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They’re low on food again. Mack is starting to think that they have too many people on this mission. Supplies that would last him and Addy weeks seem to only stretch to a few days. Of course, him and Addy wouldn’t be able to get Murphy to California all on their own. Mack would strangle Murphy within the week, if Addy didn’t beat him to death first.
Mack, Addy, 10k and Cassandra have been sent to look for supplies in a small town nearby. Doc, Garnett and Warren are checking their map, trying to figure out which road to take to get them west the fastest. Murphy is asleep in the back seat of their truck. He refuses to help with any of this.
“How about in there?” 10k points to a building with boarded up windows and a shuttered door. It looks like no one has been in there since the apocalypse started.
“Dried goods store?” Cassandra asks, reading the sign above the door. “Maybe. You would’ve thought it would have been raided by now.”
“Not many people out here.” Addy observes. “It might have been overlooked.”
“Let’s try it.” Mack agrees. “Maybe there’s a back door?”
“The alley is blocked off.” Cassandra points to a pile of trash at the entrance of the nearby alley. “We’d have to go all the way around to the next street and see if we can get in the back.”
“We might be able to bust the lock.” Addy swings her modified bat around. “Hit anything hard enough and it’ll break.”
“You’ll attract every Z in the neighbourhood.” 10k reaches into one of the pockets in his cargo pants and pulls out a set of lock picks.
“Is there anything you don’t have in there?” Mack asks.
“I don’t have the steak dinner Murphy keeps asking for.” 10k shrugs. He crouches down and starts fiddling with the lock.
“You can pick locks?” Cassandra asks, crouching down next to him.
“We’re about to find out.” 10k mutters, tongue between his teeth.
Addy and Mack keep watch while 10k works the lock. It takes him a lot of trial and error, but eventually the lock clicks and he pulls it off of the shutter.
“Alright, get back.” Mack says, grabbing the bottom of the shutter. The others back away. “I’m gonna throw this up and run, you guys kill anything that comes out. Got it?”
Addy flips her bat around her wrist. Cassandra readies her pistol. 10k pulls a knife and a crowbar out of his belt. They all give Mack a nod.
“Alright, three, two… one!” Mack hauls the shutter up and sprints past Addy. He turns on his heel once he’s behind her, pulling up his gun, but-
There’s nothing. Just yawning darkness, swallowing up the store inside.
“Well, that was anticlimactic.” Addy says. She bangs her bat against a nearby lamp post to see if it draws anything out, but there’s just silence.
“I am not going in there.” Cassandra says. “It’s too dark, we could get jumped.”
10k scoffs. “We have torches, Cas, we’ll be fine.”
“I’m a bad shot one-handed, and what if my torch dies? This is gonna end in tears.” Cassandra insists.
“It’ll be fine.” Addy clicks on her torch. “I just put new batteries in your torch.”
“I’m the exact sort of person who dies first in a horror movie.” Cassandra complains, pointing to herself. “I’m not going in there. I’ll keep watch out here.”
“You’re my pick for the final girl.” Mack whispers to Addy, who rolls her eyes at him affectionately.
They head into the building, 10k first, then Addy, and Mack bringing up the rear. 10k holds his torch over his head to get more light into the space. Somehow, the daylight from outside doesn’t penetrate more than a few feet from the door. The store is a maze of shelves half full of jars and tins and packages of dry goods. It looks like it was picked through at some point, but not ransacked.
The three of them split up, heading down different aisles to cover more ground. 10k sets his torch on the shelf and pulls out his bag. He starts shoving whatever he can fit into it, dried fruits and cans and crackers. They can return here and get more if they need to, but he knows how hungry everyone is so he wants to get it back to the car as soon as possible. He tries to remember if Cassandra has told him her favourite fruit before.
Something clatters along the floor to his right. His head whips around, zoning in on it. Friend or foe?
“Mack? Addy?” 10k calls out.
There’s a low groan and creaking from the same direction. It’s only one voice, one Z. He better get it before one of his friends stumbles into it. Mack is great, but he doesn’t have fantastic spatial awareness at the best of times, let alone in the dark.
10k doesn't fancy his chances of using a gun effectively in such close quarters, so he slips his knife from his belt. He takes his torch in his hand and tiptoes towards the source of the noise. The light beam passes over shelves and tile floor, until they land on a set of feet. But the feet aren’t on the floor, they’re hovering off the ground, kicking and squirming.
The torch beam travels up the bloated corpse until it reaches its snarling, gnashing face. It’s hanging from the ceiling by a noose, a rope that is slowly breaking.
“Oh, fuck.” 10k fumbles for his slingshot, because he can’t stab someone in the brain when they’re three feet off the ground. He drops his torch and it shatters, leaving him in darkness.
As it writhes, the rope holding up the Z breaks more, until it finally snaps and the Z comes tumbling down with a crash. 10k panics, yells for Mack and Addy to run get out get out quick and dashes towards the daylight. Cassandra stands outside, raising her pistol as 10k sprints from the store and gets behind her. A moment later, Addy darts out followed by the zombie with the noose still tight around its neck.
Cassandra fires her pistol with one hand, the other arm in front of 10k protectively. The bullet goes straight through the side of its skull, dropping it to the ground.
“You said you couldn't shoot one-handed.” 10k says, out of breath.
“I said I wasn’t good at it.” Cassandra winks at him and reloads her pistol.
“I guess that was the owner.” Addy kicks the corpse with her steel-toed boots. Then she realises who’s missing. “Mack!”
“Yeah?” Mack wanders out of the store, digging into a box of crackers. He glances at the corpse. “Where’d that come from?”
“It was in the store, it chased us out.” Addy gestures with her bat. “You didn’t notice?”
“It was too dark.” Mack holds out his box of crackers to her. “Want one?”
Addy stares at him in disbelief for a moment, then takes a cracker. She bites into it and hums. “Mm, we should get all this back to the others.”
“As long as I don’t have to go back in there. It’s creepy.” 10k says.
“I did try to tell you that.” Cassandra reminds him. He rolls his eyes at her.