*Author's Note!*
This one is a bit long, sorry guys. I hope you enjoy this one!
Happy Reading!
~ZeB
_______________________________________

~ Lucy ~

"Should we go in and find them?" Chip asked no one in particular.

"No. If we do, we'll be trapped in there along with them. It's a big city, we might not even find them. We'll be of more use if we wait here for them to return." Brick said.

Chip, Brick and I stayed behind in one van as the rest of Brick's team took the other back home. I sat in the second row of seats with my legs dangling out the open sliding side door, biting my nails.

"Such a bad habit... But I can't help it. I'm worried."

Annie and Luke have been gone for several hours now. The only change we've seen is the amount of people piling up at the blockade. The roar of the crowd, as inaudible as it was, drifted far out of the city. I threw my hands down from my mouth and sat up when I heard rustling in the trees. I scanned the darkness for their familiar faces.

"Lu–"

"Shh, quiet." Brick interrupted me.

Looking back at him, I saw he had his finger over his lips in a hush motion, then I followed where he pointed.

In the faint light that illuminated from the spotlights at the blockade, figures shuffled down the hill towards the city. Not one, not three, but many of them. They dragged their legs slowly across the pavement with little motor skills anywhere else.

I checked back out of my open door and let my eyes focus. There, a figure was shuffling through the grass at a constant pace. I slowly pulled myself in and sacrificed closing the door all the way for just getting it to latch.

I scoot along the floor of the van to the other side door and waited to see if any of those things heard me. Luckily, I don't think they did.

"From what I've heard from Luke, they react to sound more than any other sense."

I held my breath as I watched their shadows on the other side of the glass. A thump and thud made the whole van shake, making a gasp escape my lips, piercing the silence like a knife.

"It's okay. They're just bumping into us, not trying to get in." Brick reassured with a whisper from the front seat.

"How are you so calm? They've surrounded us." I replied in a hushed voice.

"They aren't here for us. They're here for them," Chip pointed to the city, "the noise they're making is drawing them in."

"Shouldn't we warn them? Many people are going to die!" My whispers got a bit louder.

"Lucy, honey, I know how you feel. I want to do the same thing, but we can't. There's too many of them." Brick turned around in his seat, "Listen to me, please. You want to save everyone, I understand that, but the truth is, you won't be able to. It's harsh, I know, but nonetheless true. You have to save the people you can and not risk your own life for the ones you can't." From the remaining light the indigo sky gave, I saw the seriousness in his eyes.

"But what about my brother a-and Annie?" Tears started to roll from the corners of my eyes.

"I'm such a crybaby..."

Brick gave a soft laugh. "Those two are a different story. They'll be just fine. Annie is as tough as nails and your brother is as durable as platinum. If there was such a thing as the best duo, those two would be it."

He was right. Annie was no pushover when it came to situations like this and Luke, well, this world has only made him stronger. If there's anyone who can make it back to us, it's those two.

"Alright, so we wait for them to come back and–"

CRACK!!

I couldn't help, but scream. I turned to come face to face with one of those things bashing its face against the window. It did it again and again, each time cracking the glass a little bit more. The blood gushing from its head wound was solid black on the window. Its hands came up and slapped the glass, dragging its fingernails down, trying to claw its way inside.

"We got to go!" Chip turned the key and the dash lit up.

"We can't!" I yelled, "My brother, and Annie!"

Chip and Brick looked at each other. Then Brick reached into the backseat and grabbed one of the backpacks we brought along. Each backpack had two days worth of food and water, plus a few medical supplies and knives. He handed it to Chip as he clicked the light above the center console and searched the glovebox. He pulled out a pen and a piece of paper and flipped it over to back where it was blank. He scribbled something fast then folded it up and stuffed it in the clear front pocket of the backpack.

Chip looked at both side mirrors, "There's only a few around us, make it fast."

Brick nodded and hopped out, taking the backpack with him. He opened the side door and pulled a can of gas out, then shut it and ran off into the trees. It felt like he was gone for several minutes, but he emerged in seconds, empty-handed. One of the things were between him and the van, but it was so dark, all I saw was their silhouettes.

The thing slugged towards him, but Brick wasted no time. He arced his arm in a downward motion, stabbing his knife through the head of it. The one that bashed its face into my window was gone, I assumed it went around the back of the van heading to the commotion on the other side.

Brick entered the van, luckily unharmed. His hands and shirt were covered in blood from the thing out there.

"Where's your knife?" Chip asked, throwing the van into drive.

"It's taking a nap in that Stiff's head. It refused to get out of bed, stubborn piece of metal." Brick cleaned off his hands and faced me, "Don't worry, we aren't leaving them. We're going to drive down this road a bit and find a clearing in these Stiffs."

"Stiffs?" I knew he meant them but 'stiffs'?

