Chapter Summary
- RECONNAISSANCE
Well, that was a rivalling experience. Freakazoid had a freak-out, no pun intended, and now a real-life bogeyman is somewhere loose in the city. Can't say any of this would be a piece of cake when I signed up for this. But it's as loud as a Screamer. Should be easy to find him. - Jack
THIRTEEN: BREADCRUMBS
Someone had to have come across the Weeping Man. With how loud that thing was, it should be simple to locate it again. That was why Jack returned to the Junction. A place where words fell on anyone's ear.
"Jack," Mahir called from the control room, this time, taking a seat rather than standing by the map table. He attempted to climb up but quickly dropped back before his bottom could leave the chair's surface. All because of the rickety-busted leg. "Got word from Babak you took care of their problem."
"Not exactly. The problem ran away from us."
"Us? Oh, the new guy. Siv told us about him."
Good. That cleared some hurdles for the conversation.
"I came back hoping someone would have heard a wailing zombie."
"A Screamer?" Mahir arched forward attentively in his seat.
"This is a lot bigger than your average anklebiter."
Mahir frowned. "First the Day Hunter. Now you're telling me there's another type… Quasim has his work cut out for him."
"Quasim?"
"He's one of our gunmen, an expert trapper. We've been talking about setting up a bounty board since we've been hearing all sorts of stories about this...Day Hunter."
Uh oh.
"What kind of stories?" Jake pried, keeping a straight face.
"Heard that the prisoners got attacked twice just recently. Single-handedly too. And these are Alexander's men."
"Now that's a little exaggerated. One infected?" In fact, Jack felt a little insulted. She did some of the brute work there.
"Honestly, it's good that we can get them off our backs. But...it's concerning that a gang of crooks couldn't handle one infected." Mahir leaned against the table for stability over his busted prosthetic leg. "We shouldn't leave it alone if this thing goes after one of our own."
"I doubt that would happen," she said confidently. "The Junction is well protected. Who would want to waltz in."
And neither would Freakazoid try, for that matter.
"Hm," The leader absorbed the sentimentality calmly, but it looked as if it was a bit too eccentric to accept it. "Siv has told the runners to be extra cautious in the day but… I already don't like the idea that there might be more than one."
"You could be right about that." Now that, she couldn't defend her freaky compadre—not with what they witnessed down in the sewers. If there were more, then surely the city would be talking up a storm.
Wonderful in her case. Not so for Freakazoid if he'd become the main target.
"The quicker we stem this problem, the better."
"Hunt the Day Hunter." Swell. "Isn't that a little dangerous?"
"As long as you listen to Quasim. Something tells me, it's not gonna be a challenge for you."
"Of course. Sign me up for bounties," she sang. Not entirely for the challenge. If she could get these bounties beforehand, perhaps she could divert the attention away from Freakazoid. Though, how long could she do so for her client?
She could always...say she knew who the Day Hunter was. That the Day Hunter was an intelligent being capable of human thought and voice.
No. It wouldn't work.
She'd hold off the truth for the time being.
"Board's downstairs at the back. We've gotten a few sightings, but folks here thought it was a good idea to put up their appeals too."
That didn't seem like an issue. Jack exited the command room with a spin on her heel and hurried about the Junction.
Bounty Board. Bounty Board. Ah. There it is.
Jack eventually found what she thought was a bulletin board, where Mahir said it would be, outside another office.
"That's...a lot of posts."
And like Mahir said, there were desperate requests. Few were sightings of infected, half-buried under colorful sticky notes. But the rest were full-A4 pages taped or stapled to the corkboard. With photos of faces.
Missing people.
"A real sight, huh."
She glanced to see the little princess strolling up the board. Not at all fazed, or perhaps because the young girl kept a poker face as she leaned against it, arms folded.
"Just up this morning, and already, it's full," Siv pointed. "The junk ones will have to go."
"Can't really do much if these people went missing from the start."
"Those are...actually recent." Siv's frontal stance loosened, prompting her to put her hands in her pockets.
Jack's eyes flashed with shock behind the shades. For a second, back to the board.
"Started around two weeks or so… Even the scouts we sent out went missing."
Jack counted sixteen, then she saw four more. Twenty people, gone missing in a short amount of time? Anyone would say it was the outbreak; it took lives after all.
"…Noam's saying it's some military conspiracy," Siv continued. "Others are blaming it on this cultist group."
"Cult?"
"Yeah. You haven't heard?" Clearly on the brunette's face, no, she hadn't. "It's some kind of freaky group that's been going around. Ya know. Doing cult shit."
Jack wouldn't know, and frankly, anything zealous wasn't something she would want to know.
Siv watched the brunette ponder. Surprised to receive the next question from her.
"And you think they're responsible for these disappearances?"
"I...don't know. Nobody's seen them. Just the stuff they left lying around. Candles. Symbols." Siv's gaze drifted to the floor before moving up to the board with a confused and frustrated look. "It's not like these people got up and walked away. They vanished."
"Sounds like you know from experience."
"...Had a runner disappear on me. Last week..." The little bite on the lip? Jack could spot it despite the little princess doing her best to avert her eyes.
Guilt. Not an uncommon badge she was wearing, plastered on anyone's chest so heavily. Siv must have turned away for a second and looked back for one of her friends to go missing.
The acknowledgement that the person was dead by now could be read in the air.
"If not them, any ideas what could have taken these people?" Jack asked, wanting her honest opinion.
"The damn infected, that's what."
Siv was about to speak but a gruff voice cut her off. Two new faces interrupted the ladies' little circle—to Jack only. From Siv's distaste, it was clear these folks weren't one she wouldn't want to make friends with.
A scrawny one. A pudgy one. Other details? Jack didn't care to note down. First impressions already screamed at her they were the kind who 'barked more than their bite'.
"Anyone with half a brain can tell you that."
"I can't deny that possibility," Jack mumbled. "But even so, there should still be bodies."
"Where have you been, lady? Look around you. It's that easy to lose anyone at any time," said the scrawny man.
"Oh really?" Siv spat. "Where were you when Peri went missing?"
"You're still holding that on me? I couldn't do anything. She was gone before I knew it."
"A likely story."
"I've told you again and again. She went to the Mines. That's their hunting grounds."
"Whose hunting grounds?" Jack asked.
"The Firebrand. They're behind the disappearances."
A name. But it didn't give much credibility.
"Hm-hm... We have GRE and escaped prisoners running the city." Jack spoke up. "And you're gonna pin these disappearances on a cult."
"Doesn't matter who or what took them. Keeping the Junction safe is our number one priority."
The hoarse voice interrupted the conversation. It almost lashed the two men to stand ten-hut.
Walking into the circle was a man around Jack's age. What stuck him out from the residents of the Junction were the tools he carried, along with the crossbow. A trained hunter—and not the kind like a safari hunter wearing that goofy movie outfit and holding an elephant gun. From his stance along, Jack could tell he has killed enough infected to know how to take care of them.
The crafted armor pieces he carried, the military vest and layered clothing he wore explained the lengths of his experience to her.
"Who's this?" Came the hoarse voice.
"Brecken. I'm the specialist Mahir hired," Jack introduced.
All she got was a 'hmph'. The man simply sat down on a bench and started wearing a piece on his right arm. Readying up for another hunt.
"Board's not for public messages. Take it up to the quartermaster instead," he remarked.
"I'm here for the bounties."
"You?" said the plump thug. The expert trapper showed no sign of response and continued tightening up the arm piece.
"I'm looking for one in particular. One Day Hunter."
A low chuckle. Actually creepy enough to make Siv step behind Jack. After he finished strapping the second arm piece on, the trapper rose up from his seat and eyed at the brunette.
