(I DO NOT own The Walking Dead, Code Lyoko, or any of the names or brands that appear in this story. But I do own all OCs featured here unless stated otherwise.)
Several hours had passed by after the group lost William and Kiwi in the library. It took a long while for the five surviving Lyoko Warriors to make it out of that town...
It was getting close to dawn by the time the group found a new place to lay low for a while. They didn't feel comfortable trying their luck in another town or even anywhere that was indoors, not after what had happened, so they decided to stop at a high school's football field and rest on one of the rows of outdoor bleachers...
The group settled in. All five survivors were exhausted... they were hungry and thirsty... and they were all grieving...
For a while, no one said anything. They couldn't. Not after being forced to watch the mutilation of Kiwi and the death of a close friend...
God... just how was any of this happening? How could their whole world have turned upside down so quickly?
All the teens had a lot on their minds now, but they all shared a single thought - they should have already been in Atlanta by now, reunited with their friends, or, in the case of Aelita, Jeremie, and Yumi - family as well.
The Lyoko Warriors should have all been reunited by now, and they all should have been enjoying themselves for a night in one of the greatest cities of the South rather than struggling to survive against 'walking corpses' which murdered a friend...
Odd should have gotten his chance to gorge on the city's best food with Kiwi...
Jeremie and Aelita should have gotten their planned romantic walk through the city's botanical gardens...
Yumi and Ulrich should have gotten the opportunity to enjoy themselves at the Dojo they heard about in downtown...
And William... William should have gotten to live... him as well as Kiwi...
The sun started to rise behind some trees in the distance. None of the teens were coping well, and all felt a renewed sense of worry for all they cared about. Their families back in France, and their friends in Atlanta... at least they hoped they were still in Atlanta...
Ulrich was the one who eventually broke the silence.
"... we need to talk about what happened." Ulrich stated to the others as if what he said wasn't already obvious.
"What's there to talk about, Ulrich?" Aelita asked, her voice dripping with as much frustration as horror and sadness. "We all saw it... William's dead. Kiwi's dead. We lost two of our own today and who even knows if we've lost more in Atlanta..."
"They're alive..." Yumi frowned at her friend. She wouldn't dare entertain the thought of Hiroki becoming one of the 'walking corpses'...
"How do you know that?!" Jeremie suddenly snapped. "You saw everything that I and the others have seen, Yumi! Napalm strikes on kids! William dying!"
Yumi grit her teeth. "They're alive, Jeremie", she said with a glare to her friend, "them as well as my little brother!"
The only thing which was getting Yumi through this mess was the hope that Hiroki was still alive somewhere in Atlanta with the rest of their school. That he was safe in the city somewhere in the care of all the group's friends and fellow Lyoko Warriors...
She was going to find Hiroki and keep him safe. She promised her mother during their final phone call...
Jeremie and Yumi's bickering continued, with both Aelita and Ulrich joining in on it.
Odd, however, stayed silent. At least until...
Suddenly, the group silenced as they heard some loud banging next to them. They all turned to see Odd as he violently started to bash his fist against one of the bleacher rows. He was slamming his fist down so hard that it actually bent the metal...
"DAMN IT!!!" Odd exclaimed, tears rolling down the sides of his face. "DAMN IT, DAMN IT, DAMN IT, DAMN IT, DAMN IT!!!" he said with each hit of his fist.
Kiwi... William...
His friend... his precious pup who he loved with all his heart...
Both torn to pieces right in front of him... both dying in a slow agony... the wailing of Kiwi still fresh in his ears...
He couldn't save Kiwi... he couldn't save William... they both suffered so horribly...
Devastated, Odd fell against the bleacher and continued to sob as he mourned. He loved Kiwi like nothing else in the world... and now he was gone forever...
"Kiwi..." Odd sobbed so hard that his voice choked. "Oh god, Kiwi... why... why...?"
With tears rolling down the sides of his face, Odd reached into his pocket and pulled out Kiwi's dog collar which he had forgotten to put back on him. The little red collar which his mom bought for him on the day they adopted Kiwi. A small gold-colored metal plate attached to the collar had his name inscribed on it...
Allowing himself to fully give in to his loss, Odd sobbed to himself as he hugged the collar tightly against his chest...
As the four watched Odd release his sorrow, they could feel their own breaking through as well. It didn't take long for no one to suffer a dry eye...
