<b>I had alot of players for this game, I split them into two groups running in similar but slightly variant settings, Here's the first part of the second group. Again, adult language and situations. </b>
Its dawn and a storm looms on the horizon. Dark thunderheads billow and churn in the distance, lightening flashing in ominous silence among them. It’s been 3 days since you've seen any people. Any living people anyway. There are plenty of bodies. People killed in the rioting, or that actually succumbed to the Flu...or "them" and died in the wreck clogged streets. The charnel smell of fire and rotting flesh hangs faintly in the air, tainting everything you smell or taste with its foulness. Supplies are running low.
The last of your canned goods are gone and your down to a few strips of jerky and some stale chips when you see it, like an oasis in the middle of the wastes, the shopping mall.
The sign says "Oakdale Galleria". Its a 3 floor mega shopping complex with a glass facade facing a broad open parking lot. Only a few burned out and stripped cars sit in the lot. Miraculously, nothing moves. The place looks almost pristine and untouched by the looting. Maybe there's something inside still.
Jasmine smiled. "Well, I could use a few more things for my wardrobe..." And nearly pissed herself when someone shouted behind her ""Hey! Lady! You all right?"
She squealed, spinning around and backing up.. The shouter was a huge woman, a platinum blonde bull dyke looking giantess of a woman, standing off to her left.
"Shut your PIE-HOLE boy," a male voice rang out, startling them both. "You're makin' enough noise to wake the dead!"
Jenna turned slightly in that direction, bringing the gun up. "In case you haven't noticed, BOY, the dead are already awake. But since you're talking, I'm guessing you're not one of them." She kept herself behind the car, watching them both.
"Oh, I'm so sorry...shut your pie-hole MA'AM. Is that better?" AJ asked sarcastically. "And now that we've all confirmed we're among the living, and identified our genders, AND possibly announced our presence to those who aren't alive...I'm assuming you two are wanting into this place as well?"
He didn't seem terribly concerned at the fact the larger woman had a gun of her own, and seemed to make it a point that she had one (whoop-dee-doo...). He had guns pointed in his direction by Panamanian guardsmen, Iraqi Republican Guard, Serbian Militia...one gun wasn't going to make him take that much pause.
He passed them by, looking to see where an entrance. The glass facade was probably shatterproof, but there might be more accessible service entrances around...
"Shall we look for a way in?" he asked rhetorically. "My wife hates it when she gets caught in the crunch of shoppers. Can't say I blame her."
God I wish she was here, he thought sadly.
"Every woman does, even me." Jenna said. She walked up closer to the man and the woman. "I don't suppose we could be lucky enough for the front doors to be
open, right?" She looked down at the other woman.
"Miss? Are you ok? It's nice to see living faces, even it they're not entirely friendly." The girl, she was gorgeous. In fact, almost too pretty but in a trashy sort of way, not like a model but more like a streetwalkers or a showgirl. Showy and a bit overdone.
Jenna managed to keep herself from ogling, and turned back when she heard the man speaking again. Then it hit her where she’d see her before. “American Booty”, a pretty hot lesbian flick.
_Go figure on THAT..._ Jenna thought.
"Remote," AJ said. "Some malls leave their main doors open, so morning power walkers can come in and get their exercise. More than likely, we'll have to find an unlocked service entrance...or make an entrance."
If he had gone into boosting cars instead of selling crack when he was young, he might know how to pick a lock.
Jasmine nodded, trying the front door. "If we can secure all the doors, it might be a good place to hole up for a while..." The doors were locked. She could see inside and the place looked abandoned.
Suddenly, there was a rustling in the hedges beside the door...
Jasmine backed up, the other two were the ones with guns.
Jenna turned, raising the bat over her shoulder for a swing. She waited to see if anything was going to come out.
Johnson stepped back, and had his shotgun levelled toward the hedge...
"Say something now," he said menacingly, as he chambered a round.
"Hey, hey whoa," a little scruffy ragamuffin of a girl came out of the bushes. "Shit, I was just seeing if you were down or Deadheads, kay?"