"Brecken. A kickboxer, right?" he continued from the introduction. "Quasim."
"Junction's residential trapper. Making a name around here?"
The man remained stiff. Cold to words of affection. "I heard you were the first who saw this Day Hunter."
"Siv saw it too." She pointed a thumb at Siv, who gave a nervous nod to vouch for the ex-kickboxer.
"What reason do you have to go after that thing?"
"Do I need a reason?" Jack droned.
"Then you're mad."
"I get that a lot," she chimed. "What about you? Not everyone is willing to go chase the infected."
"Because nobody will. Mahir's too careful to send men out to deal with it and everyone else can't even hold a weapon properly."
"You-" Siv bit down on her words, but her knuckles turned white. That jab could mean anyone in the Junction but if anything, it was aimed at the runners. Her teammates.
"It's the harsh truth, girl," Quasim scoffed. "It's all lost causes now."
The insensitive remark rubbed Siv the wrong way to the point of grounding her teeth, no matter if the man's intent was to have her see eye to eye.
"The one good thing their corpses are for is being food."
Unbelievable! There was so much Siv wanted to do. Yell at him. Punch him. It didn't help how quiet Jack stood, absorbing the nonsense spewing out of his mouth.
"Some of those people are your own trappers!" Siv finally burst out, not as loud as she had hoped. But it was a one-sided match she knew—past arguments ended up that way.
"They knew the risk. Something you runners don't seem to understand," Quasim pointed. "Thanks to them, we lost a Safe Zone."
Siv stepped forth, ready to give him a one-two! How dare he talked about Orhan and Fazil! But what stopped her from exploding, at least trying to win this match this one, stepped forth the brunette faster than her.
"So you're not mad. You're being practical," Jack spoke up. "Almost righteously so."
That managed to stir something out of the expert trapper. Eyes narrowed and frown deepened—he didn't like where this was going.
"I'm doing what's needed for the Junction. A Special can break in and slaughters everyone if we're not careful."
"Oh, do simmer down," Jack continued to defuse the tension. "We have the same goal. As long as we work together, nothing of the sort will happen."
"You're a newcomer." The glare darkened. One, two more steps and Quasim closed the gap between them. "You don't know what happened here."
"I imagine it happened the same way as it did back in the Outskirts."
"And here you are. Far from Harran," Quasim started off with a threatening tone. "You might have gotten Mahir and everyone around your finger. But word of caution. Nobody has time to sit down and listen to your little stories."
Jack snorted. What a generous way of telling her to calm her shit down. Labeling her as one of many problems for the Junction.
"I'm not here to make enemies. So don't go tempting me. Mate." Her smile never went away. But the words did give a number of chills to Siv and Quasim's men.
A wild dog against a skilled trapper. Her grin looked as dangerous as a bite to the neck.
With that, a break occurred. Quasim lifted up a piece of paper, torn off the board minutes ago. Normality came back.
The bounty for the Day Hunter.
"Brilliant. I'll take that off your hands."
Quasim pulled the note away from Jack's swinging grasp. "This isn't a job for a woman."
"Really? You're gonna pull that card out?" The brunette's face hid behind the shades but the sheer thought basically pissed Siv off.
"Yeah, yeah. You're a big-shot kickboxer," one of the goons interrupted. "'Ex'-kickboxer."
"Punching freaks isn't going to put them down, miss," Quasim continued, jabbing his 'courtesy' as a means of belittling her further.
Jack hummed. "Yet here I am." Arms held wide up. "I can always demonstrate my skill if you think I'm washed up."
That zipped the lips out of the two lackeys so tightly. And that made the Cheshire smile on her face stretch a tab wider.
The only one who was unmoved was Quasim.
"I've been hearing this one rumor lately," he suddenly started off on another track in the conversation. "About this Day Hunter being seen with a woman in red."
"That's news to me."
Quasim's eyes were suddenly fixated on Jack. No, on something she had. Without a care that he should have asked permission, he draped a limb of his crossbow at her flashy red jacket's folds. Right at where her heart was.
"That jacket of yours is very noticeable..."
She was about to say: anyone can wear red, even the dead-
"Well, duh. She's been after that freak this whole time."
Jack frowned. The shades covered the shock in her eyes. Ok. When did this stage get taken by the lil' princess? Didn't help that Siv's eyes were filled with admiration. Acknowledgement. Above all, annoyance.
"She's been wanting payback since we saw that freak," Siv exclaimed.
"That's...one way to put it," Jack droned. But her usual snarky cheer barely hung on her words.
"Payback," Quasim repeated. "Sounds like you got more than what you hoped for."
"And you can do better?" Jack frowned again before she could speak, eyes much wider. Boy, did Siv talk like a certain lad she knew. Just for this one part. "Mad Jack went up close and personal and beat the living shit out of that thing!"
Ok, exaggerated much? The fight she had with Freakazoid didn't end with a knockout for him. But Jack couldn't stop Siv's loudmouth, even if she tried.
"Hah!" the third guy bellowed. "I bet you bolted with your tails between your legs. You're just runners after all."
Siv's face scrunched up. "At least she's got more balls fighting the infected than you did Downtown!"
"You little-!"
An armored hand pulled the scrawny thug back by the shoulder. Not because Quasim wanted to put his men in their place, but to save him from a good hook Jack had prepared when she stood in front of Siv as her shield.
For any outsider, they would have thought how nicely knit the Junction was. Not the case, and frankly, Jack had already spied some of the cracks on the surface. The stress, the seeping anger and the contagious despair. It was almost like being back home in the Outskirts. The only difference, Quasim and his trapper friends. For the Ravs, it was all about banding together. Sorting problems together and settling disputes. Mostly.
In the Junction, however, some problems hadn't been settled.
The standstill went on between Quasim and Jack—the expert trapper expected her to yield but the brunette wouldn't falter.
"Alright." The Day Hunter bounty was handed to Jack. "You can have your payback."
One of the men clearly objected. "Quasim-"
"Better to lose one life than ten on this monster," Quasim mocked. "Let's see how you fare before you come running back to us."
"By all means. I'd better get started then."
The cheery tone in her voice and the easy seizing of the paper made a dent in the hunter's face. Jack gave the three men a salute, enough to make two of them fed up and leave.
Quasim stayed. For a few seconds. He put an airsoft mask on and buckled it off.
Charming. He has high expectations that Jack would end up dead.
"Assholes," Siv cursed softly with the renowned spunkiness back to her trembling body. It was then that she spotted the obscured glance by the older woman.
That smirk…
"I wasn't defending you back there."
Always the need to deny things.
"And here, I thought this was one big happy family."
Siv sighed deeply. "If only that was the case, huh…"
"I take it there's a story behind him and his men?"
"The skinny one. Rusul. He's the reason one of our runners ended up missing."
"Peri. Right?"
Siv averted her eyes again—no, she slowly glanced up at the posters. Shoulders down, the runner looked strangely regretful. If Jack didn't know any better, Siv had been eyeing one of those photos the first time around.
"That's her," she started off dejectedly as she pointed to the poster of a young woman in her early twenties with a distinctive mole under her eye. Siv's eyes trailed down, first noting the worn-out leg guards Jack wore. "She's...was into Legend brand, you know. Carried a shoulder bag around with a Stuffed Turtle charm on it."
The young teen anticipated something out of the cocky woman, but Jack let the silence do the talking instead. That eventually made Siv continue instead.
Because she wanted to? She wasn't sure herself.
"...Rusal got stuck at a safehouse Downtown… Things got out of hand and Peri..." The young teenager's fingers curled into fists as she shook her head. At herself?
"Sorry to hear that," was all the brunette could offer.
