The area was strewn with corpses of all types. Smokers, Hunters, Boomers and even a Witch or a Tank here or there. The sidewalks and streets were almost painted with blood. They stood for the longest time, unsure as to do. One or two zombies stood around the calm neighborhood lined with oleander bushes on each side. One particular group of pink oleander was the group they stumbled out of from the ghost portal. Danny took a deep, shaking, hesitant breath and turned to the others.

"So what's the plan?" Sam asked before he had a chance to speak.

"Well, I was going to ask you guys what you think we should do." He confessed, "Obviously there's people here." He said.

"Right." Jazz nodded.

"How about one of us picks a direction?" Tucker suggested, "And we'll just take turns."

"We avoid major roads." Jazz said firmly.

"Sounds good." Danny said, "There may be nothing to shoot here, but who knows what sort of progress they made."

"Okay. So which way first?" Sam asked.

Danny looked down one street, finding a blinking yellow light at one end. Then he looked down the other side, finding what looked like the fencing to a field at a school. "There's a school down that way." He said, "But there's a stop light going the other way."

Tucker sighed, "Who's gonna pick first?"

"Well, this was your idea. So it should be you." Sam said.

"I'd say we go toward the school." He said, "We just stay on the other side of the street from it."

"Let's go, then." Jazz said and began walking.

They studied their surroundings, first a church on their right, then the rest of the buildings around them were houses. "We should check a couple of these houses for supplies." Danny announced.

"Good idea." Sam nodded.

"This house here." Tucker pointed.

"Fenced-in, massive bushes so you can't see in or out, massive house-"

"Drug dealers." Danny cut off Jazz. "They have to have a gun."

"Or two." Sam said, "What makes you so sure they were drug dealers?" Sam asked.

"Why else would they hide their house like this?" he asked.

"True." They rounded the corner to see the front of the house and found a gate to the driveway.

Danny took a deep breath and pushed open the gate, hearing an alarm go off. He jumped and instantly tried to close it. He glanced over and found infected running from each direction at them. He instantly abandoned the idea of closing the gate and started shooting.

"Should've known they'd have an alarm on their gate." Jazz teased and fired.

"Shut up. I don't see you suggesting what they'd have." He snapped.

Sam turned slightly and shot to the left, glancing back the other way to see what was incoming. She finally heard a click, indicating that she'd run out of ammunition for her SMG and forcing her to switch to her halberd. She glanced over and found that it was just Jazz and Tucker shooting. She did a double-take. Only Jazz and Tucker? She turned around and found Danny practically glued to the wall with a Smoker's tongue tightly wrapped around his body and neck. He struggled weakly before closing his eyes and going limp. "Danny!" she ran to his side and hit the tongue with the halberd, catching him as he fell forward. She quickly pulled the tongue off of him and carefully laid him down. In the back of her mind, she heard the firing stop. All she could hear was silence.

"What happened?" Tucker asked.

Sam studied the bruises forming lightly around Danny's neck that went into hiding in the collar of his shirt. "Smoker." She breathed. She held him closer and put her ear to his chest, finding that his heart beat faintly. It was all she could hear. She froze, "He's not breathing…" she gasped. She quickly laid him down, however, before she was able to do anything, he gasped loudly and coughed. He rolled over and almost gagged.

"Danny?" Jazz leaned over to look at his face.

He panted and stared at the ground for what felt like too long. He refocused his vision and took a deep breath. Their voices were muffled to him as they spoke either amongst themselves or to him. He shook his head and rested on his knees and elbows. His hearing finally became clear. They'd been calling him and asking if he was okay.

Sam touched his shoulder, making him flinch, "Are you okay?" she asked.

He nodded and sat on his knees, "I'm okay." He breathed. He stood up.

"Can you even walk?" Tucker asked.

"Yeah, I'll be fine." he said as he stumbled and caught his sister for support. He sighed, "Okay, my balance is out the window and my head is killing me." He admitted, "But I'll be fine."

"Danny," Jazz started, "Why didn't you use your ghost powers?" she asked.

"I tried." He said, "They weren't working." He said. He looked over across the street and saw the school- a high school, standing amongst the houses and one other church further down the intersecting street. He tried taking a step forward, declaring himself stable and nodding in approval. He looked down each side of the street, "Which way?" he asked.

"Are we just abandoning the idea of more guns in this house?" Sam asked.

"That Smoker's still in there." He grunted and studied the north end of the street. "I see stop lights down there, but barely." Then he looked south, "Stop lights are right there."