Jenna breathed a sigh of relief. Lowering the bat, she smiled at the girl. "Well, I'm not a big fan of the Dead, and we're not dead, so I guess that makes us down. My name's Jenna." she said, holding out her hand.
The moment a little girl was in his sights, A.J. raised his weapon up
and away from the child. He scowled--which looked rather menacing.
"You could've gotten yourself killed..." he started, but then he realized just how stupid his comment was. His features softened. "Aw hell...I don't even know how you could've approached this any better. Yeah...we're among the living and breathing."
And looking for a way into this place, he thought.
"C'mon...we gotta find a way inside."
Jasmine exhaled. "Don't suppose you know a way in?"
"Whoa!" Sam exclaimed, taking a step back. "What the hell is going on here?" They all looked up at the new arrival, a slim, but attractive woman though a bit tom boyish in appearance.
AJ almost wheeled around with his weapon leading--the tension in the air was more than a little thick.
Stay cool, he thought.
"We're giving each other heart attacks and inducing paranoia, ma'am," he said. "In the middle of all this, we're trying to get in here. It might be defensible."’
Jenna turned, gun still in hand. "Better be careful about the surprises, Missy." she said. "We were just about to try and find a way inside. Hopefully in a hurry, cause that storm is about to rain on our parade."
She looked at the big guy. "So which way? Left or right?" she asked.
A smudge of charcoal grey seemed to bulge from the darkness of the parking lot. A figure moved forward, clad in black from head to foot. An alien: great petal eyes like pools of oil and beneath these a circle of a mouth like a perfect O, devoid of teeth, utterly black, surrounded by a skin of shiny plastic, all shaded beneath the gun-metal-grey dome of a helmet. Not the head of an alien grey but a gasmask; a man dressed in swat relief’s. Tubes drooped from the underside of the mask and coiled over Kevlar plated shoulders to tanks strapped on a wide back. The body-amour was also black- some kind of bullet proof vest. The figure wore a black boiler suit underneath and at his hip lay a satchel of midnight color stuffed with who-knew-what. Ammo would have been a good guess, for in his right hand he gripped a sub-machine gun and in the other a snub barreled sidearm. Like a wraith he drifted into the open. Something about his gait suggested disregard for fear, a harbinger of danger, not a savior of the law. This was no well armed policeman but something else.
"You shouldn't point guns at little girls," the voice, dark and muffled, was aimed at AJ, as now were the machine gun and sidearm, the former leveled casually from the figure's hip, the latter at shoulder height, left arm held rigid, gun aimed meaningfully at the black man's throat. "Point it somewhere else."
"What, you've never been surprised?" Jenna said. "Why don't you put that gun down. It was a mistake, and nobody wants to hurt anyone else." _Yet._ she thought.
Well, they all come out of the woodwork now, don't they, AJ thought.
"Already moved it away from the girl when I found out she still was a girl, fella," he said, gun pointed obviously into the air. "Maybe you might want to do the same thing...before this ends badly."
He was pretty sure he could get the deer-slug through the kevlar, if it came down to it. He was hoping that it didn't.
"Whoa whoa..." Jasmine backed up. "There are enough dead people around here already. And he was already pointing it away..." She edged over to the kid. "So, um, know a way in?"
Sam scoffed, then sighed. "I should have stayed at the yard," she thought to herself. She looked at the blurred reflection of the bunch assembled in front of the shopping mall through the eyes in the suit.
"What's the good of pointing a gun at anyone? I shot my husband fourteen god damn times and he didn't even blink."
"Did you know he was one of them before that?" Jasmine asked with a grin.
Sam grinned back at Jenna. "Yeah, I knew... but I was almost to that point, anyway."
"My husband is the only one I've encountered. After the bullets didn't work, I ended up burning him to a crisp in a junked car. Smelly, but effective."
It takes a lot." Jenna said. "The ones I took on stood up to bullets, even my strongest blows with the bat. I just kept hitting them til they went down." She put her pistol away.
