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Season 4 Finale
As his bottom lip quivers, Lou carries forward, holding his staff with its pointed tip held upward, the dull end placed against the ground to be put to use as a walking stick. “Lou, we’ve been walking for almost eight hours” Jules murmurs from a few steps behind, lowering his chin into the warmth of his zipped-up jacket as the rest of the group follows behind, shivering from the frigid, below-freezing temperatures that wrap around them like a cold blanket, “we need to take a rest.” Each step slower than those taken just an hour prior, Lou soon comes to a complete stop in the middle of a road, beckoned to put a halt to his pursuit of sanctuary by the man practically begging for a rest. Able to see his breath as each gust takes the appearance of a white cloud, the man at the very front of the group turns around slowly to glance back at the men and women that follow his lead, each tired step he takes matched by one of their own. Near the back of the group with their eyes shut, Elsie and Josie keep their hands tucked away in the pockets of their thick coats, eyelids parting the moment those they follow come to a stop. Just a few steps ahead, Jenn crosses her arms as her bottom jaw hangs low, mouth open now that keeping it shut proves to be too exhausting. Stood beside her, Adrian wears little more than a long-sleeved shirt as he presses his arms to his daughter’s sides, Marta wearing both her own jacket and his. His breathing heavy, Rudy follows alongside Sonya and just behind Courtney, both of his daughters appearing the brace the frigid weather much better than he does. Standing beside the man’s eldest daughter, Sebastian hangs his head to his side as he holds his girlfriend close, doing his best to keep her warm as his legs buckle the moment they’re called to stop. Trailing closely behind his friend, Jules squints in the direction of the man coming to a stop ahead of him whilst Terry nearly stumbles over, his legs having yet to register the request made of his brain to keep from moving even a centimetre further. Tilting his head back as the darkness of night begins to come to a close, Lou stares into the sky as he feels the gentle first few snowflakes grace his skin, having gone too long without feeling their crisp touch than he’d anticipated. “We still don’t know what we’re doing” Jules begins to mutter, his voice just barely loud enough for the rest of his group to hear, “it’s cold, we’ve got nothing and haven’t slept in over a day. Can we please- please- sit down for a few hours.” Even in spite of his obviously exhausted appearance, Rudy shakes his head vehemently as he struggles to speak, looking toward Lou with the quiet hopes that he refuses to allow such a break. After a few seconds spent in silence, Lou drops his head and lowers himself to a knee, having already hiked up a great distance in altitude as his head falls. Without a word, the man looks at Jules with a brief glance upward, unable to speak the permission to take a breather into fruition with anything more than an approving nod. As if freed from the weight of concern that comes along with having to ask, all but one of the survivors reacts with various expressions of relief. “No” Rudy replies, huffing and puffing for every breath as those that stand ahead of him turn back with a loss for words, “no, we can’t take a break.” Shaking his head in ardent refusal, the older man stumbles back for a moment before regaining his balance, his head continuing to jolt from one side to the other with no end in sight. “What? Dad, you can barely even stand!” Courtney replies with squinted eyes and a look of disbelief. “If anyone would’ve asked for a break, I would’ve thought it’d been you!” Terry calls back, shrugging his shoulders as he shares a very similar look of surprise. “No, please! We have to get somewhere” Rudy replies, wincing as his teeth present themselves strongly, both hands pulled free from the pockets of his jacket before hanging by each of his sides. “Rudy-” Lou begins remark, his voice almost missing the ears of the man who continues to remain dismissive. “No, Lou. Please, for god’s sake-” Rudy interjects, bowing his head as he continues to gasp for air, glancing over his shoulder for a moment in the direction of a road sign he’d spotted just half a kilometre behind, “-there’s a car dealership about three hundred metres from here, can we just- can we just keep going until then?” Pulling his head back without the strength to do so, Lou’s body carries itself further back than he’d anticipated, pulling him back to the point that he’s forced to take a seat upon the cold asphalt. Wincing just as Rudy does, the man looks up in the father-of-two’s direction and lets free a deep breath, able to see the passionate man quietly mouth just one word. “Please” the oldest member of the group pleads silently, watching the pack-leader’s head bow as the voices of confrontation reply from each direction. “Rudy, we can’t keep moving!” Jules groans, rolling his eyes and face as Sonya speaks to much the same opinion, “dad, none of us can keep going like this. We need to take a break for a couple of hours at le-” “I don’t have a couple of hours!” the woman’s father shouts, a sudden burst of energy presented through the angry presentation, the suddenness and implication of the man’s declaration prompting every eye to look in his direction. Stumbling back again, Rudy presses his eyes shut as his face scrunches, eventually joining the rest of his head in bowing toward the ground, where it stays for a few moments. “What does that mean?” Courtney inquires, her hand having reached out to catch the man amidst his second off-balance second step. With a desperate look on his face and the shake of his head as he glances up, Rudy stares toward the cloudy skies covering his heaven as he slowly pulls one side of his coat outward, a stain of blood on his black t-shirt worn just over his left pec. Letting out a groan and sigh at once, Rudy takes his second hand and winces as he rolls the shirt up, presenting those standing ahead of him with a sight that provokes immediate concern. Their eyes widened, Sonya and Courtney wear shocked expressions as the older sibling points toward the wound he wears, unable to speak the words that sit at the tip of her tongue before her father utters them for her. “I’m bitten” Rudy confesses, holding his shirt up for only a few extra seconds before the muscles in his arm give out, lowering the shirt and jacket back into place as his head sinks once more. Their exhaustion immediately fading off, the man’s daughters look to each other for a moment as Sebastian tightens his grasp on the woman within his arms, shaken just as she is though with a much different priority. “I don’t know if it was the amputation or the bite, but Kim lasted just a little under a day after she got chomped” Rudy remarks, placing both hands against his knee as those standing behind him take a few steps back. “We’ve been walking the entire night, so a few hours might just be it for me” the older man admits, aware that living for him is something accomplished on borrowed time, “I don’t know what happens before this thing takes over, but I don’t wanna be out here when it happens.” Licking his lips as he runs his fingers through his wet, grey hair, the man stands upright once more and lets out a deep breath, repeating his request to the man at the very front of the group. “Three hundred metres isn’t that much farther ahead, and there’s a fair chance you all find a car worth driving off the lot while we’re there” Rudy explains, doing his best to keep from being too much of a burden on those that he holds back, “can we please- please- just keep going a little bit longer?” With his eyebrows lifted, Lou keeps his stare on the older gentleman before glancing at the turn in the road they soon approach, recalling what it’d once been like to not know what lies around the corner within the near distance. Pressing his lips together, the young man pushes himself off the ground with whatever energy he can latch onto in that moment, and shrugs his shoulders in Sebastian’s direction, meeting little resistance from the man keeping Courtney upright. “Just a little bit longer, folks” Lou replies, tilting his head back as he resumes their progression forward, setting the lead for the folks still wearing their exhaustion like a badge. Whilst Rudy’s daughters find a second wind out of the horror that faces them in their father’s impending demise, others present a second wind knowing that the journey ahead won’t take too much longer, and those that struggle to carry on clench their teeth and keep their feet moving ahead of each other. = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = “Why didn’t you say anything before?” Courtney asks, her hands folded as they hang between her thighs, both arms resting atop her legs as she occupies a couch beside Sebastian. “I didn’t want to hold everyone back” Rudy replies honestly, laying back in one of the desk chairs as Sonya takes his temperature with the back of her hand, “I figured we’d keep moving until somewhere promising showed up. If we’d kept moving, I would’ve stayed quiet until we got here.” Having started a small fire in the centre of the abandoned dealership, the group keeps themselves warm whilst a select few brave the elements in search of a vehicle. “How long does he have?” Elsie inquires, looking to Sonya for an answer before receiving a worried shake of her head. Breathing through her teeth, the man’s youngest daughter lets her hand slide off the man’s sweaty forehead, “he’s running a fever- a bad one.” “How long did it take-?” Sebastian inquires, falling silent suddenly as he directs the question to Sonya, rubbing his thighs out of uncomfortability as he looks away, “nevermind.” Looking back to the man sitting beside her, Courtney thinks quietly to herself for a moment before realising what the man had intended to ask, kept from having to respond to it as a voice from the other side of the room answers the question. “When Margo died, she went unconscious for a few hours before coming back. Her bite was a lot worse though” Jenn remarks, shaking her head as she sinks back into her seat, “if he’s had this for eight hours or so, he’s probably got a couple more left with a fever that bad.” “Hours?” Courtney asks back, looking at the woman with a look of surprise, “what do you mean hours? Mom went after a little over a day!” Putting both hands up in surrender, Jenn lowers her chin as she keeps from an outburst coming to. “I said ‘probably’, I’m not an expert in this stuff” the responding woman replies, trying to quell any discussion from reaching the point of hostility. “Court’, I’m not feeling so well” Rudy replies, his voice calm and forgiving, watching his daughter’s frenzied face turn back to him before darting off to the depths of the room, “it’s not gonna take too much longer.” Hyperventilating, Courtney’s hands begin to tremble as she pushes herself off the couch, apologising as she wipes her face of the tears that begin to fall, “I need some air” she says as she walks off. “Go after her, son” Rudy remarks just as Sebastian begins to step off the couch and follow after the woman, turning back to look at the man in silence as he reiterates himself, “I know what I said. Just go after her.” Swallowing the cotton mouth that dries his gums, the man whose attendance had been requested steps back into action, trailing behind the man’s eldest daughter as he joins her outside in the cold. “Sebastian, I can’t-” Courtney begins to explain, shaking her head as tears begin to fall in spades, unable to finish her remark before feeling the man’s weight step into her, his hands pulling her close as he lulls the horror that fills her heart with his warmth. “It’s okay, it’s all gonna be okay” Sebastian replies with a whisper, holding the woman’s head against his chest as he presses his chin against the top of her head, “it’s okay to cry. I’m here.” “I thought I’d have more time” Courtney whimpers, her voice subdued as she presses her face into the man’s chest, unable to keep her composure as the tears only shed harder. “I know, Court’” Sebastian replies, pressing his eyes shut as Lou watches on from afar, sifting through a bucket of keys held between his body and shortened arm as he takes a moment to pause, watching the sincere moment being shared amongst those he considers to be close friends. Without a way of fixing the problem that provokes such a guttural reaction from the grief-stricken eldest daughter, Lou remains quiet and returns to his efforts, continuing to venture through the abandoned lot and peer through shattered windows and already-vandalised vehicles. Pulling his head up as he tries to hold back tears from just seeing the woman’s pain, the man returns to his sights as he digs yet another keyfob from the red, plastic pail. “Any luck?” Marta inquires, stepping through a tight squeeze between a pair of blue sedans, unable to find any luck of her own as she reaches the end of her search. “Not yet” Lou replies, accepting that he’d have to settle for a vehicle barely able to be considered such a thing at this rate. “I don’t know if anyone here knows how to hotwire a car, but if they do- we might need them” the bucket-wielding man replies, his rebar staff carried in his protege’s hand. “Go inside. Get some warmth and I’ll call you out here in case we find anything” Lou urges, immediately met with reluctance from the woman that shakes her head in refusal. “I’m fine out here. Besides, if I go inside and get warm, I’ll just start shivering against once I come back out” Marta responds, the shrug she’s met with speaking volumes. “You’re probably right” the man responds back, pulling free another set of keys with a hopeful look on his face, almost immediately letting it fall. “I know I am” the woman responds with a smile, returning the staff to its rightful owner before swapping it out in favour of the man’s plastic pail. “I know you may not know this- what with being an Angelino and all-” Marta begins to remark, lowering her hand into the pail and shuffling the keys within around, preparing to select one at random as she finishes her confident remark, “-but up here in Canada, we tend to know a thing or two about cold weather.” “Oh is that so?” Lou replies with a subtle smirk, walking casually alongside the woman as she retrieves a supposedly lucky key from within her bucket, “well, as an Angelino, we tend to know a thing or two about luck. I mean, it’d made sense for people from the city of angels to be blessed with such a thing, right?” “Since you’re still coming up empty handed, I’d say you’re not as lucky as you appear” Marta replies, turning to face the man that returns the same gesture, looking her in the eyes as they both fall helpless to keep a smile from spreading from one ear to the other. “I guess you ought to show me how it’s done then” Lou replies, glancing off in the direction they’d initially begun walking toward, “go ahead, lucky one.” Bobbing her head from one side to the next, the woman’s thumb presses against the ‘unlock’ button on the keyfob she’d retrieved, immediately listening to the subtle honk of a heavy-sounding vehicle just a few metres in the opposite direction. With a squint, Marta’s eyes immediately take toward the truck she’d believed the sound to have come from before pressing her thumb down once more, watching its rear lights flash as the pair immediately stare with astonishment. “You’ve got to be kidding me” Lou mutters beneath his breath, listening to the woman cackle as he points his finger, shaking his head with his tongue pressed against his molars. “Woo!” Marta exclaims, throwing her hands up as both Courtney and Sebastian turn to face the direction of the excited shout, the rest of the survivors who had traipsed the parking lot in search of exactly what they set out for taking a sigh of relief in what appears to be the confirmation that their search has concluded. | As the daylight begins to pass and Sebastian keeps his hands on the wheel, the truck they drive finds itself trekking along slush-covered ground, the snow that begins to descend from the sky starting to stick to the road and force the driver to keep their speeds low. With their elbows pressing into the centre console, Courtney holds the hand of her much-loved significant other as her teary eyes remain fixated on the path they still have to journey ahead through, trying to subdue her mind. “How are you doing, dad?” Sonya whispers, sat in the backseat with her father sitting beside, clearly worse for wear as his sweat begins to run heavily, staining his shirt around the collar as he no longer wears his jacket. “Awful” Rudy replies, clearly waiting for the sweet relief that’s brought with death, but allowing his suffering to prolong in order to offer his children whatever time with him they have left. “How does it feel, Rudy?” Sebastian inquires, keeping his foot to the pedal as the majority of the group follows closely in a pair of cars just behind them, unable to bear the winter chill from the truck bed. “Why would you ask him that?” Sonya queries to the man behind the wheel, his answer provided with clarity and honesty. “Because sickness is mostly mental” the man in question responds, “if he explains how it feels, he might feel a little bit better.” “He’s dying” Sonya cuts back, prompting the man to fall silent as her older sister squeezes her eyes shut, trying to forget her father’s worsening state in spite of such a task proving impossible to accomplish. “It’s fine honey” Rudy responds, holding his sweaty hand out to keep the woman from continuing to berate the man behind the wheel, his youngest offspring’s irrational anger more than understandable by the vehicle’s every passenger. Sat in the back of the truck on his own, Terry keeps his ear close to the open window separating him from the inside of the truck’s cabin, listening to the conversation happening beyond the transparent divider between himself and the group within. “I feel like I have the flu” Rudy replies gingerly, his words hitting those sat in the front seat just as they do to the girl sitting beside him, “the spot around the bite feels warm and tingly. Honestly, it doesn’t even hurt anymore.” “That’s good” Sonya replies, wiping the palm of her dominant hand over the jeans that cover her thigh, nodding with every faint hope that his condition could be improving. “No, it’s not” Rudy replies, almost unable to finish his response before letting out a violent grunt, pulling himself up from the near-flat position he’d sat within his seat with, coughing up the mucus that builds within his lungs, the result that spews out of his mouth taking on a dark red colour. “I can’t feel anything in my chest or shoulders anymore” Rudy confesses, watching his youngest daughter reach up to turn on the cabin’s overhead lights whilst his eldest sits stoically in the front seat. “My hands are kind of numb and I feel like my feet are swollen” the father continues to explain, every word he utters simply continues to wear down Sonya’s already-waning hope, “it feels like something’s in my chest trying to keep me from breathing, and I get dizzy if I exhale too hard.” Listening to the man’s descriptions, Courtney’s hand- still held within her boyfriend’s- begins to tremble hard, almost as if she were holding onto her composure through a pain of her own. “It’s alright” Sebastian whispers, keeping his words subdued within his breath for only the woman beside him to hear, her face turning toward him with an expression as if she were trying to convince herself to admit such a thing. Pulling her tongue out from being pressed between her molars, the tension in Courtney’s face begins to ease as her eyes meet those of the man beside her, lips parting as she lets out a deep sigh. “I know” the woman whispers back, flashing the slightest smile in the corner of her mouth as it proves to be all she can muster, turning her attention from the man sat beside her to the man sitting on the verge of his life’s conclusion, his eyes meeting hers as she turns back. “You’re in pain” Courtney remarks with a sorrowful tone of voice, the man’s whimper-like breath filling the silence that proceeds her proclamation and precedes his response. With a tear rolling down the side of his face, Rudy presses his lips together before letting them part gently, “yes, I am” he replies, not wanting to spend the final moments of his life lying to those he holds closest to his heart. Pulling in a gasp as her face suddenly resumes its grief-stricken expression, Courtney lets out a hurried breath, quickly pulling it back in. Trying her best to smile as her face floods with the emotion of having to bid her father adieu, the woman pulls herself together just enough to muster what she knows to be the best she can offer. “Everything’s going to be okay” Courtney tearfully whimpers, lips pressing harder together as her father fights through the pain that the infection riddles his body with, aware that he does so for the girls he holds dear. Letting free the deepest breath he can muster, Rudy nods his head gently, wearing a smile of his own in the corner of his mouth, “yes, it will” he whispers back, sharing the same realisation that his girls have come to- the final hours spoken of earlier have dawned. Reading the faces of those within as his arm leans against the window separating them, Terry turns his eyes back toward the man behind the wheel of the pursuing vehicle. Watching the passenger in the vehicle ahead point to his empty wrist, Lou passes his eyes toward Marta and presents her with a subtle nod, the hand she uses to pull the crank window down soon extended past the door and into the Canadian elements, snapping her finger toward the vehicle that tails them. Quickly laying into the horn for less than a second, Josie confirms her reception of the woman’s signal and follows the car ahead off the road, joining the foremost truck in pulling onto a quiet path split between two empty fields. “At least it’s peaceful” Rudy sighs, slowly making his way down a small hill with the assistance of Terry and Sebastian, his only remaining family following closely behind, Courtney’s arm holding her little sister close. “If I had final minutes to spend, this is the kind of place I’d want to spend them in” the older man to his right replies, prompting the only smile he can muster as his facial muscles begin to hurt. “If you could, just dig my grave wherever I stop breathing” Rudy responds, turning to look at Sebastian as the younger man looks back at him. “Who said we were burying you?” his daughter’s love jokes, earning the closest thing to a laugh the older man can provide him. “You know, Sebastian- I always liked you” the older man confesses, never having implied anything other, though not wanting his final minutes to be spent leaving things for interpretation. “Make me a promise, will you?” Rudy wonders aloud, stopping with the men as Sebastian turns to look at him, the palm of the dying man’s hand pressing firmly into his older aid’s back, “fuckin’ marry her already, won’t you?” His mouth slightly agape at first, Courtney’s boyfriend looks back to the woman standing just a few steps behind, a smile coming over his face as he looks back to her father, a quiet nod and smile returned to the man. “Good” Rudy replies, nodding back as his eyes return to the open field, continuing to lug himself onward as he nears closer to his final resting place with every step. After a few brief minutes, the man’s knees begin to buckle as it becomes clear he can no longer continue on, the weight of his body slowly pulling down the men that carry him forward, the cold ground fully embracing his body as he’s carefully laid upon it. “I’m okay, I’m still alive!” Rudy proclaims as best he can, trying to keep his daughters from hurrying up to him with anything more than the slightest concern. “Um, I don’t wanna ask for too much, and I get why you’d say no, but-” Terry begins to remark, splitting his request between Sebastian and the two girls that draw closer, “-can I have a word with him in private for like, thirty seconds?” “I can make it that long” Rudy replies before any of the three in question have the chance to respond, assuring the three members of his family- both blood related and through wished-for marriage- that he’s fine with the request. Putting both hands up, Sebastian steps back and retreats to his girlfriend and her younger sister, putting his arms around them to embrace in the wake of tragedy that unfolds before them. “Listen, I said some pretty cruel things a few days ago, and I-” Terry begins, trying to speak quickly to keep from running overdue on his requested time. “Let me tell you a story” Rudy interjects, not allowing the much younger man to finish his apology purposefully, waiting for approval from the man kneeling beside his final resting place. Replying with a quiet nod, the younger man grants the survivor he’d likened to a soon-deceased canine permission to recollect. “A few months after he started taking me out to hunt with him, I told my father that- for my birthday- I wanted him to buy me one of those cap guns. Y’know the little toys?” Rudy begins, watching Terry nod back to him, “guess what he said? No.” Squinting, Terry watches the father fold his hands atop his chest as he looks toward the cloudy sky, feeling the cold kisses of each individual snowflake collide with the skin on his face. “He was a park ranger during the summer months, and before he went out for a night shift one night- right when I was supposed to go to bed- I told him that I hoped he died out in the forest for saying no” Rudy confesses, “I was a spoiled boy for many of those years. I didn’t think anything of what I’d wished upon him until the next day- when he didn’t come home.” Eyes falling, Terry stares to the ground with an apologetic look in his eyes as his face is clouded by the heavy breaths that leave his lungs, the view he has of the man dying beside his knees remaining mostly unimpeded. “For seventeen years, I never let myself forget that those were the last words he ever heard me speak to him” Rudy explains, a smile appearing in the corner of his mouth, “but then, when I was twenty-one, I remembered the exact reason he gave me for saying ‘no’.” “He said, the reason I won't get you a toy gun is because I don’t want you to think of guns as a toy” the older man explains, looking into the confused expression worn on Terry’s face, the younger man unable to see what importance is held within the rationale. “This is what he said- it’s one thing to think shooting guns is fun” Rudy continues, nearly shedding a tear as words remain leaving through his chapped lips, “it’s another to think guns are fun to shoot.” Finding himself at a strange sense of peace as each final moment passes in favour of yet another one, the older gentleman stares into the dark sky he believes his father to be awaiting him behind. “-You may not understand that now, but you’ll know what I mean by that when you’re old enough to think about it” Rudy continues to speak, the tear that’d threatened to leave his eye now falling freely, “-when that day comes, I won’t have to worry about buying you a toy gun.” Letting the muscles in his neck loosen, Rudy’s head presses into the soft ground beneath it, its damp soil acting almost like a pillow. “I realised after all those years, that my father wasn’t the kind of man to think much of a little kid just spouting something off for the purpose of hurting him” the regretful, yet well-taught survivor explains, a faint nod returned to the remorseful soul beside him, “he probably brushed it off and went out thinking about how much he loved me instead.” Mouth agape, Terry stares off into the treeline that sits just a few hundred metres away, thinking about the point the once-boy’s father once attempted to make before realising what was meant by it. “I don’t hold what you said against you, and I don’t blame you for saying it. I needed to hear it-” Rudy confesses, reaching up gingerly to pat the young man on the shoulder gently, “-and I wanted you to hear that.” Bowing his head, Terry gently pats the father’s hand and pulls away as the rest of his family returns, kneeling beside him without much in the way of words to offer. “Sebastian, can I ask for one more favour?” Rudy whispers, passing a look toward his eldest daughter before returning his eyes to the man on his other side, “don’t make Courtney put down her father too.” Letting free a heavy sigh, Sebastian looks to the man and bobs his head in complete silence, leaving the room for final words for him to share with his remaining family. “Everything’s still going to be okay” Rudy whispers, one hand taken into the hold of each daughter, who both press their second hand against the back of his own as Courtney responds with reassurance, “yes, it will.” “Are we ready?” Marta inquires, her dirt covered hands pressing into her hips as Lou kneels before her, the woman’s father wiping off his own cold palms as they place the final handfuls of dirt atop the newly-departed father’s grave roughly an hour after he’d passed. Wiping his nose with his free hand as his prosthetic fingers press against his side, the man and his rebar staff turn back to look at the pair of sisters as they mourn close to Sebastian, their only living family now being each other. “Yeah” Lou replies, nodding toward the man that stands with one hand patting Sonya’s back as his other hand rests around Courtney’s waist, the temporarily dual-handed survivor turning back to his protege with a hopeful expression, “let’s find home.” Patting the back of his daughter’s mentor, Adrian begins to step forward as Marta helps pull the man to his feet, the free hand his dominant arm wields reaching for the plastic one worn atop his shortened stub as he proceeds forward. “Lou?” Jenn calls out in a suddenly worried voice, stepping away from the mostly-quiet group of survivors with her finger pointed to the direction of the fresh grave. Looking to the woman with uncertainty at first, Lou soon joins Marta in turning around to find the source of her strife, an immediate cause for concern agreed upon by those that remain amongst the living. “Do we run!?” Sonya wonders aloud, only for her ear to be caught by the same voice that strikes fear within the rest of her peers. “No” a stern voice replies from a few dozen metres away, only this time from the exact opposite direction of the sight that had provoked such worry. Armed with the same heavy artillery as it had appeared his peers did, the thick-bearded man with the declarative voice steps out from cover with a flashlight aimed at the loss-burdened survivors standing before him. “Everyone get on your knees, put your weapons on the ground, put your wrists together and hold them out” the yet-unnamed survivor orders, stepping forward in the centre of an approaching line of similarly-armed men. Glancing directly behind them, Marta finds yet another wave of men and women approaching in the opposite direction of the first wave, the sides to their left and right soon cut off by equally well-armed fleets of soldiers. “What’s the call here, Lou!?” Marta exclaims, feeling the touch of the man’s prosthetic grace her lower back, keeping her within arm’s length as they quickly run out of room to retreat. With his hand on the pistol protruding from his waistband, Sebastian stands ahead of Courtney and Sonya whilst Adrian stands in front of his daughter, the American half of the survivors following the rest of the group’s backward departure before their eyes widen at the voice that soon calls out behind them. Nostrils flaring, Lou’s fingers grasp tightly around the rebar staff at his side as he turns a side-eye toward the line of approaching guards that close in to his right. “Wait!” a feminine voice calls out amidst Marta’s declarative question, prompting the silver slayer’s grip on the weapon to lessen instantly, his eyes widening as the hairs on the back of his neck are brought to a stand, his body immediately locking up as he freezes in place, unable to move his legs. Following the declaration, the bearded man and his line of guards ceases their forward progression, looking past the faces that look at him with fear as they, too, fall into shared looks of shock. “Lou?” the woman’s voice wonders aloud, prompting Marta to quietly join Sebastian in looking to the face of the man whose name leaves the unknown girl’s lips. Turning back toward Courtney and Sonya, the only man armed with a gun other than Marta looks to the nearby line of soldiers to their backs. “Oh my g-” Sebastian begins to mutter beneath his breath, unable to finish his utterance before his voice evades him, able to look past the frazzled hair to recognise the face that stands mere metres away from their one-armed once-guardian angel. Turning her face back to the person responsible for the sudden halt in the quickly-escalating situation, Marta looks back to the woman who she fails to recognise, but creates her own assumptions based on her mentor’s reaction. The first to turn around, Jenn looks past Marta and Adrian to find the woman for herself, an immediate look of persistent shock taking over as her jaw drops. “Jenn?” the woman in question calls out, the only name uttered aside from his own prompting the one-armed slayer to take a deep gasp for air, his sudden return to earth watched on by the woman beside him, who quickly cements her assumptions into reality as the man slowly turns around. Slowly and steadily through the miniscule gap between his two front teeth, Lou’s eyes turn with the rest of his head as his body rotates to face the music of who stands before him. Growing wider as he finally uncovers beyond any doubt the mystery of who calls his name, the man’s lip begins to quiver as the remaining air that had yet to leave his lungs gets caught and held back, the rebar staff held within his free hand falling from within reach and to the soft ground below. In the last manner he could have anticipated, the journey responsible for refusing him peace over the last three months of his life finally comes to a climactic conclusion, fitting the final missing piece into the puzzle that is his group’s ultimate reunion. Struggling to regain any semblance of composure, Lou forces his lips to steady with the rest of his jaw, which tenses as he stammers toward finally lifting the name of the one woman that had eluded him for so long from upon his tongue. “Ally” With a smile, Ally lowers the weapon she’d held before her toward the ground as a select few others- whom she shares the square that had decreased in size until recently- do much the same. “Boy oh boy, my parents would hate this” the woman replies, trying her best to keep her lips from pulling apart, unable to help the smile that overcomes her face like irrefutable joy, her playful mockery of the man letting the jubilation settle, “I’ve been looking everywhere for you, ya bum.” Though his shocked expression remains unchanged, Lou’s lips feel the warm gust of air escape the lungs they’d been suddenly trapped in, firing out all in one breathy chuckle. Instinctively taking shape in the corner of his mouth, the man on the other half of a long-awaited reunion nods- with a crooked smile- in wholly-devoted agreement with one eyebrow raised, “right back at ya” he mutters just loud enough for those that surround him to hear, “right... back... at... ya...” == RISE and REVOLT ==
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“Now!” Terry exclaims, joining Lou, Jenn, and Jules on the front line of defence as the front doors to a drugstore are pulled open by the hands of Elsie and Josie. Armed with a baseball bat, Jenn swings at the first corpse that steps through the now-open entrance before Jules steps ahead, plunging the blade of his knife into the skull of another roaming corpse as the field ahead lessens.
