Sorry for the unforgivable gap in updates. I have no excuses. But it is here. And a third is coming. And maybe a fourth and fifth and so on a so forth. Now, why are you reading this and not my story? Read and Review.

The Survivors

Zoey sat across from Cutter, never taking her eyes off him. He wasn't watching her, just playing idly with the mess they called food, but he wasn't even watching that. His bright blue eyes were staring at Alexia, who was sleeping in the corner.

Zoey scooped some peas onto her spoon and flicked them at Cutter. He jumped and the pistol was already out of its holster and pointed at her before he seemed to notice the motion. Just as fast it was returned.

"You seem jumpy," Zoey said, shaking a little from the realization of how close she had come to having her head opened by a .45 caliber bullet.

Cutter shrugged.

"Your name isn't really Cutter, is it?"

"Nope."

"Not that talkative now, either."

"One thing at a time." His eyes darted from their vigil for a second before returning to the dozing form. "My name is Cutter McCarthy. Cutter is not my given name, but no one knows what is."

"Embarrassed?"

"You're a smart girl. Don't let it get around."

"Why do you keep looking at Alex?"

"I like her."

Zoey raised an eyebrow. "We are in the middle of a zombie apocalypse and you think you can… what? Have your way with her? Because if you think that, I am going to have to beat the crap out of you."

"Ah, the overprotective big sister syndrome." Cutter smirked. "I love a challenge."

Zoey sneered. "You are a pervert."

"Wrong. I'm thinking ahead. But, admittedly, I don't have much of a chance. Murderer, remember. Even if I got off light because it was self defense, I still killed someone. Four some-ones." He shoveled a bit of food into his mouth and then nodded at her. "You a med student or something? I know Xion College is a medical place."

"Yeah, I'm a med student."

"And your friend? Alex?"

"She's a bit too squeamish to be a doctor or surgeon. She wants to go into pediatrics."

Cutter nodded as if this were a very wise choice. "No idea what that means."

"She wants to help kids."

"Ah." Cutter glanced from Zoey to Alexia and back. "That's too bad."

"What's too bad?" Zoey asked.

"You have to pull your weight. Unless you know how to fix a generator or rough it urban style, your only other choice is a gunner, and you'll need that anyway."

"What are you talking about?"

Cutter ignored her. "Otherwise you'll be nothing worth keeping. Except you're girls, so that will save you from being tossed. Won't save you from the other monsters in here. Murder is the least violence one can do to another. At least my victims aren't scarred for life. Only for death." He snickered.

Zoey's eyes narrowed, trying to hide a twinge of nervousness. "That a threat?"

"A warning. I'm not a rapist. Neither is Francis. A decent amount of people in here are not that bad once you get to know them. But there are those few that are just short a few marbles and unless you prove to be a resource worth maintaining, all of them are going to 'have their way with you' — as you so delicately put it — and then you'll be tossed. If you're lucky, the Infected will get you before too long."

Zoey swallowed hard. "But… but what about the government? The police? Eventually they'll come and—"

Cutter gave her a sympathetic smile. "Zoey, they came. Didn't you see the news? An entire battalion tried to enter the city to help evac. Not a single one survived. Torn apart or Infected. The stuff has spread like you wouldn't believe. Nothing is left. There is no government, no law. It is kill or be killed, hunt or be hunted. Survival of the fittest, but it's not just that anymore, either. It's the most ruthless, the one who can shoot straight and fast. They'll live. People like you are not needed. Medical attention does not help. You get cut up, you get killed. By them or your friends. It's the best thing." He stabbed his fork into the foam tray. "Human and Infected. There's nothing else. We have to stick together. Strength in numbers, right. The Infected got that down pat."

Zoey glanced at Alexia. "There's no way she can handle a gun. She's never killed a fly. Hell, she can't even slap a vulgar advance off a guy's face without my help."

Cutter followed her eyes. "You're a good friend, you know? If I had Francis as a buddy before I came here, I don't think I would have killed those guys. Friends can help you out of a lot of jams, steer you away from mistakes. Look, if you trust me to, I'll keep an eye on her. And you never know. Stress can be a cruel, yet effective, teacher." Cutter nodded to the door. "Come on. I'll take you out to Francis. He's helping watch the barricade. You can stick with him. He might be gruff, but deep down he's just a big teddy bear."

