She subconsciously felt the cool and all too familiar touch of slightly-oxidised metal pressing against her forehead. Whilst it was there, and albeit whilst she was unaware of it, it soothed her skull and drew the heat and blood out of her forehead, calming her.
The air was equally cold as it caressed around her, swirling gently, akin to dancers in a ballroom. There was some din in the distance; a quiet noise, muffled, despite belonging to consternation of some type. For now, it was distant from her; her focus was simply on the events churning in her mind. Fragmented images of pain and horror frequented her dream-space, driving her to move, to run, to be free of the foul hallucinations.
Fatigue was her enemy in that regard; her body refused to respond to her whims. Instead it stayed frozen, almost entrapping her, an eerie and otherworldly experience for even the most veteran of nightmare dwellers.
A single drop of dew slithered its crystal path downwards, past oxide and rust, toward her, still sitting in the buggy, her chest slowly rising and falling, her auburn hair moving in unison with her ragged breaths.
It leapt, and fell, landing right on her head. She experienced falling as she was snapped back into conciousness; she yelped quietly, a hand shooting up and clasping the metal framework of the bare-bones buggy in front of her.
The basement they had parked up in added a whole new definition to bare-bones; where miscellaneous objects and fractals usually impregnated cellars of the past, the only residents here were cabinets lining the walls, the buggy seated in the centre of the room, and three men in the distance examining their weaponry, and arguing.
She raised the back of her hand and scraped sleep and gunk from her eyes, opening them up properly as they dilated to absorb as much light as possible. Vivid and bright sunlight coursed in through tiny windows at the top of the room, sectioning the space with divisions of light, dust particles hovering and reflecting the urban clutter that human kind had synthesised. There was no doubt, now; she couldn't remember falling asleep, but they must've reached their destination.
Her thoughts turned to Evelynn. It'd been nearly a week since the ambush in the quarry... had Adam told her the truth? Was the scientist alive, and in the lodge like he said, or lying in a ditch somewhere, or worse?
Would she have condoned what he did to escape the Eagle's Nest? To have pinned it as an act of valour and leadership... or an act of cowardice?
She refused to engage in the mental debate with herself.
It had been almost three years since she had been in a city. Not a town, or a larger settlement, but a real city, with skyscrapers and sidewalks and old, rusted-out cars scattered like children's toys across countless streets...
She raised herself from her seat in the rear of the buggy, her shins groaning under her weight, her joints screaming with the pain of disuse and fatigue. She stood on her boots, the quiet sound of footfall being entirely negated by the argument frequenting the air near to her.
She blocked it out, ironed out the kinks in her steps and made her way solemnly to one of the stupidly small, above-ground windows. She was too short to stand right up to the droplet-covered and dusty glass, but managed to sneak a fairly good look at the exterior when she stood on the flat of her feet a meter or so back from the wall.
The window opened onto a street, paved in hues of cool orange and lighter yellow as the rising, early-morning sun glistened pristinely off of tired and dilapidated glass that occupied nearby windows. She felt a certain sense of homeliness here; she was fully aware of the dangers of built-up areas in this day and age, but the ghostly nostalgia of standing in a place were thousands... no, millions of people had once lived their lives was nothing short of amazing.
The din behind her was growing more intense, despite staying hushed. She continued to try and escape from involvement by avoiding it entirely, and meandered back towards the buggy with a yawn accompanying her.
On the bonnet rested her Magnum, which when she felt her jacket for it, had obviously fallen out while she had slept. She was beyond relieved that she hadn't lost it, and returned it to the concealed holster within her coat, the weight of it against her chest granting her some degree of security. Alongside where it had lay, filling the spaces between numerous bullet-holes and grazes, lay a small, tan-leather wallet, containing syringes within. She hadn't been counting, but she could see there were less full ones in there than the last time she'd looked... that was a relief in itself. She'd more or less forgotten about Joel and Adam's shots, given that she had no need to participate in the inoculations herself. She felt gladness at the fact the men had not shared her poor memory.
The din was almost on the point of bubbling over. Deciding to bite the bullet, she made her way over to the three men who were arguing, clumped around a tattered map that was spread carelessly over a damp, rotting crate, and intervened.
She yawned again. "What's the problem, guys?" She asked as she moved over to them. At her intervention, the three voices stopped attacking each other, and fell into silence.
Joel turned to her, and knelt down to her height.
"Ellie, are you okay?"
