Warning: (bloody) violence ahead

Chapter 10: Kristoff

Cities were a bad idea. Like, really bad. So unbelievably bad, he couldn't even fathom reasons good enough to go venturing into one. Kristoff knew that now. Too bad "now" was a little too late. 'Cause here he was, smack in the middle of Detroit, Michigan, of all places, right on the Canadian/US border.

"Wahaha!" he let out a panicked yelp as he stumbled.

Notgoodnotgoodreallyrealllynotgood.

He was booking it. Sprinting as fast as he could, right down the middle of a wide, city street, cluttered with empty cars. Thankfully, the cars weren't packed too close together, leaving enough room for him to sprint in the space between the lanes.

The reason for said sprinting was the pack of fifteen or so infected, brain-dead, dead-beats on his tail, chasing him right down the middle of the city. It'd been an accident, really. Just one massive misunderstanding. A misunderstanding that looked like it would cost him his life.

How was he to know that big cities equaled death? How on Earth could he have guessed that, though from a distance it looked totally deserted, Detroit was actually filled to the brim with those dead-beat infected bastards? Who could've possibly told him that the reason the city looked so empty at first was because the dead-beats wandering around it were simply hiding. They were all grouped up together, hiding out together in packs in deserted stores and in sewers and back alleyways. They were waiting. Waiting for some witless wonder to come stumbling upon them so they could take them down and have them as a happy meal.

Unfortunately, Kristoff seemed to be that witless wonder. And now said witless wonder was running for his life down some random street, crowded with cars. Thank heavens he left Sven on the outskirts of town. The massive oaf wouldn't have been able to maneuver between the cars as easily, and that would've been the end for both of them.

The plan had been simple. Get in, find supplies, find Sven, get out. Kristoff wasn't familiar with big cities, however. Being raised on the other side of the Canadian/US border, he'd never had much experience with them. Meaning, he failed to deduce that a large population in such a small space meant that the virus had spread faster, leaving less time for people to get out. So what did that create? Entire cities of dead-beats. And with a population of over seven-hundred-thousand, Detroit had turned into one of the biggest dead-beat cities in North America. Fortunately, cities were known to be complicated, with labyrinths of crisscrossing streets, filled with dead cars. It didn't take Kristoff long to loose the hoard of cannibals on his tail. He managed to shake them by weaving in and out of the maze of abandoned cars, as well as cleaver maneuvering through city streets and back alleyways. In less than twenty minutes, he could slow down to a normal pace again, this time treading slowly through the city's inner workings so as to not accidentally stumble upon another camp-out of mindless zombies.

This also meant that he was now lost. He'd lost track of what turns he'd been taking in his panic to escape the ever encroaching hoard of walking dead behind him. He had no clue which direction he'd left Sven in, and he certainly had no idea how to get out of the city.

Any map he picked up proved more confusing than helpful, especially since a lot of the street signs had gone missing in the massive onslaught of the HSE virus.

Kristoff had been wandering around Detroit for what he guessed was close to five hours (in actuality it was closer to seven), treading cautious now to avoid any more hoards of dead-beats, the careful maneuvering considerably slowing his progress. The sun had hit its high point in the sky and had already started to make its way down towards the horizon. If only Kristoff could remember what direction the sun set in (North, East, West, or South), he could orient himself and find his way back to Sven.

Unfortunately, though he'd managed to find some bottled water and food to keep him going, Kristoff had still been walking who knew how far out in the sun for seven hours, causing his body to heat up to dangerous temperatures and leaving him too exhausted and tired to keep East separate from West.

Kristoff was picking his way through a pile of garbage clogging up a small alleyway, doing his best to keep quiet and under the dead-beats' radar while staying out of the sun as he made his way towards the opposite side of the city he'd left Sven at, when he heard a commotion. It didn't sound like the kind of noises the dead-beats made. The infected usually made shuffling, incoherent noises with their rotting limbs and throats. On occasion, they would even scream this piercing, high-pitched sound that was the most inhuman thing Kristoff had ever heard.

But the noises ahead sounded like voices.

The infected also couldn't talk. At least, not like the living could. Which meant, there were people nearby. People who might have a clue on how to get out of this damned city.

Kristoff decided to pick up his pace, quickly shifting through the alley garbage to the other side before he could loose the sound of living people. Kristoff managed his way down a couple of streets and alleyways, surprised by how far the voices seemed to be. He realized though that he shouldn't have been all that surprised. The city was empty, after all. No cars, no electricity, no people, no construction cites. Everything that would've once made noise was now a distant memory, leaving way for an eerily quiet city that allowed voices to carry three times as far as they'd once done.

