Left 4 Dead: Gemini Strain.
Chapter XXIX: Through The Rain, Through The Shadows – Adam
"Latvia!
C'mon, keep up!" I yelled to her through the roar of the storm
and the torrent of its flow. Rain encompassed every part of our
being. Rain tore at our clothes. Rain attempted to drown us while we
made our way to the university. Rain made us lose our way.
I could barely hear her over the rain and the thunder even while she
was standing right beside me. Through the faint light from my gun I
could see her soaked self clutching an assault rifle awkwardly in one
hand and using the other to shield her eyes for a better view.
"Where are the others?" she said to me, almost entirely
muted by a stroke of thunder that lit up the sky.
I was
confused about what she said and gave her a look that expressed my
concern over her question. I looked around in an attempt to scout out
the rest of the group but succeeded in only gesticulating madly with
my flashlight and free hand like a fool. I received no signal from
Russ and that made me frightened.
"That is an
excellent question, Latvia...!" I replied to her. My light was
not bright enough to just beam around for a moving group of
people and knowing my luck the group I would find would turn out to
be Infected. There was one thing that we both agreed without words.
We had to get out of the rain.
I was attuned to her sudden
scream of terror as if it came from my own throat. I whipped around
to see her struggling against an Infected that had rushed her. It had
knocked her down to the wet pavement and was trying It's best to win
the struggle between the two.
I had to think quickly.
Shooting the Infected off of her could result in an incident of
friendly fire and so I opted for the next best option. I brought back
my foot and swung it for a swift kick to the head. My attack was not
strong enough to send the Infected far but it was enough to get It
off of her. The Infected gave an inhuman grunt of pain from the blow
as it collapsed to the asphalt in a heap. I wasted no time and shot
the Infected in the head once for death and then another for good
measure.
I bent down and grabbed Latvia's outstretched
hand, bracing myself to keep proper footing on the rain drenched
streets.
"You okay?" I yelled through the rain.
"Yeah, just a bit shaky. Thanks, Adam." she replied to me
as she picked up her dropped assault rifle and stood almost shoulder
to shoulder with me. It took me a moment to realize why she did such.
Once I registered the fast approaching figures in my meager light I
brought my SIG 226 up and ready to aim.
We backed up
steadily as we shot at the rush of Infected that came our way. I'm
not sure what led all of them to our position in the rain but we made
short work of them much to our relief.
"I can't see
anything that would be fortunate about this at all!" I yelled.
"Because there isn't one." she replied to me. "Look
around for signals or anyplace we can go."
I did not
need her to verbalize that to me but it made no difference in what I
was doing already. If anything I found one way too quickly.
"Look up there, Lat! Someone is giving a signal!" I yelled
to her pointing upwards not too far from our positions. In a window
there was a constant blinking of a light.
"Better make
it there then, it is our only option at the moment." She called
to me as we ran as fast as we could to the
building.
"This place looks blocked also..." Latvia said to me in a
slight murmur. She shifted her weight nervously and looked at me
with concern. I shrugged my shoulders with dismay and looked around
again for another route. Though we had not met many roadblocks per
say it still seemed that this office supply building was much larger
than it appeared.
"If anything we have to get to that
one room." I told her with a sigh that matched my shrug. If we
weren't so weighed down from the way that the rain soaked our
clothing we might have made more progress. Lucky for me my backpack
was waterproof so it wouldn't become heftier than normal.
We changed our path yet again to look for the stairs upwards. Since
the storm blacked out the area the elevator would not work. We had
very little argument though considering it was amazing that
electricity managed to still flow in a majority of the city.
"I wonder how the others are faring in this weather" Latvia
mentioned to me as strapped the rifle to her back and begun to wring
out her hair with a defeated look.
I stopped and turned
around to her digging in my cargo pants this time instead of my
backpack. I pulled out a handgun and handed it to her.
"Thanks, but what's the occasion?" she asked me with an
arched eyebrow
"More or less, firepower is awesome."
"Okay..." she did not seem too thrilled by my response but
held the gun in her hand with reassurance.
I noticed while
I was sweeping the room the stairwell up and mentally jumped with
excitement. Soon we would be able to see who was in the room giving
us the signal. I hoped that the others knew where they were going or
see ked refuge from the rain. We had the map, the medical supplies,
and the wits.