"What?" She joked, slightly taken aback from the urgency in his tone, and of how grey his ragged beard had gotten since she had last noticed.
"Are you okay? Are you?"
"Yeah." She said, seriousness returning to her voice as she realised he was in no mood to kid. "Yeah, I'm fine. Not a scratch. Why?"
The older man let out a sigh, dropping his head in the process. He turned it slightly and spoke again, not to her, his voice venomous.
"You will never risk her again."
A Scottish voice responded.
"I saved her, didn't I? I got her out of there."
Joel stood, and span around.
"That's not the point."
"That's entirely the point."
"You two are forgetting that we lost a man." Blufor piped up, cleaning dirt from under his nails with a hunting knife. His gaze looked up to Adam.
"Because we decided to go out the front way." He said to the Scotsman.
Adam's voice began to carry anger. His exposed arms tensed, slightly skewing the sullen memoriam tattooed on his right bicep.
"Are you saying his death was my fault?"
"Yes." Joel said, harshly.
"Yes, I agree." Blufor concluded in agreement. "If we'd gone back to the prison, we'd have been able to get out again, with everyone."
"Instead," Joel began, "you felt the need for a rush. Sure, the flashbang surprised them. Didn't mean shit when we got to the gate, though."
"Are you fucking joking?" Adam asked, his voice choosing not to shout, to instead split into a savage whisper. "They were going to shoot her, shoot us, then and there." He turned to Blufor, his eyes dark. "If you thought they were going to recapture us, you were wrong. That was a stupid assumption."
"The only stupid thing that happened that day was agreeing to go back there with you."
That comment almost snapped the Watcher. He resisted the temptation to tackle Blufor; she could see the tension in his upper body bulging out of his tank-top as he tried to hold his anger back. He exhaled, and placed his head in his hands, trying to calm himself.
"Look, it was either him or her."
"Don't say that." Joel almost shouted, wincing at the thought of Ellie facing harm.
"Don't say what? That Ellie might've died?"
"Don't fucking say that."
Adam moved directly up to Joel, stood at his full height in front of the man, and spoke directly into his face.
"What, you think that she's always going to be safe and happy in this fucked up world we're still trying to hang on to? Who pulled her out of there, huh? Who was the one who put his neck in the firing line to get her back? That's right, I did. You didn't even get out of the buggy."
Joel didn't respond, only casting his eyes downward, his resolve clearly thrown by the truth.
"I wonder why, though?" Adam spoke, continuing to push Joel. She sat on the periphery, helplessly watching the two seasoned survivors clash. "Was it because your 'special girl' isn't worth protecting as much any more?"
She watched Blufor stand out the corner of her eye, and place the combat knife down, bracing himself to account for the worst.
Joel met the man's eyes, still silent, fury burning in his gaze.
Adam's faced contorted with a feigned and melodramatic realisation.
"Oh wait, I know! It's... because you're getting old, isn't it? Getting upset because you can't fucking keep up any more?"
She reared backwards as Joel lashed out, a swift and strong punch which sailed directly into Adam's cheekbone, sending the Scotsman rearing backwards, falling onto the rotting crate and almost impaling himself on the combat knife.
"The fuck, Joel?" She blurted, moving quickly towards him. "What the fuck do you think you are-"
The breath was pushed from her body as Joel's hand landed on her chest, and his full force pushed her back, making her fall onto the concrete floor.
The Watcher stood, wiped the blood from the fresh cut on his cheek, and with a furious expression, ran at Joel and shoulder barged him onto the floor, pinning him. He was thrown off when Joel kicked him forcefully in the side, only to catch his breath and tackle the older man again, this time into the wall.
Joel let out a small yelp of pain, most unusually for him. Without thinking, she reacted almost in an almost animal fashion at the injuring of one of her family, and before sprinting at the Scotsman, plucked an empty syringe from the leather wallet. She threw herself onto Adam's massive back, and jammed the syringe just above his left shoulder blade, the point sliding into his flesh easily. He screamed in pain, and stumbled backwards, grappling manically for the needle. She saw his hands find the item, rip it out of his shoulder in a swift movement and crush it in one hand. He began to move towards her.
What? Why was he coming towards her? Surely he wouldn't...?
He didn't get five feet before Joel sprinted across the room. His right hand crashed into the side of Adam's face, sending him back down to the floor. The Watcher answered with a vicious uppercut that knocked the older man onto his back, gasping.