Some time went by again before the group decided they had to keep moving once more, sorrowful or not, mourning for their friends or not. They couldn't afford to sit still for too long lest they end up like William and Kiwi...
And as if on cue, the teens all heard the all-too-familiar sound of growls and snarls come from nearby. One of the undead creatures had made its way out onto the football field from somewhere and was now stumbling its way toward them.
The hostile creature was both slow enough and also far enough away that it wasn't a threat to the teens... but given how they felt right now, they were even more upset and angry to see another one of those things now than they were before William and Kiwi died...
Without a single word, everyone gathered up their things once more and continued on west toward their destination, keeping their distance from the creature on the field...
Onwards to Atlanta... and prayers that they hadn't lost any other friends over there...
The group of five kept moving for hours. Eventually the sun had risen once again.
Exhausted, hungry, thirsty, the five Lyoko Warriors forced themselves to press on. They were all scared that they could be found and eaten alive like William and Kiwi...
As they walked, Yumi, Ulrich, Jeremie, and Aelita all occasionally glanced at Odd to check up on how he was doing. The poor boy was a mess, with bags of exhaustion under his eyes and a blank look of sadness on his face. He said no words since his outburst at the football field...
Odd kept himself going though. If only for the sake of his friends... his remaining friends...
To remember his dog, Odd settled on wearing Kiwi's collar as he would a wrist bracelet. It wasn't much, but it was all he had left to remember Kiwi aside from memories. And in a way, he supposed... he supposed Kiwi would always be with him wherever he goes.
The group walked for a long time, covering many miles down the road. They had no idea how much longer they could push themselves like this but they certainly wouldn't feel safe again until they were reunited with their friends in Atlanta...
The five only hoped they were all okay...
By now, the group was in the country some days walk east of Atlanta. Even out here they still didn't feel safe... not anymore...
After a while, the group spotted a couple of buildings on the side of the road. Ulrich suddenly held up his hand when he noticed what one of them was.
"Guys, stop." Ulrich suddenly said to the others.
"What's wrong?" Jeremie wondered with a sudden worry.
Rather than use words, Ulrich simply pointed down the street at the buildings.
One was a liquor store, now abandoned and boarded up with wood on its doors and windows - probably long before the pandemic began, given how old the building looked.
The other, however, was a gun store. The group could see even from a distance that it looked ransacked, with broken windows and a kicked-open front door.
From afar, the group could also make out the large weathered wooden sign hanging on the side of the building. Next to a Georgia state flag which was painted on the wood, the teens could make out the words reading: "Zach's Firearm and Military Surplus Emporium - FISHING, HUNTING, AMMO, GUNS! GUNS! GUNS!". Looked like the store had operated for many years before the virus hit.
Aelita, Jeremie, Yumi, and Odd were a bit taken aback in surprise by Ulrich pointing out the place. They already had a suspicion about why he did so...
"A gun store...?" Yumi blinked in surprise. She had seen two or three on the group's drives between New York and here, but there was no reason for them to ever stop at one.
"Yeah... a looted gun store," Ulrich corrected her, "but maybe there's still something we can find in there which can help us stay alive..."
Looting the pharmacy for medical supplies and the houses for an emergency radio was two things, but looting for guns...?
"You're serious, aren't you...?" Jeremie asked, wide-eyed from shock at the idea of shooting anything, even a 'walking corpse.'
"Think about it!" Ulrich told his friends, "we all know what we're up against out there! I don't like it either, but we need weapons... not some broken chair legs and lamps."
Yumi shook her head. "Ulrich, we can't start shooting at those things," she reasoned, "what if the government comes back and they have a cure ready to be dispensed to the 'walking corpses'? We'd be committing murder!"
"We saw them eat our friend alive!" Ulrich bluntly replied to her. "All I know aside from that is that if we have guns, it'll increase our chances of getting to Atlanta and finding our friends without all of us becoming corpse food like William and Kiwi!"
Realizing what he said at the end, Ulrich cringed and turned to Odd, finding that his best friend was glaring at him. 'Corpse food' definitely didn't set well with the boy who just saw his dog get eaten alive by the 'walking corpses'...
"... sorry, Odd." Ulrich apologized for his extremely poor choice in words. Aelita, Yumi, and Jeremie all awkwardly exchanged glances.