Marching forward, Lou thrusts the pointed tip of his staff through the eye of a much more bloated corpse as Terry follows suit, pressing his back against the one-armed survivor’s own as they proceed onward. “Next up!” Elsie calls out, turning back to the dark confines of the building where the lack of sunlight is more than apparent, watching Rudy and Sonya emerge from within to take over for them. Returned to the forefront, the tomahawk-wielding girls move to different sides of the storefront and aid in the rest of their group’s efforts of clearing a path to the truck. “We’re good!” Sonya exclaims as she and her father barricade themselves behind the glass doors, keeping them propped open for the rest of their group to advance forward. With an ice chest carried between the two of them, Sebastian and Courtney step into the open first whilst the others remain behind. With Jenn and Jules providing them cover, the reunited couple storm past a fleet of undead roamers and quickly lift the heavy container into the bed of their escape vehicle. “We’re clear!” Courtney exclaims, climbing into the truck as Sebastian follows suit, their fight taken to the corpses that near the other side they had not climbed aboard from. “Next up!” Jenn calls out, watching Marta and Adrian lug a second ice chest from the abandoned storefront, one father-daughter pairing soon followed by another. “We’ve got a path to the truck!” Sonya shouts in the direction away from where she currently hurries toward, prompting Elsie and Josie to retreat from their battle amongst the dead in an effort to return to the safety of their truck. “Lou! Terry!” Rudy soon calls out to the only men still waging battle in the field, helping Adrian and Marta drag the ice chest aboard as the rest of the group provides them cover. “We’re good out here, just let us know when we’re ready to roll out!” Lou shouts back, dragging his staff through the forehead of another corpse before thrusting it through the bridge of another’s nose, Terry’s quick succession of stabs just behind him making it clear that his blindside is covered. As the dead in the surrounding area continue to take notice of the group’s presence, more corpses make for the rundown pharmaceutical storefront the band of survivors currently defend from their ranks. Mostly covered in litter, blood and the remains of the undead, the downtown city street the group currently ventures down is illuminated by the first set of clear skies the group can remember seeing overhead in a long stretch of time, keeping the air clear and chilled. “We’re ready!” Josie exclaims, risking her safety to disembark the vehicle from the horde-surrounded side, slipping through the door to the driver’s seat with plenty of room to spare as she turns the keys in the ignition. One by one, the rest of the group floods back into their getaway vehicle as Lou and Terry follow suit, taking their preferred seats in the truck bed and backseat of the cabin respectively. “Step on it, Josie!” Sebastian calls out from the back of the truck, sitting directly across Lou as his hands press tightly into whatever his fingers can reach, bracing for the sudden momentum as the truck speeds off with its tires dragging along the ground. Struck with a cold rush of air, the group in the back of the vehicle remain vigilant of the dead that surround them, keeping themselves as out of reach as they can manage as the overrun street passes them by. After a few minutes, a passing look through the window he sits beside prompts Terry to call out a question for those familiar with the area to answer, “where are we?” With one arm stretched out along the truck bed’s inner wall, Sebastian takes a good look around the many cars they cautiously slither through and the area he can barely make out from over the main road they navigate through. “I’m not a hundred percent confident, but if I had to guess-” the man remarks, squinting his eyes to make out every last detail his sights happen to set upon, “I think we’re in Kelowna?” Sat on the opposite side of the truck’s back half and rolling his eyes, Rudy leans into the furthest corner with an arm draped over his bent knee. “We’ve been driving for almost two days, it’d be a problem if we weren’t” the man responds, his large frame dressed in a grey sweatshirt. Keeping to themselves as the sun continues to beat down on them, the group mainly keep to themselves as the journey progresses onward, another few minutes passing before the obstructions in the road become too much to contend with. “We’re gonna have to take this exit and get back on the road in the next town over” Josie calls back, the vehicle moving slow enough for her declaration to reach the ears of every passenger without repetition. “We might as well find someplace to settle in for the night then” Lou replies, aware of the descent the late-afternoon sun begins to take, “we’ll figure out where we are, where to head next and find some gas if we’re lucky.” Following through on the suggestion, Josie’s foot inevitably presses gently upon the brake pad as they slow to a stop in the middle of a mostly-empty parking lot, the dead only numbering in the low double digits between themselves and their destination. “Jenn, Adrian, Rudy, Sonya on the supplies. Terry and Jules get a good look at the place. Everybody else, get to work” Sebastian remarks, the first to hop off the truck and set his sights on the dead. In very different directions, the group dissipates in favour of handling their respective tasks, one portion of the survivors handling the monsters that roam freely whilst the rest begin preparing their camp for the evening. Within half an hour, Sebastian and Terry successful barricade the entrance to an activity centre the rest of the group seeks refuge in, each survivor huddled closely together in the lobby as they gather their bearings. “That should hold them for the rest of the night” Courtney remarks, jostling the leather belt the men had tied around the handles with very little give presented to her, an eye paid back to those she travels alongside. “We should check the place out- make sure it’s safe” Jules remarks, keeping a knife in hand as he stares toward the dark, yet lively interior they prepare to make themselves at home in for the night. “Alright, we’ll stick in groups of two” Sebastian replies, undoing the top to one ice chest to retrieve a sealed plastic bag filled with flashlights, “Courtney and I will stick together and Rudy will go with Sonya.” “I’m going with Lou- sorry dad” Marta remarks, watching the man bob his head in a playful display of mockery. “I’ll go with Jenn since the others are gonna pair together” Adrian replies, watching Elsie stick beside Josie whilst Terry and Jules pair themselves without hesitation. “And I’ll go with Adrian because I don’t have much of a choice” Jenn retorts, passing a look at the already clustered-together group members she’d been numerically left out of. “Adrian’s not that bad” Lou jokes from the head of the group, bowing his head at Sebastian as he graciously accepts a flashlight. “That might be the nicest thing you’ve ever said about me” Adrian replies as he pries a metal bar protruding from a skeeball machine it’d become dislodged from. “I meant every word of it, pal” the ‘Silver Slayer’ responds, watching the passive shake of the head Marta’s father present back to him precede a smirk. “Let’s not get too cosy before we’ve made sure this place is safe” Jenn remarks from the back of the group, dragging the ice chests to the corner of the room for them to return to later. “Everyone keep from getting an itchy trigger finger if you’ve got one, shout if you need help, and don’t leave any of these dead slow pokes alive for someone else to stumble upon” Terry doubles down, he and Jules the first to split away from the group, “we’ll see you when we see you.” Following the lead their friends take, Elsie and Josie venture off without a word whilst Adrian and Jenn do much the same. “You guys can handle yourselves, right?” Lou asks to the pair stood across from them, the older gentleman and his younger daughter replying with exactly what he’d hoped they would. “We’ll be fine, the rest of you will be too” Rudy replies, snapping his fingers as he struggles to recall what the younger man had once told him, “what’s that thing you used to say?” With his head tilted to the side, the rebar-wielding man looks toward his elder in confusion. “The thing you said you did when we all first met” Rudy replies, slowly jogging the memory of the younger man across from him, “the thing you used to say to keep yourself calm, what was it?” In a sudden turn, Lou’s face widens as he finally locates the man’s train of thought, “everything’s going to be okay” he responds, nodding to the man that’s now been reminded, “I still do.” “Good, because it’s true” Rudy replies, nodding to the man as he peers back toward Sebastian, a promising look of hope worn on the face of the man slowly coming into his own, “everything will be okay.” Smiling back at her father, Courtney leans in and kisses the man on the cheek, giving her sister a fist bump before pulling off to follow Sebastian down a long stretch of walkway along the building’s side. “We’ll see you soon” Lou assures, he and Marta pressing their knuckles against the father-daughter pair’s own before travelling into opposite directions, their departure from each other dismantling the final few shreds of the group still left together. In the concrete jungle just beyond the walls of the building, additional corpses begin to swarm at their own slow pace, drawn to the sound of the collective groans that join those already aware of the living’s presence beyond the front doors. = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = “Is it a bad sign that we’re the ones left out from the rest of them?” Adrian remarks with genuine intrigue, casually strolling along Jenn’s side as he shines his flashlight at the cavernous ceiling towering above their heads. “I had my own auto-partner for a while back there. She’s dead now though, so I have an excuse” the woman remarks, the dry sense of humour in the wake of a tragedy she’s still only a few weeks removed from starting to become a staple of her personality, “what’s yours?” Casually strolling onward with the metal rung he’d stripped from the arcade machine moments prior, Adrian remains quiet for a moment as he lets the woman’s comment settle. “I don’t really have one” the man responds, looking to the side of the woman’s head as she continues to place one foot in front of the next, expression unchanged from the utterance she’d made, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to remind you.” Eyes turning toward the man, Jenn squints for a moment as if confused, waiting for the clarification her visage would provoke. “About your girlfriend- I didn’t mean to remind you of- well, you know” Adrian explains, his voice softening as he looks away, bowing his head apologetically as the woman he shares his company with realises what he’d been trying to speak to. “Don’t worry about it” Jenn replies, shaking her head as she continues to step forward, “it’s not the first time I’ve lost someone, and I doubt it’ll be the last.” Squinting, Adrian returns his sights to the woman with slight puzzlement, “what do you mean?” he asks innocently, watching her face turn to his as if confused by the question. “Which part are you lost on?” she asks back, the shrug provided to her preceding the answer the father gives, “both.” Nodding as she stares forward, Jenn tucks one hand into her pocket whilst the other slowly sways the baseball bat at her side. “I was dating this guy back when everything shut down. He wasn’t always the most dependable person I’d met” the woman explains, her remarks casual in spite of the heavy weight held behind them, “he was a good person, but he wasn’t much of a good boyfriend if that makes any sense? Anyway, he died a few days after shit hit the fan and life moved on.” With his head slightly leant back, Adrian continues to walk alongside the woman with his flashlight held forward, keeping the verbal door open for her continued discussion. “Without going too much into detail, it wasn’t long after that before Halston and I got together” Jenn continues, turning her head toward the hallway that emerges around the corner they now step past, continuing about their intended journey, “it didn’t take long for me to feel ways about her Wyatt couldn’t get out of me.” Subtly nodding, Adrian keeps his eyes forward as the flashlight is redirected toward the dark corridor they’ve still yet to traverse, “and the other part?” he asks, “-the part about her not being the last person you’ll lose?” With a smile coming over her face, Jenn stares straight ahead as she shrugs her shoulders, gently tapping the head of her bat against the carpeted floor every few steps. “It could just be our luck, but we lost three of our friends within the first few weeks. Even though no one died, we got split up after the boat sunk” Jenn explains, “before we found each other, we’d lost three more and we’re still looking for one more.” Unassuming and blank, the drywall that lines the corridor they continue through presents them with very little stimulation, the grey carpet along the floors and undetailed ceiling many metres overhead keep their minds from wandering elsewhere. “I know you haven’t fully experienced it yet, but the day will come when you lose people you care about” Jenn continues, not holding back from the rather sorrowful line of dialogue she speaks into existence, “whether it’s ‘cause they die or ‘cause you get split up from them, that day will come.” With his eyes low, Adrian continues to follow the woman’s every step with one of his own, remaining quiet in the wake of her conclusion for just a brief moment before replying. “We lost two people back at the cabin” the father remarks, prompting the woman- who accompanies him down the lengthy passage- to turn and look at him, “I killed one of them.” With a slight widening of her eyes, Jenn nods to herself as she looks ahead once more, inspired to ask one rather important question. “Should I be worried that it’s just you and I out here, or are we good?” the blonde-turning-brunette inquires, the question waved aside and declined by the man questioned. “It was an accident, but it could’ve been avoided if I hadn’t been-” Adrian begins to respond, pausing as his mind temporarily wraps around the same regret that it had been enamoured by in the wake of the incident, “-if I hadn’t been so stuck in my ways.” Taking her opportunity to fall silent, Jenn bows her head and lets the man continue to speak, invested in hearing his rationale whilst also feeling the need to hear more of someone she’d yet to personally know. “For a while back at the start, there’d been people stealing from the storage unit we had just outside of the cabin. They were taking our food and whatever else they could smuggle in the middle of the night” Adrian explains, “I had set up bear traps just outside the unit for the next time they came until Lou found us. He started sleeping in the thing to keep an eye out since he figured the traps would hurt the people stealing. We didn’t know who they were, so he figured they could be you guys.” Turning the nearest corner, the pair begin making their way down yet another passage, this one lined with dark walls splattered with various paint colours manufactured to glow in the dark. “One night, he ended up falling asleep in the cabin. So, I went to set up a trap now that no one was in it. Since I woke up early, I figured I could go out and disarm it before Lou woke up and could step in it” Adrian continues to speak, his voice falling faint as he follows-up, “it got someone before that.” Squinting, Jenn instinctively thinks about which turn the story could take from that moment as the man beside her keeps his eyes straight, following the light he aims within his hand. “At the end of the day, I went out and confronted Lou. I started talking about how he was a problem and needed to go, but that didn’t get me very far” Adrian proceeds to confess, “he dragged me back into the house and tried to make me put the kid down. I said no, he did it for me and told me to bury him.” “From what I’ve seen since he found me, I’d say that feels pretty on-brand for him” Jenn replies, nodding along with her humorous remark as she tries to shed light on a conversation she can sense the downward trajectory of. “Well, I wasn’t too fond of it and spent the whole night packing bags for Marta and I. I didn’t know where we were going to go, but I knew we couldn’t stay there” Adrian begins to conclude, “Sebastian tried to stop me, we wrestled over a gun, and it went off.” Nodding, Jenn continues to keep her interjections to a minimum so as not to disturb the man’s recollection, too invested in hearing more from a man she’d only ever heard little from. “I ran off, Theo found me and took me back to the camp. Lou and Marta came down, took me back and they locked me in the storage unit until we were forced into the camp” Adrian proclaims, “we found out the kid was part of Lee’s camp after a little bit and Lou covered for me.” Her stroll remaining casually paced, Jenn lets the man’s side of the conversation fade with its finale, taking the opening she knows sits just around the corner to speak once more. “He may be a hard-ass, but Lou’s got a heart where a lot of other people wouldn’t even have a conscience. It’s part of what makes him so difficult to not like” the woman explains, turning her face to the older man as they remain moving forward, “I’ll take it you saw him differently after that?” “I saw everything differently after that” Adrian corrects, briefly looking back at the woman before turning his sights back, “I knew I was as good as dead if he hadn’t done that. So, when he said he was giving me a second chance at life, I figured it was time to try and get right.” Squinting, the woman’s interest proves to peak once more, “why?” she inquires, still looking at him as each step matches his. “Because if the old world was still around, my mind wouldn’t have instantly thought ‘this is it- they’re gonna kill me’” Adrian answers with a shrug, “in the old world, you went to jail. If my first thought is ‘you’re an eye for an eye’, then this clearly isn’t what I’m used to.” Shaking his head, the man continues to walk the multi-coloured walls with a much less-heavy chest than what he’d carried with him only a matter of weeks ago. “Something inside my head just clicked. Like I realised I shouldn’t still be here, but I am” Adrian proclaims, incapable of describing exactly what recognition had come over him, but able to accept that it had, “so if I was gonna keep being here, I guess something needed to change.” Nodding, Jenn shares the next step in their collective journey by rounding the nearest corner, eventually finding another flashlight approaching directly ahead of them. “I don’t think anybody can make it nowadays if they don’t change” Jenn replies, trying to offer whatever words she can to alleviate the melancholy ambience that seems to fill their immediate surroundings. “We all have to accept that some things we used to do need to be left behind. I can grieve over Halston all I want, but I can’t just shut down ‘cause she’s not here anymore” she continues, “the world didn’t stop when Wyatt died, it didn’t stop when she did, and it won’t when I do.” Aware of the disappointment he takes in having to hear such a truth acknowledged by a woman as young as the one he walks beside, Adrian refuses to speak to such a fact, accepting the world for the ways in which it now operates. “I appreciate the people I have now while I have them. I won’t have them forever, and I want to take comfort in knowing that I do right now” Jenn explains, looking at the man in the eyes as he looks back to her, “and I’m happy right now.” | “How much you wanna bet I’ll make this?” Jules calls back, carrying a basketball in his arm as he walks to the opposite side of an arcade hoop. “I hope you know that you’re not doing our people any favours right now” Terry replies, setting his flashlight down to light the floor between his friend and the target in question, “the world has been taken over by zombies, and while everyone else is out making sure the place is safe, our black asses are shooting hoops.” “If a black man can’t shoot hoops, was equality ever really achieved?” Jules quips back, immediately met with the raise of just one eyebrow from the man across from him, “alright, maybe that was a little too far, but c’mon! Live a little!” Rolling his eyes, Terry’s crossed arms begin to lessen as he shakes his head. “Fuck it, let the white people do the work” Terry responds, giving into his friend’s calls for a reprieve as the ball flies through the air. Missing badly, the grey basketball with silver lining bounces off the ceiling and strikes one of the metal posts that sit at either side of the hoop, chased after by the steadfast survivor. “Oh, it’s the biggest choke since the Warriors!” Terry exclaims, rebounding the off shot and taking it back as Jules leaps to the call for defence, nodding his head as his eyes keep upon the ball. A subdued thud ringing through the spacious room with each dribble, Terry steps to the left before cutting back to the right, his attempt at hitting the lane in stride thwarted with Jules’ excellent coverage. “Congested like the flu, boy! You ain’t going nowhere!” the confident defender remarks, watching his friend step back with the ball in tow, creating separation as he takes into concern his next step forward. “Don’t be scared, I’ll make this quick!” Jules remarks, watching the smirk shine through his friend’s lips as he meets each step with his own. Moving to the left immediately, Terry takes a half step and spins back, letting his friend follow through with his attempt at poking the ball free as nothing but open floor is shown ahead. Dashing forward, the hoop-eying man casually tosses the ball toward the net with no one to defend him, watching it float through the air. “And he-” Terry proclaims, watching the ball prepare to go in from off the backboard without the ability to stop his own momentum, his hip crashing into the machine and jostling it back as the ball reacts accordingly, “-no!” Shaking with the weight of the survivor’s body crashing into it, the hoop moves away from the ball’s path with the rest of the machine and keeps the point from being collected, allowing the ball to bounce out and eventually back to the floor. “In the home of the Raptors themselves, York makes like Lowry and chokes away the win!” Jules shouts, leaping up to catch the ball as he takes his turn to set the game in motion. “You reached, I got ready to preach, baby boy!” Terry barks back, hurrying up to the top of the key with his eye on the ball, following it with each bounce along the floor as his friend prepares to make him pay for the costly error. “Ally’s folks better have a hoop in Calgary, otherwise this trip is off!” Jules proclaims, ducking close to the ground as he keeps his left side presented toward the man on defence, dribbling with his dominant hand. “They’re white folks that stay in Canada, you’ll get lacrosse and you’ll be happy!” Terry replies, earning a quick chuckle from the man before the game provokes his return to serious competition. Pressing his arm into the ball-handler’s side, Terry keeps his friend at bay as a few feigned attempts at breaking forward are taken, each failing as hard as the rest. “Streetball ain’t make no bitches I see” Jules replies, prodding back at the man prepared to hold him back from scoring with sights set on redemption. “Momma ain’t raise no bitch, baby boy” the defender retorts, finally giving into the man’s advancements as he bites on a half step. Spinning back just as his friend had, Jules cuts back and opens the floor for free usage, watching the man tasked with defending him turn back with shattered ankles, giving chase. “Lay his ass down, he can’t keep up! He can’t keep up!” he shouts, confidently leaping into the air to fire the ball forward, not needing the backboard to aid the shot in finding nothing more than net, the score made off the back of Terry’s costly error. “He can’t fucking keep up! Momma ain’t raise no bitch, she raised a bum!” Jules continues to declare, gesturing the brush of a broom with his hands, “go home, bum! This ain’t your home, get off the court!” Playfully shoved back, Terry wears a defeated grin as he stares off at the ceiling, moving with each push until the winning man returns to the knife he’d placed near to the machine, moving it aside to take a seat atop the centre console. “Remember when we used to do this shit after class?” Jules wonders aloud, wiping his brow of the small amount of sweat that begins to form upon it. “You mean when we used to skip class and sneak into the gym to play ball?” Terry responds, watching the man across the room from him chuckle, “yeah, I remember. I also remember having to make a break for the locker room every time the janitor would walk in once he heard the ball dribbling through the doors.” “I did try to get the ‘no dribble’ rule going, but you kept calling me ‘Jules Harden’, so I don’t know what you expected” Jules replies, sharing the laugh that the man now taking a seat upon the end of a skeeball ramp joins with. “I don’t know how we didn’t get detention more often” Terry replies, pressing the sides of his hands against his lap as the turn of their shared amusement into steady recollection becomes a yearning for better days. “I miss it. I don’t know how those became the things I wanted back, but they are” Terry confesses, turning to look at the man who shares a similar longing, “I miss getting in trouble. I miss playing hooky and giving the teachers a hard time.” With a smile, Jules looks back to the ground with the handle to his weapon still grasped tightly within his hand, a subtle nod taking over his head as he voices his agreement, “I do too.” | “I just hope wherever our next stop is has something better to sleep on” Courtney replies, her rifle kept pressed against her chest as the man beside her aims the flashlight in one hand whilst carrying a fire poker in the other. “That’s just another way of saying ‘I hope the next place we stay is a hotel’” Sebastian playfully retorts, picking fun at the woman with humorous mockery, “if that’s your goal, no problem. After the last ten nights, I could use a good night’s sleep.” “Honestly, just give me a blanket at this point. Something to sleep on other than the floor could do the trick” Courtney replies, continuing to walk forward without realising that her boyfriend had come to a sudden stop a few steps back, “I feel kind of guilty admitting this, but the floor doesn’t actually feel that bad anym-” Looking to the vacant side next to her, the woman’s eyes drift back to the man a short distance behind her, a red cap held in his hand as he drops himself to a knee. With a pause, Courtney watches the man take the tip of a pen to the inside band of one cap as he uses the top of his bent knee as a makeshift desk. “I think proposals are usually done with a ring, not a hat” the woman remarks, aware that the man’s not intending to do such a thing in spite of what it would look like. “Your father would already know if that were my plan” Sebastian remarks, pressing his tongue gently between each row of teeth as he scrawls along the inner fabric. After a few seconds, the pen begins to effectively press ink into the rather durable material, allowing him to write with a reasonable amount of effort. “What are you even doing?” Courtney inquires, aware of what he’s trying to accomplish, though completely clueless as to its reasoning. “I’m writing down the date on the back strap” Sebastian replies, finally finishing the effort on one cap before turning his attention toward the other. “Okay, yeah, that makes so much sense. Whenever my friends would go out drinking, the preferred pastime was always to write down the date on the inside of our baseball caps” Courtney remarks, taking her turn to poke fun at the man just as he did her, “though, in all seriousness, I think it’s their own name that people write on their property.” “Yeah, I guess ‘return to the nineteenth of December, 2018’ doesn’t help accomplish much, does it?” Sebastian replies, playing into the woman’s mockery with a double-down of his own. “Alright, seriously- what are you doing?” Courtney giggles, watching the man stand upright once more and extend one cap out to her, “you look like a character in a video game trying to finish one of those secondary tasks.” With appreciation, Courtney casually takes possession of the man’s offering, looking at the back of the hat to read the exact date written across it. “When Jenn and I were talking in that souvenir shop the other day, she said she’d forgotten what day it was” Sebastian replies, holding his own red ball cap with the same date scrawled upon its back strap, “she told me the day would come where I’d forget it too. So, I figured it’d be easier if I made it a point to lose track by choice instead.” Confused, the woman looks back to the man stood before her with a smile as he places the cap over his head, turning its brim to the side so as not to obstruct his face. “You look like a middle-aged rapper when you wear it like that” Courtney murmurs, chuckling with him as she adjusts the cap accordingly, the tip held out at her as she follows suit, placing her own atop the frizzy hair that falls over her shoulders. “I wanted to write the last date I’ll remember on a pair of hats. I don’t know why, I’m not even sure it’s very romantic if I’m being honest” Sebastian confesses, “but if I’m gonna lose track of time, I’d rather you be the one that I lost track of it with. So, I guess that’s my explanation for the gesture.” Smiling big and wide, Courtney places her hands around the man’s neck and leans in to kiss him, keeping her lips pressed to his for a good few seconds before their romantic display is cut. “Aarrgghh” a lone corpse groans, staggering around the corner and catching sight of the coupled pair, who pull their faces apart to watch the figure groggily stammer toward them. “Do you want to get that or should I?” Sebastian inquires, not receiving his answer by the time the woman pulls away from him and pulls free a hammer, aided by the man’s flashlight as her weapon’s claw bury themselves within the softened skull of the undead loner. “We were in the middle of something, asshole” Courtney remarks beneath her breath, kneeling to the ground with the zombie as it falls before pressing her boot upon its head, freeing her weapon from the hole within its cranium it had created. “Look at that door” Sebastian mutters aloud, speaking through the quiet air as his eyes take to the same thing his girlfriend’s do, the one beige-coloured door just a few metres away wearing a bloody handprint around its knob. Squinting, Courtney stands to her feet and joins her boyfriend in advancing upon the intriguing sight, yet to present her mind toward the various explanations that could await their discovery. “What should we do?” the woman inquires, watching the man’s fist reach forward, tapping its knuckles against the entrance without an answer, “alright, great talk.” “Sorry, I-” Sebastian replies, apologetic for his lack of response before falling immediately silent, both he and his girlfriend able to hear the faintest sigh coming from within. “Is that a zombie?” Courtney whispers, unable to make a definitive answer as she steps back, her hammer prepared to swing forward as the man’s hands press against the blood-covered handle. Bobbing his head in the woman’s direction, Sebastian lets her prepare for whatever offence she’ll need to partake in before opening the entrance, shining a light toward the inside as Courtney immediately pauses. With a squint in her eyes, the hammer-wielding woman looks in at the decrepit interior with uncertainty, finding the body of a woman with a gun on her lap slumped against the wall below a standing sink, the body of a young boy laid upon the ground beside her. “Turn off... the light” the clearly-exhausted woman sighs, her voice prompting both survivors to immediately leap into action. “Are you okay?” Courtney exclaims, attempting to come to the woman’s aid before the wave of the near-death survivor ushers her away, both she and Sebastian only able to look on at the woman within. “I’m bitten” the wounded survivor sighs, her head kept away from the body that sits beside her, a bite wound worn on her right bicep. “I don’t... wanna see him... like this” the woman groggily murmurs, shaking her head as she keeps her stare away from the deceased child, a tear running down her sweaty face. “What happened to you?” Courtney inquires, unable to keep herself from splitting her attention between the clearly-distraught mother and her apparent son. “We couldn’t get away... fast enough” the bathroom-bound woman replies, sniffling as best she can as her breaths become sparse. “They bit my... boy... before we could... get in here. I... locked the door... and stayed quiet until... they left” the woman continues to speak, each word clearly taking great amounts of energy out of her. “He got... so sick... but... I just... I couldn’t” she continues to explain, paid the decency by Sebastian of the light being kept away from the young boy’s body, “he turned. I had to... do it when he came back, but... he got me first.” “Are there more of the dead out here?” Courtney wonders aloud, already able to fill in the blanks of what the woman’s trying to get at. Shaking her head, the wounded mother spoken to powers through the infection quickly taking its toll on her in order to nod, “there’ll be more... if they... find you.” With a look toward each other, the coupled survivors pass each other a look before the man with the flashlight turns back. “Before who finds us, the dead?” Sebastian questions back, an immediate rush of concern running through his veins as the woman shakes her head in refusal. Parting her dry lips as her eyes begin to shut, the woman’s voice fades as she replies, “the people... with blood... on their faces.” Kept parted, the woman’s lips remain open as her lower jaw falls and remains that way as her head tilts back, the small amount of life she’d retained until the last seconds fading into non-existence. “The people with- what?” Courtney replies, looking to her boyfriend at an absolute loss for words before turning back the way they’d come, following the light in the man’s hand down both ends of the hallway, each direction as empty as they’d left it. Shaking his head, Sebastian places the light into the woman’s hand before reaching toward the newly-deceased body and retrieving her pistol. “Look away” Sebastian remarks, trying to keep the woman from having to watch him distribute mercy amongst the newly-departed, the end of his fire poker driving through the woman’s skull as he groans, trying to drown out the sickening sounds his weapon produces as his teeth press together. | “Good to see you again” Elsie remarks, letting her flashlight fall to the side as she and Josie reunite with Jenn and Adrian, their journeys taking them to the same stopping point as each other, the sound of collective footsteps within their own near distance prompting them to all turn back. “Which ones are you?” Jenn calls out, waiting for a moment as her voice travels to the souls that draw nearer. “The alive kind” Lou shouts back, he and Marta reuniting with the majority of their group as their flashlights soon appear around the corner. “That could mean anything. Prove that you’re who you say you are!” Elsie sarcastically responds back, waiting for a moment for the man to return her proof. “I never said who I am” the one-armed man replies, unable to see the satisfied reaction the woman gives him back. “I’m sold- that’s Lou” Elsie retorts, hearing the faintest chuckle be offered back by the woman who travels with the subject of her inquiry before their figures appear from around the corner. “Put an end to any of the dead along your travels?” Jenn inquires, watching the shake of Lou’s head provide itself back toward her. “I was hoping to see a really freaky-looking thing, but instead I just got spooked by a pinball machine” Marta replies, prompting the man beside her to call that into question. “Spooked by, or did you bump into the thing, gasp, and put your fist through the dust-covered plastic cover the game was concealed under?” Lou wonders back, gently reaching for the girl’s hand and lifting it up to present a gash running along the back of her hand. “Oh my god, Marta. Are-?” Adrian begins to wonder aloud, stepping ahead to approach the girl before her nonchalant voice subdues his obvious look of concern. “I’m fine, it’s not deep” Marta replies, the proof held within the limited amount of bleeding for such a length wound, “I’m more surprised the thing was so easy to break.” Nodding to himself, Lou presses his back against the nearest wall and watches the group reconvene, a few stares in every direction paid as they await the rest of their group’s arrival. “What do you think the others are doing?” Elsie inquires, tying the string of her tomahawk to the belt loop on her waist. “Terry and Jules are probably playing basketball” Josie responds, immediately humoured by the woman across from her. “Why? Because they’re black?” Jenn queries, placing her hands against her hips in a mocking fashion, “that sounds awfully racist of you Josie.” “I’m black. You say racist, I say knowledgeable” Josie retorts, squinting her eyes as she looks toward the sky, passing a glance to the man just off to her side as he wears a similar visage. “I don’t know if that’s how that works. Not even ‘cause it doesn’t sound like it was put correctly, but because I never took them to be big into basketball” Lou responds, watching the woman that looks toward him respond by matching Jenn’s posture, both hands placed to each of her sides. “What? I always thought they were into baseball! At least, I thought Terry was into baseball” Lou responds, passing a look back to Jenn, “don’t you remember that Orioles cap he always used to wear in freshman year?” Looking into the distance for a moment, a look of sudden remembrance comes over the expression of his once-classmate, her finger lifted as her hands finally disembark from their hip-adjacent stance. “Yes! And then Mr. Gnervo kept telling him not to come to class with it on his head, so he ripped a hole in it and started wearing it as a bracelet!” Jenn shouts with a smile, watching Marta tilt her head in confusion amidst the recollection. “Wait, he ripped a hole in the hat?” the young woman inquires, both the man she stands beside and the woman he converses with nodding along with each other. “Terry was a petty motherfucker. If you told Terry to do something that Terry did not want to do, Terry would make you question why you chose to get into teaching” Lou replies, the smirk that forms in the corner of his mouth suddenly falling aside, “that’s how Terry got into our inner circle.” “That’s how almost everyone got into our inner circle” Jenn corrects, placing her eyes back into Marta’s direction, “if someone was funny, they were welcomed. If they had balls of steel, they were practically a legend.” “I heard someone say ‘legend’, why are y’all calling me?” Terry calls out, his feet sifting across the rug as he and Jules become the fourth pair to reunite with the survivors. “What did you do with that Orioles cap?” Lou wonders back with a smile, his index finger pointed as the rest keep themselves wrapped around the rebar staff he holds outward. “The one Gnervo kept getting pissed at me for?” Terry queries, a quick glance taken toward Lou and Jenn before answering, “I lost that thing somewhere in Israel on summer break last year.” Snapping his fingers, Lou spins back toward Marta as Jenn continues to provide answers to the claim she’d made earlier. “Vinny was the legend that hid booze in the music room, Terry was the jokester, Jules was Terry’s friend and I guess sort of funny.” “Watch it, blondie” Jules warns with his finger pointed, the declaration of humour given all in good fun. “Lou was the guy everyone liked, Ally got in at first ‘cause she was Lou’s girl. Wyatt did everyone’s homework, and I got in ‘cause I was his girl” Jenn continues to recall, slowly beginning to draw blanks, “Margo got in by being Vinny’s girl, and Halston got in by accidentally catching us sneaking in booze and not ratting us out.” “You bribed her with entry to the group so you wouldn’t get told on?” Josie inquires, quickly finding herself corrected. “No, she chose not to rat on us, and that was more than enough to be let in” Jenn responds, “once you’ve proven you could be trusted, entry wasn’t too far behind.” Puckering her lips and nodding, Elsie begins to step back and lean against the wall as she acknowledges the sense behind the rationale the group voices their once commitment to. “It’s a pretty good quality to have, ain’t it? To just be able to trust someone ‘cause they’re trustworthy?” Marta inquires, being met with an abundance of nods by those she seeks an answer to. “It’s a quality that’s hard to come by. It sticks out ‘cause fewer people have it now more than ever” Lou responds, gently tapping the sharpened tip of his staff against the ground as he presses the back of his head against the same drywall Elsie does, “rare or not- it’s still good to have.” “It’s what this group is built off of” Jenn replies, watching Lou nod his head as he stares off at the ceiling, patiently waiting for the rest of the group to come together so as to confirm the coast is clear. “If none of us could trust each other, we wouldn’t have lasted more than a few hours together” the woman slowly becoming more of a brunette by the day continues, “if you can’t trust people not to stab you in the back, then you’re better off sticking it out alone.” *pop pop pop* Subdued by the distance between themselves and the gunfire, the group’s eyes immediately turned toward the direction in which Terry and Jules had arrived from, the friendly banter ceasing as the imminent danger posed put their survival instincts to the test. “Is that one of us!?” Adrian calls out as Lou marches forward, the first to pull away from the rest of the group and ready for a fight. “It doesn’t matter, let’s go!” the staff-wielding survivor proclaims, Marta and Jenn the first to follow as the rest they leave behind inevitably fall into line. Dashing through the arcade, the eight survivors call out the names of those they’d yet to be reunited with, drawing closer to the scene of supposed chaos with every step. *pop pop* Hitting the ground just a few metres away, two bullets nearly connect with Lou as he dashes forward, coming from around the corner as a small group of men flood into the building. Mostly concealed within darkness, the sudden attack prompts the survivors to dart for cover, hiding their flashlights as best they can to avoid detection. His eyes widening as he stands at the centre of danger, the ballsy one-armed survivor calls out to the rest of the group as a set of lights draw near. “Get down!” Lou screams aloud, urging the few yet to do so to seek refuge anywhere they can. Led by the first few corpses to gain entry through the shattered glass of the building’s entrance find themselves splattered against the asphalt by the group’s truck, which burns rubber against the asphalt as the cement block placed atop its gas pedal sends it tearing through the now splintered and destroyed front of the building. Falling off the accelerator, the foot-mimicking block topples out of the open driver’s side door as the truck crashes into the nearest wall, flipping onto its side in the same arcade the group finds itself caught in. Accidentally slamming into someone he’s not certain of the identity to, Lou dives toward the ground and loses the flashlight he’d tried to press the head of against his chest, letting it roll onto the floor. Hearing a grunt, Lou realises the man he’d fallen into was likely taken to the ground alongside him, though he’s still unsure of whether or not there’s much cause for concern. Reaching through the darkness, the man reclaims his torch and flashes it into the eyes of a man that pulls his arm over his face, shielding himself from the sudden burst of light before lifting the barrel of his handgun with the other. Knowing the soul ahead of him is unfamiliar, Lou pulls the handheld lantern away and thrusts his staff forward, immediately hearing the splatter of blood come from the man who audibly falls back. *pop. pop pop. pop. pop pop pop. pop* “Marta!” Adrian calls out from just a few metres behind the woman’s mentor, earning a response from across the room. *pop pop* “Everyone shine your light in the direction we were running!” Lou orders those within his group, watching the sparse torch lights eventually appear from behind overturned tables and the closest debris able to set out for. Not given much to work with, what little sight is offered provides the man with more than enough clearance to set forth toward, his flashlight tossed to the ground as he steps out of hiding. Pressing his teeth together, Lou nears the closest man and quickly sticks him in the back of the head with his staff, turning his sights toward anything that moves. Taking the stag as a one man show, the survivor directs his sights toward the front of the heavily-damaged room as the dead begin to shuffle in, aimlessly wandering at first before their sights fall upon the man in the room’s centre, a scattered assortment of three burning light bulbs to his back. Standing his ground, Lou begins to wail on the dead that approach closer, demanding the souls that continue to occupy the room behind him keep their lights steady. “They’re leaving!” Jules calls out from behind cover, his own light shaking gently as he speaks, both eyes watching the men responsible for uprooting their night and turning it into a fight for their continued survival beginning to dash through the army of the undead they’d purposefully allowed entry. “They’ve got something!” Marta calls out, her voice immediately prompting Lou to beg the question to her, putting a momentary stop to the zombies that draw closer. “What do they have!?” the man calls back to his protege, swinging his staff upon another deteriorated skull as the woman shouts back. “I don’t know, but why else would they do this!?” Marta calls back, admitting that her declaration was made out of speculation, though it’s more than enough for her mentor to begin using the display as pieces to a puzzle meant to be reunited with each other. Remaining silent for a moment, Lou puts down another corpse as it wanders near, cycling whatever reasonable answer could dawn upon him as another set of cars take off in the near distance. “‘Cause they’re shackling us” the man mutters beneath his breath, looking off to the side as he realises they’d been played, screaming out at the group that remains behind him, continuing to seek out cover. “Everyone with a light, keep it aimed at me- everyone else help me fight them!” Lou barks out, swinging at the dead with amplified force as a number of feet run out from cover, joining him in battle before a path forward presents itself. “Everyone follow me!” the man finally calls out, spending a few seconds putting down whatever corpses draw nearer before dashing through the front lobby. *pop pop* Forced to seek cover once more, Lou and the group duck as they approach the gaping wound worn in the building’s facade, a set of gunshots continuing to be fired from beyond as another wave of the dead nears. “Son of a bitch!” Adrian exclaims, slamming the metal post he’d ripped from the nearest machine against the wall as he cries out expletives, “they took the fucking coolers!” With a clear path back to his group, Sebastian walks up confidently with his hand extended, holding Courtney back as he rounds the corner. “Sebastian, get do-!” Lou exclaims, watching the man lift his dominant hand up before shielding his ears. *pop pop pop pop pop* “Ah!” a man calls out from beyond their shattered entrance, falling to the ground with his weapon still in tow. Unphased, Sebastian continues to move forward as Lou steps out from cover, dashing through the entrance to aid in putting down whatever threats remain. Without a bullet fired, the air grows quiet from the side of the enemy as the scruffy-faced survivor leads the charge, following the tiremarks that plague the parking lot without much to show for it. “Not today!” Courtney exclaims, running up to the bullet-wounded foe and kicking the pistol away from his hand, disarming the man responsible for the attack on her friends. “Who the fuck are-?” the woman barks, getting close to the ground and pressing her knee upon the arm of the man left stranded behind, grabbing him by the collar of his shirt before her question falls silent, the look she takes in his eyes forcing the hairs on her arms to stand. “What the fuck do we do now!?” Josie calls out, kicking the hubcap on a long-abandoned car as Courtney stares into the face of one man responsible, his cheeks and forehead smeared with red paint as he angrily looks back at her. “Dad, come on!” Sonya cries out from within the building, sprinting ahead of her father as he jogs after her, clearly at a loss for breath as they finally reunite with their peers. “The fuckers stole our shit!” Elsie calls back to their as-of-yet uninformed contemporaries, the man’s eldest child keeping her sights locked onto the silent man beneath her. “Kill this fuck!” Terry shouts, marching forward before Sebastian takes him by the arm, holding him back from doing something he can’t take back. “No, we’ve got bigger plans for this asshole” the man whose hand wraps around his bicep replies, looking Terry in the eyes as a pause ensues, the pair of men standing in silence before the soul calling for such an execution bows out, nodding his head in agreement. Standing out in the open amidst the wake of chaos that surrounds them, Lou looks out at the pair of tire tracks that lead through the nearest exit, watching the dead continue to pile up in numbers. “I’ll ask the question again, what the fuck do we do now!?” Josie shouts once more, met with silence from the rest of her group, which all stand by at an equal loss for direction. Catching his breath as he leans against the nearest car, Rudy watches his youngest daughter pull away to rejoin with her older sister. With his hand placed atop his daughter’s shoulder, Adrian and Marta remain standing just a short distance from Terry and Sebastian, whilst Jules, Elsie and Josie huddle together. With one knee pressing into the asphalt, Jenn holds her head in the palm of her hand as the air remains quiet, not a reply to the question still left unanswered to meet her ears. With his full arm hanging by his side, Lou stares out at the distance he knows the people responsible to have gone, a squint in his right eye held in their direction. One after another, the group slowly turns their attention toward him, waiting for the answer they’ve come to expect of him. Having proposed the initial destination of Calgary, the foremost survivor remains standing without a word to offer back, unable to provide direction now that they’ve been thrust off course. == RISE and REVOLT == Struggling to part his eyelids as the side of his face lays within the soft cushion of his pillow, Lou sighs through his nose as he lets his body fall limp, giving into the comfort of the soft mattress he lies upon and the puffy comforter that gently sits over him. Taking in the serenity that overcomes him for a few seconds longer, the half-naked man slowly lets his eyes part for good as he stares out the bedroom window overlooking the coast line, nothing more than heavy rain greeting him.