Blufor intervened.
"Grab Joel!" He shouted, wrapping a muscular arm firmly around Adam's throat and dragging him to his feet, blood spewing out of the Watcher's nose where Joel had struck him hard and split the bone.
She moved over to her protector and helped him up. He stood gradually, with much more effort than Adam, and spat a globule of blood onto the floor, the dull crimson splat sounding just by her. He looked over Adam with distaste and fury, as Blufor was struggling to hold the huge ex-SAS soldier back.
"Are you done?" Blufor shouted in the Scotsman's ear as he struggled.
Adam squirmed for a moment more, then closed his eyes, went still, and swallowed the rage that had consumed him. He lifted his head and opened his eyes again, calmly using his free hand to clamp his bleeding nostril shut and breathing deeply.
"Let me go." He said calmly.
"Adam..." Blufor began.
"Let me go." He said more forcefully.
Blufor glanced up to Joel, who, despite panting, nodded. He relinquished his grip from around the Watcher and moved backwards. Adam's body loosened, and he stood on his own two feet, rolled his head around, and picked up his tattered assault rifle from the side of the crate.
The other three in the room tensed. The Watcher noticed, scowled, overacted slinging the weapon over his back and with sarcasm, walked swiftly out of a nearby bar-locked door, scaling a flight of stairs into the iridescent, orange-bathed street in moments, allowing the light to course in and brighten the room.
"The fuck was that about?" Ellie spurted, using her jacket sleeve to wipe the blood from around Joel's mouth as stood. Joel said nothing, and only stood there, brooding.
Blufor addressed them, leaning on the crate that had almost shattered under Adam's weight.
"Don't worry about him, he's just stressed..."
"Looks a bit more severe than just fucking stress." Ellie interjected.
"You weren't awake."
"What?"
"You weren't awake, neither of you were."
She was surprised by this development.
"What do you mean?" She clasped Joel's hand and led him over to Blufor.
"Did something happen on the journey?" She asked the squad-mate.
"I was only just awake, and Adam was driving, as usual... you know how he always insists?" Blufor let out a light chuckle. "Ever the gentleman. Anyway... it was a few hours after we got away, the sky was growing darker. That valley that the Nest is in is huge; you could still see the lights on the walls, in the distance, if you knew where to look."
"So what?"
"So... we glanced back once, saw it, and there was only the lights. We talked for a bit, and glanced back again. Slightly north from the town, there was smoke, and a lot of it." Blufor scooped up a second, more recently acquired assault rifle and sat it in his arms. "Looked like a forest fire."
"North of the Nest?" Ellie asked, putting the clues together. "You mean-?"
"Where Evelynn is? Yeah. We talked about the possibility, and agreed that the fire did look like it'd come from an explosive of some sort."
Ellie stood there in silence, clinging to Joel's hand and staring at the map on the table. He reacted to the sudden tensing of her grip, and drew her a little closer to him.
"That isn't all." Blufor continued. She saw him glance over to the buggy, and then return his eyes to her. "He's running out of shots."
She moved her head around to glance at the leather wallet resting on the bonnet, viewing its contents. Sure enough, she noted the supply of the immuno-suppresant was waning; over ten syringes sat empty, with only six still containing a dull yellow liquid. One was missing, and she remembered its demise when it was crushed in Adam's mighty hand.
"Without those shots," he began, standing and slipping on his jacket, then his backpack, "he'll turn. So will Joel. He needs to get back to Evelynn to get more."
"He told you?"
"Yeah. We had a lot of time to talk."
"Right." She made the final connection. "And without Evelynn, there won't be any more."
"Exactly." He said, briefly glancing up at her as he gathered all sorts of gear from around the crate.
She split from Joel, moved towards the wallet of syringes on the hood of the buggy, folded it shut, and gently slipped it into her jacket pocket, by her heart, alongside the .44 Magnum.
"Does he only care about his life?" She asked, turning back to Blufor and Joel. "Or does he care about Evelynn too?"
"Both." Blufor replied. "More her than his life, but death... and the idea of a death in vain... does things to people."
He turned to Joel.
"I hope you're at least mature enough not to take this any further."
Joel simply nodded, bent down, and slung the third and final assault rifle over his back. He moved through the door, up the steps and out into the city. Ellie did her jacket up, securing her precious cargo, and made her way out in suit, leaving Blufor to clear up and close the door on his way out.