Brick cracked up laughing. "I call them that because that's how they look; stiff. They move like every muscle is stiff."

"I've just been calling them things."

"Well, in a time like this, I believe many people will call them many different things. For instance, your brother calls them Z's. Other scavengers back home call them biters or even freaks."

"What should I call them?" I felt like I needed to belong to a name group.

"Choose whatever works best for you."

"Best for me huh? Hmm..."

"Okay. I'll call them things. It's what I'm use to anyways." I smiled, happy with myself for starting a trend.

"There you go! That works just fine." Brick smiled in return, turning back in his seat.

I hadn't noticed the whole time I was talking to Brick, but we were no longer in our original spot. We were cruising down the road, away from the city.

*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*

~ Luke ~

"One, two... Three!" We bolted across the road, not giving the Z's another look. We made it to the other side and pressed our backs against the wall around the corner.

"That was fun." Annie said, smiling like the cute dork she was.

"I guess you're right." I couldn't suppress a grin. There was something about her that triggered me to smile so easily.

"What is it about her that gets me this way?... Well, where should I begin that list?"

My thoughts had a point. There are too many things to list off right now.

"Now what?" Annie squeezed my hand.

"We keep doing what we just did until we're out of the city. At least, as far as this tactic will take us."

"Roger that." She saluted and kissed my cheek.

We continued this for a few streets. Each as simple and easy as the first. The Z's were too occupied to notice us. They either shuffled around with no purpose or chased the occasional far off sounds of a scream.

The city was littered with debris. Glass was everywhere, fires still ablaze, Z's walking around, sometimes we were lucky enough to see a survivor scurry around and take out one or two Z's, before slipping back into the darkness.

As we neared the next street, I walked ahead of Annie to scout it out, but it was just like the others; dead. Literally.

"Same thing, fast and eas–" Upon turning around, I was greeted by two men.

One held a hand around Annie's mouth and his other arm around her waist so she couldn't escape. He was overweight and his head started to bald in the front, but he didn't look older than 30. The other man had an unkept, scruffy beard with blood dried all over his face. He was a skyscraper. I'm 5' 11", this guy had to be about 6' 4". He was probably in his mid-twenties.

"I'm Ted," the tall man near me said, "and that's Frank." He cocked a thumb over to the guy holding Annie.

Annie was scared. She tried to kick and scream, but Frank's arm and hand were like iron. The street lights shown a sparkle in the corners of her eyes.

"She's crying..."

"What do you want?" It was more of a demand than a question, but I didn't care. I wanted, no, needed, to help Annie.

"Well," Ted eyed me up and down, "it doesn't look like you have much so..." He gave a cocky grin and tilted his head back, looking down to make it known that he found me inferior, "we'll take your girlfriend here." Frank chuckled his approval.

"That's not going to happen, so let her go and we'll think of something else. Come on man, we're just trying to get out of here." My heart raced in my chest. These men want her for reasons I don't want to know about, and they don't seem like the type willing to compromise.

"Look at you issuing demands, squirt. I have the upper hand, why would I let my leverage go?" He took a step towards me. My eyes drifted to his right leg, he had a limp.

"It's cheap, but if it comes to it, I'll use what I got."

Frank started to back away with Annie as she tried to break free of his hold. He stuck his nose into her hair and took a deep breath in, "You smell good, babe."

"Let. Her. Go!" I charged, trying to pass by Ted, but I was taken off my feet by a heavy shove to the side.

I landed on the ground, hard. Ted towered over me, then I felt a sharp pain in my thigh. He kicked me and by the look of his boots, they were steel toed. The pain traveled up my leg, leaving the point of contact numb. Ted raised his foot, preparing to stomp down on me, but I rolled away just in time. I got to my feet and lunged backwards, bringing my hands up in a boxer stance. The pain in my leg intensified when I put weight on it, making me change my stance.

"If that's how he wants to do this..."

"Look at you. You got guts trying to fight me, I'll give you that." He limped forward, inching closer and closer.

I've been in multiple fights, something I'm not entirely proud of. Football was the cause of most of them, being a competitive contact sport and all, but over the years I've learned to take care of myself. I even studied MMA on the internet back when people weren't eating each other. I probably annoyed everyone in the house when I practiced the moves in my room, but now was the time to put them to use.

"I'm going to make you regret not giving up sooner, kid." Ted cocked his fist back, preparing to swing, but I was faster.

I gave him a swift kick to his right leg, connecting at his knee. He howled in pain and followed through with his punch, but he was slow and left himself wide open. I used my arms to protect my head then gave a sharp jab to his face. He stumbled back a few steps. Another hard kick made him drop to his knee.

"Now's my chance!"

I steadied my breathing as the adrenaline pumped throughout my body. It was just him and me, everything else vanished. I exhaled as I swung, landing my fist squarely on his jaw, forcing it side to side. He collapsed at my feet while the world rushed back all at once, once again I was aware of the surroundings.