"And them I hit them some more, til they just stopped moving." She unhooked the bat once more, holding it up. This works almost as well as a gun, in close quarters." The bat looked small in her hands, but it did look well used.
"Regular guns don't seem to be really effective," AJ admitted. "While we were making our stand, I found three things to be effective--fire, explosives...and blowin' large holes into 'em.
"Which is why I'm sticking to shotguns right now."
Jericho turns to the man with the shotgun and dips the chin of his gasmask, "...Mossberg 12 guage Bantam, pump action, positive steel to steel lock-up, blue finish, honey satin buttstock and pump grip, 24 inch VR ported Accu barrel with 3 choke tubes. Thumb operated tang safety for left and right handed use, wide vent rib with white front and brass mid-bead sights, 6 shot field capacity. That's the fully-rifled deer barrel model with different sight options, though the sight seems to be missing."
AJ raised his eyebrow. Whoever this was, he knew his weaponry. Either he had training...or he was one of those gamer geeks who got obsessed about guns. "
AJ went over to a nearby service exit door, to give it a try, and began to look at the possibility of climbing upward. There was a door down by nearby row of hedges, cleverly concealed to maintain the façade’s architectural integrity. Trying to open it proved fruitless. It was securely locked.
They were the first people Jeff had seen in two days. And all of them looked normal. Alive. Two men, two woman and a little girl. Ok maybe not normal. One of the women was a huge platinum blonde and one of the men was decked out in paramilitary gear like some weekend warrior survivalist nutcase. Most of them were armed, but given what was going on he couldn’t blame them. They looked to be trying to get into the mall, which wasn’t really a bad idea all things considered.
AJ heard the stranger as he read of the litany of what he supposedly knew about the shotgun he was carrying. He scowled a little at the fact that the door wouldn't open. He continued to survey the side of the mall, and decided to make a test climb. "I don't suppose anyone has a rope?", AJ asked frowning that smoothness of the mall’s walls. The glass was probably shatterproof; the exit doors didn't have to be. Moreover, there was usually a set of inner doors, so..."Unless anyone can come up with an alternative, I'm thinking we can blow out the locking mechanism on this door," he said. "If anyone has an alternative, speak now."
Jenna looked at the door, tugged on it. "I could probably pull it open, but I don't know how we'd get it closed again."
"Why don't we walk the perimeter? There aren't any of those dead things now, and it's no use blowing out a door and going in if there's a gaping hole around the other side and an army of those things waiting for us..." Jasmine shrugged. "We see if it's all good, if it is, we find a good door to break, that we can seal up from the inside. If this place is clean, it'll work for a home base until we can figure out what we should do..."
The rain started to fall, gently for the moment but heavy storm was looming in the distance.
"The rain is coming." Jenna said. "And me without an umbrella. If we're going to look around, let's get moving."
AJ nodded. "Okay...let's scout the perimeter. I don't mind a little rain, but let's keep in one group. We may not know each other, but right now, we're all we've got. Let's keep it that way."
He had no idea how this was going to work. If none of them knew how to jimmy a lock, he didn't see any other way to get in other than making an entrance.
"Bad idea," said Jericho, "might need the lock later. Here," he patted a coil of black rope tied around his right shoulder. The rope looked like the sort used by professional climbers, flecked with tiny smatterings of green and very strong but so thin it hardly showed against the rest of his dark outfit. He holstered the sidearm in a sheath strapped to his right thigh, swung the MP-5 sub-machine gun over his left shoulder and moved a satchel, which until now had been hanging at his hip, into closer view. Beneath this hung a small metal grappling hook. "I'll go up. Find a skylight. Open the doors from inside."
"I wish you said something sooner," AJ said. "Okay, I'll go with you.
No reason any of us should go anywhere alone."
"Do a quick runaround." Jasmine suggested. "Make sure we're not walking into a nest or something. We'll circle around while you get up there, meet you back here in ten minutes or so." It finally dawned on AJ where he’d seen here before. At a friend’s bachelor party. She’d been the star in three of the pornos running on the big screen TV all night long. Damn…small world.
