Land of the Free, Home of the DEAD

by NikolaiEvans115

Category: Call of Duty, Highschool of the Dead
Genre: Drama, Horror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-11-24
Updated: 2012-09-03
Packaged: 2015-08-13 11:33:10
Rating: M
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,152
Publisher: .net
Story URL: s/7578548/1/
Author URL: u/2948269/NikolaiEvans115
Summary: The only sound audible was the crackle of burning flesh as we stood and stared at the mounds of flaming corpses of the things that had once been human. "Is...Is it over?" "No." Jake said, making my heart sink in my chest. "This is just the beginning..."

1. Act 1

A/N: Hope you like :3 also 'Mars Area Highschool' is a real highschool in Pennsylvania, where I go to school so yeah, just clarifying a bit! Also, all CoD WaW fans, don't punch me in the face!

Act 1: _**'Representatives of the DEAD'**_

_"Of course, the first place we headed as the world fell apart around us was the band room."_

Two teenagers sprinted along the hallway of the two floor high school, panting and looking back over their shoulders as if they were running from something which, of course; they were. Among them was a tall, thick-framed boy in a tattered, blood stained wrestling jersey; which read "Dempsey" across the back in bold white letters. He had rugged, hardened features as if he had been carved from a block of stone; and sandy blonde hair that sat in a shaggy buzz cut on top of his head. His eyes were a dark blue, almost black color; and some scruffy shadow above his upper lip and around his chops suggested that he hadn't shaved that morning.

A female ran with him, her dark, choppy ebony hair falling around her face in a tangled curtain as she pushed herself to run faster; muttering something worriedly to herself in a light Russian accent.

Her eyes at the moment were like that of a cornered animal's: electric blue and bright with fear, but shining also with the determination to fight if need be. The girl had an exotic look about her, with deep, emotional eyes and some freckles splashed across her nose and cheeks. She wore baggy burgundy sweatpants and a tight, cutoff tanktop that showed her navel. It read "Got vodka?" across the chest.p

Suddenly a man rounded the corner, walking with a slight limp. A blank look was plastered on his face, and his dress shirt was ripped and the left leg of his slacks was stained red from the inside. His mouth hung ajar and his eyes didn't appear to actually register the pair of teens, rather it was like he was looking right through them.

_**SShhkk.**_

The boy drove a pair of scissors into the man's heart, kicking him savagely against the lockers where it slumped to the ground. No, not a man...It was fairly obvious that this entity was far from human as it hauled itself up with an animalistic groan and started shuffling after the teens, the pair of scissors still protruding from its chest where its heart should have been; droplets of blood falling to the linoleum floor after dripping off the twin silver blades lodged in its ribcage. It's a funny thing about the phrase 'should've been'. That thing_ should've_ been a person, but it _wasn't._ Those scissors _should've_ killed it, but they _hadn't._ Their friends all _should've_ been alive, but they _weren't._

To add to the dilemma, 4 more of them were advancing around the corner; eager to the prospect of the teens flesh in their untasting mouths. Some were dressed as they had been in life; in the neat, formerly clean cut dress clothes that staff usually wore. Others were wearing football uniforms, one a letter jacket.

" _It's like something out of a horror movie or video game, but it's real. These things used to be our friends, our peers our teachers. At first, we didn't know what to call them. Zombies, monsters, nothing like that seemed right. And so _they_ are 'them'."_

Just then a lean, muscular Japanese teen emerged from the double doors of the band room. He had a short, shaggy cut of bristly black hair. His arms and legs were relatively skinny, but thick cord-like veins showed through the bronzed skin; showing his athleticism. His head was back, his chin up; his deeply tanned features deep with hate, and intimidation radiated from him; even though his profile showed no emotion whatsoever, his eyes shone with an imperialistic fire, as cold as the shining razor-sharp steel of a samurai's katana. That just made it all the scarier.

He ran his calloused palm over the length of a dull steel cutlass that the school's color guard used for marching band competitions.

"Not as good as my real imperial saber, but it will have to do, I suppose..."

"Nice choice, Takeo. A freaking prop!" Dempsey spat. "Fuck this place. What we need is GUNS!"

"I agree with Jake," The girl admitted.

Dempsey sneered at the other boy."See, Nikita's actually got a brain."

The Japanese boy, Takeo, shook his head. "You abandon what little honor you have left, Dempsey." He glared at Jake. "For at least _I _have honor!" one of the zombies lunged for Takeo, aiming a bite at his neck. With the practiced ease and skill of a seasoned swordsman, the saber arced up and around his head, biting through one of its rotting cranium and sending bits flying. Takeo glared murder at them as he brought the dull steel back home, growling,

"My flesh will _not _be devoured!"