Odd simply didn't reply. Clearly the cone-haired teen wasn't happy about what he had just heard from his closest friend, much to Ulrich's own guilt. The last hours had made it a little hard for Ulrich to keep his words in check, or his feelings under control...
As Ulrich self-reflected and as Odd contained his feelings of anger and loss, Jeremie cleared his throat.
"I think Ulrich has a point, if I have to be honest..." Jeremie admitted to the others.
"A point?" Odd asked, his voice coming out icy and through tightly-gritted teeth.
Jeremie's eyes widened in alarm. "Not about the 'corpse food' thing... I meant about the gun thing..." he clarified, immediately easing his friend.
Once he saw Odd was calm, Jeremie continued on. "His point about us going into that store and taking some guns, if any's left, so we can keep ourselves safe for the rest of the way to Atlanta..." he told the others, "I'm not sure if we can make it the rest of the way there without any..."
Yumi threw up her hands. "This is insane!" she protested, "Do you hear yourselves?! We're talking about shooting people if they-"
"You and I both know that they're not people, Yumi... not anymore..." Ulrich interjected before she could finish. He had a sad look in his eye as he told her this.
The Japanese teen opened her mouth to say something, but she closed it a moment later. After everything she's seen so far... she realized couldn't disagree with Ulrich. Those creatures which they saw eating people weren't people themselves anymore...
Maybe the government will come with a cure.. maybe they will not... But either way, all of their lives were still very much in jeopardy until they can reach safety in Atlanta. It was only now that Yumi also finally realized they really would likely have to shoot some of those 'walking corpses' at some points to stay alive...
After another moment, Yumi gave a reluctant nod of submission. The group would need to find some guns. They would need to do whatever it takes to make it through this...
Alongside Yumi, Ulrich and Jeremie were both in agreement on the issue. Odd seemed to be as well, though he didn't make it vocal.
That just left-
"... Aelita?" Jeremie turned to face his pink-haired girlfriend, "what do you think? Should we go for some guns or should we try and keep going without them?"
"We won't do something like that unless we're unanimous, Princess..." Ulrich added to the agreement of Jeremie, Yumi, and Odd. Whatever they do, they do it together.
Aelita looked out to the gun store in the distance, then back at her boyfriend and friends. She crossed her arms and lowered her gaze, falling deep into thought.
"... after what happened last night, I think we should." Aelita told the others after a moment, "I don't wanna risk anything, not after William and Kiwi..."
The pinkette continued. "They want to murder and eat us, guys... I hate to say it, but I think it's us or them at this point." she reasoned, albeit with clear reluctance. "I don't want to shoot anyone, not even one of those 'walking corpses', but I'm not gonna get eaten or watch more of my friends get eaten... we're not going to die like that."
Aelita raised her head to look at her friends once again. They all saw that look of intense determination suddenly replace the fear in her eyes.
"I'm going to find my brothers in Atlanta," Aelita proclaimed to them all, "and we're all going to get through this mess one way or another..."
Yumi, Jeremie, Ulrich, and Odd all glanced at one another, all nodding after a moment.
The decision was unanimous then. These five Lyoko Warriors were going to arm themselves. God help them, they were going to arm themselves...
Although they agreed to do this, the group couldn't bury their feelings of reluctance as they made their way down the street toward the gun store...
After entering the building together, the five teens took a moment to glance at their new surroundings before separating to search for any kind of firearms they could take. Even only seconds after entering they could tell it wouldn't be a goldmine...
The whole store had been trashed and looted front and back, and there was no sign of the store owner. Nor anyone else for that matter. Several shelves and display cases which lined the store or the walls were broken or torn off their hangings. Countless shards of broken glass littered the floors, along with some large splotches of dark stains here and there which the teens could only pray wasn't blood. Even the cash register had practically been torn to shreds.
The teens felt a little unnerved by the sight of such destruction. Society really was collapsing all around them...
However, each of the Lyoko Warriors felt a sudden relief when they found that at least a few weapons had been left behind by prior looters...
Yumi spotted an all-black rifle hanging on a wall display - the only remaining rifle left in the whole store from what she could tell - so she went to check it out. She saw the price tag for this $800 dollar weapon and also saw the name of it as well, "Colt AR-15."
Out of curiosity, Yumi took the rifle from the wall display and held it in her arms. It didn't feel too heavy, maybe six or seven pounds at the most...