As Kristoff neared the voices, he noticed something off about them. It didn't sound like a normal conversation. Not a civilized one, at least. Instead, it sounded like the voices were arguing. He could pick out that one was high pitched, the other angry and low. Concern quickened Kristoff's pace and soon, he came to another alleyway.

At the far end of the alley, he saw a a girl with braided pigtails and a megenta hat run into view. Not long to follow was a man with a long stride and a furious face.

"Get back here, you whore!" His words cut at the girl.

The girl had run into a dead end. She was face to face with a wall with a bus blocking her path to her left and Kristoff's alleyway somewhat obscured by more garbage. She turned to face the man, who was on top of her in seconds, slamming her against the wall, and gripping her wrist hard enough to bruise it. She let out a yelp of pain.

Kristoff's heart leapt as his thoughts caught fire. As the man slapped the girl, it was obvious what was about to happen and Kristoff would be damned if he let it.

"Hey—hmmmf!"

He'd been about to move forward to leap over the low wall of trash at the base of the alleyway when arms wrapped around him from behind, a hand clamping over his mouth. There was a small zip!ing noise and he felt a zip tie press into his wrists. He felt as the sharp edge of a blade was pressed against his throat.

A "shhhhhhh" came from behind him.

Kristoff strained as he slid his gaze to peer out the corner of his eyes as his heart pounded in his throat. Whoever was holding him was strong. Not so strong that he couldn't break free if he wanted to, but the knife pressed against his throat cut off any ideas of that happening.

He managed to catch a glimpse of his attacker's face, which was pulled close to his own. It was a girl. She couldn't have been too tall from the way she was restraining him. She had small, brown eyes, a round face and blonde hair shorn so short that it stuck up everywhere.

She slid her gaze to look back at Kristoff, a small smile playing on her lips. She gave a tiny nod of her head towards the girl and the man at the end of the alleyway, as if to say "Just watch."

Kristoff's chest seized, his mind stuttering. Just watch?! How could this girl just let this happen and force him to watch. He felt like he was going to be sick.

The girl jerked his head with the hand she still had firmly clamped over his mouth to turn him back towards the scene at the end of the alley. The redhead was crying as the man hit her again. Kristoff jerked forward as the blonde-haired girl held him back. He couldn't let this happen. He couldn't just sit by and watch.

And then, a battle cry sounded out from above. A shrieking yodel that was somewhere between dead-beat and human.

The man at the end of the alley pulled away form the redhead as he looked up in surprise. That was the wrong move.

Some sort of warrior princess dropped out of nowhere, bringing a massive battle axe with her, held above her head and letting it swing down with the momentum of her fall, like something from an epic roman war movie.

Slink!

Kristoff's eyes widened in horror as the man's head fell from his body to roll along the alleyway floor, blood spilling everywhere, the axe having done its job.

Kristoff suddenly felt a pressure on his back pushing him forward. His feet backpedaled. When he'd been fighting to move forward, moments before, now he was trying to stay the hell away from this psycho with the axe. The blonde-haired girl proved insistent and forced him forward, over the wall of trash and out of the alleyway where the girl with the axe was now talking to the girl with the braids.

"Geez, Astrid, took you long enough," the redhead said, brushing off some gravel from her teal shorts.

"Yeah, sorry about that, Anna," the other girl said. She was dirty blonde, with one thick braid, choppy bangs, and a headhband. "Mishap on the roof. Anyways, Sandy was supposed to be back-up—"

With one last push the short-haired blonde shoved Kristoff forward, making him stumble to the his knees in the middle of the two girls.

The redhead let out a gasp as she stepped back.

He looked up to find the blonde one with the braid standing over him, steely blue eyes on fire with blood still splattered across her face, the image of some demon straight from hell.

"Sandy?" she asked Kristoff's attacker as she came around to stand beside the blonde with the braid and the bangs. There was a woosh! and a razor sharp axe was suddenly in Kristoff's face. "Who the fuck is this?"

Kristoff swallowed as he looked at the blade, still slathered in blood and less than an inch from his face. Yup. Cities were definitely a bad idea.

A/N: So, yeah, tried to clear up who was who in this end bit a little better. Hopefully, it worked...? (p.s. yes, I genderbent Sandy (the Sandman) but i have reasons, I promise. Mostly, it was really the only place I could fit him in, plus I really needed this role filled, and he was really the only one that could do it, but he needed to be a girl to hang with this gang because of...reasons...*spoilers* don't hate me D:)