Another flash of steel rent the air and the Japanese teen brought the dull steel blade back down, splitting in half what was left of his head.

Dempsey exploded out of the band room, holding a heavy full-metal music stand over his head like a mace. "Eat this, motherfuckers!" he cackled as he swung downwards at ones heat with all of his force. Shards of bone flew as its jaws were smashed together with hundreds of pounds of force; its teeth shattering. Blood and gray matter fell to the floor in a cascade of red as the monsters brains were displaced from its head. He swung once more like he was hitting a home run, holding the stand side on.

With a stomach churning 'chunk'ing noise, the thin metal side of the music stand severed the zombie's spinal cord, decapitating it. Meanwhile Takeo was dispatching the other two. (Twice as quickly and a lot less showy than Dempsey, he would add.) For good measure, Jake brought the flat face of the music stand down on the headless corpse with the audible crack of ribs. He stood to his full, reasonable height; smiling at the girl crazily with his teeth bared. He wiped the splatters of blood from his face with a well muscled arm.

"That. Was. SWEET!"

"Yes, comrade," The girl agreed, rolling her eyes at him and remarking in that strange accent. "He looks _so _much prettier without a head. Come, tell Takeo to follow. I need to get some things from the band room."

/\/\/H.O.T.D\/\/\

The two teenage boys stared uncomprehendingly at the oddly shaped instrument case in front of them, labeled, "_Mars Area high school, flugel horn NO.1_" Takeo addressed Nikita first.

"A 'Flugel Horn'?..." The Japanese teen spoke the strange words alound, looking questioningly at the Russian girl. "You plan to dishonor the dead by killing them with a _'Flugel Horn'?"_

"No, dumbass." She replied with scorn. "I plan to kill them with what is inside the case." She flipped open the two metal clasps, taking out the shining brass instrument and tossing it carelessly to the floor; leaving them staring at the felt case lining that held the cut out indentation shaped like the instrument. Nikita traced her fingers around the edges of the felt, before stopping on a small protruding tag of the stuff. Dempsey watched with curiosity as she dug her fingernails under the edge of the lining and wrenched it free of the plastic case, exposing the contents underneath.

Takeo nearly had a heart attack when Nikita lifted the concealed Tokarev TT-33 handgun from the hidden compartment in the case, 3 extra magazines clutched in her other hand; which she promptly stuffed into the pockets of her baggy sweatpants. The Japanese junior choked. "You had this thing in school the whole time!"

"Pretty much." Nikita replied, blowing a puff of air out between her lips in annoyance as she pulled back the slide.

_BANG! BANG!_ The pistol spoke twice, the rounds slicing through the air a foot from Jake's head.

Behind him, the zombie fell; two ragged craters in its head gushing blood as its knees buckled and its cranium hit the floor.

Takeo comprehended the corpse for a moment. " Oh my."

Jake rolled his eyes, convinced that it was sheer luck. "Wow, two headshots in a row? Well, obviously that was _completely _intentional "

"Damn right it was." She lied, flipping him the bird with one fingerless gloved hand.

"The dead approach." Takeo said solemnly. "The gunfire will attract even more of them if we doddle."

"Come on. We need to get to our development or else we're never gonna survive this shit. We'll be cornered by them eventually and I doubt we'll be able to fight our way out of it with a music stand and a few TT 33 magazines."

"This sounds like good plan." Nikita agreed.

"Yes, we will go to our homes." Takeo seconded, nodding as he pried open the band rooms only window.

/\/\/H.O.T.D\/\/\

"_DIE, schweinhund!"_

Ahead of them in the middle of the road, a teenage blonde girl was fighting for her life; and, by the looks of it not having a completely un-enjoyable time of doing so.

A grim smile was plastered to her soft features, the manic light of combat and murder shining brightly in her eyes, which seemed to shift from dark gray to inky black. Her blood-splattered hair of the lightest blonde whipped around her as she fought ferociously, wielding her weapon: a massive, machete sized Bowie knife with a knuckleduster handguard.

It was drenched in gore, with a deep blood channel running through the thick blade. The knuckleduster handguard had a slight curve to it, resembling a cog or gear cut in half. The girl also was apparently stronger than she looked, as the knife looked extremely heavy; as well as extremely sharp, judging by the severed limbs and angry donors surrounding her; pushing her back further and further.