Yumi then got herself in a shooter's position to test how the rifle felt like that. It felt pretty well solid, and it felt perfectly level in her hands as she aimed down its sights. She knew very little about firearms but even she could tell that this seemed like an easy one for someone like her to use...
The teen decided to take the rifle, at least for now. It wasn't like there was any bladed fans in existence like the ones she used and mastered on Lyoko...
Yumi gathered up a few empty AR magazines, some fully-metal and some fully-plastic, from a shelf next to where the rifle was hanging and she stuffed them into her bag for loading with bullets later. Then, she read the engraving on the side of the rifle in the hopes that it would tell her what kind of bullets it would need.
Luckily, it did. "Five-five-six millimeter..." Yumi muttered to herself before she went to hunt for boxes of that kind of ammo. She also set about to find any kind of owner's manual so she could learn exactly how to use her new rifle...
As Yumi began searching the shelves for boxes of 5.56 millimeter rounds and a manual, Aelita stumbled on a display case which contained a few remaining handguns. One of the weapons, to her own amazement, had a grip which was colored pink...
After a moment of slight hesitation, Aelita went to open the display case and claim the gun for herself. In some twisted way, taking the gun into her hands slightly reminded her of what Jeremie had said to her when he bought her her very first cell phone during her first months out of Lyoko -"I thought pink would suit you."
The pink-gripped pistol which Aelita picked up was a small steel-colored nine-millimeter Beretta Px4, which an engraving on the slide told her was made in Italy. She had gotten a fair bit of firearm training over the last couple of years and also some knowledge in the use of firearms thanks to Dylan and Chase and Uncle David, the firearm aficionados that all three of them were. Americans...
To Aelita's good luck, the gun actually had an attachment. There was a small micro-optic mounted on the top of the frame. And conveniently, to Aelita's own surprise as well, she found an info card which said that the optic didn't rely on a battery, but rather absorbed sunlight to form a tiny red dot inside with which to aim. It made her curious...
"Hmm..." Aelita murmured in thought before curiously holding out the tiny solar array of the micro-optic into a beam of sunlight coming in from a window. Sure enough, the dot formed within the optic's lens just a few moments later, much to her own interest. It was a useful tool.
Aelita wasn't a master at shooting but she knew enough to use this thing at least, and the optic would help. And of course she also knew the most simple rule for any good gun owner anywhere in the world - "please for the love of God don't look down the barrel to check if the gun is loaded or not."
"Good weight..." Aelita muttered to herself in thought as she experimented with holding the weapon, appreciating that it didn't feel too light or too heavy in her hands. She hadn't fired it yet, but she felt optimistic that if she had to shoot then the weapon's firing wouldn't be too wild from a light weight or too clumsy from too much weight.
She'd rather not have to use the thing in general. But after everything she and her friends had experienced so far, it had clearly become a necessary evil to be armed...
The pinkette took one more look at the pink-gripped handgun before she began searching for magazines, nine-millimeter bullets, and a belt holster of some kind to go with the gun. There had to be some of that stuff laying around in this place somewhere, hopefully...
As Aelita looked around, Ulrich had found an unexpected weapon for a gun store - an authentic Japanese katana hanging as a decoration on the wall in the manager's office.
Initially, Ulrich simply blinked at the sight of the sword. He honestly felt a bit bewildered at having found a convenient weapon as he was already a master at using katanas thanks to countless hours training and battling XANA's monsters on Lyoko...
His shock quickly being replaced by excitement, Ulrich went to the katana and took both it and its accompanying sheath off the wall display. He briefly ran his finger along the blade's edge just to make sure that it wasn't just a decoration, and he was given his answer when he was left with a cut on his fingertip.
"Yeah, that's definitely sharp..." Ulrich thought to himself as he wiped the fresh blood from his fingertip off on his shirt. "Guess the thing really can help defend us against all of those 'walking corpses' out there if it comes to it..."
The teen then took a moment to further examine the weapon. The katana had a black-colored carbon steel blade with an all-black metal sheath, and red cord wrappings were interlaced on top of the weapon's white plastic handle. The black blade had a gold habaki which met at the black tsuba guard under it.
What really caught Ulrich's eye on the weapon, however, was the beautiful gold decorative engraving which ran about halfway up the blade. A golden vine with gold-colored cherry tree blossoms... a flower that was a national symbol of Japan and Japanese culture.