AJ opened up a pouch on his belt, and pulled out a peculiar canister. "This is a thermite grenade," he said, handing it to the tall amazon. It makes a large radius of intense heat and fire. I only have one left, so don't use it unless you have to."
He then shouldered his shotgun and made his way back to the strangely dressed character. "Let's do it."
The kid chose now to speak up. “I can pop some of the locks if ya want me to…” ;
"Really? Well, give it a go, kiddo." Jenna said. "Couldn't hurt anything."
Jasmine looked to the kid. "Have you been around here a while? Can you tell us what condition the mall is in?"
“I got here just a little while before you all did.”
"Hold up, Batman," AJ said to Jericho, as he walked over to the kid.
"Well, that might be nice to try. Will we be able to lock 'em after your through?"
It wouldn't be much good if the doors couldn't be closed afterward, after all.
“Well, most a the time the lock don’t work when your done…” she admitted.
"No!", The gas mask shakes vigorously, "I go up. My rope, my risk. You go with the others." Up comes the mask again, facing AJ, "protection. At least one of us should stay with them. You have the Mossberg."
Jasmine nodded. "All right. We'll do a quick circle and meet you back here in ten."
AJ shook his head. "If you were in my platoon, I'd kick your ass for insubordination...but you've got a point, and I don't wanna argue. Okay, up you go. Just make it quick." He assumed that the guy knew what to do once he was in there. "Hold off on jimmying the lock, kid," he said. "Let's get some cover until we can get inside."
Jasmine headed off to check the perimeter of the mall, to make sure there wasn't a gaping hole with zombies wandering around. She didn't have guns like some of these people. She'd survived by running and hiding. It was no use running into this place if it was already full of those things...
No one else seemed to following here. She had an obvious choice: circle to the right or circle to the left.
"How long do we give him to get to the door?" Jenna asked. "Just in case, I'd likie to have a backup plan." She looked at the commando looking guy. "You think you can do this fast?" she asked. "We'll look around, see if there's another way in, as well. If you're not back in a while, I say we have the kid open the door. Or me."
"Name's Annie," the little girl replied, looking somewhat annoyed. "Not kid." She poked her head out to the commando guy and griped, "Hurry will ya? I coulda been inside and dry already."
Jericho shrugs, an agreement, indifference, or confusion. "Watch the night. I'll be back." He swings the grappling hook, the face behind the mask upturned toward the roof of the mall... The hook caught on something with a loud clang. Or at least it sounded loud in the quiet of the early morning.
"Same as before--ten minutes," AJ answered. "If push comes to shove after that, then one of you picks the lock--but not the main doors here."
He gestured to the side. "One of the emergency exits here. If it follows standard design, there'll be an inner exit door which we can secure."
He continued to keep an eye out for anything zeroing in on their position.
Jasmine decided to circle right; at a decent jog she could probably circle the mall in about five minutes. She pulled away from the main group, heading around the corner of the mall ahead of everyone else. There was a home depot on that side with a garden section. She could see inside. The plants were actually still looking pretty good in the greenhouse.
Jericho started scaling the outside the building. Given the wet concrete it was slow going.
Jasmine checked the gates and looked for gaps between the fencing and the roof. Well, more an awning, but it would probably keep the deadheads out... Maybe she could crawl in, though the inside doors were probably still locked. It might be a good place to run to if things got bad outside before they could get a door. The lot was surrounded by a fence. She could probably scale it without too much trouble and then she’d be in the green house area. Breaking the glass door would get her inside the garden center proper. As far as she knew, Deadheads weren’t together enough to climb Of course the door could be the same shatter proof material as the front doors. She was starting to feel a bit…alone out here by herself.
AJ didn't like it when people went out on their own--not at all. It usually meant that he'd have to go out by himself and bring them back...and beat the crap out of them--verbally and sometimes literally. But whether or not to leave the group...the rules of warfare had changed. Damn...
