Episode 2: Guns and Crackers

Episode 2

"Guns and Crackers"

I woke up the next morning, sleeping last night was tough. Jake's group wasn't back yet, and I was starting to worry. With the snipers still out there, who knows what happened? We shouldn't have sent them in such a small party, I should have come. I need to know where they are, we've lost too many people, I can't bear to lose another. I sat up, and my head rushed. My head was still pretty banged up, I felt dizzy and sick for a few seconds, then stood up. Everyone else was still asleep, I walked over and looked out a window. The storm had settled down, which was good. It was now sunny and nice looking outside, despite all the stranglers walking around looking for prey. I sighed and sat at a table. I really wish I was with Jake's group right now. I feel like I should be doing something, anything. I just sat at the table in silence until a few minutes later, Winston woke up. He got up and sat at a table with me.

"How is your head feeling?" he asked.

"Alright, a little sore." I admitted.

"I'm really sorry about that, I totally lost my shit and-"

"Winston it's okay, you don't need to explain yourself. I understand."

He smiled, "Thank you." he said.

"Something that is bugging me more is not knowing where Jake's group is." I said.

"You know what bugs me? Not knowing what damn day it is. I lost count, I don't know how old Julie or I am, or if a birthday has passed. It's only been about five months if I round it, but I still don't know if my birthday has passed or anything. I think I'll just stick to saying I am forty two the rest of my life. Which is the age I was when this started at."

"I guess I will too, I want to celebrate birthdays for Kayla, but I guess you're right. We will never know."

"So what are your plans for Jake's group Jeff? Are you gonna send out a rescue party?"

"If they are not back by noon we will send a search party."

Later after everyone woke up, Julie decided to cook everyone breakfast. Sabrina headed up to the garden to get some vegetables. I headed up to the roof with her. She looked upset.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Damn," she said, "The storm destroyed the garden."

I looked at it, one of the dirt bins had fallen over, all of the dirt and vegetables had fallen out onto the floor.

"At least some of them survived." I said, touching a tomato that looked untouched.

"I guess, but this will set us back for the winter. I want to grow as much as possible before winter, once winter hits we can't grow anything."

"We can still go on supply runs, and this mall is loaded with food, I don't think we have to worry."

"I just want to make it easier for us, more food we grow in the summer, the less food we have to scavenge in the winter."

Sabrina picked some of the remaining vegetables and we headed downstairs, everyone was eating at a table. Julie just made some toast and bacon. I sat down beside Sabrina, and noticed that Kayla and Brandy were missing. I then heard a big bang on the window. Then Kayla and Brandy scream, then giggling. I turned around to see a strangler, it was on the other side of the window. It was pounding on the glass as Brandy and Kayla were taunting it. Brandy had a flashlight, and he was waving it around. He was going to attract stranglers! I got up and ran over to them. I snatched the flashlight from Brandy's hand and turned it off.

"What the hell are you two doing?" I asked, furious.

"Sorry Jeff," Brandy said, "We were just playing."

"That is not playing," I said, "That is really dangerous. What if it attracts more here? You don't want another horde ripping through this place like last time do you?"

"No."

"Patrick, go shoot the one strangler before he calls some of his friends over." I ordered.

"Sure thing." Patrick got up and ran to the roof. I heard a quiet sound of a silenced rifle shooting. Then I saw the strangler's head explode at the window. Blood covered the outside of it.

"Now it's breakfast," I said, "Let's go."

After eating, I stood up and announced that I had something to tell everyone. They all gathered around me and I started to speak.

"Alright," I started, "Jake's group has not shown up yet, and I am getting a little worried. I know it's probably nothing, but we need to send help just incase. The snipers are out there, and you never know if they came in contact with their group. We will be leaving in a couple hours at noon, whoever wants to come tell me now. Some people need to stay back keep in mind."

"I'll come." Patrick raised his hand.

"Me too," Sabrina volunteered, "It's been getting boring cramped up in this mall all the time."

"If Sabrina is coming I want to come!" Kayla said.

"No, the kids are staying back." I ordered.

"I'll stay with them." Winston said.

I trusted Winston, but after what he did to me, I'm not sure if it's a good idea. I don't think the kids are very comfortable with him either. I guess they have Julie with them too, and I doubt that Winston will attack my kids. He is better now, I hope.

"Alright, so Patrick, Sabrina, and me?" I asked.

Everyone nodded, and Patrick and Sabrina went to go pack. Kayla ran up to me and grabbed my hand.

"I don't want to be with him." she pointed at Winston, who was having a conversation with Julie.

"I understand," I said, "But I won't be long. Sabrina wants to come, and I don't want to just kick her out of the search party. Winston is better now. Okay? You have Brandy with you."

"Julie scares me too."

"She's just a teenager." I said.

"But she says things to me sometimes."

"What kinds of things?"

"Like, we are all going to die. Someday it will happen and there is nothing we can do about it. She once told me she is okay with dying, and I should be too."