With his hand already having fallen off the side of the bed, Lou rolls his body to lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling for a moment before his eyes fall to the sleeping woman beside him. Dressed in a black tank top and laying on her stomach, Marta’s face directs itself to the door on the opposite side of the room, her hair tied back in a ponytail and wet from a shower taken the prior night. Laying in for a few minutes, Lou continues to look at the woman with half a smile, his pride in being trusted by the same people he’d come to accept as his own matched by the joy he takes in just watching her take advantage of the moment afforded to her for a decent sleep. As he slowly becomes acquainted with being awake, the one-armed survivor stares up at the ceiling whilst he gathers his bearings before rolling out of bed, reaching for the shirt he’d tossed on the floor the night before. Slowly walking up to the window- which takes up the majority of the wall- Lou peers out at the frozen waters sitting along the coastline, their frigid surface relentlessly attacked by the battalion of raindrops the forecast suggests is in store. “I thought we agreed to keep our clothes on” Marta jokes with a tired reflexion in her tone, wiping her eyes as she sits up in bed, watching her sleeping partner face her, “-though, I will admit that I like the look of you with your shirt off.” Concealing a chuckle, Lou smiles as he departs from the dismal shoreline sights and slowly makes his way to the door, throwing on his shirt before stepping through. “How do you take your coffee?” the man calls back, adjusting the dark green t-shirt adequately as he turns around. “As tea” Marta replies with a light grin, watching the man nod his head before venturing down the hall of their temporary beachfront stay. “Morning, early bird” Courtney remarks, rummaging through a set of pre-portioned sugar packets in search of the one she likes most, “sleep well?” With a widened expression, Lou’s head bobs to the side as he reaches for the nearby electric kettle, his thumb pressing down on the button to boil the water already sat within. “I closed my eyes and kept them that way for a couple of hours” the man replies, casually reaching out for a packet of tea bags, “does it get any better than that?” “We have running water, working hydro, and a view of the beach that it sounds like Jules is more than happy with” Courtney replies, sporting a humorous squint in her eye, “I think this is as close as we’ll ever get to heaven.” Listening to the click of the metal container’s button, Lou bites open the packet and sits the bag of tea within a mug, gently pouring in the hot water as he continues the conversation. “I sure hope that’s not the case” the man replies, setting the kettle back upon its flat stand before looking up with a curious look in his eyes, “what the hell is hydro?” Pulling her head back momentarily before her visage is overcome with a look of sudden realisation, Courtney nods her head and returns to the search she’d briefly paused. “Oh, sometimes I forget you’re American” the woman replies, funnelling through an assortment of sugar packets, “hydro’s the word we use for electricity.” Pressing his lips together, Lou nods to himself as he patiently waits for the boiling water to darken with his mug. “You know, the lot of you say ‘American’ as if you guys were more than just one border stop away from us” the man retorts, reaching for a specific pink packet of sweetener before extending it to the woman’s hand, “you’re not on the other side of the globe.” “No, but sometimes I like thinking that we are. You guys are weird down there” Courtney responds, squinting her eyes and crinkling her nose as she looks to the man, “you like guns a lot, you don’t let people smoke pot, and you’re really really religious.” Taking humour in pursuing the line of dialogue his friend appears to be in favour of venturing down, the teacup-awaiting survivor leans against the wall behind himself and crosses his arm-and-a-half as best as his shortened one will allow. “All of a sudden, it seems like everyone everywhere really wants those guns, and we smoke pot just like we drink before we’re allowed to- we just do it quietly” Lou replies, preparing to speak to the final point before appearing to have stumbled upon a sudden realisation, “and I might not believe in a god, but seeing as the majority of the students in my school were poisoned and killed by the priest when all of this began, I might not be the best person to speak against that final point.” Her smile having quickly faded as her eyes dart back to the man casually leaning against the wall, Courtney waits for the man to explain away the claim as if it were a joke. “Yeah, it was a pretty strange way to figure out that the world was ending and we were all screwed” Lou doubles down, uncrossing his arms to take the mug by its handle, “it’s a long story and I’ve got to get this cup back to Marta, so just don’t bother asking.” “You walked all this way just to get her a cup of tea?” Courtney inquires, watching the man turn back from his intended retreat to the rooms, “wow, you’re falling in love with that girl and you don’t even realise it.” Rolling his eyes as he returns the way he’d just stepped off from, Lou sets the cup back upon the table and refutes the woman’s point, “as great as Marta is, I’m not in love with her” the man replies, watching the disagreement-riddled face his friend reacts to him with take shape. “Listen, I don’t know what you want me to say or how many times you want me to say it” Lou explains, placing his hand upon his hip as the woman across from him remains unconvinced, “I don’t love Marta.” Rolling her eyes, Courtney speaks up the moment he utters his declaration, continuing to refuse belief in his claims despite all he argues in favour of it. “You can try to convince yourself that these feelings you have aren’t there, but just refusing them doesn’t make it true” the woman retorts, “after all, why wouldn’t you want to be with her? She’s pretty, and she’s tough, and she literally stole my paramotor to fly out and find your friends- she owes me a new paramotor by the way- she’s perfect for you.” “No, Ally’s perfect for me” Lou hastefully rebukes, only to find his counterpoint argued against instantly. “No, Ally’s the girl you lay awake at night thinking about ‘cause you haven’t found her yet” Courtney replies, gracefully emptying the contents of her sugar packet into a cup of black coffee, “and when you do- if that day ever comes- you’re gonna reunite with her, you’ll be happy for a little while, and then you’ll realise that you don’t care about her the way you do for Marta.” Shaking his head, Lou wraps his finger around the handle of the mug and turns around to leave without another word, called back to the conversation at the sound of his name. “Lou, I don’t understand why you won’t just let yourself be happy” Courtney proclaims, forcing the man to stop in his tracks and turn back once more, the look of discontent wrapped around the man’s face, “that girl cares about you and you know it. I just don’t get why you wont let yourself feel it too.” “Why is this even an issue?” Lou snaps back, his voice raised slightly louder than it had been as the dialogue had progressed, a clear disinterest in the discussion being presented. “We’re a few hours away from deciding on where we’re going next and how we’re getting there. We barely have food, we’re already running low on gas, and the dead are everywhere” the man lashes out, “why- of all the things that we’ve got to worry about- are who we do or don’t fuck a priority in all of this!?” “Because it’s different when it’s the reason why you want to drive us all out to Calgary- probably get a few of us killed in the process” Courtney replies, immediately silencing the man ahead of her, his eyes veering off into the distance as he hangs his head. “Sebastian told you” Lou remarks beneath his breath, feeling the weight of betrayal course through him as the woman begins speaking again- instantly reassuring his discovery. “Yeah, Sebastian told me. Don’t you think the others should’ve known about why you’re so fixated on bringing us all out there?” Courtney inquires, stepping closer to the man that stands in the centre of the hallway he’d entered from with a clearly angered expression. “It wasn’t about her” Lou mutters beneath his breath, the response prompting the woman to fall silent for a moment, looking into his face to try and dissect the reply, unsure of whether or not it’s genuine. “Her parents don’t just have a place in Calgary, they have a whole damn plot” Lou reiterates, “a few cabins, a lake, a ton of open field- everything the others have been talking about wanting.” Pulling back, Courtney looks to him with inquisitive eyes and leans her head to the side, “are you pulling my leg?” “No, I’m telling you the truth. Once we were halfway off the island- right after we found the others- it was the first thought that came to my mind” Lou explains, “I know where it is, I just didn’t know how to get there. But everything we need- farmland, shelter, weapons- it’s all there.” Her mouth agape as she considers what the man is proposing, Courtney finds herself letting out a sigh and glancing off to the side, hands finding their way to her hips. “I didn’t say anything at first because I didn’t want people pushing west. I figured Ally could still be around here and I’d have time to look for her” Lou explains, “when I found the note, I realised she was going to Calgary too. They’re looking for a place to stay, I’m looking for Ally, we’re all looking for the same thing.” “Lou, we’re still not gonna be able to make that trip out!” Courtney replies, aware of what’s to be gained from it but still making an effort to remain a mediator. “Putting it off a few months isn’t as safe of a plan as you think. As a matter of fact, it’s more dangerous” Lou replies, adding water from the kettle into the cup to keep Marta’s drink hot. “How so?” the woman inquires, met with an explanation so quickly that it’s almost as if the man had it readied. “If we were to go today, there’s a chance we could realistically make it to Calgary within two days” Lou replies, pressing the tip of his finger against the table beside Marta’s tea, “if we hold it off, we’ll have to find a way to get enough food, water, shelter and heat to last four months of winter. How likely is it that we accomplish that?” “Well in that case, we’re already screwed!” Courtney replies, “we’ll have to hike out somewhere further than Calgary just to get to a place where it’s not always below freezing!” Extending his arms outward, the man across from her prompts a roll of her eyes with his reply. “If we’re already screwed and have to go out further than Calgary anyway, what’s the point of holding it off any longer?” Lou questions back, “let’s face it, nobody’s got a better plan. We might as well take the risk.” Holding her head down, Courtney thinks quietly to herself as Lou watches on for a few seconds, eventually deciding he’s said all that’s needed of him before reclaiming the teacup and resuming his departure. Still with her chin pointed toward the carpeted floor, the woman watches the man saunter off before turning back with her cup of coffee, noticing Sebastian stood at the front of the hall she prepares to retreat toward with his eyes kept on the man in the distance behind her. = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = “Congrats, Jules” Elsie remarks, stepping through the lobby of the beachfront inn they stay at, the rainy day the subject of her remark oversees from the comfort of a patio chair keeping him from wearing an enthusiastic expression. “This wasn’t really what I had in mind when I suggested a beach house, but thanks” the man replies, kicking his foot off the table it had been set upon as he leaves his seat, turning back to rejoin the survivors he enjoys the building alongside. “Still no food?” Jules calls out, watching those that join him in the front lobby suppress their hunger beneath cups of tea and coffee as best they can. “The drawers are all ransacked and everything in the fridge is long-since expired” Sonya replies, setting a cup of coffee in Josie’s hand as they cross paths, “there’s a store down the street, but with the smashed windows and graffitied-exterior, I don’t think we’re bound to find much in there.” “Anybody know how to hunt?” Terry calls out, leaning back in a chair with one leg crossed over the other as his eyes press shut, not expecting to hear the voice that responds to his question. “I know the basics, but I’m not really sure how to keep the meat good once the thing I kill dies” Rudy replies, prompting the man responsible for asking the question to lift his head and look in his direction, “I used to go with my father when I was younger, but he passed before he could teach me the rest.” “You hunt?” Terry calls back, watching the confused expression on the father of two look back at him, unsure of why he’d be so surprised, “you? The guy that’s spent every day since we’ve met moping around and playing the world’s smallest violin? You know how to hunt?” Uncoupling the hands that rest against his chest to hold his hands out at each side, the man in question defends his honour. “Why is that so surprising to you?” Rudy wonders back, only for an answer to be given from the man that sits in the chair beside him. “It’s surprising to everyone” Adrian replies, setting his cup of tea on the glass coffee table stood before him, “why did this never come up back at the cabin?” “Because Courtney always came back with the food, I just put them together to make dinner and left it at that” Rudy replies, “it wasn’t until Lou came around that anybody actually went out and hunted for things.” With a giggle, Terry props his foot up against one of the steel bars that provide support for the glass table ahead of him, “Lou hunts for stuff?” the man laughs, joined by yet another voice as it closes in with a friend in tow. “Yeah. your mother’s phone number” Lou replies, gently resting his rebar staff against the nearest wall as the joke mainly earns silent appreciation, the template already long-since worn out, but it’s intended humour nonetheless appreciated. “If you wanna keep meats fresh, you have to put them on salt and keep them somewhere dark and cold” Courtney replies, patting her father’s shoulder as she walks past him, joining Sebastian on the couch a short distance away. “Speaking of that, why don’t we just go to Courtney’s place on the island!?” Jules calls out, believing himself to be onto something. “Number one, we don’t have our boat anymore. Number two, somebody left my paramotor behind” the woman in question responds, looking past Lou with an intentionally sarcastic frown. “Yeah, my bad” Marta replies half-heartedly, taking the empty seat beside Lou just as the man lowers himself to sit. “Number three, I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t be pretty by the time we got there” Courtney confesses, “however we went about getting a boat, the animals would’ve probably run out of food or frozen to death by now. The only thing it’d be good for is isolation, but the food would run out quick. That’s assuming the enclave didn’t already get there, slaughter all the animals and burn the place down by now.” “When the hell did you buy that place anyway?” Sonya wonders from one seat over, “the housing market’s been shit since Trudeau’s first year in office.” Whilst Courtney chuckles, the man that sits beside her with an arm wrapped around her back to hold her close lifts his mug into the air. “Hey hey, now- let’s be reasonable and give him some credit-” Sebastian remarks, slowly lifting the mug to his lips as he finishes his statement, “-it was more like his second or third year.” “Would Harper have been any better right now?” Adrian inquires to the man directly across the room from him, his answer kept from voicing itself by their uninformed friends. “Who are these people you speak of and when did they die off?” Terry asks aloud, poking fun at their lack of knowledge in the domestic political scene that unravels before them. “Uh, around the same time that Trump did if I remember correctly” Marta responds, earning an amused giggle from the American friend so casually leant in his seat. “What happened to that guy by the way?” Sonya wonders aloud, earning her response from the same woman she’d handed a cup of coffee to moments earlier. “Probably flew off to China in search of zombie-clearing businesses to bring back” Josie replies, pointing at Jules as he attempts to speak. “Don’t even start!” Josie interjects, earning a dismissive wave of disappointment from the man she keeps from voicing his impersonation, their fun had whilst it still can be. “Alright, not to be the one that ruins the fun, but are we gonna do this now or later?” Jenn wonders aloud, leaning against the wall nearest the front of the room without a drink in hand, simply prepared to get back onto the road in search of somewhere secure. “I’m down for now” Courtney replies, pecking Sebastian on the cheek as she gets up from the chair, walking to the pull-down map near the back of the room with her drink in hand. “Anybody have their proposals?” the woman inquires, extending her hand toward the pull-down cord before her attention is called for from the other side of the room. “When did the two of you start bumping uglies?” Elsie questions aloud, directing her sights between the once cabin-owner and once island-owner. “We dated before shit hit the fan, started getting close over the last few weeks and decided to just let things go however they will” Sebastian replies, winking at the woman who comedically blows him a kiss. “With that settled, let’s figure out where we’re-” Courtney begins to declare, the centre of the group’s focus placed upon her as she drops the map and falls silent, looking at the landscape as it’s depicted before following the scrawlings that already mark it. “What the hell is that?” Terry wonders aloud, sat in the best position to see what’s written upon the detailed atlas. Beginning with their exact location on the illustration, black lines circle key destinations throughout the provinces and direct all the way eastbound, crossing through one major city after another before ending in five stars, all within close proximity to each other. Stepping away from her place against the wall as the rest of the group leans forward in their seats and inspects what’s written upon the diagram, Jenn approaches Courtney as the woman remains standing in silence, fixated on following the outline presented to her. With her eyebrows furrowed, the blonde-haired woman closes in on the paramotorist and parts her lips to speak, reading the lines permanently etched upon the American half of the picture. “Clearest path, pit stops marked, a journey of one week and a day-” Jenn murmurs, reading the smaller set of black letters seemingly meant for any wandering pair of eyes to find, eventually finishing her rehashing of the written instructions with the larger scrawling that sits at the bottom, “For those that find this, head east to the New World Order.” “What the fuck is all of that?” Adrian wonders aloud, his answer not being offered as Courtney attempts to look past it, grabbing a pen from within her pocket as she brushes it off. “Something that’s too far away and none of us need to concern ourselves with” the woman responds, stepping to the side as she redirects the group’s attention toward the task at hand, “we’ve already got one suggestion, now it’s time to open the floor to others. Whose got a plan?” Looking out at the rest of the room, Courtney is met mostly with silence, a few faces scrunching tight to consider their own proposition, but no one immediately jumps out to take advantage of the open floor. Waiting for a few seconds with the expectation of at least one voice spouting off a destination worth talking about, the woman soon places the cap back upon her marker and crosses her arms with her head hung, opting to remain quiet until someone fulfils their end of the bargain. “I have a suggestion” Lou murmurs beneath his breath, though the room is more than quiet enough for his words to catch the ear of its every inhabitant. “Yes, and now we’re trying to figure out new ones” Adrian calmly replies, pressing the tip of his finger against his lips as he looks back at the marked-up map. “That’s great news, can we- and, just hear me out- maybe figure it out before we’d be halfway to Calgary right now?” his one-armed acquaintance asks back. “Okay, what the fuck is with you and Calgary?” Rudy chirps back, as confused as the others that have yet to become privy to his motivations, “for as long as you’d been looking for your friends, I’ve never once heard you say a word about Calgary.” Sitting upright in his chair with the slightest frown, Lou’s attention is called for by the woman sat beside her father, a cup of coffee in hand, “seriously, Lou- what’s with the fascination about Calgary?” Sonya speaks up to ask. “I know there’s a place with everything we need out there” Lou replies, not missing a beat as he speaks with dignity and respect, looking to the woman’s side of the room as the group goes quiet. “There’s a big, open plot of land with a few cabins, plenty of space to grow the stuff we need, and I’m pretty sure there’s enough wildlife out there to hunt if we need to” the man continues, the crowd much more receptive than they had been the prior night. “Tell them the other thing” Sebastian speaks up from a short distance to the side of Sonya, watching the young man’s eyes redirect toward his seat, “the other reason why you’re setting on Calgary.” With a half-frown, Lou looks at the man for a moment amidst a pause before the lowered tone of his voice carries itself to those he shares the room with. “It’s where Ally went” the man replies, rolling up the sleeve on his shortened arm as he rests back in his seat. “How do you know that, I thought the others said she ran off and said nothing?” Sonya questions aloud, immediately presented with the note the subject of her question holds up, handing it to Adrian for the man to pass on. “Her family owns that land in Calgary. I know it’s in this little town of Priddis just outside the city, and it’s got everything the rest of you appear to be looking for” Lou clarifies, watching the woman read the note quietly to herself, “the journey’s the thing in our way.” Lowering back into her seat, Sonya lets the note fall into her lap as she takes another sip of her drink, the rest of the group sitting in as audible a silence as she does. “How would we get there in one piece?” Courtney inquires, still stood beside the map as she locks eyes with the man staring back at her, “we need food, shelter, and probably a few better weapons than what we’ve got now. How do you propose we do that?” “That’s not a difficult question” Sebastian replies on the man’s behalf, watching the staff-wielding survivor’s eyes take toward him as he speaks, “we horde everything we can, stop at every gas station along the way and rest whenever we find somewhere like this.” Subduing the appreciative smile he wears, Lou’s ears are taken with the rest of the group to the head of the room, “with that logic, nothing’s off the table” Sonya replies. “Correct, nothing’s off the table- which is why we’re doing this” Courtney replies, uncapping her marker once more and writing in the portions of the map not scrawled upon, “anybody else?” she asks whilst jotting down Lou’s suggestion. Met with broad silence, the woman’s question is left for an answer that seemingly never comes, most of those in the room opposed to the plan presented only able to glance in each other’s direction with the hope that an answer will come from them. “Please don’t tell me we went through all this nonsense just for you all to shut down now” Courtney remarks, rolling her eyes as she returns the cap to her pen and turns for the map. “Honey, it’s not that we ever actually had a plan to begin with, it was that we just couldn’t get on board with going to Calgary” Rudy replies, the opinion he voices being one that a select few others agree with. “And now I’m giving you a chance to offer something better” Courtney replies, placing the marker back to where she’d taken it from, “we can’t keep going in these conditions without a plan. Calgary may be far, but at least it’s a plan. If you’re not in favour of making that trip, now is your chance to give us a better chance elsewhere.” “I think the point here is that there isn’t anything that gives us a better chance” Jenn replies, speaking up from the front of the group as the attention falls upon her. “It’s the middle of December according to Sebastian, it hasn’t stopped raining in weeks and it’s cold as hell outside” the woman explains, “no matter where we go, we’ll be faced with more snow, more cold, and a tough travel regardless. If Calgary’s not an option for any of those reasons, nowhere is.” “We can go somewhere warmer” Rudy quickly replies, instantly met with reluctance. “Any place that’s warmed than here will be farther out than Calgary is” Sebastian replies. “What’s the point of going to Calgary if we can’t plant a farm for the next few months?” Adrian inquires. “When the time comes to start planting, we’ll already be there” Marta replies from the front of the room. “What’s the point of going there now if we’re just gonna have to wait out a few months of the cold without food?” Sonya queries aloud. “We can start making ourselves a home that doesn’t get raided by a bunch of vengeful asshats” Lou responds. “Can everyone just shut the fuck up for a second?” Terry calls out, silencing the room and thwarting any further line of questions as the air simmers, his eyes soon traipsing across the room to fall upon his good friend. “Lou, if you can answer this question honestly, you’ll have my vote, alright?” the man inquires, keeping his tone respectful yet eager, anxious to fill in the holes the plan sorely lacks an answer to. Pressing his back into the soft cushion of the couch he and Marta share, Lou gives the man a nod and remains silent, more than willing to hear the man’s concerns as he wears a composed expression, hungry to defend the plan he’s set forth. “Let’s paint the closest thing to a realistic picture. Let’s say we get to Calgary unscathed, maybe find ourselves a little bit of food to ration along the way and settled into this new home” Terry explains, leaning forward with his elbows pressed to his knees. “That’s the place we’re at. We’re there and there’s no turning back- that is our home” Terry continues, closing in on his question as the man he asks looks on intently, “what’s the goal?” Continuing to stare silently as if still waiting for the question to present itself, Lou’s head soon leans to the side in wonder at what the man’s asking, confused by the way in which the question is framed. “What do you mean ‘what’s the goal?’ he just told you the goal” Elsie replies, met with quick resistance as the man turns back to look at her. “No, he told us the destination and what it is. It’s home and it’s where we spend the rest of our lives apparently” Terry replies, speaking to the woman as he looks over his shoulder before redirecting his attention toward the still-silent man, “but we’ve all been out there fighting to survive or to find each other. What happens once we’ve done that?” Still visibly confused, Lou shakes his head subtly as his lips part, unable to truly figure out what the man is asking him to answer. “Lou, I’ve heard it from you, I’ve heard it from your new friends, and I continue to hear it now that you’re going after Ally. You’ve spent all this time looking for us” Terry explains, motioning his hands toward the ground, “when you get to Calgary, and you find Ally- if you find Ally- what happens then?” “We live. That’s it, we just carry on with our lives and try to live them while we have them” Lou replies, shaking his head as he responds whilst still wearing a confused look, “what else are we supposed to do?” Continuing to remain at a hush, the rest of the group having spent the last few weeks with Terry cooped up in a hotel room watch on as the conversation progresses, as unsure as the man being asked the questions is as to what the desired answer is. “I think we should all know- even some of the lesser experienced people here- that there’s something more than that. There’s always something more than that” Terry replies, “you don’t just live when those things still walk out there. You can’t just call it a day once the world’s gone to shit.” “No, but you can try” Sonya responds, immediately watching the tip of Terry’s finger direct itself toward her, at first in silence as the leader for the other half of her group subdues her retort. “That’s wishful thinking at best, but it’s not realistic” the man explains, briefly looking at her to make a response at her claim, “this guy applied to a high school at the last second ‘cause he had to, and he didn’t even plan on going to college. This guy- for all he’s done- has never had a plan.” “And he seems to have gotten along just fine” Sebastian replies, met with the same retort that had befallen the friend one seat over from him. “He got along fine now, but had the dead not shot up from the ground, he’d be waiting for graduation to come and go on to do nothing with his life” Terry refutes, looking into the eyes of the man in question to see a reluctance to disapprove of such claims, “even when he was split from us, he didn’t make a plan- he just had blind hope he’d get back to us.” “And you’re saying that needs to change now?” Courtney wonders aloud whilst still standing before her map, continuing to wield the marker at the tip of her fingers. “I’m saying it needs to change if he wants me to agree to go to Calgary” Terry replies, making sure to keep both of their feet to the fire, “‘cause if this is just another blind chase to find Ally with the hope that the grass will be greener on the other side, he’s taking us all down with him if it doesn’t pan out.” Without a question to present, the rest of the room falls silent as the man in question reclaims possession of the group’s attention, his eyes stared directly into by the man across from him. “I love ya, Lou- but I’m not gonna blindly walk into a place that could be overrun, taken over, or falling into pieces looking for a girl that clearly only wanted you to find her” Terry explains, “I know I wouldn’t run into the unknown without knowing for sure we can get there, and neither should the others.” His face stoic and remaining glued upon his friend, Lou leans gently forward as the man awaits his answer, watched along by the rest of his peers intently. “If, for whatever reason the place in Calgary doesn’t work out, we go somewhere that will” the man replies, immediately watching the disappointed shake in Terry’s head greet him, “whether you’d like to admit it or not, that’s how this works. That’s the only way this works, and it’s really the only way people have ever lived.” Squinting his eyes, Terry crosses his arms and sinks back into his seat as the man one coffee table-length apart rises to continue. “Before the world went to shit, people went somewhere to get a diploma and then moved to wherever place the company willing to give them a job was” Lou continues, speaking to those willing to listen whilst a select few others redirect their attention to forms of their own doubt, not needing to hear an explanation to change their vote. “One way or another, they went looking for a place to settle down and make a life in. The only thing that changes now is that we’re going to a place that’ll also keep us safe from the dead” Lou remarks, a statement that few have much of a way of speaking out against, “whether that’s in Calgary or somewhere else, it’s out there somewhere. If it wasn’t, there’d be no point to living ‘cause there’d be nothing more to do than just make it to tomorrow.” Bowing his head, Sebastian’s chin presses against his body as Rudy and Sonya watch the man with an unobstructed view. From the front of the room, Jenn’s face wears a lack of any emotion other than the subtle appearance of agreement in the man’s each point. Not as opposed to the position as their friend is, Elsie and Josie casually watch on whilst Jules simply takes in the conversation without much care over which way the vote goes. “The only thing any of us should be interested in is finding somewhere where we know we won't go hungry or without a shelter over our heads” Lou remarks, only to be met with the semi-expected retort from the other side of the commons area. “That’s funny, ‘cause we had that at the cabin before you showed up” Rudy replies, his yearning for easier days most often met with hostility, though its existence proves to be justified now, “even before the avalanche, it wasn’t good enough for you.” “I never criticised the cabin, I criticised the people in it for hiding away from the world” Lou replies, his finger pointed at the man, “if you’d been ready for the world outside before I came along in case shit went south, I wouldn’t have cared where you did or didn’t hide out.” With a subdued chuckle, Marta kicks one of her feet atop the table and lays her hands atop her lap, looking up at the man as he resumes speaking. “Look, the old world isn’t coming back. We’re not going back to school, or work. We’re not paying off debts of renting cars and buying islands off the coast of another island” Lou explains, sarcastically jutting his chin forward in the paramotorist’s direction, “that doesn’t mean we can’t find a place to settle in and call home without having to go to bed with one eye open every night. That shouldn’t be the expectation, but it should be the goal.” Awaiting a reply in the event that it arises, Lou takes the silence that proceeds his remarks as an opening to turn back toward Terry, who still remains unenthused, but doesn’t seem to wear the disappointment he had prior. “I’m sorry, Terry. I don’t have a backup plan ‘cause the only backup plan is to move on and find a new home if this one doesn’t pan out” Lou concludes, “if that’s not good enough for you, so be it. If that’s not good enough for any of you, so be it.” “You wouldn’t accept us saying ‘no’ to that, don’t bother saying ‘so be it’” Terry responds, pulling forward in his seat as his reply is doubled down upon. “No, I wouldn’t. I would accept that it was the call you made, but it won’t be the call I make” Lou replies, reclaiming his rebar staff as he leaves the group amidst each watchful eye, “whatever call the rest of you make is fine by me. But regardless of what your answer is, I’m going to Calgary.” Rolling his eyes, Terry joins Jules in adjusting the place he takes in his seat, his ear caught to the same claim made by the second voice occupying space ahead of him. “So am I” Marta replies, immediately earning a bemused reaction from her father, who throws his hands out in exhausted disbelief at his daughter’s reply. “Marta, for fuck’s sake-” Adrian remarks, beginning to speak before forced to fall silent. “Contrary to what you all think, it’s not because of an undying love that I’m going with Lou- it’s because he’s right” Marta interrupts, “I understand that there’s a little hypocrisy behind him trying to find a ‘forever home’, but I can’t find a reason to disagree with him.” “I can!” Adrian retorts, “if we were going anywhere to settle permanently, why can’t we find somewhere warmer where we don’t need to worry about not being able to farm? Why Calgary other than ‘cause it’s where his girlfriend is?” Looking toward the ceiling, Marta rolls her eyes before answering her father in kind. “I’m not saying I agree with where he’s going, I agree with the point he’s making” the woman responds, “if we can’t make a life somewhere, what’s the point of this endless fighting?” “Then let’s find somewhere better than a place ever further north than Vancouver!” Rudy replies, throwing his hands out, “we’ll take up a plot of land in Montana or that place where all the Amish live!” “Utah- and they’re mormons” Elsie replies, stepping away from Josie’s side as she walks across the room, preparing to depart in favour of refilling her cup. “It doesn’t matter, what does is that I’d rather settle down in Utah than I would in Calgary” Rudy replies, almost immediately drawing the ire of the leader to the group’s other half. “You’d just prefer to settle somewhere in general” Terry remarks, immediately sparking an irritable retort. “You’ve made your problems with me perfectly clear, let’s move onto something that matters” Rudy cuts back, watching Terry part his lips to speak before his own daughter refuses him the chance. “Let’s shut the fuck up, stop arguing with each other, and start figuring out where the fuck we’re going by the end of the night” Courtney remarks, immediately prompting the woman still standing in the centre of the room to conclude her point. “Lou is why we were all brought together, he was right about needing to be able to defend ourselves, and if it weren’t for him- we might still be in the enclave’s sights” Marta concludes, turning away to retreat along the side of the man she voices her support for, “be sceptical all you want, but I told him last night the same thing I’ll keep telling him. He’s not let me down yet, and I’m going to continue trusting him until he gives me a reason not to.” Without needing to speak any further, Marta departs the room and the conversation as the rest are left to speak to themselves, the truly undecided voters left to share amongst themselves what they’d kept from being spoken thus far. “Should I keep the pen cap on or are we good to go?” Courtney inquires, raising the question for anyone to respond, as of yet uncertain exactly what reply awaits her. == RISE and REVOLT == Filling the settled air with the sound of shattering glass behind the weight of a strike with her elbow, Jenn reaches through the empty pane and unlocks the door to a rundown shack with ease. “Like I said, no one’s coming back to open up the place and get back to work” the woman remarks, shining her flashlight around the walls of an abandoned souvenir shop as the sun begins to fall on yet another day.
“I know that, it just feels out of place” Sebastian replies, following the woman’s lead as the majority of their group settles in for the night, “I’m still not completely used to all of this.” With her lips puckered in the corner of her mouth, Jenn shrugs her shoulders as she turns her light to a rack of stuffed plushies, giving them a brief pat with her hand as the man she’s joined by continues to look around. “That’ll change, don’t worry” the woman replies, continuing to pan her light around whichever corner she prepares to next descend upon, “when you don’t have a place to settle in and call home, the days start going by a lot faster than what you’re used to.” Gently sliding a greeting card from a plastic display case filled with a variety of others, Sebastian lets the woman’s word settle with him as he reads the cheerful remarks plastered in black text atop the flimsy pasteboard’s face. “What makes you so sure of that?” the man soon asks aloud, stepping away from the shop’s counter before wandering down one of the many accessory-laden aisles. “Toss me one of those cards” Jenn replies from across the room, keeping the man from progressing further down the knick knack tunnel he’d prepared to step through. “Seriously” the woman replies, watching the man look at her for a moment before turning back to follow through with her request, “and a pen too.” Laughing quietly, Sebastian casually strolls around a counter he has no authority to stand behind and takes a card he has no intention of paying for, throwing it like a boomerang in his younger friend’s direction. Reaching for the first writing stick he can find, the man watches the woman across from him catch it and open the cardboard postal-piece, thinking quietly to herself for a moment before writing atop its white background, having to draw a few circles first to get the ink to run. “Should I go out looking for a carrier pigeon too?” Sebastian jokes, watching the woman’s face present him an amused smirk as the pen is literally put to paper. “What day is it?” Jenn responds, pulling her face away from the note she’d written atop before tossing the pen into a random corner of the store. “Hm?” the man replies, jutting his chin forward as the woman repeats her question, “today’s date- as in the day that’s just about to end- what is it?” “Uh, well let’s see-” Sebastian replies, pulling his head back as his eyes trail off toward an unimportant corner of the ceiling, “-it was a Saturday when Theo dragged us out of the cabin, and I’ve slept in a different bed for the last eight nights so today would be a Sunday. That would make today the 16th of December 2018.” Closing the two sides of the card and tossing it back to the counter her fellow survivor sits at, Jenn wanders back the way she’d initially begun to walk, “I lost count and so will you” she responds with a shrug. Reaching the short distance between himself and where the card landed, Sebastian looks onto the white card face and squints, “you thought it was February 15th?” the man wonders aloud, almost unable to comprehend such a drastic difference. “I didn’t think it was, I guessed that it was” Jenn replies, picking a pink hat with blue letters off the nearest rack and casually throwing it upon her head, “after a while, you start realising they’re not worth keeping track of anymore.” Shaking his head, Sebastian returns to the side of the counter that truly makes him feel at home, a non-paying patron simply looking around a store filled with things he has no interest in as opposed to the register attendant behind its checkout station. “Well what about birthdays and anniversaries?” Sebastian wonders back, redirecting his stroll from the aisle he’d attempted to walk down at first before opting to follow the woman’s trail, “what about Christmas or New Year’s?” Continuing to casually walk down the backside of the merchandise shack, Jenn steps past a shelf of tacky jewellery and a display stand set up with plastic chairs and long-since deflated rubber palm trees. “What about them?” Jenn responds over her shoulder just as she hears the man’s footsteps close in on her aisle’s entrance, “do you think throwing parties or having little sing-alongs are gonna be a priority when we’re hunting for food or running away from the dead?” Still carrying a smile on his face, Sebastian snatches a hat of his own off the same rack his fellow survivor had lifted hers off of, following her slow-moving saunter onward. “Maybe they’re not a priority, but they’re still nice to know” Sebastian replies, holding the red cap by his side as he kicks over a plastic beach chair with his foot, “do we really have to let go of everything we had before things went south?” As if the question had triggered the deepest recess of her mind to recall what she’d long-since subdued, Jenn stops in her tracks and turns around to meet the man’s eyes with her own, a much more serious posture than the one she’d since carried. In momentary silence, the woman’s face turns away as the air grows stiff, the man that stands before her not wishing to speak out in favour of hearing whatever words he knows await their chance to be spoken. “The old world is gone, and it’s not coming back” Jenn responds, carrying the same light tone she’d spoken to him with since entering the building in spite of her posture implying something harsher was to be expected, “if you want to hold onto souvenirs, be my guest.” Carrying on, Jenn walks to the end of the aisle and rounds the nearest corner as Sebastian watches on, remaining stood in place for a moment before lowering his head. Listening to the woman’s feet trek across the floor just as they had since their arrival, the man sits with his thoughts before turning back and retrieving a second red hat from the shelf. = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = “Urgh!” Sonya exclaims, throwing her arms forward with a metal pipe held tightly within her hands, driving the cylindrical edge through the skull of a corpse that presses against a fence. “Not bad at all” Jules remarks, leaning against a wall half his height with his arms crossed as he watches the woman pry her weapon from the corpse’s skull, “but if I were you, I’d try to keep myself from grunting like a tennis player every time I try to put down one of ‘em.” “I’ll keep that in mind” the woman replies, tapping her weapon against the chain link fence to draw the dead closer, watching a few isolated corpses take interest in her sights. With his eyes squinted, Jules watches the woman step back and prepare herself to put down the one feral heathen drawing closer than the rest before looking around his immediate surroundings. Puckering his lips, the intrigued survivor steps up to a long-abandoned ticket booth and retrieves a brick sat just beside its base, inspecting it for a moment as he listens to a much more subdued grunt precede yet another swing of the pipe. “Hey, Sonya- toss your weapon real quick” Jules calls back, turning around to face the confused woman, who questions the request for a moment before doing as told, tossing it into his possession as he rests its head against the ground. “Here’s a little tip I’ve figured out along the way- have you ever noticed how Lou sharpened the end of that metal stick he’s got?” Jules inquires, met with a silent nod from the woman he now kneels to the ground beside. “Look for ways to make your weapons better when you get the chance. Always remember to think outside the box” the man continues, crushing one end of the pipe repeatedly with his faded red brick, grunting as he gently rolls the weapon as if it were a dough roller. “He made his stick pointy, other people can add things around something to make it easier to handle-” Jules proceeds, gradually narrowing the pipe’s tip into a more pointed, almost spear-like pillar, “and sometimes- all you need for it is something like a rock and a roll of tape.” With her hands on her hips, Sonya watches the man continue to mash the head of her plain, stripped tube before glancing back at the dead that accumulate at the park’s closed off entrance. “So you’re saying it’s bad to use the pipe?” Sonya inquires, trying to fully comprehend the advice being given to her. “No. If it was working, it’ll do. The point is- if you sharpen one side of it- you’ll be able to clean up more of them than you would be otherwise” Jules responds, throwing down a few additional shots with his flattened stone before reaching for the roll of tape in his pocket, “if you can make a weapon better, it could prove to be the difference between life and death.” Pulling her head back and nodding, the woman waits for the man to conclude his efforts for another few seconds before being presented with the result of his work. Whilst not perfect, the pipe’s open end is mashed into a mostly-shut tip, much deadlier than what it had been before. Whilst its other end still sits open-ended, the black tape that wraps around its base proves much easier to grip for the woman that now reclaims it into her possession. “So, now it’s less of a pipe and more of a spear, and that makes it easier to kill zombies?” Sonya begins to wonder, the silence she’s met with mid-pause granting her the confidence in knowing she’s on the right track, “and when I kill zombies easier, it buys me time to get out of a jam?” Offering the woman a purposefully-condescending applause, Jules reacts to the woman as if she’d accomplished the impossible, playfully picking on her in the way his group is more than accustomed to. “She’s finally learning!” the man exclaims, laughing at the woman as she reacts with a playfully-unamused face, proclaiming his work to be done for the meantime as he walks off. “And here I thought I was in the clear of sarcastic jackasses when Silvano bit it” Sonya calls out as the man having helped her turns back, smiling as he does a shimmy, walking backward as he responds. “I don’t know who that is, but he sounds like he was a fun dude!” Jules chirps back, letting the comedic banter die off as the woman shakes her head with a smirk, sights settling back upon the seven corpses that line up by each other’s side, waiting to be knocked off one at a time. With puckered lips and a squint in one eye, Sonya looks to her weapon for a moment before rushing forward, piercing the skulls of each zombie in quick succession without a grunt to be heard. | Sat beside the fire alone with his arms draped across his arched knees, Rudy listens to a pair of footsteps approach as he stares into the rising flames. “I know you sort of stick out like a sore thumb, but I didn’t take you for the loner type” Terry remarks, patting the man on the shoulder as he passes him, setting a few sets of canned soup beside the open firepit before taking a seat on the ground. Stepping out to a pile of cookware collected over the past few hours of the group’s stay, Terry reaches for a large metal pot and casually sits it in the centre of the burning flames, prying open the lid to one of their dinner’s cans as he keeps the conversation moving. “So what is it?” the man wonders back, carefully removing the lid and setting the can down, preparing to do the same with the rest of his findings, “are you purposefully stubborn or is it something else?” “I don’t know what you’re asking me” Rudy replies, looking up at the man whose eyes remain fixated on each can he opens, setting one down after another. “I saw you back at that camp. I could see you at the front when your group was moving out” Terry replies, wincing at a stray ember flies from the flames and burns his arm, not keeping him from finishing the thought, “it seemed like you knew how to aim that rifle, so- what’s got you so opposed to change?” Staying quiet for a second, Rudy’s eyes look into the flames that increase in size, growing used to the pot that sits atop their levelled-out centre as he remains without a word. “Your oldest one’s been used to this stuff since the start from what it sounds like. Maybe the other one took some time, but she seems to be getting the hang of things” Terry continues to speak, using the man’s silence as an opportunity to continue prodding at his stoic exterior, “so what’s holding you up?” “Nothing’s holding me up” Rudy quickly retorts, prompting the man interrogating him to look over his shoulder with a pair of raised eyebrows, the puckered lip shake of the head he reacts with only indicative of a lack of belief. “Then it’s a choice thing. If there’s nothing preventing you from learning how to survive, it’s something you’re choosing for yourself” Terry responds, carefully taking each open can off the ground and pouring its contents into the pot. “I’m not choosing anything” Rudy once more responds, sitting back a short amount as yet another can is emptied into the literal melting pot, one aluminium can after another mixed into the container. “Well there’s gotta be something” Terry chirps back, quickly running low on cans to empty as he’s again forced to wince at the ember that singes his skin, “if my father saw the rest of us fighting to make it while he sat on his ass, he’d have never forgiven himself.” “I’m not the kind of person that just jumps into your kind of world feet first, alright?” Rudy calmly snaps back, watching the younger man turn around as the final container empties into the firepit-topping cauldron. “Maybe you, and your friends, and the rest of them can all look at what’s going on and just go with the flow, okay? I’m not” the older man continues, his eyes veering off toward one of the inoperable pools in the near distance, “this isn’t where I thought my life would be.” “And what, you think it’s where the rest of us thought we’d be?” Terry hastefully inquires, “you think any of us thought we’d have gone from L.A to Canada in a few months killing zombies all day and night? Having to scavenge for cans of Chef Boyardee in a theme park ‘cause some dude with a grudge forced us to run away from our last place?” Staying silent as he looks away, Rudy’s sight is soon reclaimed by the man raising the question for him to answer, the younger survivor’s persistence keeping the air from going quiet. “I’ll have you