Joel had stopped in the street, and she reached his side, where she stood and gazed around at the scenery. Some buildings were dilapidated and sad, with cracks in their greying bricks that fauna sprouted and spurted from in erratic patterns, while others were majestic and glistening, the yellow light of the mid-morning sun refracting through thousands of panes of glass that were somehow intact after nearly thirty years of zero maintenance. The asphalt they stood on was old, and baked to within an inch of its life by the sun above; where it would once have been jet black, the hue had brightened to a steel-like grey, interlaced with thousands of cracks differing in both size and composition. There were bus-stops and metro entrances, bookstores and coffee shops, and old husks of cars and trucks slumbering in front of them. She had passed through many a city in her time, but always loved imagining people flitting between the shops and up and down the sidewalks, buying a hotdog or a coffee on their way to work... with no thought of killing, or needing to survive. Only of their loved ones, and how soon it would been until they could see them again, to hear their laughs and to embrace them.
Blufor arrived next to them, looking formidable as ever, pulling her away from her idyllic daydream.
"What's the plan then, Sarge?" She asked jokingly, trying to shake away the last thoughts of civilisation and focus on survival.
"Easy." Blufor replied. "Find Adam. He won't have gone far. Then, find Mercs. Or Red-Rings. Or both. Either will lead us to Amber."
"How do we know she's in this city?"
Blufor grinned cheekily at her, through the corner of his mouth.
"We don't." He gestured down the street. "Shall we?"
They began to walk, just slowly, along the street laid out before them, weaving in and out of car shells and soaking up the light of the sun. It gave her surprising strength to feel it again – almost charging her batteries, per se. The weather they had experienced up near the Eagle's Nest was unforgiving; cold, wet alpine conditions that sapped the strength from even the strongest man. The weather here, though... it was apparent they had travelled a long way.
Joel spoke up.
"What's that?" He gestured forward, to a white and yellowed van half-sunken into the concrete, residing next to the entrance of the city's subway system. Sure enough, the item of intrigue was more evident upon approach; on the van's rear doors, a rough eye had been drawn in black ink, with an arrow, which pointed downwards and to the right, directing them into the subway.
"Well," Blufor began, "Adam might have his issues, but at least he's smart."
They made their way gradually over to the entrance of the subway station, warily keeping a close eye on any open doors or orifices in the buildings, their eyes occasionally flitting from their weapons, to the buildings, to each other, and back. When they reached the opening that led into the darkened depths of the subway, they hesitated. Without the light of the sun, it was impossible to see, but when the rays hit the air in just the right way, she could see the cloud of spores sitting just below the top of the staircase. A slight greenish tinge and a pungent smell accompanied their presence.
"Shit, spores." Joel swore. "That's gonna mess things up. I don't know about you, but I didn't happen on a mask."
"I did." Blufor said, pulling his backpack around, removing the gas mask, and sliding the plastic respirator down over his head.
"Don't suppose you have any more of those?" Joel asked, a surprising amount of apprehension lacing his tones.
"No, only one." He looked to Ellie and spoke, his voice muffled by the mask. "We only need one, and that's for me."
She touched Joel's arm lightly, bringing his gaze down to her.
"You're like me, remember?" She smiled warmly at him, trying to bolster his confidence.
"You're infected, so is Adam. Looks like he remembered."
"But..." Joel asked, again apprehensive. "What if... what if it don't work, if I turn down there?"
"Then Adam already has, and we need to rethink our plan." The squad-mate slapped Joel on the back jokingly. "C'mon. What's life if it's not worth being risked?"
Joel nodded, sighed gently, and made his way toward the entrance, taking point. He took a deep gulp of fresh air before he went down, and then calmly began descending the steps into the station, flicking the tactical light on his assault rifle on as he went.
"Can't ever say I've done this before..." He spoke, breathing in the spores, allowing them to pass through his body. When they came to a halt at the end of the staircase, Ellie approached him.
"Anything?" She asked.
"No..." He said, with slight amazement creeping through his tough demeanour. "Nothing. I've seen guys lose their masks and start choking straight away, but... nothing. I'm fine."
He looked down, and met her eyes.
"This what it's like for you, all the time?"
"Yep." She said, perkily. "Welcome to the club, Joel."
Blufor arrived beside them both.
"Lucky, you two. This thing sweats like a bitch."
With that, he walked on, taking point from Joel.