Jericho was half way, a small slip had set him back a few feet, but he was making progress.
AJ didn't like it when people went out on their own--not at all. It usually meant that he'd have to go out by himself and bring them back...and beat the crap out of them--verbally and sometimes literally. But whether or not to leave the group...the rules of warfare had changed. Damn. This did not feel right. People were scattered all over the place. This was the open, possibly hostile territory. This lack of discipline was going to get some people killed or worse, turned into one of those things. It was a hell of a war. Anyone was a potential traitor. The enemy had a 100 percent effective recruitment strategy.
Jenna walked around the building, looking for the woman who had gone. She saw her over by a gate, near a Home Depot. She moved to catch up with her, keeping an eye out around them. She still couldn’t quite believe this was the same porn star she’d seen in that movie. Almost hard to recognize her with her clothes on, she pondered, a slight smirk curling her lips as she admired Jasmine’s ass for a moment as she walked up. Of course, most folks would probably be surprised to find themselves breaking into a mall with a pro wrestler. The End of the World sure did make for weird situations.
Annie shivered, hunkering down inside her overly large leather jacket. She hated this. It was getting cold again. She was wet and these guys were screwing around playing GI Joe. Why didn’t they just go the fuck in already? This rate they were all gonna get the Black Flu and spaz. She could almost see them, their skin growing those black boils and coughing up their guts then coming at her, growling, drooling and hungry. The faces of her friends replaced them, her dead friends that had tried to eat her alive, would have if she hadn’t escape blocked the apartment door and squirmed out of window. With a soft, almost inaudible whimper, she closed her eyes and forced the visions out of her mind and focused on now. She couldn’t be a little fucking girl anymore. The bogeyman was real and she had to smart or he WOULD eat her. She headed closer to the building and got under an overhang. At least that kept some of the rain of her. But she really had to pee….
Jericho crested the building and pulled himself up onto the roof. It was broad flat, dotted with air conditioning units, vents and a couple of elevator access areas. He saw the stairway access across the way and, strangely enough, two deck chairs set up near it.
Oh well, at least the big lady's going to be there with her, AJ thought. I just wish they'd get back over here.
He could take the kid and follow along, but then the "masked marvel" would have no idea where they went. Divided like this though, they were very vulnerable...If he had to, he'd get the kid and follow the two women, but he wasn't happy about it and speaking of the kid. "Folks call me AJ," he said. "What do they call you?"
She looked up at him, short black hair plastered over her forehead by the rain. “I told you. Annie.”
"Sorry...I forgot," AJ said. "I've had a few other things on my mind of late."
His "Daddy" side wanted to kick in and find a way to keep her dry, but he kept it under wraps. He had nothing he could give. Hell...he was still standing out in the rain himself, water dripping off of the brim of his cap. "So tell me Annie...have you ever loaded a shotgun before?"
Annie sneezed, bundling the large jacket around her, "No. You got a spare to show me?" She tried and most succeeded in sounding flip about it, but the idea kind of scared her. She’d only held a gun before once in her life. She hoped she wouldn’t screw it up, but mostly she just wanted to get in out of this rain. And find a place to piss. She really had to go.
"It's pretty easy," AJ said, wanting to get the girl's mind off of their situation. "I can show you in a few easy steps. It might come in handy, just in case things get hairy. I can give you a walkthrough now..."
Besides, it'd mean that he'd be able to give her something to do once the shotgun was drained of shells. He could switch to the Colt .45 while she reloaded, and then switch back to the shotgun...ideally.
Jasmine continued her tour, with the big blonde trailing in her wake. She circled around the back. Out of sight and found the loading dock. A bright candy apple red Porsche was parked in front of the dock.
"Mama like..." Jasmine sighed, heading over to check if the keys were in it. Now THAT would be lucky, though she'd still have to park the thing outside... Then again, maybe they had a gate to the loading dock area... They could stage a few vehicles there, maybe. No keys but there were a pair of panties in the back seat. When tried the door it opened.