The anger did fume up, but not from that response. The young lass had her emotions pent-up for too long, and now, they needed to seep out.
"Everyone's given up on finding them. Quasim is no better."
"Because he's an arsehole or because he doesn't listen?"
"Both," Siv answered. "Not everyone here likes how things are run. Him especially," Siv explained.
"So why keep him around?"
"Mahir tolerates him because he's the only one who's got some idea how to handle those freaks… You can't actually send a military man to gun hordes down."
"Basically, he gets the job done and no one questions him…"
Siv nodded. "Because of that, he's gotten a bit of a following."
In other words, he may be a thorn in Jack's side. She had to tread carefully.
"Well. Still admirable with what you said there," Jack admitted.
"C'mon. It's obvious you can take them down if they'd tried. I'm not blind."
Jack's soft chuckle, however, did nothing much to quench Siv's exasperation. "You really are like Champ."
"Champ?"
"Kickboxer champion. Current titleholder," Jack explained. "You two are quite similar."
A hint of surprise and pride came from the younger girl. But quickly, Siv tried to hide her emotions. "No way. I'm nowhere as tough as you are."
"Oh, you can be boastful at times, like her brother. But you're also level-headed when the situation calls for it. You need that for the ring," Jack explained.
That didn't do much convincing for the little princess. "Seems like it's all about the strongest surviving… And being a dick," she added, to push away the self-loathing.
"The strongest doesn't mean much if you're not being smart. Why, the Ravs wouldn't be standing if it wasn't for the Grads."
From Siv's expression, she found that hard to believe.
"The smartest graduate students hailed from Harran University. They come up with something new every time," Jack hummed.
Still nothing to Siv. What could smarts do? If you wasted time thinking of a plan, someone would wind up as a meal for a Biter. Siv had to think fast right from the start and get to the finish line alive. She had taught that to the two runner teams she built up.
She made the first rule as a runner the most important. Don't go being a hero.
It was unrealistic. One would be stupid to go for the glory and heroism—or be like Mad Jack. And none of the runners were like her. The only tricks they had were diversion and UV lights. They were too scared to whack away an infected unless push came to shove. Because a runner couldn't waste energy when they could be using it to run.
Quasim and his men, however, made it look so easy that they've managed to do more than the runners. In the last two weeks, the runners, capable of vaulting high places with good physical vigor were outclassed by brutes.
It was admittedly disheartened. Siv even made a few decisions to disband the two teams.
All because she was stuck indoors-
"You know... There are two Ravs here in the city." That surprised Siv. "Why don't you give them a call. They can offer some helpful tips."
Tips? On how to survive a zombie pandemic?
Jack didn't falter.
"You don't have to be smart or strong. You just need to be clever about doing both."
Siv found that those words struck a chord of truth in her—spoken by the very person with those qualities and expertise.
"Alright. Since I got some competition, I might as well 'lighten up' everyone's load a little more."
Lighten? Siv watched the ex-kickboxer take the first thing that caught her attention. Then another. And another. Twenty pages.
"You're taking all of them?" Siv asked.
"I can't promise anything," Jack confessed as she stacked the papers neatly together. "Were there clues behind their disappearances?"
Siv didn't think much about the question. But she replied, "No. One minute they were there, the next...they weren't."
"And this Firebrand group. Has anyone seen them in person?"
"I don't think so."
It was then that it clicked in Siv's head.
Wait, something about what she said herself wasn't right there.
"Where did these people go missing?"
"Mostly around this district… Addresses are on those papers." For some reason, Siv could feel a chill at the realization.
"Remember our encounter with GRE back at the overpass? How they said they'd take us to the Checkpoint?"
"How could I not forget it?" Siv groaned. "You held a frigging grenade."
"And there was the arena. Those cronies said something about throwing uninfected survivors into the ring. But people here pointed the finger at this inconspicuous group."
"Who? What?" Ok, where did that come from?
Jack realized on the spot that she had wandered off. She pointed to her earpiece. "Talking to my partner on the line."
"Oh." The guy who helped her get the Antizin. And this whole time, Siv thought no one would want to tag along with Jack on whatever adventures she was on. She had enough excitement after that jump by the GRE. Maybe the guy was on the same wavelength as Jack's craziness.
"It could be something," Jack uttered. To her partner, to Siv or to both? The brunette went to fold the papers up and roll them into a pocket. "Could very well be normal disappearances."
The way she said 'normal' didn't sound as if the disappearances weren't intended. Accidentally.
Who would take people off the street in the middle of an outbreak?
"Jack. You know something. Don't you?"
Jack made the mistake of not wearing her smile. So she wore it back for Siv. "Just thoughts. Nothing to fret about."
Was it nothing? A white lie to make Siv's worries go away? But this was too much for a young teenager to figure out on her own. So it did make it easy on her mind—that Jack would check it, whether it had an answer or not.
She couldn't help but feel an inkling about what she had just learned...
"Oh, and I'll take this too."
Jack skimmed over what bounty she could find under the sea of papers. One did catch her eye—the newest that was pinned at the far corner. No one would have spotted it, or cared about the contents.
"Noises at Museum, Bayside," she read it off.
A starting point.
"Two bounties on top of missing persons? Now, you're overdoing it."
"It'll be fine. Now that I have a partner."
"Yeah, this partner of yours," Siv started. "Is he ok with helping you go after this Day Hunter?"
"Pft," Jack snorted. "I reckon he's got no choice in the matter. Don't worry about Beastly. It's already in the bag."
"Oh really? " whispered the annoying, creepy voice through her earpiece.
Crane was annoyed.
High up, perched at the silicone factory, watching that brunette talk out of her ass with the Junction folks. He started to have second thoughts about having a 'wingmate'
What could he do? He was an infected. And the Junction was already on high alert thanks to his recent horseplay. Well...he couldn't blame them. Did he feel upset about the bounty? Yes. Was their choice justified? Yes. It wasn't a bad idea to think of it as a blessing in disguise if he were to go out of control.
That also didn't mean he was a little grateful for Jack to take the bounty. A little. He wasn't going to admit that to her.
And then there was that Quasim guy. Another name to learn when he didn't want to.
Kyle couldn't go down to the Junction to give his complaints, but he could tell what kind of people the trappers were with their bickering and jarhead attitudes behind walls. Quasim was the only man that he and Jack had to be careful around. How much of a nuisance could this trapper guy and his band of merry men be to Crane? Did he have to check every step to make sure he wasn't going into a trap?
And to top it all off, there had to be some word about a cult. Just the mere mention brought back the bad memories from the Countryside, even if none of the people in the Junction said the name, the Faceless. All-round bad news for Crane.
Still, another one? He really couldn't get a break.
"Oh. Jack. Just the person I'm looking for."
Another voice echoed through the comms. Through Crane's infected eyes, he witnessed a new skeleton walking to the tall dark-orange skeleton and the small lighter-toned skeleton. Male. Adult. Had a bit of a walk that suggested he was heavy-weighted.
"What can I do for you, Doc? "
A chuckle out of the 'Doc' guy. "Actually, it's the other way around. Doing my rounds to check on those who got bitten. Including you, Jack."
"Oh... Right."
Ok, so this was a doctor. "Nothing invasive. Have you taken your dose yet?"
"Ah-hah... Sorry, Will. I don't have it anymore."
A moment of surprise, no doubt. "Did you lose it?" he asked, rightfully worried. "If you're having seizures, you'll do right to let us know."
"Of course. But I'm fit as a fiddle." There was a crack in the ex-kickboxer's voice. Why did Crane hear a crack there? He watched Jack's silhouette raise both hands in the air. "See? No shakes."
"I see that... But we shouldn't take the chance. Come. I can give you a shot in the clinic."