"How far down?"

"Really far down. Really, really, really far down." He tossed his thumb at Alexia. "Wake her up and she can come. Better for someone she knows to wake her, and I don't like leaving young ladies in crowded prison mess halls without proper supervision."

"You do not seem like a killer," Zoey said, standing and heading to take her tray to the trash.

Cutter took her untouched tray for her. "I'm not a psycho. Self-defense, remember. I was a black belt and had a sharpshooter rank in rifles. Pistols are even easier. I've learned how to kill men and women. Never thought I'd do it. But that's the thing, isn't it? You never know what you're capable of until your life is in danger. Or the life of someone you care for. Get a move on and meet me by the door."

It only took Zoey a light touch on Alexia's arm to wake her with a gasped scream. Zoey helped her friend to the door, where Cutter was waiting with his shotgun.

"Here," he said, tossing Zoey a pair of pistols.

Zoey took them and glanced from Cutter to the steel guns in her hands. "What do I do with these?"

"Stick them in your pockets, in your belt, down your shirt, in your hand — wherever it is easiest to keep them. Both of you. Once we're outside I'll show you how to reload them. And fire them. Firing them is important. Especially when you aim at the Infected. That is the best use for these weapons. Aiming at the Infected. And then pulling the trigger. And then—"

"Cutter. When do you shut up?" Francis asked, throwing the door open and hitting Cutter in the face. "Oh. Sorry, buddy."

"You don't sound sorry," Cutter muttered nasally.

"I'm not. Okay ladies, let's go."

Zoey sat next to Francis on the barricade, cradling a hunting rifle in her hands. She had been given the weapon by Francis for no better reason than there were no other guns available. Alexia had been coupled with Cutter on the other side of the makeshift gate, where she gingerly fiddled with an Uzi.

The barricade was a shoddily constructed blockade. It was a few trucks, placed end to end across the prison bridge, their tires deflated — a hastily created iron bar gate with hinges welded to the back sides of the trucks — with four-by-four metal plates welded to the cab roofs. Concrete slanted dividers were shoved against the trucks, long bent iron rods sticking up from newly poured concrete that only looked a few days old. These served as bars for the guards on top of the truck cabs, a form of protection.

"Hey, Zoey," Francis grunted, nudging her out of her thoughts. "Heads up."

"Huh? What?"

Francis growled. "Heads up. Down range." Zoey stared blankly. Francis sighed and twisted her head with one hand, pointing across the bridge into the dim morning mist with the other. "Down range. That's what we call 'away from the prison.'"

"Oh."

Francis waited and then poked her. "Well? What are you waiting for?"

"What am I waiting for?"

"You have the scope. You look down there and tell me what you see. I think I saw some figures, but you have the scope so you have to tell us what it is. I can try and break it into smaller words if you want."

Zoey pursed her lips and hefted the rifle butt into her shoulder, sighting down the barrel through the scope. The mist did not clear for her, but the murky shadows of shambling figures leapt closer. Now they were clearly murky shambling shadows, not just possible shambling shadows.

"Well?" Francis asked.

"What am I looking for? I see plenty of people idling about, wandering around. Nothing is coming this way if that's what you were worried about."

"Damn," Francis said. "I was hoping for a scrap."

"You are insane," Zoey said, still watching the Infected at the far end of the bridge. "It's like you find this fun."

"I do. Better than parole. They never let you have fun. Couldn't walk into a bar without the manager hiding the lighters."

"That might be a good — what was that?"

"How should I know? You have the sniper."

Zoey ignored him, peering intently at the anomaly's last appearance. There it was again. A flashing burst. Then steady beams of light — flashlights — cut around the fog. As the lights found figures in the miasma, the flashes came again and again until the shadow forms dropped to the ground.

"You can't see that?" Zoey asked.

They came again, much closer, and the rata-tat-tat of machine guns echoed eerily across the bridge.

"Survivors," Francis muttered. "Hey, Cutter. Get back to the mess and rally a few guys; we got incoming Infected." He turned to Zoey, grabbing his auto-shotgun. "You stay here. Cover those guys."

"What about Alex?"

"What about her? She's staying here. Technically to give you cover, but who are we kidding? If I took her with me, she'd probably kill me. Cutter will be back in a minute or two, so sit tight and shoot anything that does not shoot back."