Jasmine glanced to the big girl. "Well, if someone can hotwire a car, we've got a ride..." She headed back out, looking for a gate to close if any. There was a roll up door but the car was parked outside of the dock itself, just close to it.
"Well, maybe we can roll it in later..." Jasmine hurried off to finish her circle of the mall. She and Jasmine made the tour, a few more entrances, all locked. A Sears and off in separate building across the parking lot they saw an Applebees and a Petsmart. Both of them looked locked down, but there was a van front of the Applebees. One of the creepy rusted out serial killer vans with no windows in the back. "I think we can avoid that..." she muttered to herself.
"Well, that's unpleasant." Jenna said. "Let's get back to GI Joe, Rambo, and the kid." She paused, looking back at the Porsche. "You think that belongs to someone in there?" She thumbed back at the mall.
:"Could be... If they're still alive,” Jasmine replied and headed back to where the others waited. They’d taken a bit of shelter under an overhang, but still looked pretty wet and miserable. Not that Jasmine and Jenna were looking much better and the rain was really coming down hard now.
"Ladies...welcome back," AJ said. "Y'all had me worried for a little bit."
He still hadn't done much to shelter himself. He was a little worried about shoving the kid out of the protection of the overhang. So he had fallen back on his marine training, which told him to grit his teeth and bear it.
"Find anything interesting?" he asked.
Jasmine slipped under the overhang with her, shivering a little in what little clothing she had. "Well, all the doors look secure. There's a loading dock area we might be able to slip some cars into for a reliable way out if we need it, and a home depot with a fenced in garden area we could also use for that. Sears across the lot. Once we get settled maybe we can do a quick run over there for anything we don't have here. Should have auto supplies at least. Might be a few cars in the service bay, and some keys for them."
AJ nodded as he absorbed the information. He wished the Sears was attached, but the Home Depot might come in handy. However..."No other way in, I take it?"
"Plenty of doors, but they're all locked down from what I could tell." Jasmine said.
"She didn't mention the Porsche. Pair of panties in the back seat." Jenna said. "You know, if he doesn't hurry up, I may pull that door open anyway. I have to use the bathroom. In a hurry."
Annie nodded slightly, in agreement. It felt like her back teeth were floating and steady beat of rain was NOT helping matters any.
"Sounds like we might not be the only ones who thought of settling in here," AJ said. "What about the fence around the Home Depot? Is it climbable?" It might offer another way into the mall. Moreover, if they did bust the lock on the door, Home Depot would have heavy chains and locks to bar the doors again. Something had to happen soon, though. They needed inside in the worst possible way.
Jasmine nodded. "Yeah, we can climb it. And I haven't seen the deadheads climb yet, but we can board over everything if we break in, right?" She glanced through the windows. "I wonder if the suburban commando decided to ditch us..."
"Lady," Annie nodded from her huddled spot under the overhang to Jenna. "I gotta go. You and me, let's go around the corner and take turns." She didn't wait for an answer as she got up as she spoke, digging her hands into the leather jacket's pockets and walking back the way AJ and Jenna had come. Screw this waiting bullshit. If she had to piss around the corner then she had to. Not like some dumbass cop was going to bust her for it.
AJ chuckled silently. There were a number of reasons that it was great to be a guy, or so he was told. An issue of "Maxim" Magazine a few years ago listed a hundred of them. It really wasn't his type of read, but it was humorous nonetheless. One of the reasons listed: The world is your urinal. He kept his vigil up, nonetheless. He also noted how long it'd been since Jericho had gone into the mall, and hoped he'd be showing up soon.
"Annie, I'm with you." Jenna said. "Let's go around the corner." She looked at the others, and gestured over her shoulder. "While we're waiting, Annie and me are gonna take a quick run around the corner. We'll scream if anything happens. You do the same." She looked down at Annie. "You ready to go?"
"Ready?!" her dark expressive eyes were briefly visible to Jenna under the ball cap. She was not quite what Jenna had expected from the way she talked. Her face was pretty...perhaps she looked like on the verge of being a teenager. She turned back to check out carefully where they were going. "I've been fucking dying! I can't wait any longer!" her voice was held to an urgent whisper. "Can you watch out first?" she rapidly started undoing her baggy cargo pants under her jacket.