The weapon was something Ulrich was skilled with thanks to his time fighting and training on Lyoko, and as a bonus it reminded him of Yumi.
He'd be a moron to leave such a good sword behind. He was taking this freaking thing!
Ulrich took the red and black-striped sageo cord that was attached to the sheath and he tied it in a way that made the sword rest on his back rather than on his belt like it was intended to. From experience on Lyoko, he could reach a sword on his back much easier and much faster than one attached to his side.
After attaching his sword, Ulrich began looking around for anything else which he could find useful...
Odd, meanwhile, had found a weapon which matched his own personal uniqueness perfectly.
Laying on the carpeted floor in front of one of the shattered display cases of the more-expensive and more-unique weapons of the gun store, Odd nabbed himself a remaining reproduction model of an old Colt Army Model 1860 revolver. This was a kind of weapon which you would have seen being used by soldiers from way back in the American Civil War days, though Odd didn't know enough about American history to actually know this himself.
At first, Odd simply would've ditched the revolver since he remembered that guns back in the 1800s often had a reloading process which would take forever, which would be a very bad thing if he ever found himself cornered by any of the 'walking corpses' again. He didn't see any other guns in the display case or anywhere else on the floor though...
But much to his luck, Odd noticed an info card inside the display case which said that this reproduction revolver had been modified from the design of its original 1860s-era version to accept modern .44-caliber cartridges, and the revolver's old rammer-lever used to load the original pistol's paper cartridges was reduced to a mere decoration at that point. These modifications would certainly make reloading quicker and easier...
So, Odd decided to keep the thing. He admired the blue-black color of the barrel, the cylinder, and the trigger, along with the brass-colored frame and the mahogany-wooden grip he was holding onto. Or, rather, at least he thought it was mahogany.
In a simple curiosity to answer that question, Odd took the revolver grip up to his nostrils and inhaled deeply, instantly confirming his suspicion.
Yep... that was definitely mahogany-
"Odd, why on earth are you smelling that gun?"
The words of a very-confused-yet-very-amused Jeremie drew Odd out of his thoughts. And in embarrassment, Odd sheepishly hid his new revolver behind his back and tried to look as casual as he could in a situation as strange as this one.
"... I don't know what you're talking about, Einstein."
Jeremie knew what he saw Odd strangely do, but he was too tired and too focused on the task at hand to care anymore. So with a wave of his hand, Jeremie went back to looking around for a weapon of his own. But he did feel pretty happy to see Odd smile again...
Likewise, Odd just shrugged and went to look around for bullets and a holster for his new revolver... and maybe a cowboy hat and poncho if there was any laying around here somewhere. He might as well look the part, right?
It took only a few more minutes worth of searching - along with a slight cut to the forearm from reaching into a broken display case - but Jeremie found himself a gun that he could call his own, at least until the Wildfire Virus was cured.
The pistol that Jeremie found was an chrome-colored Ruger Mk IV Hunter, which an engraving on the frame said was a .22LR-calibered pistol. An info card inside the display case stated that the gun was designed both for target shooting and hunting, and that its small caliber meant that it trades power for accuracy.
Jeremie held the pistol in his hand for a moment before experimentally aiming it at a wall. After that, he took another close look at his new gun.
Unlike the guns that everyone found, with the exception of Aelita's, this pistol was modified. This Ruger which Jeremie found had a seven-inch long six-fluted barrel and a custom-made walnut-wooden grip with finger grooves which wrapped around the front. And, to his own surprise, he made out the detail of a small waving Confederate flag burnt into the wood on each side of the pistol grip.
The sight of the flags on each side made Jeremie deadpan in irritation. He was definitely in Georgia, for better or for worse...
... certainly for worse, actually, given the apocalypse unfolding around them nowadays ...
"... wow, I never took you to be one of those 'The South will rise again!' people, Jeremie."
Jeremie turned to see Odd was looking at him from close by... his expression exactly matching the amusement of Jeremie's from earlier. Karma, it seemed...
"... shut up." Jeremie murmured to his friend, causing the cone-haired boy to chuckle before resuming his own search for bullets and a holster.
With a sigh of annoyance at both his friend and at his new Confederate-flagged gun, Jeremie kept the weapon close to him and looked around for magazines and .22LR ammo to go with it. It'll do for now, he told himself, and afterward maybe he could find something less "controversial", to put it politely...