Wordlessly, Takeo readied his dull color guard saber and charged, closing the distance between them quickly and easily with his long legs. Dempsey rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, you go save that chick Takeo!" The senior called after him. "And why don't you just yell 'Banzai' and blow yourself the fuck up, while you're at it!"

Takeo had only killed one of them when the girl hacked down the last one beside him. They were soon joined by Nikita and Jake, who found the other two to be getting along rather well.

"Umm," she blushed. "Thank you "

The Japanese teen bowed. "Takeo Masaki."

The girl smiled, remarking in heavily German accented English. "Takeo. That's a nice name."

The junior in question only grunted in response, as blushing would have been equal to eternal dishonor.

"Yeah, stop flirting, Tak. And just who the hell are you?" Asked Dempsey roughly.

"I " The blonde girl dabbed a spot of blood from her face which, to Dempsey's horror, she _licked _rather sensuously from the tip of her finger." am Samantha Maxis. Call me, Sam, please."

"Uuhh, yeah. I'm your local badass Jake Dempsey and you already know Chinaman here," he jerked his thumb in Takeo's general direction, to which he exclaimed a rather indignant "I am _not _from China!" before for turning to Nikita. "Yeah and this is Niki."

"Your ?" Sam prompted.

"Russian stereotype?" Dempsey offered.

"Dog?" Takeo joked, barely restraining laughter.

She punched both the boys in the gut, turning to the other girl and gesturing to the Bowie knife she held. "Where did you get this monster?"

Samantha sniffed, her dark eyes glistening. "A parting gift from my father. Sadly, he was bitten and I was forced to slice off his head "

There was silence as Takeo looked backwards in the direction of the high school, where columns of thick black smoke were spiraling into the air. Everywhere they looked, all sense of sanity and order was falling apart and being replaced by disorder and confusion. The air was alive with screams in the distance; mingling with the sound of madness and the thrum of utter chaos.

"Listen up."Jake said roughly. "We can't waste time fucking around here. We'll all get to know each other later, that's all well and good; but right now we have to keep our priorities straight. We need real weapons to fight. To stay alive. To kill all of the mon zom Urrggh. Freakbags."

Nikita nodded sagely. "Because I don't that this is going to get better any time soon. It's going to get worse. Much worse."

"Okay. Takeo, go to your place; and Nikita go yours. Get any guns you have or anything else that will help you kill these things. Sam'll come with me, I guess. Meet back here when theres too many of them."

Around 20 minutes later, Nikita and Takeo converged near Jake's house; sporting their new tools of destruction.

With true weapons, Takeo looked intimidating enough to kill them by just looking at them. He now wore two or three katanas of various lengths stuffed into a tightly bound sash about his waist, along with two more double-handed katanas slung across his back in an X-shaped fashion. A detective style handgun holster was strapped under his arm on the left side of his chest. A mostly empty backpack sat at his feet.

"What do you think of _these _toys, eh?" She asked, smirking.

Takeo caught his breath. He would never admit this, even under pain of death, but Nikita had never looked so terrifyingly beautiful. A modern AK-47 assault rifle was dangled over her shoulder on its gun strap, along with a strange instrument in a crescent shaped case: a silver arced sickle with a wooden handle. In one hand she held a short submachinegun with a wooden stock and drum magazine. Its muzzle was comprised with a multitude of air cooling perforations so that the barrel itself was visible. Takeo recognized it from one of the many books he had read from his freshman year till the present: a PPSH-41.

Takeo gulped. "Are those things automatic?"

"Dah? No, the AK is a semi-automatic replica. But this," she caressed the barrel of the other weapon. "Is real. Straight from Eastern Front in 1942, my friend. It was great grandfather Nikolai's." She snickered jokingly. "He was expert zombie killer."

Takeo stared at her blankly, making her roll her eyes.

"It was a joke, dumbass."

Takeo shrugged indifferently, not feeling much remorse at the loss of the joke's humor upon him. "Let us go find our American part."

"You have to carry this, though." Nikita smirked as she tossed him an army style duffle bag, which almost knocked him on his butt and winded him as it caught him in the stomach.

Takeo choked. "What in the name of the Emperor is _in _this thing, your great grandsire Nikolai?"

"No, that's all the ammunition we had in our entire house. Parents weren't, by the way."

Meanwhile, Jake and Sam were inspecting his house and looking for the large stash of weapons that they knew would be there.

Jake grunted, picking up the hand-written note that sat on the coffee table in the relatively neat house. He scanned it quickly.