know I wasn’t expecting any of this. I’m supposed to be waiting for acceptance letters in the mail right now- not this” Terry continues, his eyes squinting as he turns the rest of the way from the pot, “I was supposed to go out east. I was supposed to go to college and move out in the summer.” “I shouldn’t have said-” Rudy begins to reply, apologetic in the wake of the man’s voiced strife though refused the chance to finish his thought, the man that speaks to him not offering the older father a chance to absolve himself of criticism. “It doesn’t matter what you shouldn’t have said. You shouldn’t be sitting here on your ass while everyone else pulls their fucking weight- that’s what you shouldn’t be doing” Terry continues, his undivided attention given to the man he now scolds. “While you were up in that cabin, I was back home. I was watching my friends die, and get eaten, and burn alive trying to make sure that the rest of us could make it out alive. People just like me going down with the ship so I could live” Terry explains, kneeling down so his eyes become level with Rudy’s own, “and while your friends are making themselves useful, you’re sitting on your ass and pouting. They’re jumping feet first and you’re here, sitting it out like a fucking pussy.” “I’m sorry that your-” Rudy again attempts to speak, only to fall silent the moment Terry’s voice calmly halts him once more. “Shut up. Do me a favour. Get your ass off the ground, leave this place, walk into the woods and wait to die like a dog” the younger man orders, refusing to pull punches with whom he views as being below him, “all you’re gonna do is hold us back and get yourself killed. I’m just asking that you do it now instead of later so you don’t hold us back when it happens.” His voice as calm as if he were asking for the time of day, Terry lifts himself away from the ground and turns back to the dinner he begins to prepare as Rudy watches on, the older man’s face wrought with shock at what had just been asked of him as he falls still. Trying to process what had just happened, the older man looks around the makeshift camp for a few moments before climbing off the ground and wandering off into the darkness, not a shred of remorse held within the firepit cook. | “Oh, there you are!” Courtney remarks, watching Sebastian follow Jenn out of the oddly lifeless gift shop as she makes her way toward the firepit. “I don’t know why but I thought you’d be with the others” the woman explains, watching the man approach her as the woman that he’d followed walks off in search of others. “Yeah, well I figured that I’d try to get to know Jenn a little more with how close she is to Lou” Sebastian explains, tucking his left hand into the pocket at his side whilst his right holds a pair of red caps. “I see. Did you find out anything you didn’t know before?” Courtney requires with a smile, both hands tucked into her back pockets as she watches the woman walk off. “She doesn’t know what day it is, she thinks birthdays and holidays aren’t important and it doesn’t sound like she’s too fond of how things used to be” Sebastian replies, squinting his eyes as he too watches the woman walk off, “if I were to ask what Lou would be like if he had a vagina, I’d imagine Jenn would be the answer.” “Oh god, I don’t want to think about that” Courtney replies, shaking her head with a playful look of disgust on her face, “not that there’s anything abhorrent about it, but I just don’t really wanna picture Lou as the bearded lady from those old freak shows. It’s just a bit too much.” Sharing her amusement with a breathy laugh, Sebastian nods his head in agreement before turning the conversation around, a curious look in his eyes as he smiles at the woman. “Why were you looking for me?” the man with hair slowly becoming increasingly grey wonders aloud, poking fun in a friendly way at the woman’s search. “Oh, um-” Courtney begins to reply, staring off into the distance for a moment as she falls silent, thinking about the answer whilst appearing to grow hesitant, “-it’s nothing. I just wanted to check in on you, y’know? Make sure you were alright.” Pulling his head back, Sebastian looks at the woman with an obviously doubtful look on his face. “Yeah, I don’t believe that for even a second” the man replies, watching the woman’s reluctant expression appear to strengthen, “I’ve known you for a long time, and as pretty as you may be, you have quite the ugly poker face.” Rolling her eyes as she hangs her head, Courtney listens to a gentle breeze roll through the air as the conversation is left for her to continue. “We never finished our conversation this morning” the woman responds, staring off into the cloudy night as the man before her waits, not wanting to interrupt the train of thought that rolls into the metaphorical station within her head, “maybe we didn’t need to, but I didn’t like that we left it off where we did.” Staying quiet, Sebastian reaches out to take Courtney’s arm and gently pulls her to the side, protected by the awning to a food stand as he begins to feel droplets of water fall from the heavens. “I don’t really know what I was thinking earlier. When you said you thought it was alright that we wanted different things, I just felt this urge to agree with it” the woman explains, clearly not pleased with the same conclusion they’d once come to agreement on. “Ever since then, and especially since everything went to hell, I’ve had my doubts about what I wanted” Courtney explains, something that seems to be more difficult to not expect from people as the days continue to pass, “that future that I wanted back then- even before everything went south- it hasn’t been as important to me since before I met you.” “What are you saying?” Sebastian inquires, trying to subdue the charming smile that comes over his face in times of awkwardness to keep from derailing the conversation. “I’m saying I did want those things. I wanted the family, and the marriage and to see the world- I wanted it before” Courtney replies, “I kept thinking I wanted it while we were together ‘cause I told you I did. But at some point, I started to really doubt whether or not I still wanted those things when we were together.” Beginning to turn into a light drizzle, the rain clouds overhead begin pouring down on the camp just as they had spent the last few days doing, their arrival this time unable to keep the discussion from taking place. “I think at some point, I told you that I wanted all those things because it’d become a habit” Courtney confesses, “it’s like when someone asks you what your favourite colour is. You’ve had one since you were a kid, but is it still what it was then or is it just the default answer?” “Are you saying you didn’t want those things by the end?” Sebastian proceeds to ask, met with a similar reply to what Courtney is trying to explain. “Well, no- I think what I’m trying to say is that what I wanted just- I don’t know, changed?” the woman replies, almost as if she’s trying to work out the point on the fly, still not totally certain herself, “like I wanted that when we started dating, but after some time the only thing I wanted was- well- was just to keep being with you.” Looking into each other’s eyes in complete silence, Sebastian and Courtney listen to the rain begin to come down harder, crashing into the asphalt their theme park camp is built upon without any care over the world and what happens around them, their only attention paid to each other. Leaning forward with his hand held out, Sebastian presses his lips against Courtney’s and lays his hand against the side of her face, the gesture immediately reciprocated by the woman whose hands soon sit upon his sides. With a few seconds passing, the rain begins to stabilise as one heavy downpour, the hurrying voices that shout in the distance prompting their passionate moment to cease. “Everyone into the cafe!” Terry exclaims, hunching over the heavy pot that he dashes across the waterpark with to keep it from filling with rainwater, the fire he’d cooked over quickly beginning to die out. Watching from afar, Sebastian and Courtney pop a smile as they watch their closest friends race in the same direction their dinner is taken, forced to laugh at the scurry they all partake in before their eyes meet each other once more. Now lowering his hands to the woman’s shoulders, Sebastian loses himself in the woman’s eyes as she looks up at him with a smile, unable to keep herself from feeling like a piece she’d operated just fine without has now been fit back into place. “This is what I wanted” Courtney proclaims with a rapid nod, her smile only continuing to grow wider as she places her hands against each side of the man’s face, assured in her declaration, “-I’m sure of it now.” Leaning into yet another kiss, the newly-reunited pair soon part their lips to set their attention on the camp’s nearby entrance, hearing a loud set of footsteps dash through the soaked grounds just beyond the front gates as they reach their intended destination. Sprinting through the front doors of the cafe the group had huddled into, Sebastian and Courtney stand on opposite sides of the entrance as their other halves finally return as promised. “Seriously, if mother nature is an actual person, would she please just make up her fucking mind!?” Marta exclaims, ripping off her gore-stained, but not-covered sweatshirt as Lou casually follows suit, shaking his head like a dog as his overgrown hair throws water in every direction. “Just in time for dinner” Terry calls out with a chuckle, dipping a ladle into the still-hot metal container, portioning their dinner into twelve different ceramic bowls. “Where the hell did you guys go!?” Josie calls out, assisting Terry by taking each bowl and delivering them to those tasked with disregarding the flavours that aren’t promised to work together and keeping down the only food they can manage to find. “To get rid of our ‘enclave issue’ Lou replies nonchalantly, turning his eyes toward the woman that stands on the side of the door opposite Marta, her attention fully set upon him, “Randal and his folks shouldn’t be an issue anymore.” “Should we even ask how you managed to kill his entire enclave or should we just explain it with the typical ‘don’t doubt Lou’ reason we usually make?” Jules inquires, watching the one-armed man’s face lighten with a smile as his protege takes over. “We led a horde into the hotel, Randal got bit, the place went up in flames and he jumped off the roof” Marta responds in quick succession, shrugging as she tosses the soaked sweatshirt on the floor, “just another Tuesday I guess.” “Oh not you too!” Sebastian proclaims with humour, earning a laugh out of Courtney and Jenn whilst the rest of the group look on in confusion, his dismissive wave clearing the room of any obligation to ask. With the room beginning to settle as the rain continues to beat the ground just beyond their building’s entrance, the survivors settle in for the night with a warm meal to hold them over, most of the faces wearing a look of disgust from the abhorrent flavours worn by people just happy to eat. Leaning against the counter that stands at the front of the room the rest of his group occupies the tables of, Lou dips his fork into the bowl prepared by his friend as the seconds turn into minutes, nothing but a welcomed silence coming over the exhausted survivors. “Alright, who’s gonna be the one to make a plan?” Elsie wonders aloud, calling out to any set of lips to part with an answer, “we clearly aren’t staying here long term, so when are we getting on the road and where are we going?” “We’re leaving tomorrow morning” Marta replies, sat in the seat closest to the man she pulls away from her dinner to look at, his eyes meeting hers as the rest of the room goes quiet. “We’re going east” Lou replies, looking out at the assortment of faces that all share varying reactions, some holding looks of confusion whilst others appear to patiently wait for him to continue, “there’s a gas station a few blocks from here. We’ll syphon what we can and head as far as it’ll take us.” “As far as it’ll-?” Elsie asks aloud, the only voice to spring up from the collective audience, an obvious confusion held within the tone of her retort, “-exactly how far east are we going and why?” Not missing a beat, Lou looks in the woman’s direction and replies with one name, the city he intends on venturing out to prompting Sebastian and his group to nearly spit out whatever spoonful they’d yet to swallow. “Calgary.” With a few collective sounds of profound shock, the native Canadians look around with widened eyes as most of their American-born friends glance back and forth in confusion. “What the fuck!? Calgary!?” Adrian exclaims from the back of the room, Rudy nearly choking on his dinner whilst his daughters lean back, almost as if waiting for the man to brush off the response as a joke, “that’s nearly twelve hours away!” “That’s what I’ve been told, yes” Lou replies with as serious a tone as he’d make the proclamation with, looking to read the expression on Sebastian’s face to find an uncertain look the likes of which he hadn’t received from the man in quite some time. “Woah, woah- let’s slow down for a second here!” Courtney exclaims from beside her father, a few looks passed around by those brought to the area through the Euronam’s sinking, the simple mention of the trip’s duration provoking doubt. “Lou, that’s not just going east- that’s a whole different province!” Courtney remarks, her father quickly adding to the outrageous proposal, “forget province- it’s a whole different time zone!” Nodding to himself, Lou sets down the spoon to his dinner and lays his rebar staff upon the counter and braces for the opposition he assumed would be coming. “Lou, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way or anything, but we’re not going to Calgary” Adrian explains, his voice presented with much more reasonability than the Golden family’s had, “even if we tried, there’s no way we’re getting all the way there in one piece.” “Lou, we don’t have the food to make it there and the roads will probably be littered with junk” Sonya continues, met with the same silence the rest of her group is as the man she speaks to welcomes the resistance. “And like Adrian said, it’s just too far. We barely made it off the island and still lost two people doing that” Rudy’s youngest daughter continues, “I’m sure you have your reasons, but trying to make it to Calgary just isn’t possible.” “Well, not necessarily” Sebastian replies, still in opposition to the suggestion laid out, though trying to remain open to both sides, “it could be when the weather changes and it gets warmer outside. However, we’re still in no shape to make that run for at least the next four months.” Finding it hard to disagree with the conclusion her group’s leader draws, Marta sways her head from one shoulder to the other as her name is called out from afar. “Marta, I know you’re infatuated with him, but please tell Lou this is nuts” Sonya calls out, coming to the same conclusion she knows most of her group would eventually meet at, “Lou, it’s nothing against you, but we all know there’s one person you’ll hear out before anyone else, and right now- she needs to be the one that tells you.” Closing her eyes and having her head, Marta’s chin falls toward the table as Lou’s eyes turn toward hers, waiting for her response just as the rest of the group does. In full belief that common sense will prevail, the three relatives with the last name of ‘Golden’ reclaim their seats as the tension boils, the father of the woman presented with the dilemma occupying a similarly unconcerned demeanour. Sat at the table just beside the young woman in question, Sebastian’s face wears a tense visage, fully expecting the woman to surprise her peers with the conclusion that she slowly warms herself up to voicing. Though not fully aware of just how far the distance between themselves and the proposed destination truly is, Terry and his group sit with various levels of uncertainty, not wanting to stray from their blind trust in Lou, though not confident in their ability to travel. Sat on her own one table over from Sebastian and Marta’s, Jenn leans back in her seat and uses a towel to wipe her mouth, pulling her face away from the meal before her as she prepares for whatever response is bound to be given. Letting out a sigh, Adrian’s only daughter turns her sights toward the man at the front of the room, Lou’s head lowering the moment his eyes set upon the visage his protege wears. “It is nuts, Lou” Marta finally answers, pausing for a moment as the group’s few bated breaths release themselves in belief that reason had won out, looking to the woman as her face pans in their direction, “it is nuts, and we’re going to Calgary.” “No, we’re not!” Rudy exclaims as those in agreement with him present an audible groan, Sebastian’s slow nod proving that he indeed knew what was coming. Tilting her head in surprise at the turn the woman’s response had taken, Jenn’s expression takes a different direction from that of her fellow American visitors, Terry’s group sinking into their seats as they struggle to figure out how to feel. Looking up in surprise, Lou looks at Marta as she turns back to face him, offering him a smile and a nod as she throws her full support behind him. “Lou, this isn’t happening!” Rudy calls out, more than aware that the man’s protege doesn’t have the authority to make the final call, “we can’t make this trip!” Pulling his face away from Marta, Lou watches Rudy throw his hands up with a loss for words as Sonya’s head falls into her hands, Courtney walking away from the table with her hands at her waist. Tilting his head back, Adrian stares off at the ceiling as the Americans that sit at the table ahead of him remain silent, not responding with nearly the passion as the newest members of their group. “Everyone calm down!” Sebastian calls out, putting a stop to the various declarations of relief or bewilderment that fill the room with an audible chaos. “We’re not making this call tonight, and we’re not brushing off anything!” the man proclaims, his words immediately thinning the room of various declining voices as it falls silent, letting the conversation fall to his control, “we’ve had a long day, we’ve barely eaten anything palatable- no offence, Terry- and we’re all in need of some sleep.” The subject of a glance from the conversation’s leader, Lou holds his hand up in surrender, accepting the suspension of a definitive call until a later date. “What’s gonna happen is this- we’re gonna take the truck to a hotel or a truckstop and we’re gonna get a good night’s sleep” Sebastian explains, pushing in his chair as he walks to the middle of the room, “when we wake up, the people that want to present a plan can do so. After that, we’ll all vote and go wherever the winning plan is.” Pushing his lips into a crown in the corner of his mouth, Lou hangs his head for a moment as Sebastian calls out for any opposition to the plan, the few hushed mumbles of acceptance he’s met with giving the group a clear view of what’s to come. Visibly dissatisfied in the reaction his proposal had received, the man reclaims possession of his rebar staff as his leader’s familiar voice captures his focus. “Walk with me” Sebastian proclaims, wrapping his arm around Lou’s back and directing him to the corner of the room those opposed to his plan venture in the opposite direction of. Giving into this gesture as Marta follows by his side, the survivor responsible behind the two groups’ merger meets with the rest of his original group to tend to the task ahead. “Are you gonna tell us why you’ve got this sudden fascination over Calgary, or are we gonna have to pull teeth here?” Sebastian inquires, joining every American-born survivor curious in hearing the answer near the cafe’s back-most wall. Parting his lips with a composed look on his face, Lou attempts to speak before finding himself falling silent, those that wait for a reply watching his expression fall as he hands the staff to his protege to take for herself. “Hold this for me, please?” Lou inquires, placing his weapon into Marta’s hands as he slides his fingers into the pocket of his pants, retrieving a folded note that he hands over to the man across from him. “What’s this?” Terry inquires, taking possession of the paper before reading what’s scrawled upon it, the one-armed survivor silently watching on as his friend’s eyes widen. “Where did you find this?” Terry wonders aloud, looking away to stare back at the man who’d seemingly uncovered what he was convinced was impossible to find. “It was in the pillowcase next to hers” Lou replies, watching the intrigued faces of those that read the note from over his friend’s shoulder change into ones of surprise, “I knew her family stayed out in Canada during Christmas vacations, but her family didn’t like me so I never asked about anything in specific.” “Why didn’t you say anything back at the hotel!?” Jenn exclaims with as loud of a voice as she can whisper, met with the same answer she’d anticipated. “I only found it a few minutes before Randal and his enclave got there” Lou replies, passing a few glances toward any face that occupies the small huddle, “but that’s her handwriting. The way she writes her “t’s”, the way she dots her “i’s”, the way she signs her name, this is from her- no question about it.” “Wait, what makes you think she would’ve even made it?” Josie replies, putting her hands up to soften the blow her suggestion raises, “I don’t wanna put bad thoughts in your head, but she left right when the snow started to get bad and it’s not like we had much food at the hotel to begin with. That’s a long journey for twelve people to make to begin with, let alone just one person.” “Well if it won’t be at that house in Calgary, it’ll be somewhere on the road” Lou replies, shrugging his shoulders as he politely reclaims possession of his weapon, “one way or another, that’s where she was going. We’ll either find her alive out there, dead along the road somewhere, or we’re not gonna find her at all. Those are the only three outcomes here.” “Why do we need to go now?” Terry inquires, keeping the group’s hopes at bay as best he can, “Sebastian has a point. If she’s going to be there, what would delaying that trip by a few months change?” Rolling his head from one side to the next, Lou considers the man’s proposition before Sebastian ends the discussion in its place, not wanting to let the conversation he’d purposefully delayed start taking on a life of its own. “We have plenty of time to figure that out, until then- let’s get what we can from this place and get our heads right, okay?” the man inquires, prompting the group to disperse in agreement, gathering their bearings and preparing to leave. “Hey” Marta calls out, watching Lou begin to traipse off before turning back, beckoning to her call as she keeps her voice low, not wanting to put her bias on display for anyone else to hear. “Whatever call you make tomorrow, I just want you to know that I’m not changing my mind” Marta explains, “if you tell the others you want to go to Calgary, I’ll vote with you.” With an appreciative smile, Lou rolls his eyes and voices his appreciation. “Marta, listen I really appreciate you saying that, but-” the man begins to reply, cut off as the woman prepares to rejoin her group. “Whether you appreciate it or not doesn’t matter, what matters is that you’re the one suggesting it” Marta explains, “I trust you to make the right call. It doesn’t matter if it’s where we go next, or if it’s a solution to a problem- whatever it is doesn’t matter. I trust you. You’ve always pulled through, and until that changes I’ve got no reason to doubt that you won't again.” Falling silent, Lou looks to the woman with a softer look, her blind faith in his call one that, whilst he truly appreciates it, strikes him to the very core. “If you think we’re able to make the trip to Calgary, I believe you” Marta explains, patting the man on the shoulder and departing with that claim of devotion, one that leaves the man feeling the true weight of his reputation in a way he never had before. Left in awestruck, Lou watches the woman return to the side of her group as they brace to endure the onslaught of rain once more, unable to fully put into words what that realisation leaves him with. Pressing his back into the counter as he stares off at an empty cafe, Marta’s departure leaves him as the only one in the building, the isolation and pure silence one that he’s felt before, but one that he’s never shared with such an unwavering pride as what he experiences now. == RISE and REVOLT == Quietly shutting the door upon her departure from the room, Courtney’s eyes drift toward the pleasant-looking man that casually approaches her, his hands tucked into the pockets of his corduroy pants. “One big, happy family again” the woman remarks as Sebastian rolls to a stop, his eyes glancing to the door as the woman continues to speak, “dad apologised to Sonya and it seems like, for now at least, it’s water under the bridge.”
“Well, if I were to list the things you were good at, being an effective mediator would be among them” Sebastian replies, watching the woman lean against the hallway’s drywall, “you always knew how to stop our fights by telling me to go for a drive and bring you back a bagel.” “Ain’t nothing wrong with breakfast for dinner” Courtney replies with her finger pointed to the man’s face, turning away to begin joining him in retreating for whatever end of the lavishly-adorned building calls for their presence next. “I’d be incorrect if I suggested such a thing, which is why I didn’t” Sebastian retorts, stepping to the woman’s side as the spacious corridor affords him the opportunity to, “if anything, having breakfast for dinner should be normalised in our society.” “Yeah, I’m sure that’s a campaign slogan the zombies can get behind” Courtney jokes, matching the nonchalant pace of the man’s stroll as their friendly union displays, lightening the air that had gone tense, cold and cruel for too long to recall. “I may be barking up the wrong tree with that one, but I’m sure it’d enjoy broad support amongst the undecideds” Sebastian quips back, their shared chuckle putting the short thread of witty comments to the side. “Lou’s friends- or, I guess our friends- apparently got themselves a car before they found us. Josie appears to have gotten it running just so you know” Sebastian remarks, continuing to slowly proceed down the mostly-dark hallway, the only light that touches it coming from the windows within each room they pass. “Does that mean we’re gonna be on the move again soon?” Courtney wonders back, turning to look at the man as he shakes his head with a shrug. “Not sure. They seem to think this place can hold up a few days, so we might not need to pack the bags just yet” Sebastian replies, his eyes wandering to the end of the hallway he’d just departed from and now has his back turned to, “everyone seems to think the decision’s best left in Lou’s hands.” Widened for just a second, Courtney’s face sits in surprise before settling into a mostly-accepting visage. “Man, that guy’s gonna become the emperor of whatever world gets built out of this one, won’t he?” Courtney jokes, her statement not entirely backed by mere humour. “Eh, probably. The consensus seems to be that this world was sort of made for him, so I guess it’d be fitting” Sebastian confesses, arching his lip to give his physiognomy a comedic tinge, “honestly, it’s probably just a good thing we’ve gotten on his good side.” “Yeah, I can’t say I disagree” Courtney replies, smiling as the man lowers his chin to chuckle, the air again growing quiet as yet another short conversation falls to the past. By each other’s side, the long-connected pair of survivors continue to walk the halls, rounding the only corner that separates them from the stairs as the time their slow-moving pace extends as long as it can continues to dwindle away. “What do you think of the others?” Sebastian wonders, hands still tucked away in the slots at each side of his hips, the woman accompanying him quick to bob her head from one side to the other. “Aside from Theo, Lou’s got a pretty decent track record with who he trusts” Courtney replies, shrugging her shoulders as their stroll continues to lead them onward, “they seem fine- even if they’re a little more free-spirited than kids were when we were younger. I like ‘em so far.” “Yeah that’s pretty much the same way I feel” Sebastian responds, quick to rationalise his assessment, “it’s not that ‘free-spirited’ is a bad thing, it just makes it more difficult to gage someone is all.” Nodding as she verbally joins the man’s declaration, Courtney keeps the conversation moving with a few variations of ‘yeah, definitely’ before yet another short talking point discovers its end and trails off into the past. In silence, the pair exit the mostly void-like passageway and step upon the top-most step of the staircase they prepare to descend upon, its gradually-dropping ledge bathed in as much light as the depressingly-cloudy, western Canadian grey skies can provide. “We never really talked about it” Courtney blurts out, holding herself back from lowering herself upon the carpeted first tread that Sebastian does. “What was that?” the man innocently asks back, turning to face his ex-girlfriend with his hand pressed against the downward-sloped railing. “The breakup. We never really talked about it and I don’t know why” Courtney replies, her discovery not one with much gravity behind it to change the undisturbed look on her deeply cared-for ex-lover’s face. “Well, uh- I guess- I guess we haven’t” Sebastian replies, stuttering over his words as he tries to find the reply desired of him. “I mean, I know we never really had to. The mutual breakups just kinda leave stuff on better terms than they usually end up on, but they also just kinda sit there” Courtney explains, visibly confused in what it is that she’s trying to say. “I still feel like there should have been more than just ‘we’re better off as friends’ when it happened” she continues, given the floor as the man searches for a response he never expected would be necessary to make, “don’t you think?” Flying out as a gust of air leaves his lungs, Sebastian’s lips press together as he shakes his head, staring off into the distance as he organises his words into a reply that would make coherent sense. “Well, we work really well together, but-” the man explains, pausing as his mind struggles to hold together the answer he’d aligned to offer her, grasping the words with the might of an omnipotent god just to clear them from his tongue, “-but we just wanted different things.” “No, I know that. Of course, it’s just weird that we never really talked about it- ever” Courtney replies, aware of the awkward aura it brings over their persistent start-stop conversations, though seemingly more affected by it than her second half is. “Do you want to talk about it?” Sebastian quickly asks, watching the woman’s clumsy struggle to dance around the topic despite bringing it up at a loss for what’s to be gained, “if you want to talk about it, we can.” “It’s not that I want to, it’s- I don’t really know what I want to do” Courtney admits, still leaving the man little information to work with, “we’ve been around each other every day since this all began, and I just feel like it’s this awkward box that we just sat in the corner and pretended wasn’t there.” “Well, let’s unpack it” Sebastian replies, turning his back to the stairs as he climbs one step higher, sharing the same level as the clutter-minded woman he wishes to get on the same page with. “You wanted a family, I didn’t. You wanted marriage, I didn’t. You liked to explore and meet new people, I liked to hide out in a cabin in the mountains and read books” the man explains, smiling as he shakes his head with kind eyes, “we got along but wanted different things. I thought that was okay?” “It is” Courtney replies, crinkling her nose as she looks off to an unimportant side of the foyer she stands in, one hand pressed against the railing she’d yet to descend the staircase with, a second thought falling upon her mind as the rest of her face scrunches, “-or maybe it’s not?” Taken aback by the woman’s sudden turn, Sebastian looks into her eyes as she begins to veer her face back toward his, a hopeful gleam in their whites as she looks up at him. *pop, pop pop pop. pop pop* On the level they’d yet to climb down to, the sound of rapid gunfire and shattered glass kill the important conversation just beginning to wrap themselves around the once-couple’s conscience. Instinctively reaching out for the woman’s arm, Sebastian pulls Courtney behind the wall they’d just ventured down the corridor of minutes prior, putting himself between her and any direction the aimless-yet-intentional bullets could be firing from. Unable to make out what’s being said within the temporary moments of ceasefire, the couple listens into the muffled words shouted aloud by those responsible for the apparent attack. Unable to make out what’s being said, Sebastian keeps himself pressing against Courtney as a sizeable set of footprints march after them in the direction they’d recently walked out from. “What’s going on?” Lou calls out as Marta follows closely behind, Rudy and Sonya trailing by a few metres as the six survivors reunite. “I think we’re being attacked” Sebastian quickly replies, easing the squeeze he’d pressed Courtney against the wall with as reinforcements close in, “we heard gunshots, some windows breaking and now people shouting- they sound like they’re on the other side of the building.” “That’s where the others are!” Marta quickly replies, watching Lou hurry to the top of the stairs and glance over the bannister that overlooks the front lobby, unable to see any signs of intrusion spoken of. “Well what the hell do we do!?” Rudy asks aloud, looking to any of the other more well-equipped members that joins him for guidance that he and his youngest daughter appear mostly unexposed to. “We should make use of that truck you said Josie started- get out before we all become pincushions, right?” Courtney responds, looking around the room for answers as their friend with the rebar staff rejoins their ranks, “we’ll go get the others and make a run for it.” Shaking his head in refusal, Lou speaks to a crowd of silence, the five that join him letting the man roll out his plan of attack. “They’re already on the move, you’ll have to meet up with them” Lou replies, aiming his staff toward the side he believes the shots to be coming from, “they’re not firing back- that means they’re already making a run for it.” “No we’re not!” Terry calls out, sprinting through the doors of the rear stairwell right as the man’s beginning to speak, waving his hand for the six to join them in retreat. “How’d you know which stairwell to take?” Lou asks seconds later, Marta following closely behind him as he sprints down each concrete step the man ahead of him takes. “I didn’t, I just got lucky!” Terry replies, speaking freely as his voice is carried upward, floating to the top of the concrete tower their exit route sits within before throwing his hands at the door that spills them into the backlot. “Come on!” Josie exclaims, standing halfway out of the truck’s driver seat as the rest of her group sits patiently, waiting with the confidence that the rest would find them safely. Doing as instructed, Terry and the rest break out into a hurry for whatever seat is left available for them, the man responsible for leading the way squeezing himself into the cabin as the Golden family, Sebastian, Marta and Lou hop into the bed alongside Jenn and Adrian. “Where are we going!?” Elsie shouts through the window separating the cabin from those in the vehicle’s back, holding onto the bar attached to the ceiling just beside her door as the truck speeds forward. “East! It doesn’t matter where, just keep driving East!” Marta calls back, sitting closest to the cabin’s rear as the man beside her watches on at the building they make a break from, his eyes looking into every window he’s afforded a look into before widening at what intrigues him the most. “Stop the truck!” Lou calls out, immediately questioned amidst exclamations as Josie does as instructed, the tires dragging along the asphalt the vehicle slams to a stop. “What the fuck are you doing!?” Sonya exclaims as the man stands from his place in the vehicle, leaping out to disembark as he begins sprinting back to the chaos they barely managed to escape from. “Just keep going East, I’ll catch up!” Lou shouts, adding nothing more than that as he disappears around the corner, leaving his survivors in the dark for a moment as they try to figure out what he’s done. Their glances aimless and accomplishing nothing, the group simply gives into the sudden plan that’s presented to them, not wishing to question the man that had already proven capable enough of finding them before. For another few metres, the truck follows through with its departure before a second voice calls out for Josie’s foot to hit the brakes. Jolting forward for a second time, the group braces for the sudden inertia before Marta hops the wall of the truck bed, her feet dashing toward Lou’s direction the moment they touch upon solid ground once more. “Marta, what are you doing!?” her father calls out, pushing himself up slightly before ordered to remain seated. “There’s a water park about ten minutes north! Go there and we’ll meet you by sunset!” Marta barks, hurrying after Lou without a moment’s hesitation, brushing off her father’s calls for her return as Elsie calls out to anyone willing to answer. “Anyone else getting off!?” the woman exclaims sarcastically, quickly setting aside the bemused tone to raise a follow-up question rooted in genuinity, “what’s the call? What are we doing?” Pressing his teeth into his bottom lip, Sebastian watches Marta turn the same corner as Lou whilst Adrian watches on, taking account of the orders the woman had given them before speaking out. “We go to the park and wait for them!” the man exclaims, pointing at the woman behind the wheel and giving her the signal to proceed, “step on it!” Not needing to hear anything more, Josie stomps on the gas and keeps the car due-north, joining Sebastian in trusting the declarations made by their once-more departed friends. Begrudgingly and with a profound sense of worry deep within him, Adrian settles back into his seat and stares off at where he leaves his daughter behind, gritting his teeth as he tries to keep his mind aimed at the hopeful thoughts he conjures every other time they part ways- this time a little harder to deal with. = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = “How did you see him?” Marta calls out, ferociously plunging her switchblade into the centre of a corpse’s chest whilst Lou holds watch, taking out one corpse after another as she digs into whatever much her hands can take hold off. “I didn’t, I saw his buddies” Lou replies, pausing to grunt as he sticks yet another rotting corpse with the sharpened tip of his staff, “I don’t know if they’ll keep fighting his war once he’s dead, but I know how you’re supposed to kill a snake.” Opening his mouth to finish his thought, Lou listens to the guttural scream the woman behind him interjects to let out, initially assuming she’d found herself in some unexpected danger. Turning back with his rebar readied, the man eases his fight-ready posture as he watches her stand from the ground with a smile on her face, looking up to him with eyes full of life as she holds the zombie’s head in her hand. “Yeah-” Lou replies, leaning back a fair amount with an impressed nod, a smirk forming in the corner of his face, “-like that.” “All clear in here!” a man shouts whilst aiming the barrel of his rifle downward, sprinting out of a room that overlooks the same staircase Sebastian and Courtney had shared to host their chat. “All clear this, all clear that!” Randal exclaims, staring at the window fixture adorning the wall he faces, stood at the top of the steps as he calls back to the man in question, “with all these rooms being cleared, you’d think they weren’t here!” “We’re looking everywhere, sir!” the man he shouts at assures, prompting his head to turn around with great haste. “Well look harder for fuck’s sake!” Randal barks, stepping down each stair angrily as he makes for the clearly once-occupied foyer, coming upon the unattended glasses of unfinished liquor that line the bar an equally-unfinished bottle of vodka sits atop- its cap left sitting beside it. Keeping to himself as he passes the remaining members of his enclave, Randal descends upon the mostly-dark concert hall and takes a seat at the one table lit with candlelight. Lowering himself into one of the pulled out seats, the man lifts one of the glasses left behind to his lips and enjoys the drink practically offered to him as a present. “All clear!” a distant voice exclaims, his words barely able to be made out by his superior, who rolls his eyes as the drink runs down his throat. Sat alone in his chair amidst what had just recently been the scene of a clearly-happy gathering, Randal runs his hand down the side of his face as he sets his rifle down, its stock gently lowered to the floor. Able to hear the distant footsteps and proceeding declarations of cleared rooms, the enclave’s leader closes his eyes and thinks quietly to himself, whatever colourful thoughts he envisions bringing a smile to his face momentarily before his ears catch what returns him to reality. *knock knock knock knock knock knock knock knock knock* Staring into the distant wall of pitch black nothingness, Randal wonders to himself whether or not he’d actually heard the call for his answer or merely imagined it as he fears he had. Not reacting instantly, the enclave’s leader waits nearly a minute for the tapping to begin again, his anxious mind running with the thought that it must’ve been a figment of the same invention his tricky brain had concocted- though he cannot convince himself of such certainty. Squinting his eyes with both doubt and allure, Randal leans back in his seat as he gently lowers the glass back upon the table he resides at, continuing to wait for the sound’s duplication for just a few seconds before finally rising to answer. Taking his rifle in one hand and one of the five candles in the other, the clearly-exhausted leader slowly follows one foot in front of the other as his men continue to declare rooms cleared above, drawn into the beckon call that awaits him. Shedding light upon the black coat that envelops the room in his every direction, Randal continues to march forward as the faintest sight of a large, metal door emerges from within the sightless depths. Leaning his head to one side as the mental toll the last few days have brought upon him, the man continues to wonder to himself whether or not the reality he believes himself to occupy space in right now is really just that- reality. Seduced by a search for the answer nonetheless, Randal closes the gap between himself and the exit provided to him before resting his rifle against the wall, freeing his hand as the sight of the handle meets him. Wiping his eyes as he squeezes them tightly, the leader of his enclave- or at least what remains of them in his war’s aftermath- stares at the door intently as he steadies his breath, feeling an odd warmth in the face of the frigid winter air that just further confuses him. Forcing a gust of air through his teeth, the man refuses to hold off the inevitable for another moment, pressing his thumb upon the metal latch and thrusting the door open. His face bathed in light, Randal’s subtle silence is replaced with the groans of an undead army, his eyes falling upon the gore-covered faces of two young survivors, who stand unmoved at the sight of his presence as the feral monsters squeeze past them in search of their next meal. Shocked to see them in such awe-inspiring command of the dead, Randal struggles to disassociate himself with the theory that his fallacy-crafting imagination had yet to shatter, the illusion remaining before such a misconception can be shattered beyond any doubt. Taking one step backward as his arm extends, the enclave’s leader appears to reach out for mercy before his exposed arm is torn into by the teeth of the foremost zombie, prompting him to scream as he pulls away. His delusion fractured, Randal runs back into the same darkness-shrouded concert hall his fatal reprieve had been taken in as those seeking his destruction retreat into the ranks of their rotten army. “You still have that gun!?” Lou calls out, hurrying through the army that pays little mind to them, seemingly not thrown off by their open-discussion or hurried dash for the front entrance. “I’m way ahead of you!” Marta calls out, taking the lead as she sprints ahead of Lou, her pistol readied as she descends the next corner, rounding it before coming to a sudden stop and taking aim. Closing in just in time to watch the results of their grand plan, the girl’s mentor watches the transparent doors of their temporary home swing outward for a brief moment. *pop* Pulling the trigger, Marta fires at Randal the moment she catches sight of him, forcing him to dash back the way he came and disappear into the lobby once more. Remaining stood with a smirk on her face, the gun woman watches the man hurry ahead of her with a confused look on his face. “He’s bit, leave him to turn!” the man’s protege calls out, her command immediately refused by the man that turns back to respond. “I’m not letting him cut that thing off and come after us again!” Lou shouts back, demanding of himself that they finish what they started, “I’ve made the mistake of leaving someone to die before and it came back to bite me, I’m not-!” Before he can even finish voicing his refusal, Marta dashes back to his side and prepares to continue the chase, trusting the man’s call to go after their target once more without needing to hear his justification. “I trust you, now shut up and move!” Marta exclaims, retaking the lead as she cuts her mentor off and races through the front doors. Not a step out of line, Lou sprints off after her and prepares to put a decisive end to the conflict that had already seen two of his friends killed. Huffing and puffing as he sprints past those comprising his enclave, Randal dashes up the steps he’d initially grown tired of waiting for a response out of as the lobby begins to descend into madness. Roaring out of the concert hall it had initially started in, a blaze begins to make its way into the lobby that Lou and Marta burst through the entrance of, running past members of the enclave that succumb to the surprise attack of the horde that is set upon them in chase of just one man. Firing a bullet into the face of a foe that draws near, Marta lets her mentor assume the front of the chase, following him up the stairs as he swings his staff toward the next few soldiers that obstruct their path forward. “Stairwell!” the woman calls out, directing Lou’s sights toward the man he barely gets the chance to notice dip into the emergency staircase, firing another round at the nameless soldier that rounds the nearest corner as they carry on. “You’re not getting away!” Lou calls out, his shouts climbing the tower that they ascend, the three sets of footsteps that ring throughout the concrete box they scale only continuing to provide a backdrop for the final retreat the already-bitten thorn in their side makes. Climbing to the highest point, Randal dips through the only door made available to him and scurries down wherever it leads, those that shadow him not trailing too far behind. Their energy depleting, the young couple take advantage of their youth and complete their journey to the top of the once-luxurious tower that now appears to meet its fiery final moments. Taking the lead, Lou throws open the door as the rain begins to fall once more, the brief reprieve from stormy conditions having been nice whilst it lasted, though fading at a rather fitting time. Gasping for his breath as his back faces the young adults that emerge to find him, Randal lets his head fall as he realises that there’s no going back, his feet standing at the edge of the rooftop that affords him no further sanctuary to run for. Seeing that the man they chase so relentlessly has exhausted every last inch of room to run, Lou brings his run to a halt as Marta follows suit, the man’s hand pressing into her chest to keep her from stepping too far out from his shadow. Catching his breath, Lou glances out at the sky as it turns progressively darker before casually stepping forward, slowly decreasing the distance between himself and the man he intends to kill. “Jules is gonna be pissed when he finds out we found the roof” he quips, spinning the rebar staff within his fingers as Randal turns back to him, the bite wound inflicted upon his forearm continuing to bleed as he accepts his fate. “The Baby Problem” Randal remarks, looking Lou in the eyes as the younger man suddenly squints at him, his head leaning to the side as his target falls silent. “What?” the man replies, momentarily halted from living up to his moniker of the silver slayer as he calls the seemingly out of place statement into question. “The Trolley Problem. You asked me about the Trolley Problem before you lured us into your trap back on the island” Randal replies, speaking to the silently inquisitive man he entertains the presence of now that his back is against the wall, “I’m gonna assume you know about The Baby Problem?” Confused, the young man remains silent- a reaction that speaks volume to the newly-infected enclave leader, who soon realises the opposite to be true. “You, your baby, and the whole town are running away from a group of bad people intent on killing all of you. When you get somewhere safe, you realise the baby is going to cough” Randal explains, figuring he might as well offer some wisdom as he prepares to depart the world, “you can choose to let it cough and get you killed- or kill the baby.” “And you’re the baby in this scenario?” Marta asks from the back of the group, sharing the same squinted expression as her mentor, watching the shrug that the enclave’s leader responds to her with. “You saw me get bit back there. You knew I was dead but you came after me anyway” Randal replies, “I wasn’t suggesting it applied here, but I find it intriguing that you made that call. I just figured you’d want to hear it since you seem so fascinated by ethical dilemmas.” Nodding to himself, Lou licks his lips as he lowers his chin, stepping forward with malicious intent that the enclave’s leader can recognise. With a smile, Randal glances back at Marta and winks before turning to look at her mentor, watching him step closer and refusing to talk him out of following through with his action. Watching the rebar’s holder continue to gain ground, Randal allows him every fleeting moment to think he’s going to put an end to his solution before refusing him the pleasure of it, taking one step back at the very last moment to walk himself over the edge, vanishing below the gravel-topped surface as a very distant splattering sound hits the pavement below. With a frown, Lou looks on with disappointment as the tip of his staff falls into the uneven, rocky ground he watches from, eyes following the man every last moment of the way before closing tightly upon impact. Watching on from afar, Marta winces at the thud she knows their target to be the source of before waiting a few extra seconds, watching her mentor step away from the ledge and return to her side, his arm wrapping around her in silence as they begin the journey back to their people. == RISE and REVOLT == As the sun begins to rise on a new day and the sight of the mainland quickly approaches, a mostly-silent night finds itself coming to a conclusion aboard the group, who’ve finally found themselves bidding a final farewell to Vancouver Island. Sat in the seat at the very back of the cruiser, Lou holds his head toward the ground as Terry, Marta, Adrian, Sebastian and Sonya watch on, the rest of the mixed-matched group having sought out the onboard cabin for reprieve from the uncomfortable hush.
