Here is your next chapter people so enjoy.

The usual disclaimer still applies. I DO NOT OWN L4D, L4D2, VALVE, OR ANYTHING ELSE OTHER THAN MY OC AND THE PLOT.

The tension between us was so thick it could almost be felt. The silence was broken by the soft click of another round being loaded into the chamber of his gun, and his single question. "Are you infected?"

Slightly offended by his question and the circumstances in which it had been asked I fired back with, "Now I'm not speaking from experience of anything but after saving someone's life wouldn't a proper question be, are you ok? Or maybe something along the lines of, what's your name." to which he replied with shoving his rifle even closer to my face. The tip of the barrel was now so close that, if I had been following it instead of his face, I would have had to cross my eyes just to keep it in focus.

"I'm the one with the gun, so I make the rules. Now answer my question, ARE! YOU! INFECTED!"

"Well for the record my name is Sarah and y… no I'm not infected." I don't know why but something was telling me that if I did not let anybody find out about the truth about me, I would live a lot longer.

His harsh face softened as he slung his rifle across his back. I began to ask him if he had seen where my knife landed, but before I was even three words into my question a sudden pain in my upper left arm answered it for me. The combination of adrenalin and the stress of the last few minutes had left me totally unaware of the fact that my knife was now firmly lodged in the muscle there.

"Ow son of a b***h. this day just keeps getting better and better." I reached over with my right hand to pull the knife out, but his hand caught my wrist and stopped me.

"Whoa there I wouldn't pull that out just yet. We don't know how bad the damage is but since you haven't bled out yet I can safely say it missed the artery. Let's at least get you into a sitting position before we try to fix it."

As he helped me sit up I couldn't help but joke, "what are you a doctor."

To which he replied, "Nah, before all h**l broke loose I was an accountant. But when the zombies started to attack it was either survive or die, and when your trying to survive you get a little banged up along the way." when I was in a more or less comfortable sitting position he reached over his shoulder, grabbed a small red bag off his back, unzipped it, and started to examine its contents.

"Crap, I'm going to have to restock this next chance I get. All I got is half a bottle of rubbing alcohol and a roll of medical tape. I'm going to have to improvise a pad to stop the bleeding." he then reached up and tore off one of the sleeves of his t-shirt and proceeded to fold it a few times. He then took the bottle and dumped its contents onto the newly created pad. "Here your gonna want this," he said as he reached into the bag and tossed me a small roll of wood that may have been part of a handle to some thing once upon a time. I could clearly see numerous teeth marks on it, some going much deeper than others.

"And what exactly am I going to be doing with this," I asked, already having a general idea.

"Well when I pull that knife out and slap this on it," he said holding up the now alcohol soaked pad, "your gonna want to scream cause its gonna hurt, and a scream may invite some unwelcome guests. Now are you ready to do this?"

"As ready as I'll ever be," I said clamping down on the bite stick now held firmly between my teeth. I had though moving into a sitting position was painful but I was proven to be sorely mistaken. When he pulled the knife out I let out a sound that was halfway between a scream and a grunt, but that changed into a full blown scream when the alcohol kicked in. To say that my arm felt like it was on fire would not even come close. After several seconds that felt like several years I released the breath I didn't know I had been holding. I let go of the bite stick and took a look at its newest, and deepest, set of marks.

When my new friend finished wrapping the tape around the pad and my arm he took a look at the stick and let out a low short whistle in astonishment. "Either this wood is getting old and soft, or that hurt a lot worse that it looked.

I smiled at his little joke and hoped that he would never realize how close he had come to dieing just then. While the original bite and grunt had been because of the pain, the depth of the bite and the scream were because the other me had wanted to rip his head off for hurting me.

"Sorry about the whole gun in your face thing earlier. Nowadays if you find another human you want to make sure they're going to stay that way right," he said with an apologetic smile.

"Yeah," I answered, "by the way you still haven't told me your name yet."

"Oh of course, my bad. Names Joseph but you can call me Joe. Now if you don't mind me asking Sarah, what on earth are you doing up here in these zombie infested woods with nothing but a knife for a weapon."

"Let's just say that I've been a little further up the mountain for the past few years and I was just trying to get to the city at the base."