"Let's go left, then." Jazz decided. "More houses, more of a chance that we find someone there or we find shelter of our own." She began walking.

Tucker followed close by her side while Danny and Sam trailed behind. Sam glanced over at Danny who rubbed his throat, "You okay?" she asked loud enough for only him to hear.

"That hurt." He said. "And scared me."

She put an arm over his shoulder and walked with him, "You're okay." She whispered.

He nodded, "I know. I just wasn't expecting a Smoker to almost strangle me to death." He looked up, seeing the sky was starting to get dark. "We should find someplace to stay." He announced.

"Let's see what's across the street." Tucker suggested, "I get the feeling we'll find something." He said, leading the others across the street. He glanced up at a sign labeled 'Oakland', "Not here." He shook his head. When they reached a street labeled 'Tulsa' Danny glanced across the street at the next intersection and saw pawn shop next to a convenience store. "Let's try there." He said. "Maybe we'll find something." He walked them the rest of the way down the block, across the street labeled 'Galveston' and realized that the door had been broken down.

"That doesn't look good." Tucker said.

Danny held out his fire axe and hit the door frame with the blade. Two zombies ran out at them but were quickly decapitated just as they ran through the door frame.

"Geez, Danny." Jazz said under her breath.

"What?" he looked at her, "We've been out here for about a week and a half. I've already shot off zombie heads and I saw that through a rifle scope." He explained, "This is the lesser of two evils." He stepped into the store and looked around, "There's five handguns in here, and a bunch of pocket knives." He said. "Who wants what?"

"I say we take one of each." Tucker said.

"Okay." Danny handed each of them one handgun and one pocket knife of their specific color. Tucker's was silver, Sam's was purple and black, Jazz's was a turquoise blue, and Danny's was bright green. He looked around the store, finding nothing else of interest. "Let's check next door for some food." He suggested.

The convenience store was in worse shape than the pawn shop. Shelves where knocked over, bags of food were torn open and scattered about, and the glass in the coolers in the back were shattered. They heard giggling inside.

"Nope." Tucker turned around and walked out of the building, "No Jockeys."

Danny chuckled and quietly ushered the girls out. "Let's keep going." He smiled. He glanced across the street and considered for a moment maybe to check the apartment complex that overlooked the convenience store, Laundromat, pawn shop, and the massive empty lot they walked by, but decided against it and kept walking. They crossed the street again and looked over at an elementary school that sat beside them.

"Well if that's not convenient." Danny said.

"Get out of one school and go to the one right down the street." Tucker agreed.

"I don't think it's a middle school too." Jazz said. "K through six. Unless the high school continues with seventh grade."

They all shrugged and just passed the school calmly. Danny looked back up to the sky and found it was darker out than it was about ten minutes ago. He looked around at all of the houses they passed, scared as to what they were going to do that night for shelter. They've passed a few vans and a couple of SUVs, but all of them were either smashed or overturned. He looked back out to the empty streets and still only found the dead bodies.

"There's really not much to kill out here." Danny noted again. Not a split second later, he regretted saying it.

There was gurgling behind them. Close behind them.

"No…" Danny turned around, finding nothing. "No, no, no…" he search everywhere.

"It's behind the wall." Jazz said quietly. All four of them had turned around. Before they knew it, they were covered in the slime and mentally gagging that they were covered in vomit again.

After another series of 'no' that Danny had muttered. He froze in disgust, "F*ck." He scowled and tried going intangible, finding his powers weren't cooperating. He pulled out his newly acquired handgun and began firing at the incoming infected.

"Damn it, he's in the front yard right here." Jazz cursed.

Danny tried once more to go intangible and still couldn't. He turned and fired at the fat infected that hid behind the small cacti that was planted in the front yard, not that his hiding was very effective. The Boomer exploded and managed to miss everyone with his explosive remains.

Sam knocked back a zombie with her halberd and hit it again with the blade, sending it to the ground with a crack in its head. Then she turned around and came face-to-face with a Shifter. She froze momentarily, then swung the blade at him, lodging the blade into his ribs and getting it stuck.

The Shifter sneered and held the blade into his side, pushing it in further and yanking the blade from Sam's hands. He pulled the weapon out of his ribs and running the other end into Sam's stomach, knowing that the end was pointed. She yelled and grabbed the handle to keep it from going in any deeper.