“Am I gonna make it, doc?” Sebastian jokes in a low voice to the woman beside him, her fingers dropping the blood-soaked bandage she replaces into a bin off to the side. “I think you’ll fare well enough” Sonya replies, passing the man an awkward smile as she pats his shoulder, carrying the bin of discarded materials used to treat his wound to the vessel’s inner sanctum, taking down the total of rain-soaked passengers exposed to the elements by one. The confines she enters not faring too well against the uneasy quietude beyond their descending steps, Sonya passes her father as he sits on a chair unoccupied by the rest of the group- which watch on from their respective corners. “You shouldn’t have pulled the trigger” Rudy quips aloud as his daughter passes, earning a sigh the instant his voice cuts through the feeble mute. “I know, dad-” Sonya replies, continuing to stroll through the quaint-enough cabin that Jules, Elsie, Josie, Courtney, her father and now herself occupy, “-you’ve already told me.” Sat across the room from his now paramotor-less first born, Rudy refuses to change his tune from the one he’d carried with him as he boarded. “I just figured you ought to hear it again” the man replies, brushing off the woman’s visible discontent with the context of his statement. “You know what, dad?” Sonya asks after a few further steps, licking her lips as she turns the bucket over, emptying its dirty contents into a garbage pale beside a tiny side table, “fuck you.” His frown only intensifying, Rudy tilts his head to the side as he nods, reacting to the quip in the only way he feels most appropriate in the moment. “Yeah, fuck you” Sonya adds, not presenting anything new, but acting the way that comes most naturally to her in the moment, “fuck you, fuck you, fuck you.” “Are you done?” Rudy calmly rebukes, his hand pressing against the base of his chin as his daughter quickly argues otherwise. “No, dad- I’m not. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you” Sonya continues, watching the man nod again as he looks off to the floor beside him, “fuck you to the highest of hells, you stupid fucking asshole.” All with a calm voice that slowly raises in harshness the longer she goes on, Sonya watches her father press his back against the chair he’s spent the last few hours seated upon, unable to rid herself of the anger that continues to simmer within her long-suppressed core. “I’m so fucking tired of hearing you complain about everything. If it’s not me, it’s Courtney. If it’s not, it’s Lou. If it’s not him, it’s the fucking weather or something” she continues on, “I’m just tired of hearing it.” “The weather doesn’t fire a bullet at the crazy guy holding your sister at gunpoint” Rudy calmly tacks on as the rest of the room sits around watching the conversation unfold. “You’re right, I did. And you know what happened?” Sonya retorts, turning her sights to the end of the room that her sister occupies, her arms crossed and head down as the pair continue to exchange potshots at each other, “she lived. People may have died, but she lived. We all lived as a matter of fact.” “And it could have turned out very differently” Rudy remarks with the same unencumbered tone he’d carried throughout the discourse’s duration. “But it didn’t, and if I hadn’t taken that shot- who knows where we’d be right now” Sonya retaliates, continuing to speak in spite of Jules stepping off the couch he’d shared with Elsie and Josie in favour of taking his chances with the mood outside, “I made a choice. And to be honest, I’m happy to be at the point where I have the balls to.” “Well, I’m happy for you sweetie” Rudy sarcastically replies, returning his hand to the place below his chin as the woman continues to berate him, accepting it as it plays out. “Thanks, pop. I wish I could thank you for it, but I can’t. I can’t because it’s in spite of you instead” Sonya proceeds, walking past the man in favour of following Jules’ lead to the deck, “I’ve spent too goddamn long letting you hold me back. For fuck’s sake, it’s time I grew up and followed the others’ lead.” “And what lead is that?” Rudy calls back to question honestly, interested in hearing what the answer would happen to be. “That it’s time to get fucking used to how shit works now” the woman replies, seemingly deciding that the day she’d spoken of had presented itself, calling upon her to adapt to the surroundings her peers have slowly become accustomed to, “the world sucks, we’re all gonna die. It’s time to live while I can and learn to give a shit.” Moving to the corner of his mouth, Rudy’s puckered lips remain shut as his youngest daughter walks off to follow through with moving to the floor above. Letting out a sigh as he glances back to his eldest child, her unenthused posture and distanced demeanour the only thing presented to him. “You sound like you’re having a fun time down there” Sebastian quips as his tending caretaker ascends the steps he sits beside, her hand taking the bottle of vodka he gingerly sips on. “Bite me, bullet boy” Sonya retorts, thumping the man’s wound with her index finger with just enough impact to force a subtle wince over him. Formed in the corner of his mouth, Terry smirks as a gentle chuckle comes over him, his eyes glancing back toward the waves they leave behind as the woman sits. “And she said nothing?” Lou suddenly wonders aloud, prompting the man- amidst a rare moment of calm- that looks toward the seas to turn his eyes for him. “She didn’t ask about where you’d go after the hotel, she didn’t-” he continues, the subject of this line of questioning more than obvious to the boat’s entire collection of passengers, “-I don’t know. She just- left?” Nodding in silence at first, Terry rests one arm against the boat’s edge as the water reclaims his eyes. “Like I said, there weren’t many things we’d talked about farther out than a couple hours” Jules responds on his friend’s behalf, “we didn’t talk about the future. We never needed to ‘cause all we knew to do was wait for Jenn and Halston to meet up with us.” “And, while the thought had crossed our minds plenty of times, it’s not like any of us had firmly written you off as dead, either” Terry doubles down, unable to do more than shrug as the evidence-deprived mystery the woman’s disappearance shrouds itself in, “if there was anyone that thought the opposite most, it was Ally.” Pulling his head back as he works out the knots in his neck, Lou follows the pattern of rainclouds that continue to persist nearly two weeks after first forming overhead. “I guess it just doesn’t make sense to me” the man confesses, eventually sliding further into his seat to better lean against the edge that acts as his backrest. “Would I think she’d sneak off when no one was looking if it was something she truly thought was necessary? Yes” Lou continues, though he speaks to the present members of his group, the words he utters mostly seem to be intended for himself, “would I think she’d do it without leaving a note? Not really.” As half an hour passes, the sun begins to shine as bright as the group can expect it to manage behind the cover of the same plague-like clouds that take shape overhead. “Take my hand” Lou remarks, extending his palm to Marta as she struggles to disembark the boat amidst the choppy waters. “No, it’s okay- I don’t want to pull you in” the woman politely refuses, gently waving his offer aside as she tries to balance herself out. “I’m down half an arm, I’m not coordinately-challenged” Lou retorts, extending his hand for a second time with the best smile he can muster in lieu of the trivial happenings that loom over their first collective contact with the mainland. Looking at him with a blank face, the continued-extension he insists on providing brings a warm smile over Marta’s face, her hand taking that of her mentors as an especially-frigid gust of wind blows her head back. “The hotel’s about four blocks out, so what are we thinking here?” Jules calls out from the front of the mish-mash group, prepared to lead the charge to street level and embrace the undead that walk amongst them. “I don’t suppose anyone picked up Corinne in the middle of the night?” Sebastian wonders with a humoured tone in his reflexion, only to be met with the entire combined group looking back at him in confusion. “The meteorologist? The one from the camp?” Sebastian reiterates, casually looking throughout the group before realising not a single visage had shifted, “am I really the only one that cared to introduce myself back there?” Laying a firm slap to the man’s rear end, Courtney fastens the strap to a knapsack she’d picked out of a bucket below deck. “You’re the only one of us polite enough to, yeah” the woman replies, shrugging her shoulders as she wanders closer toward the front. “Well we can’t start camouflaging ourselves if the rain’s gonna pick up” Jules responds, keeping his voice contained enough so as not to draw attention from the level above, “if we take that option, it’ll be risky.” Slipping the switchblade out of her pocket, Marta follows Lou as he follows Courtney’s lead upon the head of the pack. “It’s been pretty cold out, so they shouldn’t be too fast to handle” the man remarks, slipping past Adrian and Sebastian before nearing Terry, “we should be good.” “What about the runners?” Marta asks from beside him, her question drawing his eyes toward her with a confused gleam. “Runners? Like people runners?” Lou replies, unsure of what she’s referring to, “are there other people out here?” Pulling her head back before letting a chuckle leave her lips, the rest of the group as confused as Lou in at the reason behind her humoured reaction. “What’s so funny?” the man inquires, looking back to the rest without certainty of whether there’s a joke he’s missing the punchline to, looking back to the girl as her amused reaction settles into one of genuine surprise. “You- wait, you don’t know about runners?” Marta asks back as she pulls back in shock, her laughter only intensifying as she recognises the authentic puzzlement he returns to her, “holy shit, I know something about the dead that you don’t!?” “What is she talking about?” Sebastian suddenly speaks up to ask, gently brushing the nub of Lou’s shortened arm as if he were able to provide context. Capable enough of handling business, Lou finds himself at the lead of the group as they walk out in the open, taking out the sluggish corpses that close in on them as he confidently strolls along. “How the hell am I supposed to know what I’m looking for if they’re not knocking on a door or talking?” the man calls back, nonchalantly passing corpses that stand no chance of grazing him, let alone tearing into him, his deadly staff prepared for the battles that await him. “‘Cause they’ll look like a fresh corpse” Jules shouts back, putting down another straggling corpse as the group calmly marches on, “and if you can’t figure it out by looking at them, you’ll figure it out when they start running at you.” Rolling his eyes as he shrugs his shoulders, Lou casually swipes his rebar weapon over the head of an undead pair, the second not straying too far from the first. “How you go four blocks without running into one of those things is beyond me” Marta murmurs, following Lou through the lobby of the hotel they now enter, “I couldn’t make it half a block before one of them caught onto me.” Unimpressed at the display the undead portrayed for him, the man and his rebar staff take a seat on one of the display seats left abandoned when the leisurely centre closed its doors to the outside world. “We’ve all got plenty of time for that to change” Rudy quips beneath his breath, relinquishing the rifle that wields fewer bullets than he’d like it to as his feet carry him to the nearest staircase. “There’s a gym, but most of the machines don’t work. There’s a jacuzzi but there’s no heat or jets, so it’s just a tiny pool. Speaking of which, there’s a pool table in the club- I’ll smoke you all if you dare challenge me” Jules sarcastically remarks, “welcome to fucking paradise, you pricks.” “Thanks, I feel so welcomed” Jenn responds acerbically, carrying her rifle in tow as she follows Rudy to the closest staircase, hoping for it to lead her to something worth writing home about. “Can I get to the roof from here?” Sonya calls out to anyone willing to answer, the best reply anyone can muster coming from the back of the lobby. “Most of the rooms have a patio, but I haven’t found a way onto the roof yet” Elsie replies, ripping a grape from its vine, “let us know if you do though.” “Would it really be important?” Adrian replies as the youngest Golden child follows the suit of her father and Jenn in searching for the building’s highest summit, “I thought you were only here waiting for the girls?” Stepping around the bar counter and reaching for the first bottle of liquor that his eyes stumble upon, Terry answers the question as the quest becomes one looking for clean glasses. “We were, but like I said- we never really talked about the future” the de-facto bartender explains, pulling one glass from below the oakwood finished table top in search for more, “this place hasn’t been too bad to us. It’ll do for now.” Casually strolling to the countertop before pausing, Adrian presses his hands into each side of his hip as he looks to the man preparing to serve him through squinted eyelids. “You’re American- aren’t you supposed to be three years away from this sort of thing?” Adrian inquisitively wonders aloud, immediately prompting an amused chuckle from the server, the witty hotel-introducer, and the rebar staff-wielding slayer. “He clearly wasn’t listening when I told the story of what we were doing when everything went to shit” Lou says between laughter as he takes a seat on one of the empty stools. “They were all getting shit-faced in the music room if I remember correctly” Marta proclaims as she takes the empty stool beside her mentor, earning an enthusiastic nod from the amused gentleman. “It was the most glorious way to ring in the end of times and you’ll never convince me otherwise” Lou replies, the bottle of aged scotch that Terry holds slightly emptied into the only cup he’s so far come across, which he wastes no time in sliding to his one-armed acquaintance. “Hey, Lou. Can I ask you a question?” Jules inquires, returning to the group with a pool cue in hand, joining Terry’s side before reaching to a cabinet and pulling its door open, revealing a stack of clean glasses waiting to be uncovered. “Of all the things you could use- a hammer, or a knife, or a gun, or whatever-” the man begins, gently guiding a stack of glasses to the counter for his poorly-inexperienced friend to fill with heart-warming booze, “-why is your go-to weapon a stick of metal?” Having to pause the lifting of his glass to his lips, Lou’s head hangs as he finds himself too humoured to not break out into a chorus of laughter. “Yeah, as a matter of fact, that’s a good question” Sebastian points out, joining the rest of the group in enjoying each other’s company for the very first time, sharing the laughter that fills the room with jubilation, “what the fuck is wrong with your taste in self-defence, dude? It’s literally just a thin bo staff.” “Leave my thin bo staff alone you filthy animals” Lou jokingly commands, animatedly slamming his fist against the counter as the rest of his peers join in chuckling. “Thanks” Adrian remarks in Terry’s direction, the next to be served a glass before Sebastian receives the next one. “Don’t thank me yet” the bartender- whose skills would likely have him thrown out the backdoor if he were applying for the position in the old world- warns as he fills yet another glass. “And why is-?” Adrian wonders back, unable to finish his question before Terry looks him in the eyes, placing his hand against one side of the glass before shoving it onward, letting it glide past the rest of his peers and right into Marta’s hands. “Oh, you motherfucker” the girl’s father remarks with a smirk, pointing his finger at the man before falling silent as his daughter puts down every last drop without a second thought, his face turning to one of amused shock. “Thanks” mocks, tipping her non-existent hat in Terry’s direction as she stares a hole through her father, who looks at her with a comedic look of shock as the rest of the group loses themselves in the hardest fit of laughter they’ve experienced all year. “What the hell?” Adrian giggles as a smile spreads across his face, the trust he’s found in his daughter over the past number of weeks proving to earn a different reaction than it would have when the dead first rose. Sharing the feigned exasperation with the gut-busted survivors that take glee in the suspense of his belief, Adrian shakes his head as he takes a respectable sip of the liquor he wishes to savour instead of guzzling down. “Dude, if Vinny and Fink knew we’d make it far enough to commandeer a bar- in Canada of all places- they would have been so proud” Terry proclaims, lifting a half-filled glass that Lou and Jules clink together with their own, “following in mom and dad’s footsteps- that we are!” “Here here!” the duo cheers, clattering their cups together as the sun rises over the city that feels a little more complete now than it ever has to anyone calling the abandoned inn home for the moment. Making it back to the lobby just in time to share in the conversation, Courtney, Elsie and Josie join the rank of the survivors just looking to make the best use of the time they share together, coming together as one group in spite of the world they call home. = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = Stepping out onto the patio overlooking the English Bay, Courtney finds her sister’s figure with arms crossed beside the fully-transparent railing her hip leans against. “I see you settled for something a little less top-level” the older sister remarks, peering out at the grey skies that loom over the oddly-pleasant tower they call sanctuary. “I needed some air” Sonya replies, briefly looking at her sister as the woman joins her on the terrace, “I wasn’t looking for a scavenger hunt.” Nodding to herself as her sibling turns back to face the world that lays beyond one ledge barely over half the woman’s height, Courtney presses her elbows against the bannister the younger woman seems to trust enough to support her weight. “So you know that witty guy, Jules?” the self-piloting wanderer remarks, forced to tuck her hair behind her ear as the wind picks up, “apparently he’s pretty good at memorising showtunes. I wish he was as good at singing them, but what do I know?” Trying to subdue a small smirk that lingers through her lips, Sonya nods as she fixes the hair that flows freely in the same breeze that seems to torment her sister. “You wanna come down? Terry’s not that good at knowing how to keep a customer coming around, so you’re guaranteed to get more than enough of an overpour to carry you through the day” Courtney jokes, finally mustering enough good will to pull a full smile and a breathy chuckle out of the hard-to-please lady. “Maybe in a little bit” Sonya replies, letting go of a deep sigh that she pulls in as her sights fall back upon the waterfront, its coastline frozen whilst its long, thin centre flows freely. “What’s on your mind?” Courtney wonders aloud to the woman she knows to have something stowed away on, “I’ve seen that look before and the answer’s never ‘nothing’.” The humoured expression having subsided, Sonya’s eyes fall whilst the rest of her head remains taken by the bay’s freeflow. “Come on, sis. Whatever it is, you know you can talk to me about it” Courtney remarks, her expression falling momentarily as the woman beside her remains silent, her reluctant posture unchanged, “you know that, right? You know you can talk to me.” Looking back up, Sonya replies as hoped, quickly waving off that any such truth would be inaccurate. “Wh-? Of- of course I know that. No, I know, it’s just-” the woman begins to remark, stopping herself as she takes her eyes back to the waterfront that captivates her so greatly, extending a sigh as she clears her mind of all strife in an effort to speak freely, “-my mind’s just in a really weird place right now. I can’t figure it out- if it’s even an it to begin with.” “What do you mean?” Courtney replies as she backs away from the see-through balustrade, matching the crossed-arm lean as she presses into the glass. “I don’t really know, honestly. I just came out here to try and get a little bit of time to myself and it just sort of descended into this really weird self-reflection” Sonya confesses, shaking her head as her sister tries all she can to best provide. “That’s alright, I can leave if you want-” Courtney explains, apologetically backing away from the railing as Sonya laughs off her gesture. “No, you’re fine. It’s got nothing to do with you, I just- urgh!” the younger sibling groans, unfolding her arms as her hands press against each side of her face, closing herself off from the world for just a few seconds to clear her head. “It’s stupid, but after I spent a few minutes up here- I couldn’t stop looking at that fucking river” Sonya finally proclaims, admitting the sight responsible for stealing her mind the instant her face frees itself from the warmth of her palms. Confused, Courtney furrows her eyebrows and glances in the direction her back is turned toward, finding the bay that grips her baby sister without much clue as to its importance. “I know it’s not what we crossed, but it reminds me of the strait between here and home” Sonya admits, finally re-earning her sister’s attention as the woman remains silent, letting her sibling explain without her words having to be forced to share the air. “I keep thinking about the talk we had in the cabin a while back. I told you I wasn’t ready and it’s just really getting on my nerves” the woman remarks, watching her sister’s face sink as the difficult topic lays itself out in the open. “I was so fucking stupid to keep thinking I could kick the can down the road. I don’t even know why I kept fighting it, but it pisses me off when I think back to it now that I’m out here. It’s the same world I was so ‘not ready’ for” Sonya explains, looking down in self-pity, “it’s fucking stupid.” Shaking her head the moment such a declaration leaves her sister’s lips, Courtney refutes the statement without a second thought, arguing against it the moment the air silences. “No, it’s not. It’s not stupid and neither are you” the older sibling responds, taking a step forward to get closer to the woman clearly caught up in performing mental gymnastics with herself. “Listen, no one’s ready for any of this. No one goes straight from lounging back in a cabin to putting down the dead like that” Courtney explains, snapping her finger mid-pause, “even Lou- who we all kind of agree is better at this than any of us- started on a rough note.” “That doesn’t change the fact that it’s messed me up” Sonya rebuttals, looking past the woman that stands at her aid as the water recaptures her eyes, “look at Marta. We were in the same place when Lou showed up, but she got the bigger picture. Now look at us- two completely different stories.” “Yes, you are- and yours is just beginning” Courtney replies, wrapping her hands around her little sister as the woman’s face looks into her own, begrudgingly listening to the words spoken that go against the idea she’s moulded into a strangely-twisted version of the truth. “Think about everything you’re gonna do from this point on” the flightless self-pilot instructs, “think about all the life you’ve still got to live. It may have taken you some time, but you get it now.” “Yeah, but I didn’t be-” Sonya immediately begins to refute, her reply stopped before it’s offered the chance to speak itself into fruition. “Yeah, but I didn’t before- blah blah blah” Courtney mocks, mimicking the display her sister had presented to her ex-boyfriend earlier in the day by flicking her arm with the finger on her dominant hand, “everything that happened before is over. Boom- done. Finished, finito, hasta la vista, baby! It’s old news, time to make new. Now we move on.” “I don’t think it’s that simple” Sonya replies, again feeling the force behind her sister’s finger flicking her once more before rolling her eyes. “It is that simple. It’s very simple. I’m almost embarrassed at how simple it is” Courtney replies, the enthusiastic pep in her verbal step too comedic for her sister to disregard without the faintest smile, “yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away! I’m pretty sure that’s what the Beatles said, and if not- it doesn’t matter. It’s still true!” Tilting her head as her arms cross, Sonya looks to the woman with a curious face, “Court’, the very next line to that song goes- ‘now it looks as if they’re here to stay.” Her third attempt at refusal marking the birth of a third flick to her arm, the youngest sister continues to be broken down into her sibling’s friendly charm. “And then it goes ‘Oh, I believe in yesterday!” Courtney replies, struggling to not realise her choice in song proved poor, “okay, I admit- maybe not the best example.” “Look, the point is that it’s a fresh start. All of this is a fresh start. I get to start new, so do you, so does dad, so do all of us” Courtney proceeds, making her point as her hands fall from her sister’s arms, hanging by her sides as the words finish leaving her lips, “so what happens next is up to you. No one else gets to decide- only you. You can sit up here and rack your brain over stuff that doesn’t matter and hasn’t mattered in ages, or you can get up, make new, and move on.” Hesitant in nature, Sonya’s embattled eyes take to the waterfront that her sister’s words had managed to free her from the infatuation of, its sheets of ice to each side of the shoreline no longer much more than a pretty picture to snap a mental image of. “I love you, Sonya. I always have, I always will, and there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you” Courtney explains, shaking her head as it leans close to one side, “but I’m not gonna sit here and let you beat yourself up, hun.” Suddenly interrupted by the gentle and quiet set of knuckles tapping against the hotel room’s door, the sibling’s turn their attention toward the entrance their father stands at the centre of. “I hope I’m not involving myself where I don’t belong, you left the door open” Rudy apologises, watching Courtney’s face turn toward Sonya’s, whose eyes remain placed upon the man she’d been tied at the hip to since before following their adventurous family member to Sebastian’s cabin. | “What about a beach house somewhere?” Jules asks aloud, sat at a table in an empty concert hall with every survivor minus the Golden family, Josie and their metal stick wielding guardian angel. “As incredibly tempting as that is, it might be the last place we should set our sights on” Jenn replies, lighting a fifth candle to stage at the centre of the circular table top that sits amidst the otherwise dark entertainment room. “Yeah, the hurricanes and lack of places to make a farm don’t seem very ideal” Elsie replies, gently swaying the handle to her upside-down tomahawk from one side to the other. “By that logic, the best place to settle down would be Kansas” Terry replies, immediately prompting the woman to look up at him with a curious glimmer in her eye. “What’s wrong with Kansas?” Elsie rebukes, taking one hand away from her weapon’s grip to lift one finger for every advantage it offers, “good place for farming, open space people won’t usually be, no snow, plenty of lakefront property if we so choose.” With one finger raised, the subject to her line of questioning presents her with the fatal flaw, “here’s what’s wrong with Kansas-” Terry replies, pausing to take a sip from his glass before following up, “I don’t wanna live in Kansas.” “I agree with Terry- fuck Kansas” Josie exclaims, marching in through the building’s rear-entrance with a wrench in hand, the rag that’s draped over her shoulder stained with grease, “who the hell wants to follow the red brick road down tornado alley? Bippity-boppity no thank you.” Rolling her eyes as the good times roll on, Elsie throws her hand in Josie’s direction as the momentary laughter begins to fade, taking a backseat to the genuine intrigue her messy appearance induces. “What’s new, Bob the Builder?” Terry calls out, taking another swig of transparent liquor- the kind of which he doesn’t know or care to know- is pulled down from his cup. Without a word, Josie reaches into her pocket and digs out a pair of car keys, tossing them a few centimetres away from the set of open flames. “The engine’s running, the oil’s clean and the brakes seem to be alright” the woman replies, her words bringing an invested look upon the faces of her newest friends whilst the overwhelming joy come over the trio she’d spent most of the last few weeks with in waves. “You got the thing to run!?” Jules shouts with opened eyes, leaping out of his seat to patiently wait for the self-pleased nod the woman answers him with. “Josie, you are a fucking god!” the man bursts out as he lunges forward, pulling the woman into a tight hug as Terry picks up the keys to inspect them, no real reason for doing so aside from it feeling natural enough to do. “Wait, you guys have a car?” Marta wonders aloud to the only people she’d expect affirmation from, the reply given to her from the man seated across the table only furthering her excitement. “Not a car- a truck” Terry replies, setting the keys back down before taking another sip of his drink, the smile that appears in the corner of his mouth joining his face in following Jules’ hand, the man taking his turn to inspect the keys- again with little reason to do so. “Can it hold all of us?” Sebastian asks the same man responsible for the answer to Marta’s question, only to receive it from the lady responsible herself. “It’s got room for five people inside the cabin and another five- maybe six- in the truck bed” Josie responds, saying more than enough to assure the group that not a soul would be disallowed from climbing aboard, “as long as it’s not Kansas- that thing will get us wherever we need to go.” “Let Lou decide” Adrian suddenly responds, sat at the de-facto head of the table as he’s left the most arm room of anyone that shares it with him, “I mean we’ll argue amongst ourselves until a few people just cave and give into whatever the majority agrees to. But if there’s anyone I’m pretty sure we can trust with making a fair call- it’d be him.” “Listen, I still don’t know the guy as well as the rest of you, but if that’s what the rest of you are cool with- so am I” Josie replies, her only destination not preferred voiced beyond any misconception. “Someone go find him and stick a pin in it then” Terry replies, finishing the last of his drink before pushing his chair out in search of a refill, “the sooner we get this thing squared away, the sooner we can work out the kinks to what happens next.” “I’ll go” Marta replies, more than willing to do so as her lead is followed by her own group’s leader. “I’ll go with you” Sebastian replies, joining her in standing from her seat as he grabs the coat he’d rummaged out of the hotel room closet he’d picked out for himself, “I’ve gotta go look for Courtney anyway, so I met as well check in on him while I’m at it.” “Listen, as long as you keep her from downing half a bottle of tequila along the way, fine by me” Adrian jokes, his glass held in the hand that joins his arm in resting against the table, the other draped over the back of his chair. “That’s fine, I prefer vodka anyway” Marta replies, again prompting the group to point and laugh at the father’s expense, his rolled eyes and shrugging grin making its peace with being the source of the group’s mockery. “I thought this was the room you said, 52-A” Sebastian replies, pointing to the accurately-carved designation beside an open door with an untouched room beyond it. “It is. At least, that’s the one he told me he was staying in” Marta responds, leaning past the man to take a look at what lies within for herself, no sign of the man’s trace to be found. “Alright then, maybe he found a different room- one he liked better” Sebastian suggests, the implication bringing an inquisitorial look over the girl’s face that his following proposal only strengthens, “or maybe he settled into Terry and Jules’ room while they’re out getting hammered.” Slowly leaning back, Marta looks up at the man with a semi-convinced look in her eye, one hand tucked past the faux-leather jacket she now adds to her belongings. “Do you remember where their rooms were?” the woman inquires, following the direction of Sebastian’s finger toward the halfway point of the corridor. “They said they were at the end of the hall from what I remember” the man replies, giving Marta all the assurance she needs to pass through the abundance of open doors- one of which she peers through to find Sonya and Courtney talking amongst themselves on the distant patio- with only one thought in mind. Finally reaching her intended area, Marta peers through a few doorways before stumbling upon exactly what she’d expected to, Sebastian nodding to himself as he finds Lou sat on his own at the foot of a barely-touched bed, impressed with the woman’s investigative skills. “I’m gonna take it this was Ally’s room?” the woman inquires, her voice prompting the man to look up at her expected appearance, one that he welcomes kindly. “I figured you’d find me here eventually” Lou confesses, his rebar staff propped against the wall beside the front door, not having made it as far into the bedroom as he had, “it’s not because I wanted you to or anything, I just knew I probably wouldn’t leave this place before you came looking.” “Mhm, that’s why” Marta responds, the first to step into the room and join the same mentor she’s grown close enough to jokingly mock, “it’s not ‘cause we’re totally B.F.F’s now and read each other’s minds or anything.” Rolling his eyes as he shakes his head, Lou slides over a slight bit to free a space beside him the woman takes without hesitation, Sebastian remaining a fair distance away as he leans against the entertainment console at the front of the room. “I know it’s foolish, and maybe it’s misplaced because I went so long looking for friends I started losing the hope of ever finding, but-” Lou begins, the woman that sits beside him already aware of what he’s going to say, bracing herself for it to be spoken aloud, “-I have to find her.” Her eyes pressing shut, Marta bobs her head the moment his thought concludes, nodding to herself with her head hung for a moment before lifting it, her eyelids parting as she looks to him. “I’m gonna give you two a little space” Sebastian interjects, not wanting another word to be shared that he truly feels doesn't belong for his ears to hear, politely bowing out of the conversation that he reserves no right to be a part of. “I’m sorry, I know we just got here and started settling in, but-” Lou explains, trying to clear the air that feels more tense than it truly is the moment their friend departs for other company, kept from doing so by his impressive protege. “No, Lou, it’s okay. I’m-” Marta remarks, shaking her head vehemently as she hides an uncomfortable smile, the conflicting emotions that come over her proving to be difficult to contest with. “You’ve been nothing but the best to me ever since we met- aside from the brief spell where you wanted nothing to do with me, obviously” the woman remarks, quickly turning the tide to her original point, “if your heart belongs to her, that’s totally fine. I get it, and I get why you wanna go after her.” “But it’s not fair to you” Lou replies, looking away from her face as he speaks before being cut off again, his point not refuted this time around however. “No, it’s not. It’s not, and I won’t pretend like it is ‘cause I’d be lying and I think we can give each other more than that” Marta agrees, staring off into the depths of the room as the man’s eyes now take toward her, “but what’s fair to me isn’t the point here. Maybe- in a different world- I took your heart before she did, but-” Stopping mid-sentence, Marta’s eyes begin to grow watery, this reaction not one she feels needs to be spared from the man beside her, a breathy huff escaping her lungs as she shakes her head. “But we don’t live in a different world” the woman sighs depressingly, frowning as the man’s heart weighs heavy with the weight of her disappointment- one he knows himself to be the cause of, “we live in this world. In this world- Ally has your heart... I don’t.” Pulling a deep breath into his lungs, Lou opens his mouth to speak before seemingly freezing, the air he’d trapped within him kept held down as the words he wishes to use evade him. In one full thrust, every ounce of oxygen he’d pulled in waves forward without the words they were intended to carry, the silence he meets the girl- who leaves him honestly speechless- with only allows her to continue speaking. “Sometimes, when I’m having a hard time falling asleep, I think about what it would be like if we met before this. If we got to know each other like this before hell tore us apart- even if it’s the only reason we met each other in the first place” Marta confesses, staring off at the opposite side of the room as the salty tears begin to make their way down her rosy cheeks, “I imagine what could have been and- when I do that- I realise how much I’ve actually fallen for you.” Lou’s lips reuniting with each other just as he had with his friends against all odds, the motivation behind his search- and the effects it has on him and those he cares for by proxy- shown to him in full display. “That’s the truth honestly. It’s not some crush, or some fleeting young-love, wishy-washy thing” Marta concludes, wiping her nose with her arm as the tears truly begin to run, “it’s what you felt. That thing you know you never want to feel for anyone else ever again.” Nodding her head, Marta hyperventilates as Lou’s hand reaches out to wipe the tears from her face, her head shaking at his touch as she musters the strength to finish the point that sits at the tip of her tongue. “I have that kind of love for you-” the woman concludes, her head drifting all the way to her left shoulder as her voice falls faint, the smile she wears one that she depends on to ease the deep pain that her heart breaks through, “-and you have that kind of love for Ally.” Deeply wounded at his core, Lou’s face turns to various different expressions of guilt and sorrow for what he’s done before the woman’s best efforts to regain her composure manage to prevail. “I know you never meant to do this. You never meant to lead me on or depend on you or- or any of it” Marta explains, clearing her throat as she wipes the tears that still linger on the cusp of her eyelid, “so I want you to know that I don’t blame you. I get what you need to do and why- I get it completely.” His own wrought with regret and remorse, Lou stares into Marta’s eyes as his head sheepishly rocks from side to side. “Marta, I know how bad I’ve hurt you” the man explains, kept from talking further as the woman shakes her head vigorously, refusing to let his line of speech present itself. “No, I don’t want you to think about that. I don’t want you to look at me like that ‘cause you’d never be able to look at me any other way- ever” Marta replies, refusing the man the chance to slowly tear away what they’d built simply because of the feeling she’d fallen into, “I love what we have. I love the banter, and the friendliness, and the care- all of it. I need it ‘cause it’s the one thing that I’ve lived for since we met. I can’t not love you, but I can’t lose you as a friend.” Again forced to grunt as she clears her throat, Marta steps away from the bedside and turns her front toward Lou, the distance between them created as she makes her best attempt to clean the slate. “Part of that is being there. To be here and support what you want regardless of how it makes me feel” she explains, continuing to speak to the man that refuses to step out of line in her speech, “I know why you have to go after her because it’s why I had to go after you. I know. I know.” Standing up to join the woman, Lou slowly approaches her as he desperately searches for what to say, beating his own head as if it were a drum just to prevent himself from saying anything that could hurt her anymore than he already has. “I only came here to see if I could find a note. Maybe just find a piece of paper stuffed somewhere the others didn’t check” the man explains, trying his best to speak freely despite his mind’s eagerness to remind himself of what he’s caused. “It doesn’t make sense why she’d leave without a note, so I came here looking for one, but-” Lou continues, finding himself coming to a stop before actually finishing his thought, looking into the woman’s eyes as his expression starts to shift, adjusting into something that completely goes against the apologetic front it’d worn to that point, “-but I know I’ll never actually find her.” Smiling without showing her teeth, Marta refuses the man’s conclusion with a nod, another tear rolling down the side of her face before she speaks. “Yes you will” the woman replies, her soft tone catching Lou’s ears the way they have for as long as he can remember hearing them, “you will because you know her. You will because you’re gonna find that note they missed and you’re gonna go after her- we all are.” Confused, Lou shakes his head as it slightly pulls away, “there’s no note. I’ve looked anywhere I could think of and there’s no note” the man refutes, smiling off the woman’s kind words as just that- reassuring statements. “You know her better than anyone else. Everyone else seems to think it, and somewhere deep down inside of you- I think you know that” Marta replies, retreating slowly to leave him space, “if you think she wouldn’t leave without a note- she wouldn’t leave without a note.” Squinting, Lou struggles to ask the question that he wishes to ask, an uncertain feeling coming over him that forces him to stay silent- his mouth open without a voice to use. Again freezing as he had before, the man’s eyes widen slightly as the rest of his body eases up, the two halves of his mouth slowly drawing closer to each other as those same words he’d fought to find completely disappear. Almost as if gifted the key to all his problems, Lou turns toward the same piece of furniture he’d aimlessly taken a seat at the end of, the sudden thought that dawns on him watched on by the woman who simply smiles at the simple hope she knows floods through him within an instant. Walking to the head of the bed, the man reaches past the woman’s clearly-used pillow- the brief imprint of her head still presented in its sunken cushion- and to the unused one that sits beside it. With a gentle tug, Lou holds it by the pillowcase’s end and peers inside, overcome by shock as he reaches in to retrieve a folded piece of paper with the first letter of his name written at the very top. “So, BFF-” Marta murmurs, tucking her hands into the pockets of her jacket as she slowly approaches his side, looking over his shoulder as he unravels the paper, “-where are we all heading?” Opening the page to reveal a short, three-sentence body of text purposefully intended for him- and him alone- to find. As Marta looks over his shoulder and reads the note for herself, her face takes a slow turn from pleased for his revelation to surprised at words her eyes read whilst moving from one end of the page, looking back to the man’s face upon her completion, where he waits for her eyes to meet his before answering her question in one word. “East.” == RISE and REVOLT == Frigid water kicked up as he leaps off the speedboat he’d commandeered, Lou dashes back to the coastline with his rebar staff in tow, following the lead of the armed reinforcements he hopes to blend in with as the camp draws closer with each passing step. The gunshot that triggered his pursuit followed quickly by a flurry of additional rounds, the only noise- aside from distant shouts and terrified screams- the man hears as he hurries through the weather-beaten path are the sounds of war.