"Oh you mean Millstone, that's where I'm from. I was heading back when I heard the witches screams. I followed them to see what had set her off and that's when I saw you. At first I almost mistook you for a hunter cause of the way you were leaping around on those branches, and I was about to leave when I saw you get stuck. When you grabbed your knife and started to hack away at those branches I realized that you weren't a hunter after all but in fact a human. By the way I would be very careful when introducing your self to other people for the first time. All you need is some duct tape and you would look EXACTLY like a hunter."

"Really," I said, "I guess I'll have to remember that. So what were you doing all the way up here in the first place?"

"Well to make a long story short I was looking for some food. I was hoping to fins a deer or a rabbit, h**l I would have settled for a squirrel, but the dam infected has scared everything off. All the food in the city has either been eaten of spoiled, and if I couldn't find anything up here I'm gonna strike out and see if I can find some sort of safe zone."

"Hmm that sounds like a good idea to me. Mind if I join you, two sets of senses are better than one."

He seemed to think it over for a few seconds before he answered, "Yeah that sounds like a good idea. Let's head back to the city so I can get my stuff, and so we can find you a more appropriate weapon."

He gathered up his gear and we set out down the mountain. I couldn't explain it but something about this guy didn't seem right. He kept looking at me like he was sizing me up, measuring out my proportions, and the silence between us just severed to make it creeper. I was about to ask him to stop when he broke the silence first.

"So Sarah do you have any family."

"No, at least not that I know of. I've been asleep for a long time, and when I woke up I was alone. What about you Joe, you got anybody you want to stick around for."

"No not any more. My girlfriend was one of the first to be lost and by the time I got to my parents they were already dead."

I was about to express my condolences when we stepped past the last of the trees and we were met with a full view of the city.

"And there she is. Allow me to be the first to welcome you Sarah to Millstone," he said with a slight chuckle and a flourish of his hands, "our fine city has numerous lodging options with your pick of numerous safe houses scattered all through out the city. Our entertainment district extends all over the city with nonstop heart pounding action as you fight for your life against the zombie horde. There now that the tour is over lest get to my safe house and rest for the night. We'll set out tomorrow and see what we can find."

"Ok that sounds like a good idea. I just have one question, what is a safe house." the look he gave me was the classic "you've got to be kidding me" look. "Like I said I've been asleep for a while so let's just assume that I have no idea what's going on."

"Well a safe house, or safe room, is a barricaded room or building which enables Survivors like us to rest, heal, and resupply ourselves. Safe houses are easy to identify because of their big, red, heavily armored metal doors. Some doors are solid and have only a peephole while others are locked with a crash-bar and have a large barred window providing a wide field of view and fire. And speaking of safe houses mine is just around the corner."

While we had been talking we had entered the city and began to make out way through the seemingly endless maze of streets and alleyways. When we rounded the corner I could see the red door that Joe had said marked a safe house. The safe house was at the end of a street that, not unlike the other streets we had passed and been through, was full of empty cars. As we walk past them I notice that one of them had a flashing red light inside and was periodically emitting a low beeping sound. I was about to ask Joe what it was when he beat me to it.

"Don't touch that car. Its alarm is still set and if it goes off any zed head within a three block radius is going to hear it and come running for lunch."

Before I could respond a man stepped out of one of the alleys about twenty feet ahead of us and called out a greeting to Joe. I could not tell what the original color of his clothes or hair were underneath the layer of grime that covered him from head to toe, as well as the axe he had strapped to his back and both of the crow bars he held in each hand. I could hear the change of attitude in Joe's voice as he called back; it was more relaxed and laid back now.

"Mike what are you doing out here."

When Mike answered his voice sent chills down my spine. It sounded greasy and wrong. "Well Joe I was going to kill you if you hadn't found any food but it looks like you did and it's a toy to boot."

I was bout to ask Joe what this Mike guy was talking about when suddenly Joe had my arms pinned behind my back with one hand and had cut off my cry of alarm with his other.

"Great job Mike, I wanted to get her into the safe house first, but no you just had to go and run your big mouth."

"I don't care Joe. I finished off the rest of that thigh the day you left and haven't been able to find anything to eat since. It's been three days and I'm starving so you can just shove it.