"Sure kid, lets go." the big blonde said, ushering the kid ahead her.
"OK," she spun around, reflexively swiping away Jenna's arm attempting to usher her, "Drop the kid bullshit first thing. I was all right before and I don't need to be talked down to like I'm less than you." Chip clearly a mile high on her shoulder; she spun around again to walk ahead of Jenna.
"Sure." Jenna said with a chuckle. For her size, her laugh was surprisingly girlish. "I'll keep first watch." She turned her back, to give the girl some privacy, while still being able to look in as many directions as possible. She held the bat like she meant business. "Go ahead and do your thing ki... Annie."
Annie squatted down, pulling her pants down and started to go like a geyser. It was an extreme relief. She'd been holding it for hours.
"Guess you really had to go, Annie. And hey, don't take any offense at me calling you kid. I'd probably call you that if you were twenty. Just a habit. Let me know when you're done, all right? I still have to go too."
No problem," Annie sighed with tremendous relief. "I snapped cuz it hurt to hold it. Sorry. You are boxer or something?"
Jenna chuckled softly," Close. Wrestler. Played Pro Basketball for awhile too." She almost turned but remembered the girl's modesty and stopped herself.
Annie bounced a little then rose, hiking back up her cargo pants and cinching them up, "Okay. All done." She stepped forward again, feeling much better. She wished she had some tp but there’d bee worse times.
“All right, my turn.” Jenna stepped around her and took care of her business. As she was, Annie saw something coming down the road. It looked like a small group of people…. No Not people. She could tell from the drunken lurching. In her mind she could hear the moaning and babble that would become enraged howling as soon as they laid eyes on them.
Annie peered but stayed completely still. Her voice didn't come at first then she managed to whisper after a moment, "Hurry... I see some things coming..."
Jenna was beside her almost instantly. "Oh shit." The figures weren't moving normally. They were shambling, stumbling drunkenly down the highway in a small mob. "Fuck, we gotta get inside now."
AJ was getting a little more than worried. The fugitive from the riot squad seemed to be taking a little long at this, and it'd be inevitable that some deadheads would show up. They ruled the open now...and human beings were either eaten or made to swell their ranks. That fence separating them from the Home Depot was looking like more of an option as time went by... Screw it, the sergeant thought. When the two ladies came back, he was going to recommend that they scale the fence, and get inside NOW.
Jenna picked up the smaller girl, and moved back around the corner, trusting that her longer legs would move them faster. She ran up to the others almost as if in answer to AJ’s unspoken summons. The look on the big woman’s face did bode well at all. "We've got company and not the good kind, if you know what I mean! We've got to get in there NOW. Fuck waiting for Joe Commando. Annie, you think you can get that door open in a hurry?"
“Sure, any you want,” Annie answered with a bravado she didn’t really feel. Her guts were turning to jelly. She didn’t want to see more of those things. Part of her, the small part of her that was still a child had been hoping maybe they wouldn’t come.
Shit, AJ thought. He wasn't about to waste the expletive by using it out loud..."Right, what the big lady said," AJ confirmed. "I've got some paracord on me. Once we get inside, I might be able to secure the door--assuming we don't take it off the hinges. "Meanwhile, looks like I'm giving cover support."
“Ya can put me down anytime now,” Annie griped at the giantess. “Which door we goin’ for?”
"Emergency exit," Johnson said quickly. "It should be easier to resecure it when we're in." The nearest one was the door near the loading dock which also put them more out of sight of the approaching Deadheads.
Jasmine shook her head. "Home depot. We jump the fence. The doors inside may be open. If not they may not be as tough. Once we're inside, we've got plenty to secure a door with."
"All right, then. Let's get there, and get in. There's a group of them, and I don't want to get caught in the middle, if you know what I mean." She hefted her bat for a second, then put it in it's holder, and grabbed her .45 "Rather have some distance if we need it." she said.