"Luke, look out!" Annie screamed.

I turned into a heavy punch from Frank. It landed above my left eye, sending my mind into a haze. He was upon me in no time, tackling me to the ground.

"Damn he's heavy..."

He put his hands around my neck, trying to squeeze the life from me. I gasped for air while punching and clawing at his face, but it didn't have any effect. The air began to enter my lungs less and less, sending me into a panic. Not being able to breathe does something to you. A rush of fear washes over your entire body and your chest begins to tingle as the lungs fight for oxygen.

"I'm going to end you in front of your girlfriend!" From the insane look in Frank's eyes, I could tell he meant it.

The light from the street lamp seemed to darken, my body felt light and I stopped resisting, letting my eyes start to close.

"In a world full of cannibalistic cadavers, I'm going to be offed by a living, breathing human..."

THWACK!

The air rushed back into my lungs, maybe a little to fast. I felt crushed as Frank fell on top of me in a heavy heap. I looked over his shoulder and saw Annie standing over him with a metal pipe, her shoulders rising and dropping in quick breaths. She rushed over and helped push him off me.

"Are you okay? Please tell me you are, are you hurt?" She was checking me over, my face, hand, elbow. Everywhere that could've been hurt.

"I'm okay, I'm okay. Ugh," I held my head as it began to pound, "I got a headache.."

She gave me the tightest hug I've ever felt. Her tears dripped onto my neck as she cried. "You're so dumb, you know that?"

"Wait, what? She's happy, sad and mad? I'll never understand..."

"I'm sorry..." I hugged her back, "But I couldn't sit back and do nothing."

She sat back, wiped her tears and smiled softly. "I forgive you."

Standing up slowly didn't help much. The blood rushed quickly to my head anyway, causing my vision to turn black. After a few seconds, it returned back to normal, but Annie was tugging at my hand.

"I think it's about time we leave." She said, flicking her eyes beyond me.

From all the noise we created, a crowd found its way over. A crowd of decaying flesh and rotting teeth. Frank remained motionless on the ground with a pool of blood around his head, but Ted began to stir. He lifted his head and looked our way.

"You little shi–" He was cut off by his own screams. The Z's found an easy meal and took it. A lady took the biggest bite she could out of his upper thigh, a man clawed and pulled at his stomach and another man silenced Ted for good with a rip of his jugular.

"Oh no..." Annie covered her mouth and turned away from the gruesome scene.

I lead her out into the street, around the buffet. A few curious Z's wandered around the others and followed us. We didn't even bother to stick to the plan we set for crossing the roads, we just went for it.

Ahead was a blockade, about 3 streets up from us. From here there didn't seem to be any major activity.

I pulled Annie back to the sidewalk so we wouldn't be out in the open.

"I'd rather use the buildings to protect us on at least one side." I said to her.

"Good idea. Are you sure you're okay? You're limping."

I was limping. My leg hurt really bad. Every muscle in my leg felt like they were kicked by Ted's steel toed boots.

"Yeah, I'll make it. I just... need to walk it off..."

"That was one of the dumbest things I could've said..."

"Well, you're barely doing that. There," she pointed ahead of us. There was a car that was clearly expensive, worth more than anyone I know could afford. It was at a cock-eyed angle from the curb like it was parked in a hurry, "We'll take that. Driving will be better than walking."

I laughed. "Out of all the cars we've seen, you now want to drive out of here?"

"Well, no, but it's one I like. So we're taking that one." She glowed with pride as she called the shots. It was adorable.

I looked back at the car, "Do you even know what kind it is? You said you like it so you must know." I arched an eyebrow at her.

"It's, uh, one that goes fast and it's in Transformers."

I covered my mouth with my hand to silence my laugh. "Close enough." She wasn't wrong. I have a side hobby for cool cars, and from here it looked like a Camaro.

"Well? Let's go!" Annie bound off to the car.

I hustled after her. "Annie we should still take it sl–" I gazed down the street we were crossing and couldn't believe what I saw. I rushed over to Annie and grabbed her hand, tugging her back to the cover of the building.

"What, what!?" She looked at me, waiting for an answer.

I held a finger up to her lips. I mouthed the words "wait here" and she nodded. I went to the corner and pressed my stomach against the wall and inched my head around, peeking down the road. To the naked eye, nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but if you had a trained eye, you could spot the problem. On the ground amongst the normal Z's, was one hunched over on all fours, stuffing it's face into the belly of its meal. It used its hands to hold the body still as it gorged down all the flesh and insides it wanted.

I pulled myself back to Annie.

She saw the concern on my face and got close to my ear and whispered as softly as she could. "What is it?"

I took a deep breath and exhaled, "It's a damn runner."