Thank you all for your continued patience with these updates and with these reviews, it's the most I've gotten on any story I've written and I appreciate it a lot! Enjoy the chapter!
"Holy mother of God!"
The zombified bear charged at the twelve survivors with a roar that was slightly garbled by the flesh rotting around its throat. Most of the group scattered to get away from the raging beast with only Sarah and Jimmy not moving, the former only trying to get her best friend to move as he had slumped to his knees after voiding his stomach. Now he was looking at the beast running at him in a stunned silence as the bear drew closer...
"NOOOO!"
Ed suddenly ran in the direction of the pre-teens and tackled the bear with all his might, launching the beast away several feet. With a look of malice that stunned Eddy and Double D, Ed stared down the zombie bear with a Pulaski fireman's axe in his hand.
"That kid's got some balls..." Terry whistled in awe.
"Yeah..." May swooned, looking on at her "boyfriend" with heart-eyes.
"He does but we should help him before that thing rips 'em out!" Lenore added, as everyone's eyes went wide as the realization kicked in and they rushed to go help the brave young man.
Ed himself had blocked a swipe from the bear with his axe. Drawing back his weapon for a moment, Ed ducked the bear's next slash before driving his weapon right into the abdomen of the zombie. Ed couldn't help but gulp at his action as he never once dreamed of attacking an animal at all, but he also knew that it had to be done to protect his sister.
"Ed, get down!" Terry called out. Without even turning his head, Ed got down on his belly as he kept his eyes locked on his target. Lenore quickly brought out her shotgun and fired at the animal, hitting it dead on and causing it to stumble back a bit before the beast got back on all fours.
"Did that thing just take a shotgun blast to the face?!" Eddy's dad shouted in shock.
"I mean it kind of makes sense for a zombie bear to be tougher than a zombie pers-AHH!" Rachel began before the now zombified woman that was just mauled by the bear sprung up onto her and dug its claws into her right side.
"NOOO!" Terry screamed as he battered the zombie with a baseball bat.
Hearing the commotion, Ed wanted desperately to look back and see what happened but the animal in front of him demanded his attention with a roar and another swipe of its claws. Jumping back to avoid the attack, Ed was met with his fellow Eds standing at his side with Eddy arming himself with a meat cleaver and Double D hanging back a bit and taking shots with a 9mm pistol.
Using his smaller size and quicker speed, Eddy drew attention from the zombie bear away from Ed, making quick cuts all over the body of the beast while dodging its claws and fangs. Using the opportunity his best friend had given him, Ed made counterattacks whenever the bear failed to hit Eddy, turning the rather shallow cuts from the cleaver into large gashes. Despite the sheer amount of blood and ooze that had spilled from its body, the bear showed no signs of slowing down while the two boys were running out of breath.
"We can't just stand here, let's go girls!" Lee commanded as she, her sisters, and her mom ran into the fray. Mr. McGee dug into the bag on the side of his wheelchair and pulled out a first-aid kit, wheeling himself over to Rachel...
Lee took out a revolver from a holster on her hip and fired it, the rounds going into the abdomen of the bear. Marie and May leaped onto the bear's back and began hitting its head with a hammer and pipe respectively.
"Make 'im hold still!" Lenore called out, however the beast shook her daughters off of its back and turned to them with its paw raised. Before it could slash at them, Ed and Eddy attacked again, Eddy managing to get a deeper cut along the bear's back and Ed managing to completely sever one of its rear paws with his axe! Double D also fired another shot at the bear's head, taking off half of its right ear. The bear let out a roar of pain as it had been stunned from the loss of its body parts.
"Nice one!" The older woman praised as she ran in close and blasted the bear in the side of the head with her shotgun, completely eviscerating the entire right side of its head. Before any of the group could cheer or relax, the bear continued to move and swatted Lenore away with the back of its paw.
Jimmy, Marie, May and Sarah all let out shrieks of absolute horror at the sight of the still moving creature.
"Hey, kids!" Mr. McGee called out, grasping the attention of the two youngest survivors. "Think you can give me a hand here?"
With a gurgle, the undead bear began stumbling forwards, now much slower thanks to the loss of its rear paw. Double D's hands could not stop shaking as he continued to hold the pistol, firing a few more rounds, he hit the skull of the animal twice more while missing one shot due to the beast collapsing into the grass, finally still.
"Did we get him?!" Eddy asked.
Ed, Lee and Double D approached the bear slowly and carefully as the latter examined the wounds.
"I believe we have won this fight." Edd answered. "The blast from the shotgun created an opening into the skull of this bear and the last few shots from my pistol appear to have entered the brain struck the stem, effectively ceasing any mental and physical functions of this beast."
"So it's dead?" Marie asked.