"Oh. Don't mind me. Some poor soul needs them more than me-"
The doctor crackled, amused. "Nonsense. I've said this before. There's plenty to go around. You did bring us more Antizin."
"Right. That's...swell." Did she say all that between clenched teeth? Moreover, why was she so hesitant to get a shot?
"We'll make this quick and you can go off-"
"Doc, she's already taken a shot this morning." Now the shorter skeleton stepped in, which surprised Jack from the looks of her mannerisms.
"Oh. She has? Why didn't you say so?"
The brunette could only muster a weak laugh. Undoubtedly trying to think of a response. Again, the young girl was quicker. She took the conversation into her own hands with her white lie. "C'mon, Doc. You already have your hands full. Don't want to disturb ya. Right, Jack?"
"Yeah... Ahem."
Good, it made Crane a little more satisfied to see that woman put in her place. But the act also made him displeased.
"It's no trouble at all. You're always welcomed to the sickbay," Will explained. "That offer for a nice cup of tea still stands."
"Of course," Jack offered.
"Hang on a sec, Doc." The short skeleton took Jack away, just far enough for the Doc not to hear their whispers, but regardless, within range of Jack's earpiece.
"We're not gonna talk about that little white lie, are we?"
"So you haven't taken any Antizin, have you?"
"...Clever." Crane could feel the smirk widen, even from so far away. Not at all offended by the sneak attack she was given.
"I'm not gonna ask... You got your reasons. But like the Doc said, you do right. Ok?"
"You have my word."
"Are you serious?!" Crane exclaimed. This is about a virus that turned people into ravages. Not some flu a person could shake off!
Hey! Siv, right?! Stop working with this woman! She's dangerous!
"And...about the thing you asked? " The whisper grew softer. "I've been doing the counting."
"Did you find something? "
"People have been taking the next dosage after around three, four days. Nothing sticks out."
The number got Crane's attention; it also made him somewhat concerned.
He knew about Antizin. He had taken it himself. The effects of the virus came and went, nearly landing him in trouble and, one time, almost slipping off a crane machine. Taking the drug subsided the effects to the point where Crane could do his work for as long as three weeks before the seizures attacked.
The number of days till the next dosage, however... It irked him. But he couldn't put his finger on why.
"That's a bit short of a timeframe." Even Jack noticed the irregularity in the pattern. "No one's taking it after a week or two?"
"Nothing yet. There are still other patients… And me," Siv pointed.
"...Keep me posted then."
Crane had to admit, it was a little nerve-wracking to see a skull nod. Having x-ray vision shouldn't be something to get used to. The two females split apart, the younger one hurrying over to the doctor.
"Let me tag along. I can help you round up the patients."
"The more, the merrier. We can be done before tea time."
Jack also took her leave, walking in the opposite direction and to the main gates.
"Ready to go hunting, 'Day Hunter'?"
Crane flared his nostrils. "So that's what I'm called nowadays."
"You've made quite the first impression."
"Not as impressive as a certain someone, 'Mad Jack'." he jousted, his remark barely brushing her chuckle off. He moved on to the main topic. "...We haven't gotten a clue about that Volatile's whereabouts."
"Bayside isn't too far from where we last saw him. Might be responsible for the noise there."
"It could be a den of Screamers."
"Alright," Jack surrendered. "We turn up nothing with this bounty. But it could also make someone's day a little brighter."
"It's a waste of time, Jack."
"My, aren't you being distant. One minute you were on board with helping me while I act as your wingmate. Now you've changed your mind."
"I haven't changed my mind…"
He wanted to remark more. Say he's done a lot of requests, and a number of them never did him any good.
"Beating up bad guys is fine," he then mumbled.
"You're awfully hesitant. What happened in your past that got you this high-strung?"
Again with the probing.
"Wouldn't know. What about you, being all secretive like that?" he tossed the question to change the subject.
"Whatever do you mean-"
"You clearly don't want that doctor knowing you haven't taken Antizin."
"Because I haven't needed it at all. And he's not a doctor. He's a professor."
"Details. Why don't you want to tell them about your condition? Saves you the trouble."
"I could. And that might give them messy ideas. Like I have a resistance to the virus. Which clearly, I don't."
"Ok. Yeah. I get your point. But is it really that hard for you to decline the doctor?" he asked. "You're so hell-bent on avoiding a shot."
"I'm afraid of needles."
"...You're what?"
"Needles. Bloody terrified of the damn thing."
"This is a joke, right?"
"If it was, I'd be giving something wittier than that."
"You're not kidding. You, who go head to head with mutated freaks and gunmen, are afraid of needles."
"That sounds right. Why is that so hard to believe?"
"Uh-huh." She's never going to give him a real reason, he thought to himself.
"Everyone has phobias. Even you, Freakazoid."
"I don't have a phobia."
"Now that's very hard to believe. Aren't you afraid of heights? Or flying? How about blood?"
More prying. Just ignore her, Kyle.
And no. He has vaulted to the top of the highest building in Harran, parachuted out of a plane 10,000 feet off the ground, and has seen more blood than a normal person should that Crane was numb to it.
"Then claustrophobic? How about astraphobic?"
"Astra-what?" That was a new word for him.
"Fear of thunder. Lighting. Maybe not the case with your amnesia."
"I'm not a kid. What I'm more afraid of is that other me in...me," he struggled with the phrasing as he pointed his talons at himself. "Going crazy and hurting people."
"Autophobia. The fear of oneself. The dread of being left alone."
"I'll see you at the square," he groaned, and ended the call.
Clear cerulean blue waters, ill-clad by the scent of red and a mixture of greens. No matter where the two went in the once-bustling, beautiful city, that was the usual scene around them.
The Bayside mostly consisted of clean, minimalist, state-of-the-art design compared to the streets Crane had gone through. The closed Transport Hub was one example—a place for the ferry ships and boats. Its unique, beautiful, skeleton-framed architecture was a recent establishment, maybe a year or two old. Now the construction of the 21st century was tainted and riddled with the undead and blossoming nature.
Scanderoon was a place on the rise of being a smart city, compared to Harran, its next-door neighbour. Towards the Coastline was the transformation from old to new, while deeper into the city was the old heritage. At every corner, old monuments were left with scaffolding beside new, innovative telecommunications integrated into the urban space. Better transportation, quality of life, city management, and information systems. A better city life. The dream Scanderoon's people sought out for two years.
Only to be crushed in one day by the Harran outbreak.
By him.
No amount of information and communication technology could protect the people from hordes of zombies. Everything had devolved down to the primitive need for survival: man, infected, and the world around him.
There was some comfort. Like in Harran, good people did whatever they could to survive, making little barricaded communities. He could name several: the Black Serpent bazaar, the university, and the ferry harbor. A small fishermen's village could be turned into a safe place from the zombies with the right tools. Crane met and helped people sheltered in those locations.
So the duo's next destination was just that. Near the Transport Hub was the long pier of small boats, the pricey kind people would fork their cash on just to show they had money. Makeshift watchtowers and walls of cargo containers surrounded the perimeter, fending off any undead attempts to crawl over to the waterways. Hydrophobia would kill them instanneously if they succeed, thanks to the extra precaution; most of the survivors stayed inside their boats.
"Jack," Jack introduced herself. "The Junction received word on some noises?"
As always, Jack was the front. Her reputation in Scanderoon has reached far enough to fall on the ears of good people. So it was an easy walk into Hope Harbor, the direct translation of its original Turkish name. Her 'winning' personality managed to impress the residents.
That made Crane hate her a little more as he listened to the comms.
"Yes," the current de facto leader of the harbor, Derya, spoke up.
