. Hmm…How about Roco?" I ask him, like he can actually answer me back. He does let out a little adorable bark though and I chuckle at him as he wags his tail happily. "I'm going to take that as a yes to the name. C'mon, Roco. Let's go introduce you to the others." I walk back into the front of the store sans water to see Noah raiding the beer coolers and I roll my eyes. Him and his damn beer. I get an idea and smirk evilly as I make my way over to him before taking the puppy in my arms and nuzzling him into Noah's cheek, which makes him jump about a good foot into the air and scream like a little girl.
"What the actual fuck, Rae?!" He yells out with his voice a few octaves higher than it normally is, but I can't answer him and even have to kneel down and set Roco back on the floor because I'm laughing so hard. "Yeah, yeah. Laugh it up, bitch," he tells me in agitation with a deep scowl over his normally cool features. He then kneels down beside me and scratches Roco on his head before picking him up.
"That's Roco. I found him in the back just now trapped behind some boxes when I was looking for more water," I manage to tell him when I'm finally able to breathe properly again.
"He's cute," he tells me with his scowl still in place before turning back to the puppy. "Hey, Roco. Oooh you're so cute! Yes you are. Yes you are," he coos to the puppy and I just stare at him in amusement. "What?!" He snaps at me defensively and I smirk at him.
"Nothing, Noah. Now give me back my dog so we can hurry up and wrap it up here," I order him with a small chuckle as I stand back up and hold my arms out. He does as he's told before turning back to the beer cooler and I make my way back to the back-room to grab the cases of water I left behind earlier in my excitement of finding Roco.
Once we grab as much gas and supplies from the store as we can I finally introduce Roco to Brittany and Mike. They also aww and coo at the puppy who soaks up the attention happily before I remind everyone that we still have a stop to make, so we load up any last minute items and then ourselves before heading off towards Cabela's.
As we pull into the parking lot I notice that the amount of cars that litter it isn't as small as I would have liked it to be, but I slowly pull up to the doors regardless. I look over to Brittany with questioning eyes and she just shrugs at me indifferently. "Ok Noah, Michael. There's definitely going to be a decent amount of walkers in here so you need to keep your guards up at all times. Once we're inside Michael you're with me while Noah and Brittany are with each other, and we do not split up for any reason. If something happens let us know over the walkies and if we need to bail then we bail. Understand?"
"Ma'am, yes ma'am!" Is heard from Noah and Mike over the radio while Britt nods her head, and at that I open my door and make my way to the front entrance of the store. Once we're all gathered at the front entrance I carefully open the door, my bat at the ready, and I lead the way inside. We all grab carts and go our separate ways after a round of "Be carefuls" and "Good lucks", with Noah and Britt making their way towards the back of the store while Mike and I take a left.
We're currently in the camping section gathering some supplies and extra blankets when we come across our first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth walkers shambling their way towards us. We decide to just jump into a different aisle quickly in hopes of getting the drop on them, but just as they're reaching us I hear the tell-tale signs of more of them behind us and my heart starts racing double time. "Shit!" I mutter out quietly as I turn around to see about ten more of them advancing on us from the other side of the aisle. My heart now feels like it's in my throat and the only thing I can think about is protecting Mike. "Michael. I need you to remain calm and get ready to shoot," I order him as steadily as I can as I pull out my DE's and step back until I'm back to back with him. I feel him pull out both of his guns just as I open fire on the walkers closing in on us and I can't help but flinch at the loudness they cause throughout the store. Mike follows my lead instantly and we're able to take the small initial herd down quickly, but more are steadily coming and it's not long before we're completely surrounded again. "Hey guys? We've got a bit of a problem over here in camping," I pant into the walkie in the few moments I have between reloading my guns and the next row of walkers getting too close. I then glance behind me to make sure that Mike's ok, and thank God he seems to be holding his own so far with no issues.
"Ten-fore, hoss. We're on our way now," Noah's voice rings out from my hip and I sigh in relief before doubling down on my efforts to keep us safe. That relief doesn't last for long however as I quickly run out of bullets, and I silently curse myself for not grabbing more than two extra clips as I switch over to my shotgun. I then glance behind me again to see Mike fumbling shakily with reloading his handguns with a walker less than two feet away from him, so I quickly let loose a throwing knife while saying, "Don't reload! There's no time. Use the rifle."
I don't wait for a response from him before focusing my attention back on the problems in front of me, but seconds later I hear the loud sounds of the rifle being fired off as we go back to fighting for our lives. We can't currently make a run for it because we're boxed in thanks to the walls of walkers and the shelves to our sides, so the only way for us to get out is to try and kill them all. Around two minutes later, but it feels like freaking eternity, I see an arrow fly right past my face and take down a walker that had managed to sneak up beside me. We then work as a team to take out the last fifteen or so before Mike and I lean against each other to try and regain our gasping breaths.
"Thanks guys. Like seriously," I gasp out before making myself stand upright again while trying to control my shaking. Mike just nods slowly beside me while looking extremely green.
"There's no need to thank us, Rachie. That's what we're here for," Britt tells me brightly from her perch on top of the shelf to my right before spinning on her heel and letting another arrow fly to take down another walker that was left behind.
"Yeah, Rae. You know we've always got your back. You too, Chang," Noah replies as he slowly walks around the next few aisles to make sure that we didn't miss any.
"Still. Thanks," I tell them before walking over to Noah and looking up at Britt. "How'd the rest of the store look?"
"Honestly? It seemed clear," Noah tells me while Britt gracefully flips off the shelf and lands with a grin.
"Yeah. We thought this was gonna be an easy score…Sorry for jinxing it guys," Britt tells Mike and I sheepishly and I roll my eyes. Of course their asses were talking about how easy it was gonna be.
"It's ok Britt," Mike tells her quietly as he goes about finally reloading his M&P's and his rifle before we start grabbing more supplies to shove in the baskets. We decide that it would be best for us to all stick together in this giant store just in case there are any more unwelcome surprises, and once we're unable to load anything else into our vehicles (including a giant red truck that Noah managed to swipe the keys to off of a dead walker) we silently load up with Mike riding with me. We stay silent for the entire drive back and when I glance over at him I see him with a blank face while calmly petting Roco, who's perched happily in his lap.
As soon as we pull up into my driveway the front door to my house is thrown open with Tina, Santana, and Quinn rushing out with relieved looks painting their faces. This causes a look of absolute horror to fall over my own face however as I see what's about to happen in what seems to be slow motion, but as I throw myself out of the SUV and rush towards the girls with terror flooding every fiber of my being I'm not sure if I'm going to make it in time.
"NO!" I scream out in panic as I see Quinn get tackled to the ground by an over-enthusiastic walker and I feel as if my heart simultaneously stops and speeds up at the same time.
:D