"What ever, lets just get her out of the open before we start."

I had no idea what these two were planning but I dint want to find out. I began to struggle and kick trying to get Joe to let go of me, but all it did was make him tighten his already iron like grip.

"Quit your struggling. It didn't work for the others and it won't work for you." His revelation made me freeze in horror. "That's right pretty; you're not the first to fall into our little trap. You see a few weeks ago mike and I discovered a new source of food that we liked even more than what we had been eating at the time. When I told you I had nobody left to live for it was only part of the truth. Yes my parents were killed and eaten by the undead and yes my girlfriend was one of the first lost, but she wasn't eaten by zombies. She was a tough bitch and a little dry too. Also you have to realize that mike and I are men that have certain need s that have to be met. Needs that the current selection of women can't fulfill, but you on the other hand are clean and untainted by the green flu."

When I realized what it was that they wanted to do to me I flew into a full blind panic and, in an attempt to make him let go of me, I bit into Joe's hand as hard as I could. When my teeth broke the skin and the moment his blood touched my tongue my hunter broke free, and for the first time I didn't try to fight it. I "let go" and gave the hunter full control of my body. It was a decision that would haunt me for the rest of my life.

From the moment I let go all I could do was watch as my body seemed to move all on its own. I could hear Joe's screams and see the blood as my claws and teeth tore into his hand and arm, reducing them to nothing more than a bloody mangled mess of flesh and bone. In shock Joe released me and with my new found freedom I went after the first thing I saw, Mike. Before he could recover from the shock of seeing his partner attacked by what was supposed to be dinner, I had leapt and pinned him to the ground in much the same manner I had attacked the common back in the lab but with a few differences this time.

I had not managed to pin his arms so he was able to mount a rather pitiful defense, and this time I was not afraid to use my teeth. I could feel his warm blood covering my lips and neck as I continued to bite any piece of flesh that came close to my mouth, and rend any part of his exposed body my hands touched.

A sudden pressure on my left arm, right where my bandage was, caused me to whirl around and see none other than Joe. He had apparently recovered from the shock of his own attack and the subsequent loss of his left hand and fore arm, and had tried to exploit a weakness in me by grabbing at what he had thought was a fresh injury. As I turned and pinned him to the ground his hand tore away the bandage reveling smooth unmarked skin. Not even a scar remained to show that earlier that same day I had a large bloody gash in my arm.

For a second our eyes locked, mine filled with the predatory gaze of a natural born killer, his with the fear of someone who knows they are about to die and are looking into the very eyes of their killer. With his final words he asked in a voice full of terror, "What are you?"

In response I reached down and whispered, my lips brushing ever so slightly against his ear, "I'm…..something else." I then clamped my jaws around his neck, and in a swift and savage manner tore out his throat. It took only a few seconds for Joe to bleed out. His struggles becoming more and more feeble until they finally stopped, his face forever locked in a silent scream.

I had no time to savor my first real kill, however, when a bullet whizzed past my head close enough for me to feel the wind it created as it flew past my cheek. I turned to see Mike holding the hunting rifle that Joe had dropped when he grabbed my arm. The look of hate on his face turned to one of pure terror as the bullet hit the car behind me, and set its alarm off. When I heard the scream of the horde I decided it was time for me to leave. As I climbed the side of the nearest building I could hear Mike shouting obscenities at me as he, weakened from severe blood loss, was unable to escape the oncoming horde. When I reached the roof I perched on a corner and watched with a sort of grim satisfaction as Mike and Joe disappeared beneath a swarm of dozens if not hundreds of the grasping hands and tearing teeth of countless common infected.

I let loose another scream as loud as I possibly could claiming this city as mine and daring anyone, be they human or infected, to challenge me for it.

There you have it chapter number 4.

I just moved into my college dorm room yesterday so for the next few days I wont be able to do any writing, but after I get settled into a rhythm I should be able to make my updates a little more regular. Also iv decided to start writing a fan fic for Lord of the Rings so my writing time will be divided between this fic and that one.

Now comes the part where I beg you for reviews and ratings so yeah please R&R.

Until next time this is Seed245445 signing off.