Divorced with a young son. Used to work as a lead chef nearby before the outbreak happened. Now she found herself taking over the safe location after the last leader got killed by Alexander's men over a dispute. Someone had to.
Didn't think they'd choose one by drawing a name out of a hat. Talk about being unreasonable, Crane thought to himself.
"I didn't think anyone would take it," the leader confessed.
"The faster it's taken care of, the better, yes?"
"Yes… That would be nice. Everyone here is so scared stiff, a leaf would make them leave port… I know," the woman's voice softened as if she took what she had just said as pointless now. "Kinda redundant."
"There were more of you?"
A nod. "This pier was full of boats. When the outbreak happened, some tried to escape to the waters, but...the Navy wouldn't let them have their way. Then our head died and more boats went off..." With one deep sigh, the woman tried to save face from the moment of vulnerability. "Better chance than staying here."
Both the brunette at the pier and the monster perched up a distance away looked over to the horizon. Days had already gone by, but the evidence still remained on the surface—a graveyard outside Hope Harbor.
"I can concur. Had to stick to the Coastline to avoid the guns."
"You...purposefully came here?"
"I was forced into a detour."
"I see… Yeah, that's probably the safest. But...where can anyone go now?" Derya laughed, mustering herself to sound unbreakable, but it fell flat. "We've been through a lot. If it wasn't for Mahir, I… I might have taken my son and…"
The woman couldn't bear to continue the dark words plaguing her mind. Such a horrible idea of taking to the ocean and being bombed down...but it had sounded better than staying a few times.
"It's alright," Jack was swift to reassure her. "Only natural to want a way out."
Another breath in and out. "Yes. But I can't walk away like that."
"The most important thing you can do is do whatever you must to protect the ones you care for. Leave the grim work to us."
"...Thank you." Crane could hear the relief wash down on the poor woman. She must not have taken a break as leader until Jack offered her a moment of comfort.
Once Derya calmed down, Jack went on to the task at hand. "When did these noises start?"
Another deep breath, and Derya swung back to her amateurish leadership skills. "Happened last week. Stopped at one point. Then it happened again this morning. I called the Junction quickly to see if they could help us."
"And they sent the best specialist in town," Jack gloated. So smoothly with her tone that she didn't come off as a glorified a-hole but Crane knew better.
"The noises happened at a museum nearby."
"Bayside Naval Museum. I've been there once."
Kyle hasn't. Despite a few days, he still had a lot more to learn about the city. Luckily, his perching spot was near a tourist spot, where a government office stood. Right in the open, under the awnings, was the Bayside map for him to quickly examine.
Four streets away. Along the coast.
"Be careful over there. We've been seeing some shady men for a few days now."
"Alexander's men?"
"They definitely aren't his. Too military-looking. But they didn't look friendly either."
Good. GRE. People he could bash their faces in.
"Duly noted." Jack left the pier. Crane already decided to have a head start, swooshing through as he stuck to the shadows.
Tricky, though. The Bayside was very open—palm trees blowing with the wind. With the sun past noon, everywhere was mostly covered in light. He had to leap from one shadow to another, feeling the burn during the in-betweens.
Once he arrived near the museum, he looked over the playing field to see who their players were. Other than the past interruptions of other infected, there weren't any signs a wailing berserk humanoid walked through her. Just the military vehicles parked recently and stacked inventory by the doors. Two men on guard.
"She was right. GRE is here," Crane said over the comms.
"How many?"
"Enough for three squads."
"Hasn't stopped us before. Any sign of Crybaby?"
"GRE would have gunned him down if he went in there."
"Can't you be a little hopeful?"
He ignored her. "...Doesn't hurt to check, though." Mostly to crack skulls.
"Huh."
"What?" Was there a problem he couldn't see?
"For a place like this, usually, it'd take a month worth of intel and schematics. And a week of setup. Now we're just waltzing in like it's nothing."
Intel? Schematics? Setup? What? Jack didn't notice the burning narrowed glare she was getting from the confused Infected.
"What are you talking about?"
"It's a museum," she pointed, a bit too smooth for his liking. "You need a ticket just to look at dusty, old antiquities and read up on their history."
Why did Crane not buy that from her?
"What's the plan?"
"Same plan as always. Divide and conquer. You take the top. I work from the bottom."
No complaints from him.
One tendril shot, and Crane swooshed onto the rooftop. As high as he could possibly slingshot himself to—the smooth, modern-structured sides didn't have a lot of grooves and gaps for him to cling on. But the momentum kept him going—without him realizing it, he was wall-climbing horizontally a good ten feet in just two 'leaps'. Dashing across the concrete walls until he found a lower-leveled parapet and climbed up.
Before he would slip through the ventilation, he glanced down to watch the dark-orange skeleton ducking to the back of the museum. Heading to two other guards by the backdoor, because the numbskulls didn't think anyone would sneak through the back. Two takedowns, and the brunette slipped inside.
Kyle crawled in as well.
How many days has it been in this new body? The third day, right? Now there was a slight difference he noted with his strange vision. But it could also be due to him being so used to it that he barely noticed it until now.
It was like he could control night and day through his eyes. In the dark vents, he could count the number of mercenaries, their orange skeletons getting fainter. A blink of the eye dimmed out those visual noises, allowing him to see his way through the vents.
And when he wanted to see the skeletons' recent positions, he willed the x-ray vision back to its vibrant state. Off and on like night vision goggles.
He could complain. But what was the point?
Exiting onto the open third floor, Crane could see the museum's large foyer below. True to the name, the maritime museum held an array of artifacts and replicas. From replicas of navy battleships to one-century-preserved, beautiful adorned imperial fishing boats.
"Boats. Lots and lots of boats."
"Scanderoon loves their boats," Jack spoke over the comms.
A flash of red zoomed into the first-floor foyer and behind a boat. One unlucky GRE thug trotted along the hull, too engrossed on the gold painting to notice the arms around his head. One good swift turn, and quickly, Jack tossed the dead brute into the cockpit.
The foyer wasn't free of the GRE just yet. On the other side, right below the ventilation, was another GRE goon.
The grunt was about to head towards Jack's cover. Then he suddenly felt something grab his left foot.
"Gah-!" Up, he went to the third floor by the very tendril that snared him. His eyes widened with terror at the sight of a Hunter.
Whack!
Kyle retracted the tendril into his arm. No matter how many times he heard the slurping sound, he couldn't get used to it. He had to fling his hand just to shake the disgusting feeling off, slinking through the top while Jack continued on the ground floor.
"No sign of our whiner."
"Again. He'd be dead if he was in the open."
"Perhaps the basement? Gonna give that a check."
Then Crane might as well clean up the remaining grunts on the two floors. He couldn't take the chance of them radioing in back-up.
"No infected down here," Jack responded on the comms, catching the hushed yelp of a mercenary from Crane's side. "Just more old stuff. Figureheads. Ornaments. Ship models. And...I have no idea what this is."
"They really love boats, huh?"
"Why do you think they built a big fancy museum just for boats?" she exclaimed. "Personally, I prefer one with classical art."
"Classical? You?"
"What? I can have fine taste."
"Next thing you're gonna tell me you've had fine wine and know which fork to use at the table."
"That would be giving out more secrets now, wouldn't it?"
He groaned with the eyes rolling, the neck twist a lot rougher on a captured GRE grunt. Out came the final exasperated gasp before the body dropped.
Last two men. Sighted near an exhibition on the first floor.
"It's been fifteen minutes. Any word?"
"Nothing. Should we radio HQ?"
All his friend could do was shake his head and groan. "Great. First, the dropoff for those convicts. Now we're chasing freaks of nature. This organization has gone to shit after Harran."
That's right. Keep on blabbering. Made it easier for the monster sneaking in.