They walked into the station, which expanded out before them; upon examination, she saw that it was a transit station, not one of the big, flashy ones that were irrigated with shop upon shop in a hope to coax commuters out of their hard-earned money, and that it's facilities were minimalist to say the least. The platform was lined with red, with rusted metal benches plastering every available wall, and old, dusty, unused monitors hanging down from the ceiling. Their flashlights probed the space, looking for any sign of the next clue.
To her surprise, since entering the subway, there had been no sounds of the infected; no manic murmuring, no eerie clicking echoing up the tunnels. The only thing present were the spores, and they were always silent.
"Found anything?" She asked, becoming slightly impatient with the small size of the station.
There was no reply for a few moments, then a muffled voice addressed her.
"There." Blufor spoke, his flashlight hovering over an unintended hole in the wall, leading through to what appeared to be the top of a storage room, or a warehouse. Surely enough, on what white-enamelled wall remained by the hole, another eye had been drawn.
"Let's go." He spoke.
Ellie moved up first, dropping down onto the tracks, heaving herself up onto the other platform and then warily making her way over to the orifice. She poked her flashlight through with one hand, and her Magnum through with the other, probing the area, checking for the infected that she was sure would be in here somewhere.
She was about to step in, when her foot found nothing and she reared back, gasping. Angling her flashlight downward, she saw the floor, a good two meters away from her.
"Shit." She swore through her panting, dizzy from the near-miss.
"You okay?" She heard Joel holler.
"Fine!" She replied, giving him some security. "Just be careful when you come through here; it's about a two meter drop."
"Right." Joel said, reaching her side, with Blufor following closely behind. "Want me to go first?"
"No." She said, shuffling towards the edge. "I got this."
She flew free from the edge, fell, and landed softly with a slight grunt on the concrete below.
"Shit... better make that three meters."
"You okay?"
"Yeah... yeah. Who's next?"
Blufor moved forward – the eyes of his gas mask reflected the light of her torch.
"I'm up." He spoke through the filters, his voice muffled and odd. He leapt down with surprising coordination, handling the fall much better than she had.
Joel followed suit quickly without speaking, landing slightly harder than Blufor, but dealing with the impact well.
In the guts of the storage room, she saw what it was for; on the towering metal shelves, paper boxes stood, each containing more paper – it was a filing room of sorts, apparently from something to do with the station, which she predicted to be travel plans or passenger information. Part of her was massively intrigued, and wanted to go through every record, just to read each of their names and think about who or what they might have been when they were alive.
At the end of the storeroom, around fifty meters of shelving away, there was another large hole in the wall, where the brickwork and the street above had given way decades ago. Sunlight poured in through the hole, and spores dispersed upwards, into the sky, their eerie yellow-green tinge polluting the sun's pristine colour.
Due to not finding anything of particular interest, they reached the opening in mere moments, pausing briefly to admire the DIY handiwork that Adam had set up to bridge the massive ravine the collapse had made.
The gorge created stretched down what appeared to be forever; there was nothing but blackness beneath them, with clouds of spores bubbling and rising out of the depths. She had no wish or inclination to find out what was down there.
Across the chasm lay an old ladder, which, when interlocked with another one, bridged the gap for a few meters, enough to gain access to another room which had also lost the majority of it's exterior walls. The bridge looked horrendously rickety, but recently made.
She looked for the tag she wanted, saw the eye drawn on a wall on the other side of the ladder-bridge, and began to carefully make her way across the makeshift traverse.
Deciding that standing up was too brave for her, she went down on all fours, and began moving across the rungs as the other two men approached behind her. To her surprise, neither of them had anything to say, nor any warnings to bestow to her. In some respects, that made her feel good; for once, no one was telling her what to do or treating her like a child.
Her stomach turned when she once made the mistake of looking down, only to be answered by the ladders creaking and her stomach turning again. She came to the centre of the bridge, very gently edged her weight across the rough joining, and once clear, picked up her pace again.
It took her another minute or so to reach the other side, where she placed her feet down on solid ground and heaved a sigh of relief. The men began their traverse, being much more careful about where they placed their centre of mass, carefully edging their ways across in succession. The whole escapade took the three of them almost twenty minutes and a few nasty scares kept the three on their toes.
With the gap traversed, they moved as a closely knit-bunch through the next room laid out before them. This one was different; it was a storeroom, like the previous one, but contained items of a more childish nature – toys, teddy bears and the like sat on shelves or in boxes, waiting for a day they'll be bought, which Ellie knew would now never come. She resisted the urge to pry for a toy bear, and moved at the front of the group, towards a set of double doors, lined with mahogany.