_Dear Jake,_

_Have gone to kill some freakbags. Left most of the guns in the locker, you're on your own for now so try your best not to die. Be back whenever,_

_Dad_

Jake raised his fist to the sky in irritation. "Fuck you, pops!" He growled. "SAM! You got the locker open yet!"

She stuck her tongue out at him. "You have zis gun locker of yours locked up as tight as ze goddamn Pentagon!"

"I'll see what I can do, okay?"

"Shouldn't you know where the keys are? It's your locker, after all." Samantha asked in annoyance.

Jake turned on his heel and walked out of the house towards their garage without another word, grumbling under his breath as he realized that he didn't, even though he probably should have. She smirked at his retreating form. "And just where are you going now?

Dempsey stared at his feet, mumbling angrily. "To get some stupid bolt cutters "

A few minutes later they stared at the contents of the locker, which, in reality was more like a walk-in closet. Jake had brought an array of various backpacks and reinforced steel gun cases.

"Sam has never seen .SO MANY guns "

"Yeah, yeah." He grabbed a handful of assorted handguns, including a stolen SWAT Glock 18, an enormous .44 magnum revolver, a souvenir replica Luger P'08, and a classic army Colt 1911. He then grabbed about five dry boxes of assorted caliber handgun ammunition and stuffed that in the same backpack.

"Okay Now we have to find some way to carry these rifles "

He clipped a leather sling to the M-1 Garand and draped it over his shoulder, folding the bipod on a scoped AR-10 and setting it in a metal guncase.

"Here." Jake handed the girl a classic Vietnam style M-16, to which her strange eyes widened in anticipation. "Use this."

She hefted the weapon, admiring the weight of the cold steel frame as she imagined the utter devastation that it could wreak on 'them'.

She removed the magazine from the receiver, marveling at the deadly pointed brass charges.

"Ooohh Samantha's been a _naughty _little girl this year. She always gets the best toys though " she purred.

Jake cringed. "Maybe I should give you a smaller gun. Do you know how to shoot?"

"Yes, my daddy worked with guns a lot and I learned by watching him. But I've never actually _shot."_

"Well, that's better than a girl who doesn't even know what a gun is. I'm sure you'll do fine. Come on, we're gonna meet back with Tak and Nikita."

As the two teens stood, Jakes eye was drawn to the strange girl. Specifically a blotch near her collarbone, like a birthmark; it was left visible by the tattered tank top she wore. No, not a birthmark. It was definitely a tattoo of some sort, not unlike a brand; it looked as if it had been burned into her skin, and it sat just above the skin of her left breast and resembled the letters '935'.

Samantha caught him staring and shifted the strap of her tank top so that the mark was hidden, and her face drooped into an annoyed frown. Not because she thought that he was checking her out; she was well endowed for her age and was fairly used to it. She had assumed that he had seen her mark, and he had. She was glad that Jake had seen her mark rather than Takeo or Nikita, as Jake would probably forget by the end of the day.

As the four climbed into Jake's pickup truck, an enormous Ford with a full size bed and four person cab, with double rear wheels. Jake and Nikita were the cab and Takeo and Sam in the bed along with all of their gear, guns, and the limited food they had.

"Where to?" Jake asked the group collectively as he started the truck.

"Baton Rouge." Nikita replied suddenly. "My brother lives there and he owns the biggest guns you could possibly have that are legal. And some that aren't. We're going to have to take the highways to get there, but it will be worth it once we have all that firepower at our disposal."

Looking about at the entire civilized world falling apart around them, and the madness taking over, the teens weren't really able to come up with any reasons to oppose the Russian girl's plan. At this point, any undead infested part of the world seemed pretty much identical to one another.

"The guns are big, then ?" Jake asked hopefully, apparently wanting some clarification.

"Yes, comrade. I promise."

The day was turning dark, the twilight mixing indistinguishably with the fires of the city as they sped away to God knows where, if there even _was_ a God anymore. As far as they were concerned, the world had ended.

The blonde girl scowled in the dark as the truck bounced up and down.

"_I will destroy that evil man Richtofen for taking Daddy away from me, and rip out his heart before his eyes." _Samantha thought. "_Do you hear me Edward? The blood of the world is on _your _hands, and I will make you _**pay for it "**_

_**ACT 1 End~**_

**A/N: Also for everyone's information Samantha is a freshman but didn't go to Mars high. Takeo is a junior, Jake is a senior, and Nikita is a sophomore.**