"What do you expect? Boss can't keep her shit together and command's all over the place."
"Really. I should have called it quits. The money isn't worth it if the world's gone crazy."
"You know we can't even leave when they have control over air support… We're stuck here until GRE finishes...whatever they're doing."
So they were as screwed as everyone in the pandemic. Good. They all deserved it. Crane never interacted with the hired men anyhow, and any sort of loyalty he had was for his paychecks. Not his employer. Brutes like those? Not even a slap on the wrist.
Though, what was this about a dropoff for convicts?
"Fine. Five more minutes. If nothing, we're leaving them in the tunnels."
Tunnels?
"We can tell HQ they got eaten."
The GRE soldier nodded and strolled a couple of steps away...
"Ugh-!"
"What the-?!"
It was at the corner of his eye. But his comrade was gone. Just like that. Terrified, he held a baton up from his belt. Was it an infected?
Then he changed his mind and brought his assault rifle up. A better weapon in his head!
Too bad his hands were trembling badly.
"Hey!"
It was only then that the GRE mercenary realized he was very alone.
The only sound was his own voice and chattering teeth.
"Anyone?!"
No sign of his group.
Or any sign of the attacker.
Shit. Shit. Shit!
This just wasn't worth it. Might as well take it to the streets and run for the nearest exit out of Scanderoon-
He barely registered the looming talons, one slipping under his chin and the other grasping his forehead. The last seconds for him before he heard the dull snap was seeing the concealed face of his attacker at the corner of his eye.
Finished. No more worrying about GRE in the museum.
"Jack? You still down in the basement."
"Give me a second." There was some struggle in her voice.
Followed by a loud THUD and a sharp "ugh".
Crane jerked. He felt that all right. Bone hitting wood. And it wasn't over.
Another THUD and a grown man's shriek. Kyle had quickly pulled the earpiece out but heard the next punch regardless. That was a bone-shattering crack he heard.
The last thing was a loud thud to the floor and the slapping of Jack's hands.
"What do you need?"
"Some of the GRE were talking about tunnels underneath this building. Maybe the Weeping Man ended up there."
"Tunnels?"
"Don't suppose there's some secret door down there, right?"
"Hm… Let's look for one then."
Wait, really? He was joking. Crane glanced around, first looking for the sign that pointed visitors to the basement. Finding his bearings, he came across the way, first blocked by a rope barrier only to have been moved by either Jack or the GRE.
True to Jack's words...more boat stuff. A little more confined than upstairs. And true to what he overheard, two GRE mercs dead with a broken figurehead beside them.
"No sign of a door yet. But there are lots of boxes and-cough, gah… Dust," somewhere far back of the basement was her voice.
Past the red-carpeted ornament exhibit and beyond the staff-only barrier was the area where containers, power boxes, and things that weren't for display, were kept. Nothing stuck out to Crane.
"Ok… Clues," he said to himself.
Clues.
Out of their grim circumstance, he couldn't help but feel a little adventurous. Something old that sparked in him back in Harran and again from his own childhood, when Crane had been asked to look for a boy's missing canine companion.
The atmosphere in the basement was particularly ideal for the mindset—the kind where mysteries were just waiting to be uncovered by him. After all, he found several truths either thanks to letters left by a dying crafty firearms collector or the cassettes made with the imagination of playing as an ace sleuth, private eye. As a bonus on reaching the end of the enigmas, Kyle would get some rewards but not without some mixed emotions as well.
He gave almost a chuckle. Who would have thought of playing detective even after being turned into a freak. He did hesitate but, argh, might as well jump back into the guilty pleasure when he has already lost so much.
So Crane got into the game.
Ok. It couldn't be some busted hole in the wall. A highly-secured museum wouldn't like a break-in. Maybe it was like one of those bookshelves in the movies. But the place looked pretty sophisticated and high-tech to have something like that built in. Thinking over the idea more broke his suspension of disbelief.
It had to be a maintenance door to the underground. Might also be outside the museum for all they knew. There should be scratches on the floor. A very obvious patch of dust being disturbed. Something that got overlooked many times-
"What are you doing?"
He wheeled around, almost tensing up at the sight of Jack. An eyebrow rose up behind her shades but Crane certainly felt the judging gaze on him.
"W-What?" he uttered. "I'm just looking."
"Nooo," Jack droned, approaching him. "You're acting stranger than usual."
"I-I am not," he defended loudly.
"Hm. Could have fooled me. Ah." All of a sudden, she bolted for a restoration room with the word 'private' on the door. Paintings were stacked aside, mannequins piled up haphazardly, and artifacts arranged on a table for clean-up.
"Here we go."
Her hand reached for something behind the table and-
Clank!
"Open sesame."
Before Crane's widened, hauntingly blue eyes, a section of the wall unfolded inwards, revealing what looked like a saferoom. Cold air blew through an open grate on the right wall, next to the maintenance door he thought would exist.
What the actually hell.
It was like something from an international spy movie. He guessed it was maybe done up maybe thirty years ago. A lot of money was put into the secret room. Was it to hide something important?
But this place was for boats! Who would steal anything about antique boats?!
That wasn't the important question. What was more shocking was how easy Jack found that. It was like she knew where. And that shmuck smirk on her face didn't make it any better for him.
Right in the basement, Crane's thunder was stolen. By someone who wasn't even playing the sleuth game.
"How…" He basically pointed a talon at the saferoom, lost for words.
Jack, however, had lots of words.
"Probably built around the Cold War. The government really didn't want the Soviet Union finding out any secret," she explained. "Did you know this leads all the way up to the National Complex? And it's integrated with other tunnels. Reckon the city wanted to spiffy this up as an attraction. Or you know, keep it a secret and use it for more confidential reasons."
"How...do you know all that? "
"You read stuff up online."
"Bullshit," he couldn't help but exclaim. A common person wouldn't come across something like that. In fact, it was something a thief would know.
"Come on, Beastly. Let's go down the rabbit hole again," Jack jested, already bouncing down the stone staircase.
"Again..." Freakazoid moaned tiredly. Could he avoid the dark, dim holes the infected loved to stay in? But he followed after the woman in red.
At least the underground wasn't the sewers. Again. Like Jack explained, it was all man-made—almost like the subways back in Chicago. Power cables, fluorescent lights blinking, and even the graffiti and old stickers showed that, despite the secrecy, someone from the surface had gone through these urban tunnels. And it didn't stink.
"Power's on. Someone made themselves right at home."
"GRE?"
"If they know about the secret passage, they know about the tunnels."
But that was a death wish. Even to the ex-GRE agent standing beside her. Crane rattled his brain as they went down the linear way. Most of the side paths were gated off or blocked with debris, which shepherded a few walkers about. Why take the underground?
Then again, the surface wasn't that safe. Hordes everywhere. Jack offered a thought or two, but Kyle found them difficult to collect; to use the tunnels as a 'safer way' sounded contradictory.
A sound hit his ears. That immediately prompted him to grab Jack's shoulder and stop. It was faint. Faraway.
"He's down here."
Jack steered her eyes around her surroundings, trying her best to listen. Nothing. "Which way?"
"Echo's making it hard to pinpoint… And it's not just him."
"Not our concern."
"They're gonna find him."
"Then we need to get to him before they do."
"Does it matter if he's dead or alive?"
"We want him breathing long enough for me to stick a syringe into him." Jack showed the heavy-duty syringe again to Freakazoid, a constant reminder of their whole mission. Ugh, just looking at the prick in its cap was enough to give his hardened, gross skin goosebumps. "After that, GRE can do whatever they want with him."
Crane would rather have the Weeping Man be dead. But that wouldn't be good if they drew out coagulated blood.
"We'll have to split up. Cover more grounds."