"Effectively, yes. Or, rather, dead again." Edd sighed in relief. "I suppose this is what we should expect from our current situation."
The sounds of thumping got everyone's attention as they turned in its direction: Terry was still beating the corpse of the zombie woman that had struck Rachel. The zombie's head was completely smashed and the rest of its body looked broken as the man continued to beat it with tears streaming down his face.
"Terry." Mr. McGee called. "Terry! Son, it's done!"
The older man quickly wheeled himself over to his elder son and grabbed his arm, finally putting an end to his attack.
"It's over..."
"What happened to Rachel?!"
The two looked over to Sarah and Jimmy as they tended to Rachel, Terry hovered over the two, unsure of what to do next.
"How... how is she?" Terry asked, his mouth dry as he gulped in fear. He blamed that on the cold sweat he had found himself breaking into...
"She's breathing." Jimmy replied, voice still shaking. "I stopped the bleeding as best as I could, but one Urban Ranger can only do so much..."
The group all watched as Rachel's breathing became shallow. She tried clutching her side but Sarah stopped her...
"I don't think you should be touching that." The younger girl said, her voice just as shaky as Jimmy's. The sound of a helicopter and what sounded like cars coming down a nearby road were the next in line to get everyone's attention.
"Oh great, that's probably the army!" Eddy groaned.
"Then we must hurry!" Ed announced.
"Ed may be correct." Edd agreed. "They most certainly heard the commotion we caused and are likely to be hostile. We have to keep moving and find some sort of shelter. I'll take a look at what I can do to help Rachel in a safer and more sterile location!"
Terry carefully lifted up his girlfriend and looked at her for a moment.
"Be very careful with her." Double D stated, causing the older man to turn his head towards the teen. "I trust Jimmy did a serviceable job, but too much movement may aggravate the injury."
"Right..."
The twelve ran into the nearest set of trees away from the oncoming noise until the noise died down just a little bit. Terry almost stopped right in his tracks when he felt a hand gently touch his chest. As he looked down, he could see Rachel's sky blue eyes looking up at him with a smile.
"Babe, we're going to get you somewhere safe! You're gonna make it through this!" He said, the young woman tried to lean up and give him a kiss on the cheek before cringing and reaching for her wound.
"Don't push yourself. Just take it easy for a bit!"
With a sigh, Rachel rested her head on Terry's arm, even through his sleeve he could feel her head feeling rather warm.
"Guys... I think I see something up ahead!" Sarah called out. With a bit more energy in them all, the gang ran until they found what Sarah had seen.
'Welcome to Sundance!'
"Sundance, eh?" Lee pondered.
"Sounds like the name of some planet or city in one of Ed's comics." Eddy commented.
"Don't know too much about this part of the country, but I think we're in Wyoming." Lenore stated. "Don't quote me on that though, it's been over a decade since I've been in America."
"Alright, we should first try to find a safe place indoors so that I may check on Rachel's injuries. Hopefully we may also find another first-aid kit or other medical supplies."
"Aha, see, I told you I heard something!" An unfamiliar voice called out. The group turned to see two men around the age of the Eds to the right of everyone. The first was a rather plain looking guy wearing a simple set of blue jeans and brown shoes with a white t-shirt. The second boy was rather smug looking, he wore a green polo shirt with brown pants and green sneakers, a shark tooth necklace hung around his neck. A set of glasses sat upon his face, giving everyone a clear look at the boy's green eyes that somehow fit his deep brown hair.
"Alright, Ricardo, you made your point." The plain looking man groaned before addressing the gang. "Thankfully you folks don't look like zombies. But what the hell are you doing out in the open like this?"
"Please, we don't mean to cause any trouble." Double D began. "Through a series of rather unfortunate events, we've been forced to abandon our homes up North in Canada and have found ourselves struggling to survive here in the United States. One of our friends is injured, can you do anything to help us?"
Eddy was unsure if he could trust these two, a sentiment that his father and the Kanker family appeared to share with him given the looks they had on their faces. His brother probably would have felt the same way but he was understandably preoccupied.
"I don't know if we can trust these guys, Bob" The smug guy, Ricardo grumbled.
"Well if you don't like them, that must mean they're at least decent. Follow me." The plain man, Bob, scoffed in reply.
The two lead the gang of survivors throughout the streets of the town, which most of the group looked around in both wonder and a bit of fear. Had the world not gone to hell, the experience of visiting a completely new area would have been pleasant.
The group eventually stopped at a small market that had all its windows boarded up and the door completely barricaded. Instead, everyone was lead to the rear entrance of the building, which housed a locked garage gate for when the store used to receive incoming stock.
"Hey, it's us, we've found some people." Bob called out as he knocked on the gate. It took a few moments but the gate began to open until it was around halfway open. A girl with blonde hair wearing a blue shirt looked up at the group form under the gate.