The five teens continued searching throughout the gun store for anything else they could use, but there was little else. A couple of half-melted energy bars in the powerless mini-fridge in the manager's office, mainly. The five split the bars among themselves.
After this "lunch", the five each loaded some magazines for their weapons. They each loaded one into their guns, and they stuffed the others into their pockets or waistbands for easy access later on. Then they picked up their bags and their newly-acquired weapons and left the gun store behind them...
If they were lucky, they just might make it to Atlanta alive now...
If they were even more lucky, they might find their friends alive somewhere in the city...
The five Lyoko Warriors desperately hoped for the best as they continued on down the road together...
"Oh God!"
Some hours had passed since the gun store, and as far as the teens could tell it seemed to be around noon. After another long stretch of walking, they came across another horrible scene of carnage on a highway overpass which they had to cross.
Aelita's exclamation of shock and horror summed up the shock of such a sight to pretty much all of the teens individually.
What greeted the teens now was a long traffic jam of burnt out and destroyed cars that seemed to stretch on ahead of them forever. Much to their horror, there was dozens of dead bodies littered everywhere, all of them burnt to a crisp. Just like the awful napalm strike they saw before...
"Oh no... oh no..." Ulrich whispered with disbelief at what he was seeing. The memories of the burning people were still too fresh in his mind...
"Just keep walking and try not to look at them too much..." Yumi murmured to him and the others. They've all already seen enough horrors...
Step by step, the five teens carefully began making their way down the blackened street full of corpses. The sight was unbearable... so was the stench of rotting flesh.
Not only was there burnt bodies laying all around them, the teens could make out many still in their vehicles. Some looked like they died while trying to escape from their burning cars. Others looked like they had died before they even realized what was happening.
Odd bit back a sob, as the disturbing sight of a burnt pup and a burnt girl cuddled against each other in the backseat of a car he passed by reminded him of Kiwi again...
Slowly but surely the teens made their way through the hellish scene, taking in all it had to offer. The things they were seeing at that moment were burned into their brains and unfortunately they would remember all of this for the rest of their lives...
But what else was new for the group at this point? The whole world was becoming more and more horrifying with every passing day, and it didn't look like it would change...
The group carefully stepped over any corpse that was in their path, and they carefully went around any vehicles in the way. A shredded and overturned American flag fluttered on a pole atop of a burnt pickup truck full of corpses. The group didn't like such grim symbolism...
This whole damn planet was falling apart all around them... How on earth were they going to survive all of this...?
"Ow!" Yumi cursed after accidentally tripping and falling over a detached car bumper. She earned a small cut to her palm thanks to some broken glass on the asphalt.
"Yumi!" Ulrich hurried over to his girlfriend's side to check on her.
The Japanese teen held up her hand to assure Ulrich and the others that she was fine. It was just a small cut she suffered, nothing that a Band-Aid couldn't fix. Ulrich quickly felt relieved.
Thankfully Jeremie managed to grab a bit of the medical supplies before they fled the library, so he promptly handed a bandage to Yumi and she had it placed on her cut in a moment. After another moment, she was back up on her feet and had her rifle in her hands once again, as if nothing had happened.
The group continued to walk. At about one-third of the way across the overpass they came across a half-burnt semi-truck trailer blocking the whole road horizontally. The cab of the truck was hanging off of the side of the overpass, with the corpse of the driver hanging out of its shattered front window...
Since they couldn't climb the trailer or go around it, the group had no choice but to go through it if they could.
With great care, the group approached the trailer's large side doors and unlatched them. Aelita and Odd aimed their guns at the door as Ulrich and Jeremie pushed them open together, as no one was sure what could be awaiting them from the inside.
Luckily for them, the trailer was empty. It took only a few moments for the teens to climb inside, open up the doors on the opposite side, and then climb back onto the road.
About halfway across the overpass, Aelita spotted something beginning to stir out of the corner of her eye. By the time she turned to look, one of the corpses on the road had already gotten back up on its feet...
Aelita's eyes widened. Another corpse began to stir... then another... and another... and another...
"Oh no- guys!" Aelita alerted the others, already reaching toward her new pistol and holster.
The other four turned in time to see half a dozen of the creatures already up, and already several more beginning to stir behind them. Before they could even think of running the rest of the way across the overpass to escape the creatures, they could see several more ahead of them beginning to stand upright.
The five teens were cut off from escape in moments...