Straightforward. It was amusing now that he thought about it: how smooth of a transition he had over...working with a partner. That was crazy to him. He wouldn't leave a person alone, in some dangerous den.
But Jack's beaming confidence assured him that it was okay to leave her alone. For a while. She was a survivor, like him. Maybe because it had just as powerful of an effect on him as it did on other people.
"Sure. The faster we find him, the faster I can hog-tie him down." He now had the strats—tendrils could outmatch a bunch of clones. "Then you can get his blood-"
"Are you implying I can't catch him?"
Crane turned back, noticing the odd expression he just learned from the brunette: hands on hip and 'a disapproving grin'. Sure, her stand was cocky, but it felt more like the Jack in the dreams stood before him, the one who couldn't say no to Jade's proposal in the gym.
Uh-oh.
He had seen that kind of face before. The kind that wanted to challenge him, back in Harran. Two runners had to poke him into some trials just to see how good the Tower's best runner really was.
If he was the old Kyle, sure. He'd accept it. Like he had a choice, to begin with. And he proved it. No questions asked.
But he wasn't his old self.
"I didn't say that." Crane pointed at himself, his new body. "No offense. But I'm faster than my old self. And I could run fast."
"Ever heard of the story, the Hare and the Tortoise?" Jack droned, all too confident. "Slow and steady wins the race."
"So you do know you're slower than me."
"I'm only human," she admitted. "That means I can still catch up with you in the daytime."
Crane flared his nostrils. He wouldn't deny it—the little hiccups he's had under the sun.
"So. Are you game?"
Her tone was tempting; taunting. Prying him to fall into another trap. But this was in his element: running over talking. In no way did he take this as a competition between gender—he himself personally knew a few women quick on their feet. And neither did Jack, from the looks of it. She didn't bring pointless stereotypes to the table. She wanted to see his skill in action.
No questions asked, Jack could certainly punch—he truly believed anyone who questioned her fighting spirit would surely eat his own words—and she could certainly run. But it was clear she was learning the ropes again, an example being her amateurish parkour skill. It all depended on how much she ran with her mouth over her legs.
He actually wanted to see her own potential.
"Sure. Since you're in so much denial."
"After you," she counterattacked, almost bringing a smile to the Freakazoid's face. But she didn't know that. "Good luck."
"Don't die."
That got Jack smiling wider.
Without a word, the two went their separate ways. The Freakazoid, as true to his word and body, particularly swooshed through his tunnel faster than Jack with hers. No doubt that he would find the Weeping Man before she would.
At least, that was what he had thought. The infected were down in the underpass, but every time he thought he had the new type in sight, it turned out to be a wandering Biter. A couple more turns, and he found himself at a...
"Dead end."
He needed to retrace his steps. Crane turned around-
At the corner of his eyes, he spotted it. Had it not been for the orange and red ribbons dangling around the grate, he might have entirely missed it.
His heart leapt into his throat once he laid his eyes upon the display.
"No."
It had to be a figment of his imagination. How did it end up in Scanderoon? Here of all places?!
His feet felt like lead, but Crane forced his way to the blind spot. The candles. The incense. The crude drawings in white, red and orange chalk.
Anyone who saw this, including Jack, wouldn't know what it was, other than it was a random altar made out of the blues. Because of how badly misshapen the image was, nobody could see the twisted, accursed woman in red with the sun as her crown.
But Crane… He knew exactly who made the small altar.
"No, no, no, no!"
He staggered back from the realization but wheeled around so fast his head was spinning.
They were alive?!
"The Faceless…! It's not possible!" he hollered to himself.
Was his past trying to torture him?!
No matter how hard he tried to search, there was no sign of the robed men wearing that abhorrent mask. Even with the x-ray vision, nobody fitting that description was in his peripheral radius.
Then why was this thing down here?!
The flashes made it even worse; he had to clutch his throbbing head. Again, his soul was being pulled back to his past.
Forcing him to walk down the dimly lit hall at the dam. Every corner, a dead body riddled with bullets. Red splattered across the tall, sacred drawings. The hollow wooden faces stared back at him hauntingly, cursing him that he left them behind.
The voice of that demented masked woman echoing inside his skull tormented him.
Her standing mockingly in robes; her presence betraying him that all would be fine after a massacre.
The real face behind her mask.
Piercing animalistic eyes that were different from the other infected. The unadulterated rage boiling up at Kyle's rejection to the offer.
And the blue liquid forced down his mouth. A final act by the Mother, trapping Kyle Crane to his unfortunate fate.
Shit. This wasn't good! Calm down!
But his claws were shaking uncontrollably. Get a grip! Get. A. Grip!
NO!
"Forget this!" The Faceless wasn't his problem anymore! Anything about his past wasn't! He was done-!
"RAAGH!"
The roar snapped him out of his hysteria. That came from his right. Further down the east underpass.
Then his heart sank with dread and guilt. The panic attack made him forget one important thing: that he had horribly taken a second to think about leaving her down in the tunnels.
"Jack. "
Kyle bolted.
She tried her hardest. Cupped an ear out and listened intensely.
But it was all too quiet.
Jack wasn't deaf. She definitely heard the roar. But from which direction? Every time she thought she was closer, she took a turn and found herself somewhere else.
"Wish I had put a tracker on the bastard…"
Freakazoid should probably be on Crybaby's tail. Why did she have to talk big like that?
Jack knew why. Professionally, she wanted to understand more of how Freakazoid's body ticked. More info about the rare Special type to be documented. There were moments that she was confident that she could be on par with him level. And then she had to remind herself that he had more tricks than a Volatile.
Personally, Jack wanted to see if the broody zombie had a backbone out of him.
She tried another path. Kept going. Then, she halted when she thought she saw blood.
Jack walked a few steps backwards and peered down a side tunnel. At the end, there was a familiar scene. Brutally mangled bodies resting down like a mass funeral. Arms crossed and eyes closed shut. Unlike the first arrangement, the attire these men wore wasn't that of locals.
The Weeping Man's handiwork, left halfway unfinished. And the GRE was unfortunate enough to cross paths with him. Maybe he really did have a conscience like Freakazoid, only to have it mentally broken by the feral side. Every death he took was a death he shamefully prepared for burial.
And yet he never went to make a grave. Just left their bodies to rot. Showed how fragile the mind was that all the Weeping Man could do was hold onto fragments.
A gurgle prompted Jack to whip up her weapon, high over her head. One of the bodies turned? Her grasp lowered when one body, leaned against a wall, tried to lift up a hand. A silent plea to be saved from a gash wound at the neck.
"Hey-"
Her free hand barely reached before the body draped to the right with a low, dying groan. Plopped onto the floor with a wet thud.
"Oh. Guess you won't be talking."
Looking over the corpses at first glance told her they had encountered the same ordeal as the two's first encounter with the new infected. Underneath the cleanup, she found evidence of the disarray in the squad.
A patting down the body revealed the usual standard anti-infected equipment. High-grade. Some used but failed. The irregular pattern of the bullet shots on the wall. Jack could only guess—they tried to fight. But they couldn't comprehend what they witnessed.
They thought they were against one infected. And they paid for their overconfidence.
Jack stood up from the bloodbath and turned around.
Which way to go? She could follow the blood trail, undoubtedly left by the Weeping Man-
Clank.
Her shoe hit something. The sound of something wooden skidded across the wet floor.
She kneeled down.
"What do we have here?"
It was wooden. Tail ends of rays fanned outwards in the woodworks. The features of a face were carved beyond a doubt, with golden-like plating on the forehead. Tribal, traditional from the looks of it. But she has never seen anything quite like it.
"Impressive woodsmanship," she commented, flipping it around. Was this Turkish hazel?