"Where are you going?"

"To welcome the guests, of course. It's what a good host does."

Zoey felt her stomach knot. What if she hit him? What if she hit one of them? They were human enough for her to suffer a mental breakdown from the taking of a human life. And what if she did not feel that remorse? What did that say about her?

She swallowed and looked into the scope. Don't hit Francis. Don't hit Francis. Don't hit survivors. Hit Infected. Hit Infected who look very similar to the people I am not supposed to hit.

Bill turned and let a short burst smash an Infected's head open. It was strange. The men in 'Nam never came apart like that. The rounds would bury themselves in the flesh, not tear entire limbs away. He made a note to check the bodies of Infected where he could. Knowing your enemy was the difference between life and death just as often as a weapon was.

"Louis," Bill said, jogging after the young man. "Make sure to stay together. We can't get separated. We're on a bridge, remember. One false step and you're liable to fall right over."

"Right. Sorry."

"Not a problem son. Down."

"Huh?"

Bill shoved Louis down and blasted a charging man in the chest. The chattering gibberish died in a shriek that would have peeled paint.

"Sorry, sir."

Bill sighed. "You don't have to apologize. Aim of the game is to survive. We have to work together. And stop calling me sir."

"Yes, sir. I mean, Bill."

"Better," Bill said, grinning around his cigarette. "Now, come on. We're going to die here if we keep stopping to chat."

"Right."

"Now that was a real sweet moment."

Bill and Louis spun to face the voice, guns raised out of instinct. The biker winced as the flashlights blazed into his eyes.

"Ow! Hey, turn those damn things off."

"You're not Infected, are you?" Bill said, lowering his rifle immediately.

"Do I look like a jabbering idiot, Grandpa?"

"You don't look it, but you still are."

"Look, old man," the other man started. However the expletives died on his lips as a howl rose into the sky. It roiled under the menacing thunder clouds, competing with the rumbles as it shrieked out, reaching for their souls, lusting for their flesh.

The biker started again. "Okay. We can exchange pleasantries later. I'm Francis. Let's go." He turned and sprinted into the fog, toward the prison at the end of the bridge.

Bill and Louis ran after him and then jogged alongside.

"I'm Bill," Bill said. "And this is Louis."

"What are we running from?" Louis asked. They all knew it was rhetorical. Deep down, every human recognized a hunting call when they heard it.

"Infected," Francis said slowing to a quick walk. "It's okay. We're only a second or two from the barricade."

"Barricade?"

"Yeah," Francis said, grinning. The trucks swam into view. "That."

Time seemed to slow for Zoey. She saw the three men emerge from the mist. She heard the shriek, saw the running shapes, the leaping form. The rifle snapped to her shoulder, a deeper reflex, instinct driven and alien to her. The cracking rifle report licked the air, sending the bullet past Francis' ear, crushing the stalking form behind him.

Francis saw the muzzle flash, felt the bullet whip past his ear, heard the crunch of bullet greeting bone. And the blood spattering the back of his neck.

He spun, his shotgun leveling with his hip. He saw the Infected clawing their way out of the mist, limbs flailing, whipping around, loose, as they ran. Francis pulled the trigger. The mechanism dislodged the shell violently, the shredding spread blasting ten of the close-packed fiends back, off their feet. He noted the other two — Bill and Louis — opening fire to the sides, covering his flanks. If it was planned or instinct, Francis didn't know. He didn't much care, either.

"Move back."

He found his voice and laced the next few seconds with a plethora of colorful metaphors.

"Move back to the barricade."

That was not him. It was the old guy, Bill. But it seemed like a good idea. The fog was getting redder, the gunshots flashing more frequently. An Infected charged him. Francis' shotgun clicked on empty chambers and he readied to butt whip the zombie thing into the next life.

Its skull exploded, its body falling onto his, smearing blood over him.

Then he was backpedaling into the gate. Cutter was standing on the top, M16 ripping into the mob. Several others gunned down the Infected swarming over the truck cabs. The survivors were losing.

"Pull back," Bill yelled.

Francis watched a known murderer and thief — Jack — go down under the tide. Francis let one more shot splice a cluster apart and then turned, gunning over his shoulder as he ran.