Her gloved hands gently pressed against the doors, and they slid easily open, their hinges remaining in good condition, being underground. The doors swung out in front of her, and the three moved silently into the store front, the still eyes of dolls and action figures watching the rugged survivors pass. The dim light of the shop cast an eerie feeling over the group, with so many eyes watching them moves towards the exit.
She remembered a nursery rhyme she knew from aeons in the past, and eagerly glanced around the store to see if she could sight the familiar title. Sure enough, the children's tale of the Click Clack, along Daddy's Track sat on a shelf amongst others, the cute and childish characters drawn in a friendly and cartoony fashion. She moved quietly off course, towards the nostalgic book, and chuckled lightly at seeing the little girl standing with her father in the cab of an old steam-train, loving each others company as they sailed blissfully down the tracks. She didn't open the small book, instead pocketing it, and moved back to where the men were standing.
The shutters of the shop were down, and had been for decades, concealing the light from the room. Another set of mahogany doors, more ornate this time, stood in front of them. She was about to move through them and part from the toy store when her foot caught on the stock of a weapon.
Adam's tattered and bandaged assault rifle sat next to her left foot, on the inside of the shop. She picked it up warily, noticing the safety being switched off, and showed the item to the other two men.
Blufor leaned inwards.
"Shit, he wouldn't just leave that around the place."
The squad-mate glanced at the doors. "He's got to be out there."
With great apprehension, she moved towards the mahogany doors, the ornate wood cool to the touch. The gently pressed them forwards, and instead of forcing them wide, simply squeezed herself through, gesturing silently to the men to do the same.
The light hit her immediately, temporarily blinding her as her eyes adjusted.
They came out into a shopping complex. The atrium was huge, and set into the floor, with an absolutely immense glass, picture roof standing at surface level, the skyscrapers and the morning sky visible through the ceiling. Some of it was pristine, while other segments hung shattered and totalled. There were walkways on either side, and one in the middle, perpendicular to the one she and the other men were standing on, bridging the gap between the two mezzanines.
It sagged somewhat in the middle, the wooden pillars having almost given way to damp and rot.
In the middle of the sag stood Adam, stock still, in a spread-out position, trying to evenly distribute his weight across the damaged walkway. It was obvious he wasn't comfortable there.
"Adam...?" Blufor asked quietly.
The Scotsman doubled around sharply and silently, not moving his feet, and pressing a finger to his lips. They all got the message and shut up pretty quickly.
Blufor mimed himself saying "What?", and Adam replied by simply pressing a finger to one ear and gesturing down to his right, to the atrium's floor.
She heard nothing at first. Then, as her ears strained, she heard heavy and huge footfalls, and a sickly, grotesque gurgling. The footsteps grew louder, as did the gurgling, accompanied by the occasional bestial growl. Blufor went to move forward, raising his rifle, only to be stopped by Adam, who told him not to use the gun with flailing gestures. He simply beckoned them over, and told them to be as quiet as possible.
She stepped forward, slowly, pacing herself, and making sure that every footfall she conducted was absolutely silent. She noticed the men behind her move with her, doing the same. They moved forward about ten feet before Adam halted them abruptly.
She could see into the floor of the atrium, here; sure enough, a monstrously big infected loomed into view, it's yellow-green and pulsing flesh horrifically visible in the light. It was different to the other behemoths she'd encountered, especially the one at the power plant, which she still had nightmares about, but it was obvious the beast was created through the same means.
That wasn't all. The beast was only exposing its front to them to begin with; she noticed it turn, and saw the red circle that had been carved into the hulk's back with a knife, a sharp line running perpendicular to the top.
So, Martyrdom were creating the beasts. Or at least using them. She wondered why, and glanced to Adam.
He, apparently reading her thoughts, shrugged, and whispered to them.
"I need to get back across." The beast didn't hear. "Okay?"
"Yeah." She spoke a little too loudly.
A growl followed, and the beast rounded. They stayed stock-still and silent for a moment, until it forgot about them and turned away, continuing to forage around the atrium floor.
"C'mon then, quick!" Ellie whispered more quietly, moving further forward, and reaching for the Scotsman.
He took one careful step towards them, then another, then a third.
His fourth step fell. The wooden planks in the platform creaked and strained, and one snapped with a loud split.