Matching the same stride as the men that race ahead of him, the handicapped survivor, branded with the moniker of the ‘Silver Slayer’, prepares himself to reprise the role as the apparent battlegrounds continue to grow closer. Still a fair distance away from his destination, Lou’s only chance to see for certain what awaits him at the end of his journey appears in the form of a fireball, its flames reaching high into the skies and serving to light the way- even if only for a moment. A gust of wind made through the quick, repeated exhales he allows to leave his lungs in favour of a clean breath of air, the man rushing in to aid his friends in battle watches as the flames steady, shooting out from within the gaps in the trees he momentarily gets to peer through. Beginning to make up ground on the forces he follows after, Lou takes his moment to strike whenever it arrives- swinging the pointed staff across the skulls of those yet to even take account of his presence. Picking off the opposition as if they were birds to his metaphorical stone-filled hand, those that wish to join in doing his friends harm find their fates sealed- eating the ground one-by-one as their slayer carries on. Nearing the soft turn, Lou watches a rag- the majority of it stuffed into a bottle of rum- catch fire from the lighter an unfamiliar foe holds at its end, joining the container in flying from his hand at the scrambling survivors- all in a mad dash to defend what’s theirs. Finally amidst the home stretch, Lou thrusts his staff upon the skull of one, final adversary before coming to a complete stop, staring out at all corners of the open field with his weapon readied. Shattering upon impact, the makeshift molotov thrust from the possession of one of the enclave’s many nameless figures lights another patch of the campground alight, setting a blaze that lifts to the sky just as the first had. In all directions, men with guns fire into the distance, striking each other almost as often as they themselves are shot- the only choices to make being to either fight or flee as it seems. Acting on his instinct, Lou takes the option that stands before him, marching into the field of battle with one certain target in mind, the man setting fire to a third bottle completely clueless to what approaches him. Setting the pocket lighter down, the well-covered enclave fire-starter prepares to swing his hand back as Lou finally comes into frame- the expression on the arsonist’s face turning into sudden horror before it’s pierced with the end of the man’s staff. Without the time to let his mind linger over the act he’d just committed, the grizzly-faced survivor leaves his rebar weapon in the man’s face and retrieves his molotov, seeking out a small group of those he stands opposed to before hurling it. With screams, his enemies meet the fiery demise their acquaintance had been intending for his people, feeling the flames surround them as the glass shatters- the killer paying their demise no mind. Pressing his boot against the chest of his first killed, Lou retrieves his staff and marches with unwavering confidence, no haste in his step as he simply seeks out his next target- accepting that any step can prove to serve him a surprise end. Continuing to glance in every direction the open grounds afford him, Lou’s eyes soon take to the centre of camp- the flames that gradually light the grass on fire barely illuminating the man that struggles to pick himself up. With a spring, the puzzled survivor sprints from his stoic position and races to the man’s aid, nonchalantly ending the life of another enclave soldier that just happened to be standing in his way before tossing the rebar aside, dropping to his knees to aid the wounded. “Come on, man- get the fuck up!” Lou groans, wrapping his arm around Lee’s back as the camp’s leader lingers on all fours- unable to find the strength to stand once more. “There’s no time! You have to go!” the wounded commander’s voice shouts back, forced up to a simple knee as he leans back at his friend’s guidance, a pair of bullet wounds- one to his chest and another to his midsection- quite easy to make out amidst the heavy blood loss that stains his shirt. “I’m not leaving you behind, motherfucker! Get up!” Lou barks back, paying no mind to the chaos that is waged in his every direction- drowning it out as he attempts to help his friend upright. “Lou, I’m fucking dead!” Lee shouts back, mustering enough strength to shove the man back, losing the ability to stabilise himself as he topples back to the ground, only able to muster enough energy to get by from the adrenaline he takes in the camp’s loss. “Wherever the hell you’re going- I won’t make it there” Lee doubles down, speaking a truth that his friend can’t deny regardless of how much he wishes to, “all you can do now is go.” Gritting his teeth as he looks at the man’s grave injuries, Lou kneels in silence as he shakes his head, trying to bring himself to accept the orders that have been presented to him as he reluctantly reaches over to reclaim his staff. “Where are they?” Lou asks as he releases a heavy breath, the side of his face- and the tired look of exhaustion on his friend’s- basked within the glow of an orange tinge- not put out by the light drizzle. “Theo ignored the signal- he was gonna let the deal go down. Don’t trust him” Lee replies, watching the man’s face sour with confusion, “I know- just don’t. One of your friends must’ve fired the first shot- I don’t know who. Courtney made it out- I don’t know about the rest.” “W- w- w- w- where did they go? Which way?” Lou asks, stuttering as he begins the question before Lee attempts to respond, unable to help as his friend is taken by surprise, stripped from the moment by the same man he’d struck moments before- yet to finish the job. “Ugh!” the slayer grunts, disarmed of his staff as the force of a fist catches him in the side of the head, ringing his bell as he falls to his back- forced to look up at the blood-covered face of his assailant. Only able to make out a scowl, Lou watches the man that stands above him swing the composite boot he wears into his side, striking at his victim’s ribs multiple times over before reaching down. “You and your friends are dead!” the wounded, yet in-control enclave soldier exclaims, picking the dazed, sole-armed survivor off the ground by the collar of his shirt and leading him toward the open inferno. “You don’t get to-!” the vengeful intruder begins to proclaim, cut short by the right hook thrown at him by the man he attempts to kill- both men stumbling back to opposite sides of the field. His scowl having intensified into the look of rage and lit by the fire he stands mere metres away from, the enclave member turns to Lou in a moment of pause, watching his planned-victim prepare for the counterattack that he knows to be around the corner. “You’re gonna regret that!” the enclave soldier growls, balling his hand into a fist before taking a few steps forward, watching Lou match the same posture before suddenly turning his head to the side. “Whoa-!” the man exclaims, stopping in his tracks and turning to the side, his balled fists turning into open palms as he throws his arms forward- almost as if to protect himself from what journeys toward him off to the side. Thrown feet-first, a man hurries in at the last second and thrusts his boots into the soldier’s chest, thrusting him backward and into the belly of the fire that burns- his screams the only thing to be heard as he disappears within the blaze. His face covered in shock, Lou stares at the fire as he watches the man descend into it, unable to look away from the scene he knows the bellows of suffering to emerge from- yet to take notice of the man that quickly comes to his aid. “Holy fuck, that’s one hell of a beard!” Jules shouts at the top of his lungs, taking his friend by the hand and helping him up, the survivor still too shocked to yet process the reunion occurring. “Ju- You’re-” Lou stumbles, his lip quivering as he stares into the eyes of a man he’d once thought was never likely to be seen again, “Jules?” “Lou, duck!” Terry exclaims from the same direction his newly-reunited friend had arrived, met with the same immediate-action he had anticipated- the pair lowering their heads to allow the man to fire his weapon, putting a bullet in the head of a pursuer neither had seen coming. “Lee!” Elsie screams, following Josie as she breaks away from the gunman’s side- hurrying to her friend as he turns onto his back, looking toward the sky with glossy eyes. “Oh shit, dude- that doesn’t look good” Terry remarks, cutting the heart-warming moment short as his attention turns to the camp’s mortally-wounded shot-caller. “No, no! You have to go!” Lee murmurs, speaking through gasps as he holds onto every breath he can capture, pushing away the girls’ hands as they reach down to aid him, “it’s not safe here! You need to go!” “Then get up!” Elsie commands, her orders not only the same as the man that had given them before her- but met with the same reluctance as well. “Lou!” a soft voice calls out, catching the survivor’s attention as he slowly pulls away from Jules’ side, reaching for his staff before looking up to the soul that calls his name. “Marta” the man responds beneath his breath, pulling away from the weapon below as the young woman throws herself into his arm- which wraps around to complete the embrace. Watched on by Terry and Jules as Elsie and Josie begrudgingly wait for Lee to respond to their plea, Lou presses his chin into the small of Marta’s neck as her eyes close tightly, taking in every second of the hug she can enjoy with a smile on her face. “I was so fucking scared you would be-” the woman whispers, her remarks cut short by the man as he holds her tighter, his whisper keeping her from having to finish the thought, “-I’m okay. We’re okay.” A partial smile held in the corner of his mouth as Lee looks toward the emotional reunion before lowering his voice to a near whisper- anything more beginning to hurt worse than his wounds. “Dragging me around is only gonna waste time- you don’t have time” the man whispers to Elsie, placing his hand on the hand that she gently rests against his chest, “I won’t blame you- just go get somewhere safe.” As her lip quivers, Elsie’s eyes begin to fall as she struggles to hold back tears, one of the only men she’d spent every moment since the end of the world with now spending his dying breaths at her helpless hands. “Are you alright?” Marta whispers to the man she slowly pulls away from, looking him in the eyes as he nods his head with certainty. “Yeah, I’m fine- I’m fine.” Lou replies, looking off to the camp’s depths as fires continue to burn. “Guys, we need to go” Terry proclaims, speaking to both sides of the conversations happening at once, making it clear to all involved that the time for departure has arrived. “There’s a path through the woods that leads into Victoria- take it for a few miles and you’ll be in the city” Lee replies, his efforts with good intention- but not needed. “We’re not going to the city, we’re headed to the coast” Elsie retorts, her second hand placed upon the one Lee rests with her, holding it tight as she prepares to bid him her final adieu. “Then go back the way you came and stick to the sides of the trail, they’ll be less muddy and the light will be better” the camp’s leader responds, his breaths slowly becoming more spaced out and hard to come by- his last moments just as near as he’d assumed. “Good luck” Lee whispers to the woman knelt before him, giving her hand a gentle squeeze before sliding it away, freeing her to continue her journey without him from this moment forward. With a nod, Elsie pushes herself off the ground and wipes a tear from her eye, nodding to the man as she follows through with his request- bumping into Josie as she turns back the way she came, steadying her breaths as the rest of the group follows, paying a last look to the dying man as they regroup. Beginning to grow distant as the warring sides take their fighting toward the same coastline they all set their sights upon, the gunfire seemingly begins the process of abandoning the camp- which now slowly consumes the ground just as quickly as bodies have. With his staff in hand and arm wrapped around Marta, Lou follows Jules as Terry walks beside him, patting his friend on the shoulder as Elsie and Josie occupy the front of the convoy- still more to do before they can catch up. = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = “Ah!” Randal exclaims, his enraged scowl set aside as a bullet rips through the forest and imbeds itself within his shoulder, forcing him to spin around and put pressure on the wound. From one side of the camp, the gunfire that rings out prompts Theo to turn his head back, his aim of the rifle lowered as his eyes take to the confusing scene, surprised by the turn the confrontation takes. “Nobody-!” the man begins to demand, returning his attention to the men that he presides over before finding his orders to be futile, the man who’d held the confidence to question his call rushing to his feet before the command could even start. Cut off, Theo’s hands let the rifle fall to the ground just as he does- struck by the fist of the foremost soldier as his authority is disobeyed- the man responsible for his attack rushing the field to join his leader in combat. Betrayed by his subordinates, Theo holds his jaw as he lays on the ground, watching one pair of boots follow the next in storming past him, refusing to let their true superior fight the consequences alone. Watching the enclave momentarily duck at the sound of gunshots and realising their deal had fallen through, Lee lays his life on the line and accepts what’s about to happen, turning back to Courtney and placing his pistol in her hands. “RUN!” the man screams, spinning the woman around and shoving her forward, forcing her to take off in a sprint before eating two slugs to the back- one ripping through his chest whilst the other tears through his stomach. Immediately floored by the attack, Lee plummets to his knees and hits the ground without an ounce of movement, the two enclave guardsmen responsible for the proceeding shots joining the rest of their peers in combating the forces that now emerge from cover. Ducking behind the men that storm past him, Randal seeks cover in their dash through the grounds, watching their weapons fire at the men and women that now rise from behind the trees before making a call of his own. Now focused on little more than self-preservation, the enclave’s leader dashes into a retreat, hurrying the way he’d come to ensure that he lives to fight another day- allowing his men to sacrifice themselves for his own blood-thirsty quest for revenge to be enacted. Ducking behind the cover of an unfinished building, Courtney sprints to whichever viable plot affords itself to her, turning back when she can to fire a round into those that give her chase. “Courtney, over here!” Sonya exclaims, dashing away from cover before turning her weapon to yet another member of the enclave, pulling the trigger without a moment of hesitation before reuniting with her sister. “Who the fuck fired that!?” Courtney calls out, joining her sister in turning back the way she’d come, keeping their heads low and away from being spotted by those that wish to do them harm. “I did!” Sonya hastily replies, immediately earning the wide-eyed look that her sister gives back, their retreat to safer territory not slowing for anything- even such an admission, “I wasn’t gonna let them take you!” “Over here!” Adrian calls out to the girls, standing near the back of his group as what remains huddles together, his eye lowering to the level of the rifle he fires. “We’re still going to the coast, right!?” Jenn calls out, looking for direction from the man that follows closely behind her, his weapon guided from one side of the camp to the other in search of a threat. “Yeah, as long as-!” Sebastian begins to reply, cut short at the shot of a gunshot- one that forces the group to take cover. “Seb!” Courtney cries out, watching the group disperse to wherever the closest obstruction lays as Sebastian falls to the ground, taken out by the stray bullet that rips through him. Dashing away from the closest safety, the fabled-paramotorist rushes to the aid of the wounded survivor as the enclave member responsible takes notice of her presence, taking aim with his weapon before being put down by a bullet wound of his own- this time courtesy of Adrian. “I’m fine, I’m fine!” Sebastian exclaims, waving the nearing Golden siblings off as he reclaims the weapon that had slipped from his possession and crawls to the picnic table Jenn had set up shop behind. “Where the fuck are we supposed to go!?” Sonya calls out, bracing for impact with each gunshot that rings out closer than the rest, her slowly-evolving adaptation to this cruel world still presenting the kinks of anxiety over the type of scene that now unfolds. Whilst the chaos ensues away from his line of sight, Theo simmers on the ground of his hidden hilltop perch, rolling over to look at the warzone below with a rattled expression. Seething, the camp’s turncoat reclaims his rifle and composes himself, using his anger as a motivation to dive further into the forest, retreating from the battle as he sets his sights upon greater reward elsewhere- following the environment he understands like the back of his hand to greener pastures. “We can still follow the path, we just have to wait this out!” Courtney proclaims, emerging from cover with her gun drawn toward another stray member of the enclave, her finger prepared to pull the trigger before a sudden attack renders her target immobile. Falling to the ground, the subject of the woman’s focus collapses to display the rebar-wielding man responsible for his killing, Lou unknowingly stood a short distance from his friends as he moves onto the next victim. “L-!” Courtney begins to scream, only to fall silent as a bullet tears into the ground a few metres away from her, forcing her to duck back into cover as her father takes the initiative. With his eye to the head of his rifle, Rudy fires a shot in the direction of his daughter’s attempted assassin and narrowly misses- forcing the man to huddle close to the ground for added cover. “If we wait this out, we’ll miss our opening!” Jenn calls back, writing off such a suggestion as unfeasible, “we’ve already got one man wounded, it’ll only be a matter of time before another one bites it!’ Wincing with pain as he presses down on the bullet wound in his left bicep, Sebastian follows the woman’s warning with defence. “Jenn’s right! We went into this knowing what we wanted out of it- now we go get it!” Sebastian exclaims, the rest of his group- even if ideologically opposed to the plan itself- falling in line with his lead. “On the count of three, we’re gonna make a move to get back on the path!” the man proclaims, accepting the pain that comes with every slight movement of his fingers as he readies his rifle to return fire, “keep close together, move as a unit, and leave no stone unturned- got it?” “Got it!” Adrian calls out, lifting his chin toward the air as his voice overcomes the surrounding bombardment, the rest of the group- one after another- doubling down on the man’s lead. “One...” Sebastian calls out, pulling in a deep breath as he lifts the rifle off his lap, Jenn’s eyes falling upon him as she readies herself to follow the man out of cover whilst Rudy presses the back of his head against the stack of cinderblocks he leans against, closing his eyes as he prays to his god. “Two...” the number calls out, its utterance prompting Adrian to look back at the girls that share the same wall for protection as he does, a silent nod given to them as it’s reciprocated with equal assurance. Letting go of the breath that fills his lungs, Sebastian lets the cold touch of the mid-December, British Columbia winter run over his sweaty face, the lift of his rifle across his chest and the planting of his elbow against the table’s seat his only required preparation, “...Three!” Bursting out of cover, the six survivors flock to each other’s side as Adrian fires a shot in the direction of the huddled enclave soldier, his attempted slaying of Courtney proving him to be a threat. With pinpoint accuracy, the bullet connects with the man’s face as he prepares to take aim for a second attempt on the woman’s life, putting him down once and for all. “Where’s Lou!?” Jenn calls out, raising the obvious question before firing another shot off, connecting with her target with ease as the woman closest to the back seeks out an answer. “I can’t see him!” Sonya proclaims, firing another shot of her own at yet another dreaded foe, the bullet missing its target- but buying them time. “Keep moving!” Sebastian orders, squeezing past Jenn and ahead of Rudy, who’d momentarily taken over the front of the group to provide cover as his wounded friend tried to catch up. Firing a second shot at her prior target, Sonya connects with a shot that, whilst seemingly non-fatal, does enough to bring the enemy to the ground. Grunting as he lifts his rifle, Sebastian fires off another round at the back of a soldier that dashes for the camp’s most well-defined exit, bringing him to his knees before killing him with a second round. Lifting his weapon toward a second soldier drawing closer to the exit, Rudy prepares to fire off a round of his own before watching the man’s brains leave through the side he’d intended to fire at- the bullet having come from within the same darkness they seek the embrace of. “Lou!” Terry exclaims, the first to emerge from within the night’s cover in search of his friend, unknowingly sprinting past the man’s group on his way further into the camp. “Terry!” Jenn exclaims, sprinting ahead of the rest of her coalition as the rest of her lost group soon reunite. “Jenn!” Jules shouts aloud, the first to follow Terry through the camp’s opening as time for reunion clearly dwindles. “I see him!” Terry suddenly barks, pointing in the direction of an open fire as Jules’ eyes turn away from his long-lost friend- breaking out into a sprint toward the same inferno that captures his friend’s eye. “Dad, keep going- we’ll get Lou!” Marta shouts, able to spot her group before they have the chance to do the same, following Elsie and Josie into the same camp her closest allies seek refuge from. “Honey-!” Adrian exclaims, slowing momentarily to call out for his daughter, who fails to hear his plea for her pause as she continues dashing into the line of danger, his own stutter ending as suddenly as it started. Gritting his teeth before nodding to himself with confidence, the father turns back to the rest of his friends and waves his hand forward, ordering them to keep moving. “She’ll handle it, let’s go!” Adrian barks, accepting his daughter’s declaration and putting his trust in Lou’s teaching to pay off- recognising her progression as a survivalist and opting to put his faith in it. Their only reason to pause now handled, the group resumes their retreat and ventures onward, leaving behind the other half of their peers as they embrace the unknown path forward, united with their only intention being to move on and turn the page to a new chapter. | “Are they okay?” Lou asks, jogging alongside Marta as he follows the rest of his group to the coastline- able to make out the hint of moonlight that squeaks through the storm clouds to kiss the chilled waves and glisten beneath the empty night. “They were all together when I passed them” the young woman replies, keeping a tight grasp of the switchblade that she swings at her side with the back-and-forth motion of her arm. “Should we keep an eye out for any of these people?” Josie calls back, able to speak through the air as it seemingly quiets, most of the gunfire having ceased as the majority of the two groups have set their sights on what comes next. “I don’t mean try to look for, just to be clear” the woman reiterates looking past her shoulder to direct her words toward the close-knit pair following all the way toward the back, “is there anyone we should keep an eye on?” “Josie, there’s a time and place for that shit” Jules proclaims, speaking through bated breaths as he continues running, not a single survivor breaking away from the pack as the seaside appears closer. “Like I said- just Theo” Lou calls back, finally able to see the wet sand that separates the forest from the shoreline- the cold water that borders it on the other side left to host a number of boats still left unaccounted for- those that opted to escape the island having departed well before. “Lower your weapons!” Sebastian exclaims, sat on one of the seats to a moderately sized watercraft as Sonya presses a bandage against his wound with pressure. “They’re here!?” Adrian calls back, having taken a seat behind the boat’s wheel as he turns back, watching his daughter, her closest friend and a small group of their fellow survivors emerge from behind the cover of the forest. Disembarking the vessel for a moment, Jenn braces against the cold waters as Elsie and Josie are the first to enter it, their arms opening to welcome the embrace that she meets them with. Stepping ahead of Marta as he pulls apart for just a moment to reach for a rifle that lays unattended in the sand, Lou follows Terry and Jules into the frosty ocean, staring at the reflection of himself that he can barely make out when the group that had waited for him break out into a collective shout. “Shut up! All of you- shut up!” Theo exclaims from behind the man, his voice immediately prompting Lou to turn back with a look of confusion. “Lou, get the fuck back here!” the man- whose inaction was responsible for the extent of the damage that had ensued- calls back, one arm wrapped around Marta’s throat as his other holds the barrel of a pistol against the side of her head. “Woah, Theo- hold on!” Lou exclaims, extending his arm at the moment of recognising the threat that’s posed, the rebar staff held outward at the man he tries to keep from acting more irrationally than he had to this point. “Shut up and get over here!” Theo commands, spit flying from his lip as he shouts at the man that willingly gives into his demands, a cooperative posture taken as his once-friend attempts to reason with him. “Everyone lower your weapons- we don’t need to lose anyone else tonight!” Lou calls out to his friends- those both aboard the ship and still in the water- as he cautiously approaches the unruly gunman. “Let’s all calm down and think about the decisions we’re about to make” the threatened survivor pleads, watching the worried look on Marta’s face stare at him with hopeful eyes, her trust in him to keep her safe from the harm that looms over her unwavering. “We’ve dealt with bigger fish than this, so- whatever’s going on- it’s something we’ll all get through together” Lou continues, carefully stepping back onto solid ground as his unreasonable friend backs away, “-just like we always have.” Shaking his head, Theo visibly refuses the man’s words of encouragement, keeping half of his attention aimed at the people aboard the ship as he stands firm in the choice he’s made. “We’ve known each other for our entire lives and you’ve known these people for, like- a fucking month” Theo spouts with vigour, his face scrunched with anger as he sways forward and back with the girl still at his gunpoint, “and yet- whenever you had the chance- you went to them.” “I never chose them over you, Theo” Lou quickly replies, met with the man’s refusal of such notion with equal haste. “You’ve chose them at every fucking turn!” Theo screams back, prompting Marta’s eyes to squeeze shut in an effort to regain her composure as he presses the barrel against her head harder, “and at every fucking turn- every... fucking... turn...- you just keep getting closer to them, and farther away from me.” “So that’s what this is about?” Lou asks, speaking calmly as he nods his head, leaning it toward his left side as he shrugs his shoulders, “you think I don’t care about you anymore or something?” “It’s about you leaving me behind!” Theo shouts back, his trigger-grazing finger shaking with the rest of his trembling hand as he leans forward, “I’ve lost everything since you brought these people back with you! Lee’s trust, your friendship, the people I’ve spent every day after getting shot off the Euronam with- everything!” “And that’s my fault?” Lou replies, turning his outward-extended hand back toward himself as his voice lowers with his head, almost curious to know if that’s the point being made. “You’re saying I sent you into this spiral ‘cause I- what?- made some friends?” “I’m saying you’re all I had left” Theo replies, lowering his own voice to match that of Lou’s own, each word they speak barely able to be heard by the men and women about their waterbound ticket to a new start. “When I found you in those woods, I had hope” the man continues, his hold on Marta remaining as tight as it had been when he’d subdued her- if not tighter, “Lee and I- before you came, we figured it was over. Everyone- all of them- gone.” Remaining silent, Lou’s expression softens as he subtly creeps forward, closing the distance between himself, the hostage and her captor, all whilst letting his friend continue to vent. “But then I found you out in those woods. For the first time since Lee brought me on board, I had actual hope” Theo proceeds, rolling his eyes and rolling his head as he stares off toward the sky whilst he speaks, “I found a friend- one I never thought I’d see again. I thought maybe it was a sign.” Feeling the motion of her captor’s head, Marta parts her eyelids with hopes of capturing whatever look she can at the man, grasping her switchblade tighter with full understanding of the risk her implicating manoeuvre poses. Passing a look toward Lou as the man behind her continues to speak, the young woman prepares to take her chance before glancing toward the finger her mentor subtly lifts from his staff, quelling her intentions upon its gentle sway of refusal. Her lips pressing into a frown, Marta takes the man’s signal for what it requests and gives up on the hopes of catching her detainer by surprise. “And even though Halston wasn’t with her, I figured coming back with Jenn was just the icing on top- and it was” Theo continues, too caught up in his own monologue to recognise the subdued advancement of his friend as he continues, “but what happened when I realised that reunion I’d given up on was actually coming true?” “Tell me” Lou replies, interjecting his own voice to make sure the man he slowly approaches knows that deaf ears aren’t where his words are taken toward. “No, go on- tell me” the man doubles down, not wanting to appear ingenuine by cowering to the man’s actions, believing it to be out of character in ways more dangerous than what unfolds now. “You were gonna leave” Theo finally replies, listening to the faint shuffling of water as the rest of his true friends hop out of the bitter Strait. “Yeah, to go get our friends back” Lou replies, almost immediately earning the shake of vehement refusal from his friend-turned-adversary, “and then we were coming right back here.” “Not until you found out these people were coming- not when you realised this place was gonna be attacked” Theo replies, licking his lips as the cold air begins to chap them, “that’s when you decided to attack them and steal their boats.” “Yes, and bring everyone with us” Lou replies, continuing to maintain his facade as he continues his slow approach, the words he uses however- they don’t lack in genuinity. “Theo, the others made every point you could ask for! All it takes is one bad harvest and people starve. And when you can’t scavenge anymore, you can’t go to where the food is ‘cause you can’t get off the island!” the man hastily adds on, “come on, Theo- think with your head!” “That’s not the point! The point is- the second you had any doubt that the island could be a permanent home- you would never choose to stay!” Theo retorts, his voice raising into a yell as his friend rolls his eyes, “I know you, Lou! This camp- and everyone in it- always came second to your little friends here. It didn’t matter that those pansies refused to accept the fact that they couldn’t fucking hack it, the point was- they came first!” Turning his sights onto Marta, Theo’s eyes fill with rage as he glances toward the weapon he wields, the distance between himself and Lou still far enough for him to pull the trigger cleanly. “I see that look in your eyes” Lou remarks, prompting his new-enemy to look at him with a sadistic scowl, the calmness in his friend’s voice somehow more angering than when it’s amplified through a yell. “Of all the people you have a problem with, it’s Marta that’s got your riled up the most” Lou quips, a statement that the angered gunman refuses to argue against. “It’s not even necessarily because she does something the others don’t, it’s because- when you think of the others- she’s the first person that comes to mind” the one-armed soldier explains, opening his hand to drop his rebar staff in the sand, disarming himself as he draws closer. “Let me remind you that this war- everything that happened at the camp back there- is your fault” Lou adds, taking on the full weight of Theo’s stare as he steps closer, his freed hand still held out in an unimposing way. “Whatever your thoughts about Lee are don’t matter- he’s dead. He’s dead, and you killed him. So, if I’m such a bad guy for betraying you, doesn’t that make you just as bad?” the man continues to ask, “he trusted you, and you chose to stab him in the back.” Remaining silent in lieu of a dignified retort, Theo continues to watch Lou speak, one eye squinted farther than the other as Marta returns to readying the blade in her hand, waiting for the same opportunity she’d expect her mentor to anticipate. “If you’re gonna try to kill Marta for what I did, then who has to die for what you did, huh?” Lou dares to question, his head subtly tilting to one side as he steps even closer. “Is it Jenn? Does she have to die for your discretion?” the man asks, prompting the gunman to glance in the direction of the aforementioned lady whose presence had once certified his hope, her feet dangling off the edge of the boat she sits at the cusp of, watching the situation unfold just as the rest. “Maybe Terry or Jules? Elsie or Josie?” Lou proceeds to ask, the foursome- some kneeling whilst the rest stand- remaining by Jenn’s side as their names are mentioned, “do any of them have to die for it?” Looking toward their direction with his nostrils flaring, Theo listens to his friend continue to speak with captivated ears. “No, of course not ‘cause they’re not why you have a problem with me” the handicapped negotiator continues, “-it’s the others you hate, right?” Glancing back as he points toward the boat, the disarmed peacekeeper continues to devolve the conversation into a battle of accusations- challenging a dart to be thrown at the metaphorical board. “How about Rudy or Sonya?” Lou asks further, Theo’s eyes joining him in spotting the father and daughter stood closest to Sebastian’s side, “I mean, they’re the pansies that can’t hack it according to you- are they the ones that need to kick the bucket?” Remaining silent as he seethes, Theo continues to entertain his friend’s game as the upper hand remains within his possession. “I mean, if your actions are anything to go by, it seems like Courtney’s the one that has to go” Lou continues onward, the woman in question remaining stood firmly by the side of her remaining family, watching as intently as the rest of the group does, “if you’re willing to sacrifice your own damn friend, what more would putting her down do, right?” Taking a glance toward the ground, Theo continues to register the words that the conversation’s only other proponent wages before they begin again. “I mean, fuck it- Sebastian, Adrian, Marta- they’d all have bought the farm if you got your way, that point really doesn’t seem to be important anymore, does it?” Lou finally concludes, reaching the ultimate destination his remarks had intended to reach, reclaiming the undivided attention of his enemy. “The answer is none of them. It’s none of them, and it shouldn’t be. None of them should be who you point that gun at- Marta included” Lou declares, nodding to the man as a smirk comes over his face, “and do you want to know why, Theo? It’s because your problem isn’t with them, your problem is with me.” Furrowing his eyebrows, Theo looks his friend in the face as he extends his arm and a half outward, the only palm he has to present provided in full view. “You’ve done all of this now. You’ve got no camp, you’ve got no people, and you’ve got no hope” Lou proclaims, passing a smile toward the woman his every word intends to secure the safety of, “that gun should be pointed at me because- if anyone’s gonna have to die for your actions- it should be me.” Pulling back slightly, Theo’s face eases as he turns his sights away from the girl within his reach, gently pulling the barrel away from her head for the first time since capturing her. “As much as you hate to admit it, you know I’m right” Lou tacks on, reclaiming Theo’s attention as he keeps the barrel within millimetres from the woman’s head, the slight retreat of his weapon more than enough to prove to the once-star of the Euronam’s pit that his words have met their target. In silence, the deranged provocateur splits his sights from the woman at his hand to the man at his mercy, eventually setting his beady pupils upon his chosen target. Refusing to part for even the briefest declaration, Theo’s lips remain as steady as his aim does, moving away from Marta’s head with its ultimate target in full sight. Collectively calling out for a stop to the man’s motion, the group upon the getaway cruiser are helpless but to watch on as what is meant to unfold does so. Relinquishing his possession of her, Theo lets Marta fall from his grasp without realising what he’s allowed to unfold. Picking her spot at the faintest sign of it, the newly-freed survivor twists her body around and drives her blade into the gunman’s chest. *pop* With the instinctive squeeze of his trigger, Theo’s sights are taken elsewhere as his weapon slips from within reach and falls into the sand he soon tumbles backward into. Covering his face as the gunshot rings out, Lou feels sand shoot against his side as the stray bullet imbeds itself within the earth. “Ah, you f-” the wounded survivor cries out, tumbling back as he trips over the same rifle that had afforded him the opportunity to kickstart the showdown that now results in his turn of fate. Ripping the blade out of his pec as he presses down on the wound, Theo pushes himself off the ground behind the shot of adrenaline that courses through his veins as his advancement is halted before it can even begin- the barrel of his weapon now taken toward him at the hand of his best friend. With a stoic expression, Lou turns his eyes away from Theo and looks to the woman beside him, her unscathed appearance presenting him with enough reassurance to set sights back toward the man in question. Cornered and left with nowhere to turn, the bleeding combattant lets out a sigh and drops the knife with his head hung, not a word to share as the sudden loss of said adrenaline prompts him to fall to his knees. “Go back to the boat” Lou softly calls out to Marta, able to feel her stare take to him as he makes his orders known, “I’ll be on in a second, just get on the boat and get ready to leave.” Pausing for a moment, the woman in question looks back to the man that had threatened to end her life before following through with what’s asked of her, turning around to leave as her mentor prepares to take care of what he readies himself to leave behind. Closing his eyes, Theo keeps his head away from the man he listens to the approaching footsteps of, aware of what’s about to happen and accepting of it. “I’m not wrong” the man- whose sentencing has already taken place- mutters beneath his breath. “Yes, you were” Lou replies quickly, only to watch the man’s head shake in refusal as he doubles down on the claim. “I’m not talking about them, I’m talking about you” Theo responds in a sombre voice, the sweat glistening over his forehead and responsible for soaking his hair, which falls over his face as he finally looks up to his executioner. “You’re a good guy Lou, but you’re your own worst enemy” the man continues to speak, staring past the barrel of the gun that stares him in the face, shrugging his shoulders as he makes the declaration he knows will prove to be important. “Those people back there are gonna get themselves caught up in some deep shit, and when Lou comes to save the day-” the man quips, frowning as he clicks his tongue and meets the man hovering over him with a defeated grin, “-well, that’s when it comes back to bite him- doesn’t it?” Meeting his friend with silence, Lou stares into the eyes of a man he once thought he’d known but, as times have changed, became more than he’d seen before. “We both know you’d be willing to die for them just like you were willing to die for us, so- since we both know they’re gonna be the thing that gets you killed, I’ve got to ask-” Theo questions aloud as he shakes his head in bewilderment, “-what happened to you? What is it about them that makes them worth that?” His emotionless face soon touched by the gesture of acceptance, Lou’s eyes take toward the woodlands that serve as the backdrop to his intended action whilst his lips part, answering the question he believes Theo still deserves the dignity of getting an answer to. “I-” the man murmurs, lifting his eyebrows as he shrugs his shoulders, the rain continuing to pelt the pair as he looks back down, the content visage he now wears lending his answer all the credence it needs, “-I got attached.” As his answer is given, Theo’s face eases in the answer that’s provided, which only certifies his own theories that had been crafted along the way as his eyes shut, bracing for the moment that begins with the pistol’s barrel pressing against his forehead. “Good luck, Lou” the man speaks softly as a cold gust of wind wraps through the air, its faint whistle the final sound that separates his well wishes from his friend’s response. *pop* == RISE and REVOLT == “Get me a radio” Randal orders, pressing the palms of his hands against the windshield of his vessel, staring out at the waters ahead as the man beside him steers forward. The only other man aboard the boat, a slender young gentleman with a buzzcut and a long sleeve shirt races to the back of the ship, retrieving the handset from a toolbox and handing it off to his superior, not a word uttered beyond his response of ‘yes, sir’ at the order.