Danny turned around and shot the Shifter in the back of his head, not knowing that he had stabbed Sam. He gasped after the Shifter fell, "Sam!" he barked and caught her before she fell. He held her close and shot at any of the infected that came close with the exclusion of one or two that kicked his back or his leg, though they were quickly dealt with. He watched for a moment to see anything if anything else was coming. Then he looked back at Sam.

Tucker and Jazz gasped, "What-"

"It was a Shifter." Danny said and held her closer. "Check if this house is safe." He said.

"Danny, a Boomer and a Shifter came out of hiding with this house. The door's destroyed and the windows are gone." Tucker said.

"Find something…" he whispered.

"Jazz, you stay here." Tucker said and ran down the street.

Jazz watched him leave, then looked down at her brother. She knelt by him and brushed Sam's hair back. She looked down at her stomach and studied the wound in her stomach that was who knows how deep. She wrapped an arm around Danny's shoulders and hugged him, "She's going to be okay." She whispered.

Danny had his forehead to Sam's and one hand gripping her hand tightly. He was silent, taking deep, shaking breaths. His eyes closed and his mental stress at max capacity. "We just got here not even an hour ago…" he said quietly.

Jazz was silent, "We didn't know what we were in for when we got here."

"We knew-"

"I found one." Tucker ran back panting. "It's two houses away from this one but it's locked."

Danny looked down at his hand and made it go intangible, finally unable to see his hand, "Now my powers work." He said. He carefully picked up Sam and stood up. "Where is it?" he asked.

"Down this way." Tucker said, "The one on the other side of the fire hydrant."

Danny looked at the house for a moment and ran carefully to the front door. He phased through the door and hesitated before taking another step. The couches in the living room were clean. The counters were clear and the house was unharmed. He carefully laid Sam on the couch and let Jazz and Tucker inside. "We're staying here." He said.

"Well- duh." Tucker scoffed and examined Sam. "The Shifter got her pretty good." He took off his bag that Frostbite had given him and pulled out a first aid kit. He carefully cleaned the wound, glad that there was none of the Boomer puke on her while he was working. "You guys go check the place out. I'll take care of her." He said.

Danny and Jazz hesitantly turned and started exploring the house, which wasn't that big. It had three bedrooms and two bathrooms. Each room looked as though it house two people each. Considering two people slept in the Queen-sized bed.

"Two adults, two teenagers, and two little kids."

"No kidding." Danny agreed. He turned back and started for the living room, turning left to check the backyard. Finding the area clear, he opened the door and stepped out. There was a big green lawn and a pool beside it. The pool didn't have much water inside, showing the possibility that it was probably being drained when the outbreak hit. He looked just passed the lawn, finding three tall pine trees. He took a deep breath and leaned his forehead on the tree and closed his eyes.

"Danny?"

He turned around and looked at Jazz.

"Are you okay?" she asked and approached him.

He scoffed, "Already stressed out about this place."

She glanced at the bruises around his neck and sighed. "I can imagine."

"I mean- I knew Shifters were smart, but stabbing Sam?"

"I know, Danny. I know." She put her hands on his shoulders. "Things aren't going to get much easier." She admitted. "But the good news is: we know there's people out here. If you'd like, Tucker and I can go find them tomorrow morning and you can stay here to watch Sam." She watched him for a while and had a feeling he didn't like the idea, "Or… something…"

He closed his eyes and leaned against the tree. He sighed. "We'll have to figure something out." He said.

"Hey, guys?" Tucker called.

They looked up at him.

"Uh... She's okay. Danny, she said she wants to see you." He said.

Danny made his way into the house, "Thank you." He said to Tucker before going to Sam's side. "Are you okay?"

"I'll live." She smiled sleepily.

He took her hand, "You're cold."

"I don't really have a lot of blood in me right now." She half-chuckled. He gave her a serious look, making her smirk disappear. She sighed, "I know you're worried. And I'm guessing you're already stressed out." She started, "I'm going to be fine." she said. "I don't even feel it right now."

"Not always a good thing." He said.

"Unless Frostbite packed us painkillers." She smirked.

He laughed.

She smiled, "Danny, if you're stressed out. Why don't you go on a quick flight?"

"Sam, it's dark out. There's zombies everywhere." He said.

"I know. Which is why I say 'flight'. It's not walking, but I'm sure it still clears your head." She said. Then she smiled, "Go ghost."

He smiled and touched his forehead to hers. "Thanks." He whispered. He kissed her forehead and stepped back. The two rings scanned his body and turned him to his ghost half. He fell backwards through the ground and vanished.

**Um... review if you think whether or not I should continue this one. If yes, then I need ideas badly**