"You serious?" She asked before getting a good look at everyone. "Dang! I figured everyone would have skipped town by now!"
The girl stepped back and pushed a button next to her to open the gate more, allowing everyone to step inside. The garage was small but serviceable, as there were four cots scattered around the room, a mini fridge, a generator, some guns, ammunition, and knives were also around the room. Terry hurried over to the nearest cot to place his girlfriend on, but Ricardo rushed in front of him.
"WOAH!" He admonished with a scowl. "That's my bed! You can put her somewhere else!"
"C'mon dude, she's got an injury!" Eddy complained, though the man stood firm with a cross of his arms. Terry scowled right back at the boy as he went over to another cot and placed Rachel on top of it.
"Ugh, ignore him." The girl groaned. "Ricardo's just a dick. I'm Stacey by the way."
As the group introduced themselves properly to the trio, Terry called Double D and Jimmy over to check on Rachel.
"How is she?" Terry asked. "Is she gonna be alright?"
Both boys checked on Rachel's injury before Double D proceeded to check on her general health.
"Well, physically speaking, a wound like this isn't fatal as it appears that no major organs were struck. However she appears to be running a fever. This means that her body is trying to stave off an infection, however our concern should be if this infection is one that is treatable."
"Is there anything we can do to stop the infection?" Terry asked, everyone hurried over to listen in on the conversation as the introductions appear to have finished.
"Well, we would need some antibiotics to help her body fight off the infection. Aside from that she would just need time and careful observation."
"Ok, so where can we get antibiotics?" Sarah asked.
"At the pharmacy, duh! Any lamebrain would know that!" Ricardo huffed. "The nearest one's a couple of blocks away."
"Hey! Don't talk to my baby sister like that, Mr. I-think-I-am-the-smartest-guy-ever!" Ed growled, stepping up to Ricardo, allowing everyone to see how much Ed towered over him by a good eight inches.
"What are you gonna do about it, tough guy?"
"Hey, if you're gonna fight with him, then you gotta fight with me!" May exclaimed as she went right up to Ed's side, leaving the tall boy with an almost dumbfounded look on his face that Ricardo couldn't help but smirk at.
"Psh, whatever!" The shorter boy said as he backed up a bit. "I don't need to waste time arguing with a guy who has his girlfriend fight his battles for him."
"Girlfriend?" Ed repeated, he looked at May, who looked back at him for just a moment with a blush on her face before she returned her gaze towards Ricardo.
"Enough!" Terry bellowed. "My girlfriend is in trouble and I'm going out there to get what she needs. I'm gonna need help getting this stuff so I'll need a few hands."
"You might want to check some other places too. There are some other shops around this place that sell medicine, even some herbal ones that could help." Stacey added.
"What about transportation?" Lee piped up. "We're looking for something like an RV or a van."
"Then you're probably gonna want to check the used car shop that's about a half mile west. I can show you where it is, but that means we won't have anyone left here from our group to watch over your friends here. No offense, but we're not sure if we can exactly trust you with our stuff."
"Then can't Mr. Nice Guy here stay and you two come with us?" Marie asked.
"I have a name you know..." Ricardo complained, though his words fell on deaf ears.
"Cool. We'll split up into groups then. I'll go with my brother and the boys here." Eddy stated, placing his hands around his fellow Eds. "Together we'll get Rachel her meds."
"Actually Eddy, I will not be joining you this time. Rachel needs careful medical observation and attention, so it's best if I stay behind and make sure she recuperates properly. Jimmy, I may need your assistance as well."
"Um, sure." The timid boy nodded.
"So I guess we're going to see if we can find a ride?" May asked.
"Looks like it." Lenore said. "Might be smarter if I stay behind too. Having a bunch of kids fending for themselves and watching over a sick person ain't exactly safe. Don't get me wrong, you're all tough for making it this far, but sometimes the adults have to take responsibility."
"I guess you got a point." Bob stated, the others agreed either physically or verbally, with one exception...
"Wait, so you're really going to leave me alone with a bunch of strangers and then agree to help them out on a whim just because one of them looks sick?!" Ricardo practically screamed.
"Yup." Stacey replied, with her and Bob each grabbing a rather large backpack that seemed full... "See ya."
The majority of the group followed the two locals out of the garage, leaving Ricardo alone with Sarah, Jimmy, Double D, Lenore, and the now unconscious Rachel.
"Terrific... The hell am I gonna do now..."
"Well Mr. Grumpy, if you really want to do something you can help us treat our patient here!" Jimmy chided.
"Don't get smart with me, kid!"
The boys followed Bob as he lead them through the streets of the town. Keeping track of their location relative to the garage and making sure to keep a close eye on their new ally.