Pressing his thumb to a bright, red button, Randal presses his lips close to the microphone as the massive, tree-covered island across the Strait he travels looms closer, the daylight continuing to burn as night nears close. “Whichever one of the boats that’s furthest behind the rest, do me a favour and turn back toward the girl’s island” the man requests, “I know we’ve already checked, but I want people standing by in case she- or anyone else- decides to set sail for it.” At the helm of a much larger boat, a pale man with a bright, red beard reaches for the same radio that sits upon the desk closest to him. “I’ll set course for it right now, sir” the man responds, ultimately forced to switch the conversation, “and my radio is beginning to die- so if any of us don’t answer, it’s ‘cause the thing’s on the charger.” “Note taken” Randal responds, ending the dialogue there without another word, the man behind the wheel continuing to keep the vessel forward as he gazes out at the view ahead, gathering a mental note of his surroundings before adjusting the boat’s direction. With the flicking of a few switches, the bearded captain steps away from his wheel, rounding the nearest corner to descend further into the ship, the talkie still in hand as he approaches a closed door. Reaching out for the handle, the captain pauses for a moment as the hairs on his arms stand at attention, taking notice of the curious sound that originates behind him. Though initially sceptical at what his ears had convinced him of, the man listens to his surroundings before hearing an additional step be taken, almost as if he’d been followed. Remaining still for a moment, the man continues to keep his face straight as his hand slowly lowers to his side- lips parting as he attempts to speak. “Don’t say a word” Terry commands in a low voice, pressing what feels like a barrel against the back of the unnamed captain’s head. “I don’t want to hurt you anymore than you want to hur-” the weapon-wielding man begins to speak, trying to reason with the man under the guise of a merciless killing, only for his remark to be cut short as the vessel’s controller turns around with a weapon of his own. Taking a small pistol into his own possession, the jacktar turns to face his potential assailant, pointing the barrel of his weapon toward the man before falling unconscious- struck in the face with a copper pipe. “Fuck!” Terry grunts, listening to the pistol fall to the ground with the rest of his enemy, taking a glance at the weapon he holds in his possession with a disappointed gleam in his eye, “why was I convinced he’d think this was a gun?” Elsewhere aboard the ship- subtly turning the knob to a dark room- Elsie passes a glance at Josie, who kneels close to the ground directly beside her- intentions set on entering a completely different room. “Make it quick and don’t let them feel a thing” the blonde woman whispers, watching her friend nod as she creeps into the dark bedroom, following the same strategy as each other. For a few seconds, the hallway and the rooms to each of its sides remain quiet, as silent as the day that quickly begins to burn into night, still met with the same light drizzle from the heavens above as most days seem to be. With a sudden pair of grunts, the sound of visceral attacks emanate from either end of the lavish, oakwood-panelled walls each room sits within, the gross struggle of metal ripping free from bone and flesh proceeding the girls’ return to each other’s company. “That was a lot messier than I thought it would be” Elsie remarks, her hands covered in fresh blood whilst simple splatters of the substance stain Josie’s. Without another word, the girls turn around to shut the doors on their way out, returning the way they’d arrived with their ends of the job finished. Stood atop the crow’s nest, a man in a toque and long-sleeved sweatshirt watches the choppy waters ahead, his face struck with the harsh winds of winter as just the destination ahead takes his mind away from what he knows his peers to be amidst. Simply waiting for the day to pass, the man takes no account for the ladder that leads to his elevated position, the oversight he’s meant to provide completely undelivered to him as Jules silently ascends to his level. “You seem too young to want to die like this” the gunman speaks aloud, prompting the unsuspecting young shipman to spin around in shock, eyes immediately noticing the gun that points at him. “Don’t say a word and we can both make it out of this alive, alright?” Jules proceeds to wonder, not wishing to end a life in order to save others if the chance presents itself. Frightened and concerned, the young man presses his lips together and nods- both hands held in the air as his fate’s keeper looks to him with a slight satisfaction. “Alright. Now, what you’re gonna do is- walk past me, climb down that ladder, and lay on the ground- alright?” Jules inquires, aware of the risk he’s taking whilst being willing of the consequences it provides. “Okay” the young man responds, appearing more than pleased to oblige to what’s requested of him. Nodding to himself, Jules takes in a deep breath and leans against the bannister to the side, allowing the younger man to step past him without issue and follow through with what’s demanded of him. Careful not to step out of line, the ship’s overseer slowly steps up to the ladder and turns his back to it, kept at gunpoint as he appears to lower himself to the nest’s floor. To the effect he desired, the unnamed young man’s ploy works to fruition, allowing him to dive across the nest and collide with the tempter of his life, knocking the firearm from his hand and to the deck below. “Captain! We’re under attack!” the early-twenties man bellows from high above, throwing his hands forward with hopes of shoving his hijacker over the rail, a fierce resistance put up by the man who’d now been placed on defence. Throwing his head forward, Jules cracks his skull against the man’s own, knocking him back into the pole that occupies the platform’s centre, dazing both fighters involved as a momentary lapse breaks the altercation in two. The first to regain his mind, Jules lunges forward, taking his opposition by the collar and attempting to push him around the nest’s divider, unable to do so as his foe holds on for dear life. “What’s going up there!?” Elsie calls out, her voice unfamiliar to the young man, who- in a lapse of judgement- reproduces his cries for assistance. “Help! We’re-!” he exclaims, turning his head to face the voice’s direction before losing his grip, shoved against the railing before bouncing forward, lunging at Jules before a second strike puts an end to the brawl. At the might of his foot, Jules thrusts a kick into the young man’s abdomen and shoves him toward the open end of the platform, no guard rail set up to prevent him from toppling over. From the heavens and with nothing to spare him, the young man’s body falls recklessly over the edge and craters to the deck as Elsie and Josie watch from mere metres away. To the sound of shattered bounds and ungodly wails of pain, the girl’s promptly stare away from the mangled body that slams into the ground before their feet, screaming in bewilderment as they spin around in horror. Screaming with the fear of a man whose bones pierce through skin with the wherewithal to understand what’s happening, the young man remains living on the boat’s front deck, the sight of his grizzly-wounded body provoking a guttural response from Josie. “What the actual fucking fuck, Jules!?” Elsie screams in disgust as she looks toward the distance, her friend immediately turning around to throw up as the man above regains his composure. In silence, Jules drags himself off the platform after a few moments and descends the ladder, still listening to the lamentation of his victim- who remains scattered along the ground, the inhumane pain he exists within not phasing the man responsible for it in the slightest. Hurrying away from the scene, Josie rushes into the nearest confines as Elsie keeps her eyes from the horrific scene before her, watching Jules calmly stroll across the desk to retrieve his weapon. “What the fuck happened up there!?” the woman screams, begging for a reply as Jules recaptures the pistol, calmly returning to his victim’s side to put an end to the appalling screams with the pull of a trigger. *pop* “Nothing” Jules responds, too exasperated to be phased by the wounds that now die as quickly as his victim does, following Josie further into the cabin as Elsie does the same- mainly out of horror at the scene she’d otherwise be left with. Throwing the captain’s body out of the nearest window, Terry redirects his attention toward the direction his victim had been heading in, turning the door’s knob to enter a sight he hadn’t yet expected. Stood before the body of a man with a stab wound to the jugular, Marta looks up at Terry’s sudden arrival with her hand shaking- her eyes having been set upon the man laid before her feet up until his emergence from the door’s other end. “I- I-” Marta murmurs, her lip quivering as she looks back to the ground for a moment, registering the act she’d committed as she looks up, “-I’ve never killed someone before.” Letting the pipe he’d readied in his hand fall to the side, Terry cautiously steps the rest of the way into the room, patting the girl on the shoulder as his teeth press together, almost as if he despised having to admit what he says. “Unfortunately-” Terry begins to say, looking the visibly-shaken girl in the face as a look of guilt comes over his own, “-you get used to it.” = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = “Are you crazy!?” Rudy exclaims, his eyes wide as his hands extend outward at each side, the expression held toward the leader of the camp he calls home for the time being, “surely you’re not too young to understand the phrase ‘live to fight another day’, right!?” With his arms crossed, Sebastian shakes his head with a hesitant expression, his head turning toward Lee just as the rest of his group’s- minus a few exceptions- do. “I don’t always see eye-to-eye with Rudy, but he has a point here, Lee-” the man remarks, uncoupling one hand from around his bicep to direct it toward the distance, “you’ve built camp here, there’s no reason you can’t build it elsewhere.” In vehement refusal of all alternatives, Lee’s foot sinks into the ground he stands upon as his head shakes. “I’m not leaving. We’re not leaving” the camp’s leader responds, “you can do what you want- stay or go, it doesn’t matter- we’re fighting.” “Make that declaration all you want- it won’t end well” Sebastian replies, not needing to understand the complexities of the apocalypse in order to recognise common sense. “There are too many of these guys- and they have too many guns- for you to keep this place up” Courtney replies, doubling down in the corner of what most perceive to be sensical, “if you stay here, you- and all of these people- will die.” “Well you leave me no choice” Lee responds, shaking his head as his shoulders shrug, “you started this thing with them, and you brought them to our door. If this is gonna get us killed, so be it- that’s on your shoulders.” Grimacing as she nods her head, Courtney redirects her sights toward the other end of the corner as Adrian interjects himself into the conversation. “I don’t care what call you guys make, I’m not dying here” the man responds, “my daughter’s not coming back to nothing.” “Who said your daughter was coming back to begin with?” Theo quips from beside his superior, immediately lighting a fire within the father unlike anything the group had seen in recent days. “What the fuck did you just say!?” Adrian shouts, storming forward as Sebastian and Rudy step in his line of sight, holding him back from progressing forward as the camp’s leader steps ahead, acting as the final pillar in the man’s path toward the leader of his army. “Good-fucking-lord, knock it off with the hostility you douchebags!” Jenn exclaims, stepping away from the back of the group to stand between the two opposing sides, “we’re all at risk here! Let’s act like we’re on the same fucking side!” “We’re not on the same side if it involves us all throwing ourselves in the line of fire for a suicide mission” Sonya responds, her arms crossed as she voices her preference to the side the rest of her group falls on. “If those fucks are coming back for my sister, we’re not staying here” the practicing medical worker proclaims, putting her own voice into the discussion with a newfound confidence in her remarks, “I don’t have to like what’s outside to know it’s better than certain death.” “And that’s exactly what it is- certain death!” Rudy shouts, joining his daughter’s opposition to the idea as Lee shrugs, shaking his head with his arms still crossed. “Like I said- you can all leave if you want to” the man declares, doubling down as he mentally prepares for the worst, in the obvious minority that he shares only with one other man- thus far. “Well, then we’re leaving” Adrian replies, pulling away from his peers as he takes a seat upon his daughter’s vacant bed, throwing one foot into a boot as the rest of the group talks amongst themselves. “We’ll leave, but it doesn’t need to stop at that” Sebastian replies, assuring his friend- though he doesn’t yet know how loosely he can use that term with Marta’s father- that such a direction has been agreed upon by most, “Lee, you’re a sensible guy. Think about how this ends.” “It ends in the way it has to” the camp’s leader responds, clearly refusing to budge from the stance he’s opted to take, “we built this camp and we’re gonna defend it- to the death.” Letting out a sigh, Sebastian rolls his eyes and turns his face away, his place of trying to reason with both sides of the argument taken over by their newest addition. “Lee, you know they’re out there waiting for us” Jenn explains, looking the man in the eyes as he remains silent, more willing to listen to her than the majority of the camp. “I already know you gave up hope a while ago, but you know they’re out there for sure now!” the once-leader of a group they’re bound for a reunion with pleads, “for god’s sake, if you want a permanent home- make one with all of us back together!” “That’s not the point, Jenn” Lee replies, his stance remaining stoic and unbroken, “they may be out there now, but this is still our home. We barely got this place in a good enough position to live in, and we still have to resort to theft. At some point, there’ll be nothing left to steal, and when that happens- we can’t be in a place where we’re rebuilding all over again.” “You don’t have to” Jenn replies, stepping ahead of the rest of her new assortment of people to rejoin the presence of an older acquaintance, both Lee and Theo trying to hear her out. “There are better places then out in the mountains of an island that doesn’t offer you anything once the supplies run out” the woman proceeds onward, trying to display his future as grim regardless of the altercation’s outcome, “what happens when another avalanche hits? Or when the terrain gets too bad?” “Or what happens when a freeze comes over and you’ve got nothing for heat?” Sebastian adds, only further strengthening Jenn’s case. “And what happens when your farm doesn’t produce enough to get you through the winter? You can only expand so far out here” Courtney speaks, only continuing to provide sources of doubt, “all it takes is one bad crop yield and you’re fucked. There’ll be nothing to scavenge and no way to grow more. There’s a reason no one farms out here.” “Add that to the fact that- after a few years- you won’t have any way off the island” Jenn proceeds, “gas will go bad, boats will become impossible to service, and you’ll be forced to starve out here.” Bowing his head, Lee takes the points made into consideration as Theo peers off into the distance, thinking to himself in silence just as his leader does- both of their faces soon coming to the same realisation as each other. “There’s no way off the island to begin with” Lee remarks, finally looking back up as he takes the cons into effect, unable to write them off when confronted by them, “even if we wanted to pick up shit and book it, there’s nowhere to run.” Letting out a sigh, Jenn takes her turn to lower her chin, one hand planted on her hip as the other lets the nails on her finger scratch at the side of her head. “Not necessarily” Lou mutters just loud enough for the rest of the tent to overhear, not a single eye left turned away from his direction as his voice finally introduces itself to the conversation. With the rebar staff to his side, the battle-hardened survivor looks up from the ground where his eyes had been stationed to take his place between each argument made. “The others are right, there’s no point in dying when the hill you’re going out on isn’t even at level ground” Lou explains, locking eyes with Lee as he speaks, “and if you cared about these people as much as you claim, you’d know it’s better to protect them than it is to get them killed fighting some pointless war.” His sights fully set on the man that speaks to him, the ground’s leader concedes his position to the man he knows to be right- tongue pressing against the corner of his mouth. “However, you’re also right that there’s no solution to the other problems at hand- there’s no way off the island-” Lou explains, receiving a nod from both Lee and Theo whilst the rest of his group sits in agreement. “-at least, not yet.” Tempted and intrigued, those that occupy the tent wait for the man to continue speaking, invested in the picture he’s painted thus far. “As far as I’m concerned, if we take care of these asshats- we get their boats” Lou responds, almost immediately met with reluctance from the other side of the room. “I thought we’ve been over this- fighting is pointless” Adrian remarks, tightening the laces on his second boot before standing up, turning his sights toward the conversation’s newly-appointed spokesman with equal hopes of a response as the rest of the group. “Not if we can force them into surrender” Lou responds, leaving his seat as he turns his attention to Courtney, head lowering as his eyes set upon her. “The last shipment these pricks brought you- some of them were guns, right?” the man inquires, met with the same response he’d anticipated. “Yeah, they brought in a few rifles and pistols” Courtney answers, crossing her arms as she steps out from the crowd, “it’s not enough to win a fight like this, though.” Pressing his lips together as he shakes his head, Lou steps away from his possession and draws closer to Theo, “it doesn’t have to be” the man responds, placing his eyes upon his long-time friend, “all it needs to be is enough to force them into surrender.” “I thought they outnumbered and out-gunned us?” Rudy questions aloud, prompting the man he speaks for the attention of to turn back toward him. “Even if so, if we can surround them in all directions- it should be enough to take out at least a majority of them-” Lou replies, shrugging his shoulders as his head shakes, “-at least enough of them to even the odds.” “And we’re supposed to expect them- when they come knocking for our heads- to just walk in peacefully without firing a single shot?” Adrian chirps back, refusing to believe such an outcome to be possible. “It is if we make peace with them” Lou retorts, his back now turned to the pair of men at the top of the food chain as far as the camp’s hierarchy is concerned, “if we explain the misunderstanding- let them walk through without bloodshed for something they want- they will.” “And what do you think they’ll-?” Rudy begins to ask aloud, the opening utterance of his question prompting Lou’s eyes to take from Courtney’s father to his own daughter, the silent stare they share serving as more than enough to get their point across. “I’m down” Courtney replies, staring directly back at the one-armed survivor she’d come to the defence of countless times, recognising the plan he’s presenting and trusting in him enough to put herself in harm’s way for it. “If I explain to them that Marta went out of her own volition and make it seem like there’s more reason for me to betray you instead of them- they’ll walk in without a fight” Lou explains, turning his attention back to his best friend, “and when they come to collect Courtney, Theo will have everyone in the camp- all armed with a weapon of their own- out of the woodworks to surround them. They’ll either surrender or be gunned down where they stand, end of story.” “End of story!? Hell no, it’s not end of story!” Rudy exclaims, immediately voicing his disapproval in the plan for reasons beyond obvious, “I don’t care what she agrees to- I’m not letting my daughter get put in the line of fire!” “You don’t have a choice, dad” Courtney retorts, letting her hands fall to each side as the rest of the group sits in silence, both Theo and Lee considering the option they’re presented with. “One way or another, we’ll have them dead to rights. If they chose to fight, we may lose some people- but your plan ends with that anyway, Lee” Jenn explains, her support thrown like the weight of a truck in favour of the only plan reasonable enough to pay off, “if Courtney’s willing, I’m not gonna argue.” “I don’t understand how you keep expecting me to warm up to this world when you keep putting my family in danger for it!” Rudy barks, spit flying from his lip as anger consumes him. “How about I put it to you this way- if these guys choose to go out firing shots, guess who’s caught at the centre of it?” the man shouts, waiting for a voice to speak up from amidst his hostility, “it’s not you!” he shouts at Lou, “-or you” he screams toward Jenn, “you don’t have to deal with it if things go south!” Bowing his head, Sebastian reacts visibly in the same way Lou rejoins mentally, accepting the point for the truth that it holds, joining the rest of the group in surprise as an unexpected voice speaks out in refusal. “Then I’ll stand in the middle with her” Lee interjects, throwing his life on the line for the same plan he’d nearly written off, “Lou will tell them the camp’s on a mission to find a new home, and I made a deal with him to hand her over. I’ll be right there when they show.” “Lee, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Theo asks, gently shoving his superior’s shoulder to earn his attention, the response he gets only souring the man behind him. “Protecting my people like I should be” Lee retorts, looking the man in the eyes as he doubles down on his oath, “if things go down, I’ll put myself in harm’s way too. If one of us goes down, so will the other.” “Are you serious!?” Rudy exclaims in utter disbelief, rolling his eyes as they dart from one side of the room to the other, only to veer back the way they came, “why the hell are you all so fixated on this!? We could all go up the coast- up to the place Adrian’s brother-in-law has on Swartz Bay- and not throw our lives on the line for something that’s much more likely to go south! All for what?- a couple boats and a rinky-dink camp in the middle of the mountains!?” “Rudy, we can’t stay here forever” Jenn responds, almost instantly finding herself interrupted by the sound of the man’s voice, his declaration finding more truth than the rest of the group cares to admit. “Yes, we can! The only reason you’re in favour of it is to meet up with a bunch of people that no one else- a few of us excluded- have ever met in our lives!” Rudy decries, “that’s what you’re risking my daughter’s life for! To help those two find their pals!” pointing at the obvious duo. Met with reluctance, Rudy peers through the crowd to set his sights on the only other man he believes would agree with him. “Adrian- if this plan had Marta in the middle of this instead of Courtney, are you telling me you’d be in favour of it?” the man calls out, prompting the rest of the group to dejectedly turn their faces toward the same man they’d labelled as everything from ‘friend’ to ‘murderer’. Peering across the camp for a moment in silence, Adrian looks at Rudy as the rest of the tent’s inhabitants veer their eyes toward him, his attention only set on being offered toward one man- his figure stood nearest Lee and Sebastian. With doubtful eyes, Lou looks back to the same man he’d taken the fall for, hoping he’d voice the same reply he wishes for- but under no means expects. Letting out a sigh, Adrian looks Lou in the eyes as he provides the same answer the rest of the tent’s occupants expect, not a soul able to blame the man for his answer. “No” Adrian replies, putting a look of satisfaction across Rudy’s face- the man having almost expected the subject of his question to respond differently, “I wouldn’t.” With a frown, Rudy nods in the man’s direction and turns his face toward Lou, the eyes of both men reconnecting as the much older gentleman responds with the only question more obvious than any other, “then why should I?” In silence, the group sits with their thoughts as the voices in favour of- and opposed to- the plan linger on each other’s conscience. “Then who makes the call?” Lee asks aloud, aware of his position in the camp- but refusing to use it to make such a call himself. With a gaze around the room, Lou joins Lee in wondering the same question, “I know what I’d prefer, but the call isn’t mine to make” the rebar staff-wielding survivor declares, leaving the rest of the camp to decide for themselves. Sharing the young man’s disappointment, Adrian hangs his head apologetically, “I’m sorry, Lou- I couldn’t say I would in good fa-” he begins to remark, interrupted before he can finish speaking. “You’ve got nothing to apologise for, Adrian” Lou cuts him off to speak, shrugging his shoulders in the man’s direction, taking the slightest bit of pleasure in the man standing up for himself honestly as opposed to feeling indebted to lie for him. As objective as her father is, Sonya remains silent in lieu of being as disqualified from making the call as he is, leaving only a small handful of people at the discussion’s table. With his arms crossed, Sebastian turns his sights away from Rudy and replaces them with a glance in his daughter’s direction, her face almost immediately turning back to meet his. “You know what happens if this goes wrong” the man remarks, a statement the woman nods at, gesturing her understanding beyond any doubt, “are you willing to do this- yes or no?” Her expression unchanged, Courtney’s eyes brush past Lou, Lee, and Theo and find both her father and sister, the expression she looks to them with instantly giving them the answer they dread. Pressing her eyes shut as her chin lowers with grief, Sonya’s reaction bears an uncanny resemblance to her father’s own, his weighted exhale preceding the reply she puts into words. “I am” Courtney responds, a slow nod coming over her as the only family she has left in the world turn away from her with an overwhelming flood of emotion, Sonya’s distress too great for her to remain in the tent she opts to walk away from- departing the group in favour of the cold, winter air that stands beyond the nylon flaps of their tent. “Then it’s settled” Sebastian declares, owing up to the demand he’d made of himself to take a stand as the group’s leader- putting an answer to the calls no one else provides clarity to, “this is what we’re doing.” | “And you’re sure you know how to drive this thing?” Terry inquires innocently enough, the assured tone in the woman’s voice filling him with all the confidence possible to muster. “No, but the buttons have pictures on them-” Josie replies, already having successfully redirected the vessel’s course toward their intended destination as she peers over her shoulder, looking back in the face of the man that asks, “-it should be simple enough.” “Alright, then- how do we stop?” Terry jokingly wonders, watching the woman’s face fall back toward the board of buttons and switches that light up before her, a look of concern coming over her face as she looks back, “we have to stop this thing?” His humoured expression suddenly sinking, the man overhead looks back toward the sea worriedly as the woman behind the wheel descends into laughter, taking glee in his reaction. Clued into the joke, Terry pats Josie on the shoulder with a slightly-shaky hand as he walks off, turning his sights to the boat’s deck as the daylight begins to fade fully. Coated in the light of an onboard spotlight, Jules drags a white sheet-covered corpse across the ship, a trail of blood forming in the wake of the man’s path. “At least you’re cleaning up the mess” Terry proclaims, watching Jules silently hoist the body over the railing and discard it at sea, taking the moment of relief to turn back to his friend with the middle finger raised. With a chuckle, the man just entering the ship’s outside peers to the other side of the yacht-sized cruiser, his eyes wandering over to find a girl with her arms draped over the railings that overlook the water, her isolation from the rest of the group understood for what it is. “Is this about the man you killed or is it just an ‘I don’t feel like I belong’ kind of separation?” Terry inquires, joining Marta’s side as he matches her posture- arms draped over the railing as he glances out to sea. “Does it have to be either of them?” the girl wonders back to the man, curious both for the answer and for the opinion it presents with it. “It should be” Terry replies, shrugging his shoulders as his eyes keep to the waves he can barely make out beneath the fading light of quite the long day. “Why?” Marta wonders back, her sights unable to be more different than the ones her contemporary holds, his view taken toward the water as hers rests directly upon him. “Because whatever the outcome of this excursion is- we’re all gonna be seeing a lot more of each other” the man responds, “at least- that’s what Lou would say.” Her head falling as a smile spreads across her face, Marta nods to herself with a slight chuckle, “that is something he would say.” Nodding, Terry lifts from his leant position just slightly, standing more upright as he continues talking. “I know it is. I’ve known the guy long enough to predict exactly what he’d say” the kind-hearted gentleman replies, opening himself more than he’s used to providing, “if you’re down- he’ll make you feel better. If you’re struggling- he’ll say it’s normal.” “Then what would he say if you weren’t sure what choice to make?” Marta wonders back, presenting her new friend with a challenge to his implication. “He’d tell you it was okay to be unsure, but the time was coming to grow a pair and make a call” Terry jokes, sharing a laugh with the girl of different background but equal-strife as Elsie watches on from the distance, occupying a deck higher up than their own, but close enough to make out the words shared. “He’d do it in his own, Lou-ish way- but that’d be the brunt of it” Terry explains, clicking his tongue in the corner of his mouth as he stares out to the farthest part of the Strait he can still make out, “he’s got his own brand of dealing with things, but that’s just who he is. Lou’s complicated and difficult to get to know, but when you break through with him- he’s one of the best people you could ever meet.” With a genuine smile, Marta looks out to the vast expanse of darkness that so captures her company’s eyes, watching the frothy white waves flow away from the propellers that their vessel moves forward through the aid of. “Everything you’ve said Lou is couldn’t be more true” Terry continues, patting the metal rail with the palm of his hand as he backs away, “if you’re cool with him- you’re cool with us. So- in the meantime- I’d start getting friendly with the others too.” Passing a warm welcome to their newest accomplice, Terry leaves the conversation there in favour of returning to Josie’s side, his departure watched on by the lady that soon glances upward. With her hair flowing in the breeze, Marta stares up at Elsie as the woman leans over the bannister of the upper level, a subtle nod shared to the young woman that now occupies the floor just below her as she proceeds to wander off, leaving Lou’s protege to take in the scenic outdoors alone. | Rolling up to join the small number of boats that already occupy the shoreline of Vancouver Island patiently awaiting their orders, Randal’s vessel comes to a stop before he disembarks it, eyes setting upon the small group that gathers before him. “Is it just you-” the older gentleman inquires, pausing to count the present heads with his finger, doing so twice over before standing firm in his count, “-twenty six?” “Yes sir. There are still more trailing behind, but most of them seem to be five minutes away- ten at most” a random man responds honestly, his answer prompting a distant-yet-familiar voice to introduce itself from beyond the treeline. “Does that mean we have enough time to talk?” Lou’s voice calls out, prompting the guns of each present member to draw toward his direction, the sound of the mechanisms shaking within their shells provoking his immediate explanation. “Don’t bother shooting- I’m not here with ill-will” Lou proclaims, unable to see Randal stepping ahead of the group he commands with a rifle drawn. “From the sound of it- you are” the one-armed man remarks from behind the cover of his forest, the bodies of his camp’s fallen soldiers from early in the morning scattered within the formerly-green pastures that had once occupied the place where his feet settle in. “I’m just going to jump straight to the punch- we have her” Lou proclaims, his declaration still incapable of stopping the leader of the group that looms closer, not an ounce of nervousness within his voice. “The person you went after- I didn’t realise it at the time, but it wasn’t her” the man continues to speak, his voice drawing the group closer- though the darkness that overcomes the sky remains too difficult for the newly land-touching enclave to see through. “The plan wasn’t to dupe you into thinking she left. The girl that did- Marta- took Courtney’s paramotor without telling her. She figured it would draw you away, and it seems like she was right” Lou explains, a firm hold on his rebar pipe held as the sound of footsteps begin to crunch upon the wet branches that line the forest Randal begins to lead his men through. “But I’m glad she did, because it gave me time to talk with the person in charge of the camp” Lou explains, his words continuing to capture the ear of the man that seeks him out, though still has yet to quash the advancement being led. “His name is Lee and the only thing he cares about is protecting the people in his camp” the hidden survivor continues to proclaim, the remark one that puts a smile on Randal’s face, “that’s why I struck a deal with him to give you Courtney in exchange for peace.” “I don’t believe you” Randal responds calmly, drawing closer to the man whose voice he follows the sound of, a smile coming over his face as the young-yet-rugged tone appears to draw closer. “You should- I have no reason to lie” Lou replies, the words he speaks being met with the response of various weapons being drawn within the darkness- the obvious firepower prompting the progressing enclave to cease their forward momentum immediately. “I’m going to remind you that you’re in unfamiliar territory against people you don’t have the first clue about” Lou continues to speak, reiterating his point from the prior morning, “so I’m gonna give you the chance to walk into the camp without having to shed a drop of blood, take your girl, and leave us alone.” “You’re lying” Randal responds firmly, his pale, white face and dark brown moustache-goatee combination barely lit from the raincloud-concealed moonlight that resides overhead. “I’m not, I just want the rest of my friends to be left alone. Like I said, you don’t know who you’re dealing with or what motivates them” Lou retorts, switching on a flashlight that pierces through the darkness he now steps out of the protection of, rounding the tree to come face to face with his opposition. “I’m willing to put my life on my word” Lou declares, holding the light to his face as he waits for the man’s response, using his own health as a gauge to determine how good the plan’s potential is. Pulling in a deep breath as he waits, the one-armed man speaks into the darkness, only able to look into the direction of where his adversary occupies, putting his trust in the idea that being left unscathed will assure him that the trust needed for the plan to work does exist. Spending the proceeding few seconds in silence and without response, Randal peers through the light to see the youthful mein behind the scruffy beard the negotiator sports. “I have important people in this camp that I promised to protect” Lou continues to speak, moving his lips within the beacon of light to prove that he is who he portrays, “the rest of the camp is looking for a new place to call home like Lee told them to. He’s there- with Courtney- and no one has to know what happened.” His rifle still aimed in the young man’s direction, Randal sits in silence for a few moments, unsure of how to react to the display he’s been presented with. “All I promise are two, reasonable things. The first- whatever you plan to do with her, I just ask that you get her off the island so there’s no trace of what happened for anyone to find” Lou proclaims, a shrug coming over his shoulders as his demands finish being presented, “the second is that you just leave us alone after that.” His rifle kept steady, Randal stares into the face of the man he now knows to stand opposed to him, the declaration he’d uttered at the start of the die beginning to seem less favourable than the one he’s offered at its end. With the squint of his eye, the enclave’s leader parts his lips to respond before actually knowing what he’ll say, making each reply up as he continues. “Why should I believe this isn’t a set up?” Randal calls back, recognising the signs of trust the young man across from him presents with high hopes, “you seem to be taking more chances than someone gutless enough to betray their own friend would ever dare to.” Hanging his head, Lou stares at the ground with a feigned expression of self-dissatisfaction as a defeated nod comes over him. “I don’t need to be proud of myself for making the right call” Lou responds, looking back up with hopeful eyes, “ever heard of the Trolley Problem? If a trolley was coming down the tracks to hit five people and I could pull the lever- redirecting the thing to the tracks where just one person is?” Flashing a slight smirk out of the corner of his mouth, Randal pauses for a moment before responding. “I spent fifteen years of my life as an ethics professor” the man responds, able to see the life that fills the youthful face that presents itself through a ray of light, “of course I’ve heard of the Trolley Problem.” With a nod, Lou looks back to where he believes the man’s voice to be coming from, “good-” he responds, placing a confidence within his voice as he concludes his statement, “-now you know which side I’d choose.” Pressing his lips together as his nostrils flare, Randal readies his rifle to be aimed as his head turns toward the men he continues to lead, still waiting for the boats that remain to catch up. “Don’t fire unless fired upon” the man orders of his armed soldiers, remaining concealed beneath the night as Lou turns out his flashlight, following the path he can still find within the break of the treeline that just barely presents itself through the guise of night. After about a half kilometre walk forward and with the night fully dawning upon the empty camp, Randal and his men approach a break in the treeline, the grounds they step into illuminated within the moonlight that just barely shines through a break in the clouds. The first to step out of cover, the self-described ‘former ethics professor’ appears before any other- his eyes falling upon the scene he’d been promised. Lifting the barrel of his weapon in the man’s direction, Lee’s voice raises the question that prompts the hands of the enclave’s leader to lift. “Repeat what the ground rules are and you can have her” the camp’s leader demands, the barrel in his hand held steadily as Randal removes one hand from his rifle, holding it in the air to prevent his men from getting an itchy trigger finger. “Easy there, champ. Let’s relax before we start doing things that get people hurt” Randal warns, holding his rifle toward the camp’s leader with the barrel aimed at the ground, not a soul besides his men, the man across from him, and his tied up prisoner to be found. “The first rule is to bring her off the island before we make ourselves even” the enclave’s leader replies, hearing the groans Courtney lets out from behind the duct tape that covers her mouth. “And the second?” Lee replies, almost immediately watching the man across from him let the rifle he’d held fall to the ground, his newly-freed second hand rising in surrender. “I do you- and your folks- no harm” Randal responds, displaying a patience and cooperation unlike anything the man across from him had expected. “Alright, let’s-” an inexperienced guard begins to whisper, his voice instantly hushed by his superior office, who hisses behind the cover of a single digit in refusal. “Shut the fuck up and stand the fuck down” Theo commands with a hissing voice, more than enough distance between his small cluster of armed guards and the transaction going down for their voices to rise slightly without being noticed. “Wh- what do you mean?” the refused guard asks with an equally-quiet tone, confused at the orders they’ve been given, “this is when we’re supposed to move forward!” His figure kept to the shadows, Theo stands from the slouched position he’d waited for the scene to unfold from, pressing his side against a tree as he directs his rifle toward the same men that stand at his order. “Where’s Theo?” Jenn whispers from the complete opposite side of the camp, lying in wait for the man to make the first move that the declaration of the second ground rule was supposed to initiate. “I thought we were sure he’d be able to know what the signal was, is he too far away?” Sonya whispers to the rest of her group, yet to understand what the miscommunication is down to. “No, he’s not-” Adrian soon remarks, his face barely lit by the moonlight as it turns toward Sebastian, the grey clouds beginning to produce a heavier rainfall than the drizzle that had spent the majority of the day falling. “Fuck” Sebastian murmurs, locking eyes with Adrian before coming to the same realisation the father beside him has, “-he can hear just fine.” Across the camp with his intentions made clear, Theo continues to hold his men at gunpoint as they frantically try to remain calm and concealed. “What the fuck, Theo!? What are you doing!?” the man responsible for proposing the advancement that triggered their superior’s reaction asks, earning the response that the man provides with complete honesty. “The deal was- he gets Courtney, and we get left alone- that’s what’s gonna happen” Theo replies, immediately met with innocent resistance. “No, it wasn’t!” the initial man replies, earning his superior’s eyesight once more, “the plan was to come out and corner them when he said the second rule! Then the others were supposed to come o-” “I know what the plan was, and now we’re doing a different one!” Theo proclaims, refusing to concede his men for the sake of just another cog in the machine he deems to be a problem. “He wants the girl- he can have her” the man orders, keeping the barrel of his weapon aimed at the men he’s supposed to provide for, “Lee wants to support this fallacy? Fine, let him! When shit hits the fan, he can go down with it too.” His weapon still wavering in the air, Lee looks into the eyes of the man across from him as he waits for the planned aid to arrive, playing the pause off as a moment of genuine interest. “Forgive me, but- I just have to know something” the camp’s leader says, watching the puzzled expression on Randal’s face as he lowers the barrel of his firearm, “it’s just- make it make sense. You’re going through all of this trouble just to get even with one girl- why?” “You ask the same question your friend back at the shore asked” Randal replies with a smirk, immediately presented with the leader’s reasoning. “It’s a pretty reasonable question, don’t you think?” Lee responds, waving his gun toward the distant ends of camp as he speaks, a strange way of talking with his hands aimed at the distance he quietly expects assistance to prevail from. “I mean, it’s just one girl! Yeah, she killed people you care about, but still! I’ve lost people here and haven’t mobilised my entire camp to go after them!” Lee proclaims, provoking a smirk and chuckle from the face of his adversary, “it just seems like more effort than most people would go to for such little return, that’s all I’m saying.” Kept on their toes without a signal to work off of, Sebastian’s group hides within the bramble they’ve been occupying patiently as Lee continues to make conversation out of nothing- obviously buying time. “What’s he doing!?” Sonya hisses, directing her question toward the man she and the rest of her people have always looked to for answers- aware that he and Adrian have uncovered something neither she, nor her father have thus far. “He’s buying time” Adrian whispers back, steadying the aim of his weapon as the man beside him shakes his head in refusal, turning his voice toward the confused sibling’s direction. “He’s waiting for Theo to make the first move, but it’s pointless” Sebastian whispers back, shaking his head as Sonya doubles down on her inquiry. “What? Why is it pointless?” The youngest Golden sibling asks back, met with a reply she hadn’t anticipated. “‘Cause Theo’s not missing the signal, he’s ignoring it!” Sebastian whispers back, immediately sparking a look of trouble across the faces of both the daughter and her father, “he’s letting the deal go down so no one else has to die!” “I see” Randal responds with a smirk, soon picking his head up to look Lee in the eyes, yet to pick up on the motivations behind the man’s sudden inquisition. “It’s just strange. It’s bad enough I have this on my conscience, but it’s another thing when I don’t even understand why getting back at her is so important” the ground’s shot-caller remarks, “is it an ideology with you people? Is it some sort of ‘eye for an eye’ oath? I just don’t get why you’d go through all the hassle.” “‘Cause they were my nephews” Randal quickly replies, watching Lee fall silent as the rain begins to come down harder, his face easing just as Courtney's does- the information that’s new to him exists as much the same to her. “Jae and Artie- they were my nephews” the enclave’s leader responds, tucking his hands into the pockets of his coat as he continues to speak, his head tilting to the side the longer his lips move to defend his actions, “and I promised my brother I’d look after them.” His mouth agape, Lee turns his head to face the woman that stands behind him, a look of remorse worn across his face just as Courtney’s appears to hold. Extending a hand to the man that stands before him, the camp’s leader takes the tape that covers the woman’s face and rips it off, forcing a groan out of her mouth. “I don’t want to hear what she has to say” Randal remarks, issuing his declaration of care- of lack thereof- for whatever argument she can make, “she spilled blood, and now her blood must spill.” “Then why did you send them after me!?” Courtney proclaims, immediately bringing question to the motivations of a man that smiles as his head lowers. “Seriously, what did you expect to happen?” the woman challenges once more, pretending to wrestle against the binds that tie her wrists as she issues the question toward a man seemingly hesitant to answer it, “you sent them to kill me, and instead- I killed them. What happens if it were the other way around- would their blood be spilled?” “They wanted to take the initiative for your information. I figured you were just one girl, it’d be clean and easy enough for them to do on their own- but it cost them their lives” Randal retorts, lifting his finger toward the woman’s direction, the rest of his men forced to direct their weapons toward the ground to avoid breaking the deal made, “you had things we needed- so we sought out to take them. And for your information- they weren’t sent out to kill you.” “Bullshit! They pulled a gun on me and that was the first move” Courtney refutes, immediately argued against by the man that proves- in the end- to be correct. “They were only instructed to pull a gun if you didn’t get in the boat like they told you” Randal replies, the silence he’s immediately met with bringing clarity over the situation, “the plan was to hold you at gunpoint when you got on the boat and force you to drive off. They kept the land, you took the goods- end of story.” Closing her mouth, Courtney lets her chin fall momentarily as Randal watches on, his anger continuing to swell as he looks to the woman he knows to be responsible for their demise, forcing himself to keep his composure intact to not risk breaking the first rule. “If you’d done what they told you, everyone would be alive and this wouldn’t be happening” the man declares, nodding to himself as he lets free a deep sigh, “but it is. You spilled blood, and now yours will be spilled.” “Why didn’t they make that clear!?” Courtney exclaims, putting her foot down as even her feigned fight against the restraints that couple her hands together begins to cease. “He reached for his gun and I hadn’t even moved. Was I going to refuse? Yes! But had I refused yet? No” the woman continues to argue, looking the man in the eyes as he continues to grow more irritated, his composure still controlled well as she finishes her remark, “it’s not my fault your nephews were fucking useless.” “Oh shit” Sebastian murmurs from beneath his breath, the entirety of his group prepared to fire their rifles as they watch on with the conversation happening before them. “What do we do!?” Sonya whispers back, hoping for an answer from those that she shares the backup line of defence with, but not a soul speaks up to offer a solution. “What did you just say to me?” Randal asks back, prompting Lee to hang his head and casually drift his eyes in Theo’s direction, the grasp on the firearm that hangs by his side tightening as he begins to realise what’s occurring. “I’m not wrong. If your nephews were really ready to handle business, they would’ve known to make themselves clear, and they wouldn’t have been taken out by a girl” Courtney responds, knowingly increasing the tension that flutters throughout the air. From within cover, Sonya lowers her sight toward the top of her rifle as her finger rests gently against the trigger- the man Theo holds directly at gunpoint kneeling in much the same position. “I wonder what he must be thinking- your brother, I mean” Courtney continues to prod, escalating the situation to force those hiding within the treelines to make the call she realises Theo won’t make as the man beside her angrily readies himself to open fire. “I wonder what he would think if he were watching you right now” Courtney doubles down, speaking to the man that lowers himself close to the ground and picks up his rifle, his every inch watched closely by the man that stands between himself and the woman he yearns to get even with. “If there’s a hell, I wonder what he thought when he saw his kids walk through those fiery gates” the woman continues, nearly slipping out of the binds she’s held by, “I wonder how disappointed he was in you.” Hiding aboard the biggest boat he can get behind the control of, Lou watches additional vessels finally reach their intended destination, one crew after another disembarking their watercraft in search of following the trail of footsteps their leader leaves behind. Able to peer through the treeline, the man waits for his group to arrive, and for a signal of surrender or ceasefire to present itself before his patience finally pays off- the answer provided through the echoing of a solitary sound. *pop* == RISE and REVOLT == “Answer the question” the gunman demands, his steady arm extending the barrel toward the woman’s face, which surprises the man with its unchanged demeanour. Though time has been bought, the horde that followed the lead of their much livelier contemporaries continues to approach, their guttural groans almost sounding comparable to locusts- enough to raise the hairs on each survivor’s neck.