I decided to shrug it off, Julie has been through some pretty tough times lately. I guess that was her way with dealing with her mothers death. I packed everything up and waited on the clock. In about half an hour, we would be leaving. It just depended on whenever everyone was done packing. I just sat at a table watching the clock, tapping my feet. I was still waiting for Sabrina to finish packing. Winston then came and sat with me.

"Hey Jeff," he said, "You sure you're okay with going on this run? You're not still injured?"

"I'm fine. The headache it still there, but it's going away."

"I just want you to know that I'll try my best to keep everything safe here. It's the least I can do for you after almost beating you to death."

"Thank you Winston," I said, "I'll be back before evening."

He patted me on the shoulder, and got up. He headed to his gun table and started cleaning out guns, getting to his daily work.

Sabrina walked up to me with her backpack swung over her shoulder. We were ready.

"I'm done packing." she said.

I got up and opened the front door, I took one last look at Kayla. I smiled at her and waved. I turned away and walked through the mall, getting to the front door.

"We are ready?" I asked.

"Yep," Sabrina said, "I packed back up ammo, back up guns, food, and medicine."

"Wow, someone came prepared." I said.

"I only brought a couple guns and some crackers." Patrick said.

(This Part of the Story is From Mark's Point of View)

After staying up the whole night with Jess, It finally got bright enough to consider travelling. I could still hear the stranglers downstairs, they really never give up. For staying up all night, I felt perfectly fine. Jess looked okay too, but it's going to take her a long time to heal about Jake's death. That's a tough one to go through. I remember having a person coming to me when I was a therapist. They told me that their brother had died. They needed help getting through it, things were going well until one day. That person never showed up for their weekly scheduled appointment. I then later in the day found out that the person had been arrested for killing their brother. I was talking to the killer the whole time. It scared me a lot. Ever since then I was a little more nervous when talking to some people. Things like that wouldn't bug me anymore, if something like that happened to me now, I wouldn't think twice about it. This world is cruel now, and it makes you into a new person.

"So what's the plan?" I asked.

"We need to find someway off of this building." Ned stated.

"Yeah, no shit. Any ideas?"

Ned walked around the roof, scanning the area. He looked lost though, I don't think he knew what to do.

"Well shit," he said, "I don't know."

"Do we wait for someone to rescue us?" Jess asked.

"We would die of thirst before there were any signs of anyone."

"We have a backpack filled with water and food." Ned placed his backpack down.

"Exactly," I said, "Nobody is coming. If we waiting up here we would use up all of our supplies, and then die afterwards."

"So what the hell do we do?" Ned asked me.

"This can go either way," I started, "We jump, and try not to die. Maybe we could land on something to break our fall, or maybe even scale down the building. I doubt we will be able to do that though. The other option is to go back down to the ninth floor, and kill all the stranglers in the way."

"Then get infected and die." Jess said.

"Not exactly." Ned reached into his bag and pulled out a couple shirts.

"What are we going to do with some shirts?" Jess asked.

"Well you see, since we don't have any respirators on us, we can use this as a substitute. I packed a spare change of clothes just incase one of our shirts got strangler blood all over it. Anyways, we tie these shirts around our mouth, and use them as respirators. It might not work as well, but we have a better chance at surviving."

I looked over at Jess, she shrugged. I think this might be the best idea we have. I walked over and grabbed a shirt from Ned's hands. I then cut it in half so it wasn't so big, and handed the other half to Jess.

"There," I said, "Now we don't have to waste as many shirts."

"I don't see it as wasting, but okay." Ned cut his in half and threw the other half away.

We tied the shirts around our necks like bandanas. I lifted part of it over my mouth and nose. I walked over to the hatch and opened it up, we peered down. Stranglers were still there, about ten or so of them. There were probably more that got lost throughout the building. We would have to be careful.

"Alright," I began, "We might be safe from getting blood inside of us, but these bastards still scratch and punch. They can rip you apart in seconds if you give them the opportunity. Be careful."

I loaded my pistol, Jess loaded her dual wields, and Ned loaded his pistol. It would have been easier if we were a bit heavier equipped. Before going down, we started by picking some off from the roof just by simply shooting at them. After we got most of them down, I hopped down. A stranger darted at me, I smacked it in the face with my gun. I then shot it in the chest. It flew into the wall and blood splat all up the wall. Jess came down, and surprised me. She stabbed one of the stranglers in the head with the end of her gun. Her customized guns were really helpful, putting knives on the ends of them was smart. She started going crazy, and stabbing every single strangler in the room. She kicked one over and shot it in the head, as another went for her she turned around and kicked it down the stairs. She pinned one up against the wall and started stabbing it uncontrollably. I shot the last one in the room. Jess was covered in blood, she would have been infected if it weren't for the bandanas. She backed away panting, looking at herself. I think she just took all her anger out on the stranglers, after losing her brother yesterday I don't blame her for losing it a little. Ned then climbed down after all the dirty work was done. We still had eight more floors to clear, after staying here all night I wouldn't be surprised if it was like this on every floor.