"Hey, so if you don't mind me asking, one of those girls back there said that you're looking for an RV. Why's that?" Their guide asked. Eddy gulped for a moment unsure if he should tell this guy of the safe haven. On one hand, him joining the group could provide extra security, but on the other hand, they met Bob and his gang not even two hours ago, at least with the group from Lemon Brook there was at least the fact that they lived in neighboring towns that had a fairly similar to think quickly left Eddy with few options, so he went with the one he was most familiar with, another question.
"Well, why do you have a backpack full of stuff? Aren't we just going to get a few things?"
The two locked eyes for what felt like an eternity before Bob broke the silence.
"Heh, you got a spine. Honestly I think that's good to have with how the world's going. Look, you've seen that Ricardo is an asshole. Stacey and I have had to put up with him for days on end. So we decided to say fuck that and hightail it out of here. Let the guy fend for himself. We brought everything we need to survive on our own; medical supplies, books about wildlife and wild fruits and veggies so we can go foraging, camping gear, weapons for self-defense, and so on. Is leaving him by himself a dick move? Sure. But the guy nearly fought your friend here and is all around unpleasant. I just want some peace." The boy explained, the men that stood before him all nodded in agreement.
"The kid definitely needs to learn some respect." Mr. McGee commented.
"As for my question, you don't have to answer if you don't want to. But I don't think an RV, van, bus, or whatever you guys are looking for is going to get you guys through this hell."
"Don't worry about us." Terry assured. "We know it's not going to be our safe haven, but it's the best thing he have as a plan right now."
"Well, at least you guys have a plan, I'll give you points for that. Come on, we're almost there."
As the men continued on, the sounds of gurgling could be heard further ahead on their route. As they ducked into a nearby alley and crouched to both remain hidden and reduce as much noise as possible, Bob took out a pair of binoculars to see the source of the sounds.
"Oh that's perfect..." He grumbled.
"What do you see?" Ed asked.
"There's a couple of zombies right outside the pharmacy, don't really think there's another one here for a couple miles."
"But we can't go back empty handed, I'm not letting my girlfriend die or become one of those freaks!" Terry replied, doing his best to control his volume. Before anyone could say more, the sounds of heavy stomps and neighing trailed from the road behind them.
"Oh crap, more of those horse-riding fuckers!" Bob cursed.
"Horse riders?" Ed questioned.
"Yeah, these guys that all dress in brown coats and animal skins like some kind of cult."
"Marauders." Eddy hissed.
"Is that what they're called? Fun..." Bob sighed in response. "So we can take our chances with the zombies, potentially getting the attention of these Marauder freaks. Or, we can hang back and see what these mountain men do, leaving lover-boy to panic more about his girlfriend."
The Peach Creek survivors all took glances at each other, unsure of the choice they had to make...
What should the group do?
Make your choice:
Choice A: Fight the zombies and risk facing the Marauders as well
Choice B: Hang back and see what happens, potentially risking Rachel's life
Several military humvees pulled up to the clearing where the gang encountered the zombie bear with various soldiers and other military personnel stepping out of their vehicles and approaching the two corpses that continued to rot.
"Mr. Vice President, sir." One of the soldiers began, speaking into a radio he took out from a chest pocket on his uniform. This man was fairly muscular but he towered above his fellow soldiers in both height and rank, as shown by the various badges and bars on his uniform. "We have evidence of this outbreak affecting animals as the scientists stated. Based on field evidence we've gathered, at least one of the kids of those scientists may be in the area."
"Good. I'm in the process of communicating with the Canadian Prime Minister. Those kids are Canadian citizens but if we play our cards right, we might expand our operation into Canada as well." Russ replied, even though the soldier couldn't see his face, even he could feel the man's smug grin on the other end.
"What's our next objective, sir?"
"Find the two kids. They're super-geniuses, despite their age. Based on their files one should be a skinny boy with a black beanie, other one is a girl with thick red glasses. They should stick out in whatever crowd they're traveling with. We need them alive but expect resistance from those they're with, you are clear to take them out."
"Acknowledged."
"You are among my most competent men General Shirley, I'm sure you won't fail me. General Dobson has also notified me that this ragtag bunch of kids may have split up, if this is the case then he'll be observing this second group. Regardless, I expect you both to complete your objective by any means available."
The soldier, Shirley, grimaced at the name of his associate.
"Check, over and out." Shirley replied before putting his radio away.
Looking back at some of the previous chapters, I do plan on trying to fix a few things for the chapters to come as well as include a bit more character development. Once again I do want to thank you all for reading the story thus far. Even aside from the choices in this story I'd love some feedback on the story itself, it's definitely not perfect, but I do want to improve the story for the chapters to come.