Given the potential close quarters, Sgt. Johnson stuck with the shotgun. "Let 'em come to you," he said. "Wait until they come into your range--we have to make each shot count." He didn't know about the tall lady, but his ammunition was running out.
Annie high-tailed it for Home Depot, showing she was no slouch when it came to running, even with baggy cargo pants on. Her backpack held tight in her arms, she ran up to the fence and started climbing, hauling herself up to the top…
Jasmine nodded, heading off at a run for the Home depot, relying on the rest to keep up, or pass her. Once she got there she started climbing the fence and got about half way before she slipped on a wet rung and gashed her leg on a piece of wire! She cursed, gritting her teeth, trying to pull herself the rest of the way up. Last thing they needed was those things smelling fresh blood.
"Climb? You want me to... shit." Jenna said. She moved up to the fence, then jumped up and grabbed the top, pulling herself up. At the top of the fence, she lifted the awning, to let Annie get through, and then reached a hand out to Jasmine. "Need a hand gorgeous?" she asked. "Let's get you over and get that cut tended to."
Annie quickly scrambled up and over, dropping to the ground on the other side and ran up to the garden shop door to get to work. The lock was a piece of junk and she could crack it easily with a few seconds time.
Jasmine nodded, wincing as she shifted, pulling the gash open. "Thanks..." she said weakly, accepting the hand
Jenna pulled her up. "That looks pretty nasty. We'll bandage it up down there." She helped the woman over, then let her down, trusting her leg strength to hold while whe did so. She looked back at the black man. "Yo, Sarge. You need a hand?" She grinned at him.
Climbing was second nature to the marine sergeant. AJ slung his shotgun, got a grip, and did the type of climb over he did when he wanted to show up a cocky recruit. Once over, he landed on his feet, unslung the shotgun again, and got ready...just in case the lock couldn't be cracked easily.
Jenna laughed that girlish laugh as the sarge touched the ground. She swung her leg over, and dropped down, rubbing her right knee. She knelt and looked at the cut on Jasmine's leg. Tearing a strip from her shirt, she wrapped it around the cut, trying to slow the bleeding. "That'll do for a temp, I hope." she said. "If you need a hand, let me know."
Annie, working with chilled and wet fingers worked at the lock, blinking water out of her eyes. Her hands were shaking and she had to make concentrate to make them stop. Oh god, what if she couldn’t…then there came the welcome click. “I got it!”
Jasmine sighed. "Let's get in and get it closed up again..."
"In!" Johnson barked. He took the rear position, backing toward the opened doorway. As he got closer, he had one question on his mind... "Can you lock it back up?"
"I can try..." Annie checked to see if her jury rig was reparable or not...heart beating so fast now she felt it would burst. God she didn't want to see those things... It was a cheap lock and she’d popped it quick. It was going to stay popped.
Jasmine limped in, hopping on one leg to get through the door faster.
"Annie? What do you think? Can you lock it back up?"
"Nope, no way...it's gone," Annie wasn't waiting around. As she quickly said it, she headed back into the Home Depot. If they came...she already wanted her hiding place and escape route planned out. She was small and fast...it was how she stayed alive before even when her friends...she didn't want to think about it.
"Okay okay...at least we're in a hardware store," Johnson said. "That'll come in handy." At the simplest level, they could block off the popped door with some lumber planks and reinforce the blockage with some 4x4 posts and several bags of compost or cement sand. At the very least, there were some chains that could be wrapped around the handles...
They were in the Garden section. It had soil, landscaping materials…lawn jockeys and other items for the yard with a counter with a register right inside the door.
"If we're lucky, they won't get over the fence... Haven't seen em climb yet..." Jasmine said. "We should have time, but maybe we can push that counter over to the door for now..."
"Chain the doors shut, then put some of those posts up." Jenna said. "Then we can look through here; see if we can use anything, before heading out into the mall proper."
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Home Depot Zombie. You can eat it. We can help.
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