The beast turned again, confused. He stood there for another five seconds or so, staring right at them through eyes devoid of vision and obscured by a fungal plume.
The moment it turned away from them, Adam began edging forward again. He was a mere two meters away from them, now. He placed his foot gently forward, and then the other again, only to be answered with creaks from the walkway.
He miss-stepped the fourth time, and his left combat boot sank straight through a section of wooden flooring irrigated with damp and rot. He sank to thigh height, and fell on his side, hard.
The walkway shattered, and began falling away from the mezzanine the other three were standing on, crashing to the floor in a symphony of destruction.
"Shit!" Adam screamed, almost falling with the walkway.
"Adam!"
Ellie lurched forward without thinking, and managed to grab Adam's right arm before he fell with the wood into the bottom of the atrium, meters below them. The weight of the Scotsman and his gear nearly pulled her over the edge with him, until she felt Joel's arms around one of her legs and Blufor's around her other, anchoring her to the floor.
The beast had the same idea with Adam.
It stormed through stalls and tables, and even and old escalator, raging toward the disturbance. It found Adam immediately, and with a hand twice the size of his, grabbed one of the Watcher's legs.
"Shit, fuck!" He swore, kicking and slamming the heel and toe of his free boot into the beast's nearby head, which was roaring and shouting the entire time. It came close to pulling Adam down to the depths, and would've succeeded had the other two men not anchored themselves into nearby handrail.
Ellie's joints screamed with pain as they were being stretched, and Adam screamed with equal gusto as the beast tugged on his leg. He managed to stop it from being torn off by relentlessly kicking the thing in the head, causing it to rear back slightly and loosen its grip slightly every now and again.
His eyes met hers, and for the first time, she saw pure fear in those emerald orbs. There were lines scored down his face, smudging the caked blood around his nose... had he been crying?
His facial expression changed from fear to realisation, and the suddenness surprised her. His eyes had been drawn to something on her chest...
She hadn't noticed her jacket had fallen open, revealing the gleaming pistol strapped to the inside.
Adam reached up quickly with his free hand, yanked the .44 Magnum out from its holster in her jacket, and aimed it at the beasts head.
He hit a point-blank head shot once, twice, three times, four, five and six, emptying the chamber into the behemoth's skull.
The beast roared in absolute agony, reared backward clutching its massively bleeding head, and relinquished its grip on Adam. He was heaved up almost immediately, over the splintered and sharp wood, onto the mezzanine where the others were. He gestured toward an escalator at the far end, and immediately broke into a sprint.
"Run!" He shouted.
Without question, she and the others sprinted after him.
"What about the rifle?" She asked him.
Blufor glanced at her in disbelief and they both glanced backward, to see the beast hauling itself onto the mezzanine to begin pursuing them.
"Fuck the rifle." Adam shouted. "Run!"
They did as bid, reaching the escalator in mere seconds and began scaling it multiple steps at a time, trying to ignore the lumbering tank rapidly pursuing them, and bursting back out into the street. They sprinted down the pavement and out into the road, passing buildings and shop-fronts where screeches and screams were now emanating from.
She didn't look back, but felt the presence of more infected piling out into the street behind them, joining the ranks alongside the brute in their wake.
"This," Adam began, "is why we live up in the fucking mountains."
They doubled around a corner, into another, longer street, increasing their pace, the horde of infected only meters behind them now. A chorus of ragged shrieks and bellows followed them, constantly growing, raising the hairs on the back of Ellie's neck and sending shivers through her veins.
The huge beast had lagged behind, but not out of lack of stamina; there was a dull grunt from behind, a few moments of silence, and then the husk of a car smashed down a few meters in front and to the left of them, crushing another completely under the force of the impact.
"Now it's throwing shit at us?" Ellie swore.
"Just keep running!" Adam shouted back, picking up the pace even further. Her heart pounded furiously in her chest – she was fit, but not on the immense scale of Adam or Blufor. She was keeping pace, but only just. Joel was running behind her, but she sensed that was more to keep her pace up than his need to slow down. He'd been playing this game a lot longer than she had.
They rounded another corner, ran a little more, and stopped dead in their tracks.
A road-block had been set up in front of them, in the middle of the street, with two vehicles and a dozen men, all armed to the teeth and formidable. One vehicle was a van, armoured and rusted, while the other was an SUV, with a massive, 50cal Machine turret mounted on the back, a splintered camouflage pattern marked across its bodywork.