There was nothing at the museum she saw for an exhibition. A naval museum wouldn't display masks. But a mask to end up somewhere in the Cold War tunnels? It was out of the ordinary.
The string was snapped. Must have fallen off someone's face during the struggle. Belonged to one of the GRE men? Didn't suit their taste.
Jack's eyes furrowed the more she examined the front of it… There was something about the mask. As a whole, it depicted a single shape.
A sun.
Noises brought her attention back to her circumstances. But she didn't drop the mask. Something in her gut told her to keep this little clue. A clue to what? She didn't know. So she slipped it inside her jacket.
Right now, Jack had to focus. The noises came from further down the tunnels.
So she continued onwards until something hit her.
"Omph. Blagh!" She cupped a hand over her nose and mouth. "Hmmm!"
It was repulsive. Vile. Jack fought every fiber to stop herself from throwing up as her legs seemed to draw her closer to the source. Each step, the smell became stronger and stronger.
Her eyes watered. The smell was so putrid, it almost made Jack fight back from retreating. And gagging.
Oh, she knew what this was.
From the clean, smooth modern architecture to the 1800s' stone structure, it was as if she stepped into another timeline. Some little details that showed the tunnels had been updated included the new-looking pipes and wires. One more step she took—the moist sound under her sole—made her freeze up.
The walls were painted red. The floor was drenched. The streaks of tissue webbing at one single spot and the litter of bones and meat confirmed it.
A large Volatile nest. Deep in the Cold War tunnel. What made it all the more horrifying for the Wild Dog was the snacking and tearing sounds.
She wasn't alone.
Get out, the rational side of her brain screamed.
She noticed a head turn. The bottom split mandibles, swinging revoltingly.
Jack huddled back against a not-so-red wall. Quick and quiet. Into what she thought was a maintenance door that could lead to the surface.
The door didn't budge behind her.
Soddin' hell!
Her teeth were clenched so tightly. Where she stood was a blind spot to the Volatile. But it lifted up its head and gave the air a good sniff. Heavy inhalation of her scent. A growl out of it alerted its compadres at the nest.
Jack slipped a hand into her pockets. A few flares and UV lights thrown could stall for her. But once that was over, would they manage to catch up to her while she fled?
She had to try-
"SRAAAGH!"
Her hands froze, the grip nearly snapping a UV light. Freakazoid?
No. The howl was different. Even the Volatiles didn't want this interruption. There was an exchange of snarls and wails, mainly from the crimson, broad-shouldered humanoids.
As if a twisted version of a movie scene where the savior jumps in and declares everything is alright, a threat worse than the Volatiles hobbled into Jack's view.
Another howl out of the crying beast.
The Weeping Man.
She swallowed.
She couldn't breathe.
What were the chances?! Well, no. Jack predicted there would be a chance, but she never imagined herself being in such an unlucky spot.
Moreover, she was outnumbered. Or at least, she thought the Volatiles would be in arms with the bigger monster.
"GET OUT!"
One claw grabbed a Volatile by the head. Crybaby lifted it up like it was a toy and smashed it right down.
Crack went the skull. Grey matter smudged across the floor.
Jack pushed herself as far back as possible in her hidey-hole. On one hand, she was glad. One last monster to worry. On the other hand, what on earth was happening?
Another roar bellowed out of the Weeping Man. That stirred the fear in the two Volatiles and forced them to bugger off. They'd rather abandon their nest than fight for territory.
So it was possible for the infected to have disagreements—in their own way. An odd point was that, as far as Jack had examined the usual horde, the walkers rarely showed signs of antagonism towards each other. Usually, they'd fight for food, but regardless of 'status', they stuck together in a street without much of a display of dominance. Sometimes.
But here, two different predatory animals didn't want to compete for the same hunting ground.
The Weeping Man outright didn't want their company. Solitary? Oh, she wouldn't know. Lenny could give a better idea of how these things behaved than she could. Jack was simply the documentarian, the note-taker.
And she wanted to be very much alive. But this was her only chance. With some hesitation, her hand switched from the UV lights to the syringes in her backpack. Her fingers had to feel their way to unbuckle it from the polyester kit—a fingernail ready to clip off the syringe's cap.
Ok, Jackie. Stab the Weeping Man with it. Get the blood sample. And run.
But he stood in such an awkward position! Breathing deep. In and out. Taking his bloody time.
No good. She couldn't stab from this angle.
She needed the beast to move.
The comms in her ear made a static noise.
"Jack! I'm on my way! "
Golden eyes darted directly towards the sound of the comms. It just had just as good superhuman hearing as Freakazoid did.
There wasn't any time to react. The talons lashed at the collar of her jacket.
"Oh, shit!"
Jack felt her entire body picked up off her feet.
A/N: 19/1/2021 Hello all and belated happy new year and hope all goes well for us in the year 2021. Out of the bad and into something good this year.
So. The really long wait. I do want to apologise for it. Half of the reason was of course real life as there were a lot of changes and me focusing more on freelancing. The other half was my structuring and plotting with this story arc. As I've said in last chapter, I am not the fastest author or the smartest. The pacing of this story really takes a lot of creative thinking/brainstorming/luck to come up with how I want for minor and major elements. Even playing Vermitide 2 and watching stuff has helped on some little bits in my writing. That's where the luck hammers in too.
I know a great number love the Descent and especially its reworking. And there is the worry I might go into haitus and abandon this story. But I still want to iterate that Descent is not a story I want to abandon or one I will abandon. It takes a lot of time and thinking to write a sequel that carries as much to the lore and source material as possible while being on its own power. I've written stories in the past and I've always made the mistake of just using small plots to randomly build something anyhow without reason. My latest ones, however, I've taken a careful but conceptual approach to how the story goes from start, middle to end. So that I won't fall into a haitus and writer's block. But it takes time and patience so I do stress to your readers to wait patiently.
It's actually thanks to this planning and thinking that honestly, this chapter has an element that I had for the longest time wanted to implement in the original story. But I could never do because of how awful my old pacing went. The Faceless was always one major important key note I wanted to bring (for later reasons) and I'm very happy to have them included here. Even more interaction development between Jack and Crane and other small ideas, I've finally been able to write them here.
Another thing too, I want to give the biggest thanks and appreciation to the writer, UranicSubseter34 for the beginning part. His story, Shadows of a Dying Light, has always (and I can never stop talking about it since I first started this fic) been an inspiration to this book. With it having updated recently and me rereading all over again, it actually helped me think over some of my blocks as well as create the new character, Qasim. So I wanna dedicate this chapter to him. Thank you and keep on the good writing fight for your fic! And I strongly ask readers to give that book a read over at FFN.
With that, I'm ending it here. Again, please don't be afraid about this fic's fate. It will not go on hiatus and I really do hope with everything I got that I will finish it all the way to the end. And I have the next few planned out already (well, some revamped from the original chps). Look forward to those. You can also see any updates from me over at my tumblr blog, dlthedescent (link broken cuz its FFN). Do follow it and I'll do any necessary posts on its progress. Enjoy this chapter.
PS. I'll be going back to edit my chapters again for some minor fixes and changes.
9/2/21 - Added new lines, fixed mistakes and edited parts according to new timestamp from pilot.
4/3/21 - Fixed a major disconnection between 2 plot elements and edited some minor mistakes.
30/5/21 - Changed a character's name and circumstances surrounding them for better plot structure
3/2/22 - Added new lines
28/2/22 - Went over a full chapter edit with some fixes, retwists, deletes and adjustments. Added new dialogue between Jack and Crane and fixed some contradicting problems.
5/7/22 - Edited dialogues and lines.
10/1/24 - Final fixes and changes, I hope