The infected rounded the corner as well, and the man on the turret shouted.
Bullets began flying everywhere; at them, as well as the infected. Joel bowled into her side, picking her up under one arm and wheeling her towards the other two men, who were busy breaking through a door into an apartment building. The wood splintered and shattered under the force of one of Adam's kicks, and the four entered the building, bullets ricocheting around the frame and brickwork that were meant for them.
"This'll connect up to the other buildings in the street." Adam said, moving through and out the building into the alleyway behind. "If we can get around to them, we can get a vehicle."
"Did you see any markings?" Blufor asked.
She heard the din of the 50cal bursting into life, the sounds booming and immensely loud, even from this far away.
"No, I didn't." Adam replied. "Mercs?"
The began moving down the alleyway, in the direction of the road-block.
"Looks like it."
"Not friendly, though."
She heard the beast roar in fury, its call drowning out the din of Stalkers and Clickers, only to be answered by another burst from the enormous machine gun.
They ran forward another thirty meters, and on Adam's signal, sprinted out into the street, directly alongside the road-block. The men were taken completely by surprise, but reacted with hostility, resulting in Adam drawing the Magnum and shooting down the first two men he came across.
The armoured van was the closest vehicle to them, but Adam made straight for the turreted SUV, sprinting straight past Mercs that were far too preoccupied to see him as a concern.
"Adam, get back here! Adam!" Blufor shouted, sprinting after him.
The mercenaries on the front line, driving the infected back, doubled around at the disturbance, and cut her and the others off from the Watcher.
Blufor and Joel moved forward to meet the resistance, with Blufor tackling the first man to the floor and viscously beating him while Joel rounded on the second man approaching and, by using him as a human shield, shot the other three still holding the front line. They fell to the floor with bullets in their backs, unaware they had been outflanked.
She sprinted over to the van, away from the fighting men, and tore open one of the doors, jumping swiftly into the cab. She drew her penknife and put it to the throat of the driver, pressing her to the seat.
The woman was young, only a few years her elder, and had the most beautiful grey-white eyes she'd ever seen. They were laced with fear.
"Get out!" She spoke. The woman didn't move.
"Now!" She shouted.
The woman piled out of the other door, Ellie keeping a firm grip on the cuff of her jacket, following her out.
Joel was already next to her, climbing into the truck and turning on the ignition, allowing the vehicle to roar into life.
Where was Adam?
She glanced over to the SUV, and saw him struggling with four different attackers at once. Two of them were the same size as he was, and the other two had managed to get a firm grip on him. She saw him being hit once, and again, and a third time, when his body went limp.
"Get in!" Joel shouted to her, the massive tidal wave of infected baring down on them as the defence crumbled.
"But, Adam-"
"Get in!"
She shovelled the driver around the back of the van, tore open the rear doors and threw her in, with little care for her safety, and jumped in after her. The truck began to turn, and she saw Blufor gain the advantage on a final foe and smack him savagely to the floor. Joel pulled up beside him.
"Blufor!" Ellie shouted, her arm extended out to him.
The squad-mate ignored her and bolted for the SUV, which was already starting up, the engine churning furiously. The machine-gunner lay dead in the turret, and the few survivors were already piling a severely injured and unconscious Adam into the back seat of the vehicle. The door shut behind the last Merc, and the SUV span around and began to pull away, with Blufor sprinting up the street after it. He was barely a meter from the back of the car when it sped up dramatically, and left him in the dust, wheeling around a corner and out of sight. He sprinted hopelessly for a few more meters, and then collapsed onto his knees.
"Goddamn it." Joel swore, wheeling the van around, the first of the faster infected slamming themselves up against the bonnet, screaming and yelping the entire time. The van turned to face the wave, and one nearly jumped in, only to be met with Ellie's switchblade through its skull. The limp corpse fell out of the van and was lost into the massive swarm of infected.
They pulled up next to Blufor, who deftly jumped in to the back, and then fell onto the floor, panting wildly.
She shut the van doors, closing herself and the other two off from the hellish horde behind them as it sped away.
They'd taken Adam.
She glanced at the woman who had been the original driver of the van, who was now sitting against the back wall, her knees drawn up to her head. Blonde hair fell in well-groomed locks around her head, and those white-grey eyes stared back at her.
If anyone knew where they'd be taking Adam, she did.
The steady sounds of the van's accelerating engine began to drown out the horrific chorus they'd left behind.