“How do you know Halston?” Marta wonders aloud, earning a pair of squinted eyes from each of her new acquaintances, still yet to fully piece together who they are. “The better question is- why do you have her gun?” the man- whose hand holds the woman’s fate within its power- inquires, a brief step forward only bringing the weapon closer to the woman’s pale visage. “Jules, don’t get too close” the blonde woman warns, speaking aloud what she assumes is little more than a friendly reminder to keep distance from the unknown, though her five words soon come to change the narrative entirely. “Jules?” Marta asks aloud, looking back at the woman for a moment with a more surprised expression, their stare holding for a few seconds before the odd-woman out redirects her sights toward the second man- the same expression held, “that means you’re Terry, right?” Pulling his head slightly back, Terry’s face narrows into a look of confusion as his lips part, unable to speak the words that clutter his mind- yet to form a coherent sentence. “How do you know his name?” Jules asks, pulling the weapon back as to heed Elsie’s warning, a slight shake in his hand shattering the composed, unyielding display he’d presented, the wheels of his curiosity truly set in motion. “Lou- I know Lou” Marta replies, looking into the eyes of her potential gunman as they begin to widen, the rest of his group’s following suit as the air immediately loses its tension, the utterance of the man’s name bringing a silence over the group as if it were the boogeyman’s. With a look to his left, Jules’ eyes fall upon Elsie, who joins Josie in continuing to stare at their as-of-yet untrusted fifth member before her eyes cast in the direction of the distant, unspoken man. “L- Lou? You know Lou?” Terry asks back as his bottom lip quivers, such a question being asked in good faith not something he would’ve ever anticipated being able to wonder aloud. “She doesn’t- it’s bullshit” Jules replies, yet to believe such a truth could be possible as he writes it off as impossible, strengthening his stance in opposition to the woman’s claims with a large step forward, his arm steadying once more as the weapon follows suit. “I do! He’s with the rest of my group on Vancouver Island!” Marta exclaims back, feeling the weight of her back pressing against a metaphorical wall as she pleads her case, practically begging those she stands before to embrace her declaration. “He’s there! So are Theo, and Lee, and Jenn!” Marta proclaims, both hands raised into the air as she finally manages to regain her breath, watching Terry’s hand extend toward Jules’ weapon gently- making an effort to lower the hostility. “What about Halston? Why do you have her gun?” Jules asks, clearly making an effort to lower the rigid posture he’s presented against the woman of equal age at Terry’s request, still wanting an answer to the question. “Lou gave it to me. He said he got it from her on the boat and he gave it to me when we started training” Marta explains, trying to keep her voice calm, though an obvious anxiety hides within the reflexion she speaks with. “Guys, this isn’t the place to have this talk” Josie remarks, turning her back to the dialogue as she readies her tomahawk, preparing for the battle that looms closer as the rest take it upon themselves to discuss. “Well, what else are we supposed to do?” Jules proclaims, watching the woman step onward as the first few stragglers round the corner, stepping far enough ahead of their horde to close in on the group, “we can’t just take her with us!” “Yes we can” Terry quickly replies, gently disarming his friend of the weapon before turning it back upon their new ally, “-we’re just gonna have to be careful.” Pressing his lips together to form a frown, Jules stares at the man for a moment before caving to his decision. “Everyone, back upstairs!” the newly-appointed gunman exclaims, moving aside to let Elsie and Josie pass as they follow Jules in retreat, Marta soon to follow as the group’s apparent leader follows closely behind. Dashing up each set of stairs, Jules leads the retreat from chaos, hurrying through one corridor after another on his way toward perceived sanctuary, each member of his group following closely behind- matching each step with one of their own. “Where was the garage supposed to be?” Elsie calls out, her figure the one sprinting just ahead of Marta’s, the tomahawk she wields in her right hand an exact replica to the one Josie wields ahead of her. “I can’t remember!” Jules calls back, climbing the next set of stairs to its very top before finding himself cornered, the rest of the group following his lead into an overrun corridor filled with the building’s now-undead tenants. “Shit!” the man exclaims, moving aside as Josie dashes past him, driving the blade of her weapon through the skull of one corpse- who’d stood beside an open door and been momentarily separated from the rest of his pack. “Get in, let’s go!” the woman exclaims, pressing her back against the door’s frame as she makes way for the rest of her fellow survivors to enter, the horde beginning to close in just as the door slams shut, buying the group a moment to breathe as they narrowly avoid a meeting with the reaper. Locked at both the deadbolt and the doorknob, the mostly-empty apartment complex sits newly-occupied- its windows overlooking the beach as its interior serves as a refuge. “How the hell are we supposed to get out of here now?” Elsie wonders aloud, standing in the centre of the room with her hands on her hips, the rain continuing to fall just beyond the window that Jules stands beside. “We’ll cover ourselves in their guts. We’ll blend in” Marta replies, still held at the half-hearted aim of Terry’s weapon as she strolls to the head of a single bed, its twin sitting just a few metres to the side of it, “the rain will wash it off, but it’ll work as long as we’re here.” With his lips parted, Terry lowers the gun the rest of the way, its barrel having sat at his hip as he gasped for air- the surprise of what looms just beyond their door having exasperated him. “Holy shit, she does know Lou” the man murmurs beneath his breath, watching the woman’s eyes take toward him without much change, almost as if she hadn’t had a reason to concern herself with the group’s perception of her remarks to begin with. “Wait, where’s Halston?” Josie replies, almost immediately taking Terry’s declaration as an opening to ask the questions that had lingered over their mind for too long without an answer. “Yeah, where is she?” Elsie doubles down, following the woman’s lead by taking a seat upon the edge of the other bed now that her aura of untrustworthiness begins to deplete, “you said everyone else was at your camp, but you didn’t say where Halston was.” Looking at the only other white woman in the room with her lips slightly parted, Marta’s head begins to lower with the rest of her eyes, the rest of the group sitting in silence as they wait for an answer. “She, uh” the woman begins to reply, pausing for a moment as she struggles to figure out how to break the ice, though a deep exhale is let out as she decides not to sugarcoat the answer, “she didn’t make it.” Slightly pulled back, Elsie’s head turns toward the direction of Josie- her back still pressing against the apartment’s door- before it moves to Terry, who leans against a record shelf with the gun at his side, a surprised look in his face. Mostly silent, the room’s following sounds begin with the weight of Jules’ fist slamming against the drywall he sits beside, taking a moment to breathe whilst occupying the nearest windowsill in frustration. “Goddamnit!” the man exclaims, hanging his head as one arm rests across the top of his knee, the rest of his group feeling the same aggravation, though separately from each other. “The dead got to her before we found Jenn- there was nothing we could do” Marta doubles down, trying her best to leave little unspoken with intentions of letting the group grieve, only for her words to bring anger over the distant man. “Stop fucking talking!” Jules exclaims, pointing his finger as he bursts away from the window, marching toward the girl as he spouts vigour before Terry steps in his way, holding him back from continuing. “Calm down, calm the fuck down!” the firearm-holding man commands, gently shoving the man back to his original side of the room, able to feel his rage without losing his cool in much the same way, “the girl had nothing to do with it.” “How the fuck do you know!?” Jules shouts back, taking a full step in retreat before turning his frustration toward his friend, “how do we know she’s even telling us the truth!? Maybe she’s not close with them like she says!” “I’m telling you the truth” Marta calmly retorts, watching the man’s enraged, scrunched-up face turn back to look at her from over Terry’s shoulder. “Then why the fuck are you here!?” Jules calls back, though his temper continues to flare, it presents questions the rest of his group can’t help but find investment in hearing the answers to, “if you know where everyone else is, why the fuck are you out here- alone- shooting at the dead and walking the streets!?” “Jules, calm the fuck down!” Terry screams back, his voice rising over the man’s own before his enraged friend spins around, returning to the original place he’d sat in silence, trying to gather himself as the rest of the group watches on. “No, that’s a fair question- and I’m fine with answering it” Marta replies, wishing to take the initiative to clear the air in hopes it’ll help the group warm itself to her more, “you might not like what I’m gonna say though, so just- keep your cool.” “We left Halston behind and now she’s dead, girl-” Elsie replies, looking to their fifth wheel out of the corner of her eyes as her head hangs halfway, “-I don’t know that you’re gonna say anything that can hurt us anymore than that does.” Pulling in a deep breath as Terry turns back to face her- Jules doing much the same with his arms crossed as he lowers himself back upon the windowsill- the woman’s face begins to shrivel. “I beg to differ” Marta replies, resting her arms against the top of her legs as she leans forward, the rest of the group she speaks to only invested in her answers more. “Lee broke off from you guys on the boat from what I’ve heard- I guess he led a bunch of people into the lifeboats before the ship went down and got them to shore from what it sounds like” the woman continues, “he found Theo at sea and brought him back too. They settled in and started building a camp.” “Lee’s in charge of a group now?” Elsie asks aloud, caught by surprise as she leans back, letting her tomahawk rest against the bed that she slowly lowers back into, “I’m shocked.” With a breathy laugh leaving through her nose, Josie hangs her head as she strolls away from the room’s entrance, shaking her head subtly as she walks across the room, beginning to pace as the young woman continues to make her case. “Before you continue, did he ever tell you how he lost the arm?” Terry wonders back, apologetic for interrupting her recollection, “I mean- he had it when we boarded, but it was gone the next time we saw him.” “They cut it off on the boat. It must’ve had an infection, I don’t know why else they’d do it” Marta replies, using the inquiry as a jumping off point for the rest of her explanation. “He washed up on the shore when the boat went down, walked through Victoria for a little bit and then hiked into the mountains” the woman continues, “he found us, then he found Lee and Theo. We joined the camp when our cabin got taken out by an avalanche, then Lou ran off and found Jenn.” “Why did he run off?” Jules interjects, the question one with too much weight behind it to leave unasked. With a frown, the girl’s head takes a bow as the rest of the group take notice of her pause, the seconds that pass without an answer prompting minds to race with their own theories. “We weren’t very open to change. Aside from Courtney, we hadn’t actually seen much of what was happening in the world until Lou showed” Marta explains, “-we sort of grated on him over time.” Sat in their own silence as the theories fizzle out, the four survivors simply wait for the woman to continue speaking, the story too open-ended for their interest not to be taken. “Lou hadn’t stopped talking about how he didn’t want to get to attached to us- that he was set on finding you guys. Sebastian- the guy that owned the cabin- got really fed up and told him to go look for you” Marta continues, watching a few eyes drift as others keep to her, “so he left in the middle of the night.” His frown becoming more pronounced, Jules lets one hand free itself of his crossed arms as it presses against his face, waiting for the woman to finish. “We became friends though, so I went out looking for him. Sebastian didn’t actually want him to run off- none of us did” Marta proceeds, taking in another deep breath as she lifts from her slumped-forward position, “so we went out and found him- and he found Jenn. She told us what happened and that’s how we found out where you were.” “So why didn’t Lou come out for us?” Jules questions back, the question asked just as a set of gunshots ring off in the near-distance, just loud enough to reach the level of the building the group occupies. “Because I’m not out here looking for you, I’m out here to buy him some time” Marta explains, looking in the direction of the gunshots with much less immediate concern than the rest of the group appears to view it with. “The woman I mentioned- Courtney- she had a falling out with a group she traded supplies with. They came after her and found our camp” Marta proceeds onward, drawing the crowd’s interest further, “he went out to talk to them, but I couldn’t risk him getting hurt. So, I stole Courtney’s paramotor and flew out to Vancouver hoping the people that were after her would follow me.” “It sure seems like they did” Josie replies, peering through her window, though unable to those who fire off the shots. “Which is good, ‘cause now it buys them time. I don’t know if they’re gonna leave the camp or settle in and fight, but now they have a chance to be prepared for what happens when these guys come back” Marta proceeds, pulling in a deep breath as she gazes around the room, a much more coherent acceptance of their circumstance appearing to come over them. “Are these people dangerous?” Terry asks aloud, finally holstering Halston’s weapon in the waistband of his pants as a show of trust for their newly-acquainted survivor. “Courtney says they are, but I don’t know for sure. She said they tried to kill her and she got the better of them, but that’s all I have to go off of” Marta replies, “like I said, I took the paramotor and flew off before they could get to camp. From the looks of it, they care more about getting at Courtney than the camp.” “So, the others should still be down there?” Elsie inquires, peering back to the young woman with a more accepting visage, following Terry’s lead in lowering her guard. “He was when I left this morning. The only reason he can’t get here is ‘cause he doesn’t have a way to get off the island” Marta explains, “there’s no bridge to the mainland, he doesn’t have a boat, and he hasn’t gotten lucky enough for that to change.” “Fuck!” Jules exclaims, tilting his head back as he rests against the cold window for a moment, his eyes soon redirecting toward Terry, “I told you we shouldn’t have left the boat at the harbour!” With widened eyes, Marta watches the conversation unfold as the group talks amongst themselves, sights now set on solutions as opposed to defence. “We didn’t have much of a choice, Jules- you know this” Terry replies, arguing in his favour as Elsie immediately aligns herself with him. “You knew what Jenn and Halston told us to do. Find a place to settle in on the coast” the woman replies, watching the man’s face ease up as he nods. “Alright fine, but let’s not pretend like we haven’t had bigger fish to fry since then” Jules replies, letting his arms fully uncross as they fall into his lap, his back pressing into the cold, transparent pane. “What is he talking about?” Marta asks aloud, looking to the man she’s taken to be the group’s mouthpiece thus far, Terry’s eyes turning back to her as his face settles. “Well, if Lou and the others told you so much about us- doesn’t something seem out of place here to you?” the man asks back, both hands pressing against his hip as he lets the woman do the maths to herself. With furrowed eyebrows, the lone-wanderer looks around the room at the people stood before her, eyes taking to Elsie’s patient expression before turning toward the pacing figure that shares the duplicated tomahawk. From Josie, the girl’s eyes take to a more-composed Jules before drifting toward the man that stands before her, waiting for the reply. “Wait a minute” Marta replies beneath her breath, every other corner of the room she looks to sitting empty, “where’s Ally?” = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = / Six weeks prior / The side of his head slamming against the pavement, an undead corpse collapses to the ground beneath the weight of a hammer, whose claw protrudes from his deceased skull before tearing through fragmented bone. “Leave it! We have to go!” Ally shouts, reclaiming her hammer from the dead’s cranium as Terry and Jules struggle to tie their vessel to the peer, the rope they use too stiff to properly bend. “We can’t leave it behind, it’ll drift out to sea!” Jules shouts back, desperately trying to help Terry twist the binds together as Ally hurries to their side, her efforts at the front of the line taken over by their tomahawk-wielding duo. “If we leave it tied up, it’ll only be a matter of time before someone comes and takes it anyway!” the woman shouts back, ripping the threads from her friend’s hands before launching it into the sea, forcing their hand into retreat toward safer pastures. “What the hell!” Terry shouts, watching the rigid binds hit the water and float away before his arm is pulled at, the woman responsible for its casting urging him to depart the scene. “We have no time, let’s go!” Ally exclaims, shoving the man in the women’s direction as Jules follows of his own volition, clearly displeased at the situation- though accepting of the circumstances at play. One by one, the group huddles together and works their way through the horde, unscathed for the most part as they reach a clearing in the cluster. “Don’t fall behind!” Josie orders as she steps ahead of the group, throwing her hand at whatever corpse stands between herself and the opening, the winter chill that rolls in allowing her an advantage over the struggling monsters. “Where are we going!?” Jules calls out, swinging his hand at whatever moves as he trails near the group’s end, the only person behind him being the hammer-wielding survivor that provides them cover. “No one knows, just look for somewhere safe!” Terry barks, following just behind Josie as Elsie keeps up beside him, their faces turning in the direction of anything that stands out- residential towers, small storefronts and easily-defendable openings all taken into consideration. After a few minutes of aimless wandering, the group begins to make their way toward a large, open park with little more than a few straggling corpses. “Follow me!” Terry shouts from the middle of the group, rerouting the group toward a fountain in the middle of a large row of barren trees, their branches stripped of the green that coats them through most of the summer. Without question, Elsie diverts from her course first before Jules follows, both Josie and Ally providing them cover momentarily before racing toward their direction. Easily discarding a pair of zombies, Terry takes to a gate that Jules soon joins in prying at, trying to quarter off the open space from the undead as the rest of the group soon closes in. “Hurry up!” Terry shouts, watching Elsie take her tomahawk to the few roamers that litter the open area as the women struggle to catch up, sprinting with all they can manage as sanctuary is built before their eyes. “Buy us some time!” Jules exclaims, tearing at the bottom of the gate that implants itself in the ground, caught on an uneven part of asphalt that appears to be recently-paved, too high for the gate to naturally roll over. Their task made clear, Ally and Josie turn their backs to the men as the dead begin to close in, their weapons readied as the crash bar to a nearby door appears to be shoved in, the presence of others unexpected as of that moment. “Lift the gate up!” a voice exclaims from within the horde, which appears to turn in the direction of the group’s unaccounted for visitors, who take their weapons to the undead just as the group themselves do. “What did you say!?” Jules shouts back, his attempts to free the iron bars from their place in the dirt coming to an immediate stop as he- along with the rest of his group- realise that they’re not alone. The first to make her way through the undead cluster, a woman with brown hair and fading purple highlights sprints to the men’s aid, lowering her head as two men and another woman follow suit closely thereafter. “The gate lifts over the asphalt- lift it up!” the woman exclaims, reaching closer to the ground as the rest of her group joins the frontline with Ally and Josie, aiding Jules and Terry in hoisting the heavy contraption over the poorly-paved walkway. Pulling away from the frontline to join Elsie in clearing the base for their apparent camp, one man departs from the rest of his group, leaving the defence in the hands of the remaining four. Grunting as they pull the obstruction inward, Terry and Jules watch the horde become subjected to the combined forces of the newly-united survivors, one falling after the other without much of an issue. “Everyone get inside!” the woman aiding in the gate’s relocation commands, prompting the rest of her group to fall back as Ally and Josie stay behind momentarily, taking out a few corpses at the forefront before following suit. Swiping with her tomahawk, Josie discards a few undead bodies whilst Ally’s hammer finds the decrepit part of a few skulls, eventually coming across one too softened for her weapon to free itself from. “Josie!” the other woman calls out, falling with the corpse she puts down as the hammer takes her hand with it to the ground, bringing the woman to her knees as the dead close in. “Let it go, Ally!” Josie exclaims, unable to finish her sentence before the woman’s tug at the weapon rips it free from the monster’s head unexpectedly, prompting her to fall back as the dead close in. “Ally, get out of there!” she shouts once more, watching the woman struggle to climb up as the dead soon surround her, the first corpse that looms near finding itself struck with the hammer before it can latch on, the rest that follow suit presenting an insurmountable task. “Get this gate closed!” one of the men exclaims just before the dead swarm the final, unprotected survivor, allowing her to succumb to their numbers as he sprints forward. Armed with a machete, the courageous man throws his shoulder to the back of the foremost corpse, shoving it into a small group of his peers before swinging at the head of the next closest monster. Ripping the blade of his weapon free from the corpse’s head, the man’s arm feels the touch of yet another corpse wrap around his arm, its teeth lowering to his skin before its skull is obliterated by the hammer’s claw. With haste, Ally frees herself from the dire situation to wrap her hand around the man’s throat, pulling him back and sprinting with him to safety as the gate closes on their way inside, a dance with the reaper escaped from at the last moment. “Are you bit!?” the woman- having helped aid in pulling the gate shut- calls out, prompting both survivors to inspect themselves, wanting to make certain of their safety just as she does. “I’m good, Stella” the man replies, catching his breath as he flashes a smile at the woman beside him, her eyes still wandering over every part of her body exposed to the touch. “Me too” Ally replies with a smile, letting free a sigh as she turns her sights to the side, laughing at the man with relief. As day turns to night, the masses huddle together around a fire as a light drizzle comes over the camp, the stone face of the water fountain offering the controlled blaze protection from the elements. “I’m Stella” the angel responsible for coming to Terry and Jules’ rescue introduces herself, turning her sights toward the line of people that sit alongside her, “that’s Alisa, Keith, and Myles- in that order.” Looking at the man at the end of the group, Ally subdues a smile as she speaks with appreciation. “Thanks for saving my ass back there, Myles” the woman remarks, met with a shy smile and nod from the same post-apocalyptic hero that had so confidently braved the battleground on her behalf. “I’m Terry, these are Jules, Elsie, Josie and Ally” the man responds, fulfilling his group’s end of the warm welcome with gratitude, “-in that order.” Chuckling beneath her breath, Stella lowers her head to the ground before replying, “it’s nice to meet you” she says with a warm expression. “Same here” Terry responds charmingly, his soft-spoken remarks to the group eventually interrupted by the inquisitive thought process Jules’ mind traverses. “What are you guys doing out here in Vancouver?” the man wonders aloud, not taking the group across from him to be much for the survivalists he and his friends have become. “Well, uh- I guess we’re not really sure yet” Keith replies honestly, pausing mid-sentence to take a glance at the rest of his friends, “Vancouver was the closest city to where we started from, so we figured it was a good place to look around.” “Oh, where are you from?” Elsie asks aloud, looking the man in the eyes before the answer is given from the woman beside him. “Bellingham. A small town across the border” Alisa replies, rubbing her hands against her thighs to create friction for warmth- the crisp, winter air beginning to take its toll on her, “what about you guys?” “Los Angeles” Ally responds, watching the eyebrows raise on each member of the group across from them. “Woah. How the hell did you get all the way up here?” Alisa responds, amused at the distance the people before her appear to have travelled. “We got on a boat back in the city and it took us north. We got on a little boat when it went down and sailed out to Victoria” Ally responds, holding her hands to the flames that fly into the air before them, “came out here when it was time to settle in.” “Oh, so you’re staying here?” Alisa questions, almost as if taken by surprise at such a fact. “For the meantime, why? Is something wrong?” Ally replies, immediately watching the woman pull her head back and shake in refusal, the man beside her speaking the woman’s thoughts into existence. “She just thought you guys were heading east like us” the man replies, holding a hand out to the group as a show of goodwill, “I think we all kind of figured you were.” “East? What’s out east?” Jules wonders aloud, looking at the man with captivated eyes, unsure of much about the group’s future motivations. “A refugee city. A few different outposts a bunch of people started setting up before everything fell” Keith replies, lifting his bare feet closer to the flames as the rain begins to lighten further, dying into what’s barely a mist, “I’ve got a friend in Uni’ that lives across the street from it- said they were taking people in before the lines went dead.” “No such thing” Josie replies, her inner-pessimist presenting itself as she takes the end of her shirt to the splatters of blood that sit along the head of her weapon. “What do you mean?” Keith asks with a smile, leaning his head toward one side as he waits for the woman to continue speaking, her expression appearing as if such a concept were impossible to believe. “I mean, come on” the woman laughs, looking back at her group- who watch on with as much confusion. “I mean, who would’ve expected all of this to happen?” Josie wonders aloud, almost as if making the same point to her own group as she does with the other- gesturing toward the dead that hungrily grasp at the bars with the hope of entry. “What does that have to do with anything?” Alisa inquires, raising her doubts over the woman’s point, though it’s one the tomahawk-wielding survivor has a tough time letting go of. “The only way you’d make a big enough camp from stuff like this is if you’d seen this coming” Josie argues back, shaking her head and shrugging her shoulders at the implication, “I don’t know what your buddy went to, but it definitely wasn’t a city.” Shaking his head in the woman’s direction, Terry retakes his sights toward the group across from him, asking them for more than what his friend had written off. “Look, I don't know much more about it than that. It’s a few different bases out east all set up to trade with each other” Keith replies, shrugging his shoulders at the holes in his information that he accepts the presence of, “the only one I know of for sure is in Nova Scotia. So that’s where we’re headed.” “And you’re in Vancouver for what? Supplies?” Elsie asks aloud, immediately met with her answer from the soft voice at the other end of the group. “A helicopter” Myles responds, his unimposing demeanour and timid posture presenting an overall lack of confidence, “my dad taught me to fly a couple years ago. I figured it’d be safer to get there in one of those than it would be to drive across the whole country.” “Well, I’m pretty sure there’s an airport closeby” Josie replies, though in disbelief of the group’s plan, more than willing to do her part in helping them put together one of viability. “Yeah, that’s where we were heading to last night. But, we’d been walking for a few miles at that point, so we just cut through the dead and hung out in the lobby of that building over there” Keith remarks, pointing to the residential tower they had been cooped up in prior to earlier in the day. “Well, have you seen anywhere safe to settle in? Maybe make a camp out along the way?” Jules wonders aloud, looking to each of the four faces across from him before one expression presents a pleasant display. “Well, I don’t really know where it is, but there’s a hotel a few blocks away that I remember seeing a story in the paper a few blocks back” Alisa replies, “I guess it had shut down when things really started getting bad, so the dead shouldn’t be that bad out there.” “That can work for the short term” Terry replies with a nod, glancing down at the rest of his group as he speaks his thoughts aloud, “it’d at least be a decent place to hunker down until we find something long-term.” Shaking her head vehemently, Stella reacts poorly to the man’s plan, arguing against the same plan their counterparts have appeared to present. “You don’t wanna stay here long term” the woman replies, “if anything- you wanna go somewhere quiet and out of the way.” “Why is that?” Ally asks aloud, drawn in through curiosity at the woman’s reasonings, not finding it difficult to agree with the point being made. “Because cities were meant for society, not survival. Food, water, whatever- all the stuff you need when you think about survival are on the outskirts. Towns, farms, places in the middle of nowhere” Stella responds, “fewer people means fewer of the dead. More space means a place to grow crops and fewer people to worry about.” “Besides, cities are all just ghost towns now. Zombies everywhere, ransacked stores and more trouble than good” Keith continues, shaking his head in dissatisfaction of the group’s presented line of planning, “if you get the chance- go somewhere quiet and settle in there.” Squinting as the rest of her group sits in silence, Elsie glides the edge of her finger against the polished blade of her tomahawk, taking the other group’s remarks into consideration. Gathering their belongings as the sun rises on yet another rainy day, the group prepares to depart from each other with their attentions set on different objectives. “Good luck to you guys. Seriously, look for somewhere safer if you can” Keith remarks, preparing to depart his new acquaintances with nothing but well wishes. “We’ll think about it” Ally responds, leaning her head to one side as she fastens a knapsack over her shoulders, “we’ve got some people to wait for first.” “Well, we hope you find them” Alisa replies, shaking the woman’s hand before doing the same for the rest of the group she prepares to depart from, turning in separate directions as they prepare to leave through different, mostly-cleared gates. “Hey, remember-!” Keith calls out, joining the rest of his group as they begin opening their gate, clearing the way for departure, “if all else fails, just head east!” Without a word, a few members of the group nod before they follow the same action, opening their gate and clearing the few stragglers that remain waiting for them, advancing upon the streets of Vancouver with their sights set on one destination. | “I don’t understand, what does any of that have to do with Ally?” Marta wonders aloud, gazing into the direction of each member of the group, all of which holding variously different expressions from each other. “It’s the only idea we have of where she could’ve gone” Terry replies, jumping ahead in the story to spoil the answer of the girl’s question, a result that prompts the girl’s head to pull back. “Where she could’ve-? What?” Marta responds back, immediately prompting Josie and Elsie to lower their heads whilst Terry’s hands fall from his sides. “We got to the hotel, we settled into different rooms, and after three weeks- she was gone” Jules responds, following through with his friend’s advancement of the story to explain their end of things, “no argument, no fight, no planning, no goodbyes. She was there when we went to bed, and she wasn’t when we woke up.” “What the fuck do you mean she wasn’t there when you woke up? Where the fuck did she go!?” Marta calls out, prompting Terry to answer with more emotion than he’d spoken to her with since their first introduction. “Haven’t you been listening? We don’t know!” the man responds back, one hand returning to his side as the other waves in the direction of the window, gunshots having stopped for the time being as the air goes silent once more, “we don't know why she left or where she went.” “And she didn’t leave a note?” Marta wonders back, met with the silent shaking heads of refusal once more, “she said nothing? She gave you no clues? Just- nothing?” “We had- and still have- no clue where she went or why she left” Elsie doubles down, sharing the same story as the rest of her peers, not an ounce of information left unspoken. Parting her lips, Marta leans back on the bed, pressing her hands into the mattress as she props herself up, the quiet thoughts she speaks to herself leaving her with one, singular thought that just refuses to be shaken from her mind. “Oh my god-” the woman murmurs beneath her breath, lifting one hand from her side to press firmly against her forehead, her eyes widened as her heart begins to sink, “-this is gonna kill Lou.” With a frown, Terry hands his head as the voice behind him speaks aloud, changing the conversation whilst keeping the subject in question. “Yeah, speaking of which- what do we do now?” Jules asks aloud, earning the attention of each of the room’s inhabitants. “What do you mean?” Josie wonders back, stopping her pace in the centre of the room as she joins the rest of the group in looking back at the man by the window. “Well, the girl says-” Jules begins to respond, only to be interrupted by the groups newly-entrusted friend. “-Marta. My name is Marta” the woman interjects, watching the irritated grimace on the man’s face find itself returned to her, correcting himself at her behest. “Fine. Marta says they’ve got danger over on the island. What the fuck do we do about it?” the man inquires, looking around for his peers to provide direction he’s yet to come across. “We go over there and help him obviously” Marta replies, speaking into existence what is much more difficult to put into action. “Yeah, how?” Elsie questions back, presented with a reasonable goal whose path to completion is anything but, “we’ve got no boat.” “Then we’ll find one” Marta responds, immediately met with the same criticism that had confronted her before. “Alright, great- where?” Jules replies, letting his shoulders fall as his hands throw out to each of his sides, “we’ve mostly stayed to the coast and haven’t seen a single-goddamn-boat, but by all means- where do we go now?” Sat in silence with a frown, Marta’s eyes take to the side as her ears listen into the distance for the same gunshots that she’d managed to evade, only for her mind to wrap around that cause for concern as a solution rather than something to evade. “We’ll take one” the woman replies, her eyes widening out of newfound hope as the group listens, playing along with her line of thought, “these people followed me in boats. All we need to do is go where they are and take one of theirs.” Letting out a laugh as Elsie chuckles along with him, Jules presses the back of his head against the window he uses to rest his back against as he looks to the sky. “Oh yeah, that’s fucking golden!” the man chirps, lifting himself off the sill before walking to the opposite side of the room, listening to the dead eagerly press their teeth together with patience, waiting for the subjects they set their sights upon to emerge from the other end. “You flew away from home to buy our friends time from the same super dangerous people that you now want us to rob” Jules responds, shaking his head in dissatisfaction as he continues to laugh, “man, I can see why Lou ran off in the first place- you’re living in a fucking fantasy world!” Standing off the bed, Marta stands her ground in confrontation, stepping up to the man’s face and daring him to present her with something better. “Alright dipshit, you tell me a better plan then!” Marta responds, lashing back at the man with the same attitude he’d given to her since their informal introduction. “You tell me where to get a boat, and- in response- I’ll ask why you haven’t done that yet” the woman continues, met with the silence that Jules presents her with, listening to what she has to say before speaking, “unless we go out and take one for ourselves, the rest of you aren’t getting to that island.” “Girl, there’s no way we-” Elsie begins to respond, immediately barked at in the same way Jules had found himself moments earlier. “Marta! Marta is my fucking name- use it!” the girl exclaims, watching Elsie throw her hands up in surrender before she can finish speaking. “Fine! Marta, there’s no way we take one of their boats if they’re as dangerous as you’re making them out to be!” the woman shouts back, only furthering riling up the dead that await just outside. “Then just fuck off already! There’s no point in waiting around in Vancouver for the guys you left behind on the island. Just give up and fuck off!” Marta shouts back, getting in the woman’s face- her nose practically touching that of Elsie’s own as she speaks, “leave Lou behind! Leave Jenn behind again! Leave Lee and Theo behind, and just fuck right off!” “At this rate, it sounds like the only reasonable option you’re giving us!” Jules shouts back, again re-earning Marta’s attention as her face now gets close to his, her voice keeping the same shouting pitch. “Then fucking take it! Give up on Lou ‘cause you’re not willing to put your life on the line for him, but don’t think for a single-fucking-second that he’d leave you behind!” the woman screams, forcing Jules to fall silent just as the rest of his group does, scolded a new arsehole. Gasping for each breath amidst the silence, Marta finds herself fuming with anger overwhelming even what Jules had presented her with earlier- disgusted with the response she receives from those Lou had propped up on such a pedestal. “Don’t you think it would’ve served Lou well to just give up on finding you, huh? To just sit down and think ‘fuck off with the rest of them’!?” the girl continues to shout, redirecting her attention from the man across her to each soul she shares the room with. “He’s literally said- word for word- ‘I’m not trying to get attached’. He’s refused to accept me- or my family, or my friends- because he refuses to give up on you” Marta continues, backing her way up to the door, which she presses her back against as the group watch on, allowing her to continue to shout as the dead beyond her back grow louder and more hostile. “Think of the things Lou’s done to keep you guys safe- to make sure you stood a fucking chance! Take a good, long fucking look at what he’s done for you” Marta commands, watching the group muster the expressions of disheartened resentment and regret for themselves, “he’d put his life on the line for -any-fucking-one of you if he had to. So- ask yourselves- why the fuck won’t you do the same for him?” With his head hung, Terry stares at the ground in silence as the rest of the group responds in their own way- Jules peering to the corner of the room whilst Elsie stands in silence and Josie begins slowly walking in circles. “Fuck it, you’ve known the guy for years and I’ve only known him for a couple of weeks, so-” Marta concludes, shrugging her shoulders as her face scrunches, her expression bitter toward the people she’s discovered let her down greatly, “what the fuck do I know anyway?” Shaking her head, Marta turns her back to the same people she leaves her argument off with, turning her sights toward the door as she wraps her hand around the knob, turning it to let one of the dead in before stabbing it through the eye, closing the entrance as quickly as she’d propped it open. Collapsing to the ground with a visible wound to his socket, the corpse comes to a rest on its stomach as the woman’s blade plunges into its back, ripping its flesh open with a sickening tear. “How the fuck are we gonna do this then?” Terry finally asks aloud, breaking the silence as all eyes fall upon him, the girl’s following much the same suit as she rips her blade from the monster’s back. “Yeah, are we sneaking up on them or going in guns-blazing?” Josie doubles down, splitting off from the pessimistic ideology the others in her group present to side with their newest comrade. “Woah, woah woah- are we seriously just jumping head-first into this?” Jules wonders aloud, turning his sights back to those in his group as Marta returns to cutting at the undead ravager, “we’re not gonna consider any other way to get over there?” “What other way?” Josie responds, stepping past the man to join Marta in her vivisection of the carcass that lays before them, “I agree with you- we’re not just gonna find a boat somewhere.” Yet to fully throw herself into the plan presented, Elsie joins Josie in keeling before the corpse as the men stand behind, watching the argument unfold as the room beside the corpse is occupied. “Besides, we’re running out of time” Terry replies, joining Josie and Marta in their favour toward the theft plot, “once they realise this girl isn’t who they’re looking for, they’ll go back to the camp and- who knows what happens then?” Running his hand over his head, Jules turns around to face the other end of the relatively-clean studio apartment, his back turned to the man as he crosses his arms. “Alright, well then how are we actually gonna do this?” Jules wonders back, caving into the pressure as the final piece falls into place. “First, we cover ourselves in this shit and get out of this building unscathed” Marta replies, aiding the girls in prying open the corpse’s back, flooding the room with an undead stench that no amount of attendance can remove from the walls, “we follow the gunshots back to the coast until we find them. When we get there, we do as follows-” Dropping to a knee between the girls, Jules waits with the rest for Marta to continue speaking as he winces at the stench before him, the rummaging Terry produces through the nearest closet the only other noise to combat the undead. “We take account of the people standing guard. If they’re organised and smart enough, there will at least be some” Marta continues, a look of confidence worn across her face as Terry starts tossing clothes into a pile by the corpse’s side, “-that’s when we strike.” == RISE and REVOLT == “A chat?” Randal calls out, the pronounced drollery in his tone leaving a surface-level tension over the silence that proceeds after each word uttered, “you think this is the time for a chat?” His chin slightly downcast as he listens to the man’s voice, his clear inflexion carrying a deeply unimpressed and unmoved weight behind his intent, the once-dubbed ‘Silver Slayer’ replies in kind.
“I prefer it to senseless killing, yes” Lou answers, nodding to himself in approval of his own declaration as his face moves toward the side he knows the concerning group’s leader to be standing. “It’s only been a few months, but I’ve seen more than enough death that could’ve been easily avoided” the man continues, speaking from a place of honesty whilst still uncertain of where he expects these words to lead him. “You ought to start getting used to it then” Randal chirps back, continuing to stare through the dark, visibility-deprived forest without certainty over where the subject of his response occupies. “Believe me- I have been” Lou responds, nodding to himself as he continues to look ahead, managing to catch a glimpse of the rifle-wielding cover that he’s yet to entertain the presence of- their light skin shining in the moonlight as they quietly reposition themselves at a better angle. “I know you want our girl, but my question is why?” Lou continues, tightening his hold on the rebar pipe as he listens to the distant jostling of weapons as they move with the hands of the enclave’s armed force, “what’s in it for you?” Spitting a wad of saliva onto the muddy ground that sits at his feet, Randal continues to stare in the direction of his Oz-like contemporary, unable to see the man he shares the other end of a conversation with. “Revenge” the man declares, unable to see the man that hides within the near distance, but able to hear the audible chuckle that is taken from his vow. “Oh, come on- there’s got to be more than that” Lou replies, humoured by the insinuation that their motivation to kill is driven by such a petty purpose. “Why?” Randal questions back, shrugging his shoulders at the idea that his incentives aren’t adequate, “wouldn’t you want to go after someone if they killed people you cared about?” Parting his lips to respond, Lou falls silent for a moment as his eyes fall toward the ground, thinking quietly to himself as the distant man reiterates his question. “If someone threatened you- or threatened the people you cared about- wouldn’t you want them dead?” Randal asks again, waiting for a reply from the unseen reaches of the woodland’s ground, one that another few seconds pass before he begins to lose patience in. “Should I take that silence as a ‘yes’?” Randal concludes, calling out to the person that continues to leave him without an answer, the question refused and brushed away the moment the second voice finally replies. “Courtney isn’t a threat to you, and from what I’ve heard- you had it coming” Lou responds, removing the point of his rebar staff from the mud as he presses his back into the tree he stands behind the cover of, “you sent those pricks out to kill her, didn’t you?” “We sent ‘those pricks’ out to take her goddamn island, that’s what we did” Randal replies, making his end of the story clear and well-understood. “We were running low on the shit she needed, and we knew she’d cut us off if we didn’t take the island for ourselves” the man continues, unable to see the physical response Lou reacts with- his closely-parted eyelids joining his scrunched face as he tries his best to reason with the enclave’s point of view. “Whatever happened after that- I don’t have a clue of” Randal prepares to conclude, unwavering in his previously-established intent, “I know our guys didn’t come back. When we saw her paramotor fly out, we followed it here and started looking for places she’d camp out in. And it looks like we’ve found it.” Pressing his teeth together, Lou stares off at the distance- peering through the darkness with the hopes of finding the figure at the preferred-end of the rifle, though he proves unlucky in his efforts. “Your people tried to kill her and she fought back in self-defence” the man responds back, continuing to try and reason with the group he still has yet to identify- but knows the true threat of, “they brought this upon themselves.” “Blood is blood, man” Randal replies, aiming his gun in the direction of the voice that speaks out to him, not intending to fire unless able to spot the man’s build from beyond the shroud of night, “you spill blood- your blood spills.” Shaking his head in vehement denial, Lou’s reply falls silent as the sound of falling rain and crashing thunder is joined by the whirring of fan blades in the sky, their travel from over the treeline and toward the strait bringing a silence over the altercation. “Goddamnit!” Randal exclaims, turning back toward his group and ushering his hand forward, redirecting his forces to the shoreline they’d initially landed on the island at, “go back!” Following their leader’s instructions, the army of well-armed enclave executioners rush back the way they’d arrived, their collective march splashing the water that’s collected in pockets of the destroyed path, its dirt turned to slushy mud. Staying to the rear of his group, Randal remains in place for a moment, looking back in the man’s direction with a look of anger overwhelming his face. “You may have thought buying your girl some time was the right call- it wasn’t” the man declares, again aiming the barrel of his weapon into the woodland’s density, “after we kill the girl, we’re coming back for you- all of you.” His objectives- both current and future- established, Randal vanishes into the darkness as quickly and soundly as the rest of the enclave does, taking to the seas just as they had prior to their arrival. Aware of the cleared coast, Lou dashes from his cover and sprints through the forest, trekking through mud and dousing himself in the dirty water that each puddle splashes upon his person as he hurries through the break in obstructions, entering an open field mostly void of its residents. “Who the hell let Courtney fly off!?” the man barks, his eyes immediately falling upon Lee and Theo, who- alongside a small band of armed guards tasked with the perseverance of the camp’s ground- join the rest of Lou’s group. With his hands out, Sebastian speaks calmly to an irate Adrian, who simmers as he stares at him prior to the one-armed survivor’s return, which draws his attention solely upon their physical reunion. His question still left unanswered, Lou continues to stare at the small collection in silence as another pair of boots approach from behind him, rejoining the camp as the voice they belong to calls out for a reply of their own. “Who the fuck took my paramotor!?” Courtney exclaims, her arms thrown outward- her dominant hand holding the rifle that had spared the self-appointed negotiator more of an issue than the one he’d had. With wide eyes, Lou turns back to Courtney at a loss for words, stunned by her appearance momentarily before he glances back toward the small crowd, a few seconds passing until his mind gathers the information that’s yet to be spoken to him. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me” the man remarks, his head tilting to one side as it pulls back, a look of disbelief worn across his visage as the rebar staff’s point sinks back into the mud. = RISE and REVOLT is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series from Season 1 onwards belong to Zachary Serra and the entity of Pacer1 = Though the sky begins to lighten, the sunlight of a new day hides behind yet another set of dark, grey clouds. Over the Strait of Georgia, waters appear frosty- yet calm, moving with the flow of the wind and the touch of each heavenly droplet from above before running into the frozen tide that sits along the coastline, unbroken and undisturbed. Flying well above the domineering skyline, the hijacking paramotorist soars toward the towers that comprise the skyline of downtown Vancouver, sheepishly tugging on the strings to her parachute in an effort of descending closer toward ground level. Nervously hovering over the air and through the slots between various office buildings and residential apartments, the woman turns back toward the coast with a look at the ground below- littered with an unspeakable amount of rotting corpses. With a glance toward the seas, the semi-distinguishable outline of a fleet of boats making their way toward the mainland presents the woman with a predicament- forced to land in spite of having struggled to even get off the ground in the first place. Aware of the necessity that calls, the girl takes her time in forming a plan, eying an opening to take her opportunity from and seizing upon it. Back toward the coastline, the girl lowers herself toward the wet sands of the city’s beachfront and lifts her legs, grimacing as she prepares to make contact with the ground for the first time since her departure from the island. Slowed to a manageable speed, the girl’s feet drag into the ground and kick up each sopping grain as the rest of her body follows suit, dragging along the soaked dunes as the parachute carries her a few extra metres, the slight tumble an easy price to pay. Covered by the bright fabrics that gently fall from the sky to cover her, the girl ruffles her way through the covers and strips the motor from over her back, freeing herself from the restraints that had kept her in the air amidst her travels. Back upon solid ground, the woman’s eyes take back to the skyline that she’s faced with for the first time since the world fell into disrepair, a sigh of relief coming over Marta as she takes in what had dawned upon her whilst airborne- she’s on her own. | “How could you let this happen!?” Adrian exclaims, shouting at Lee as the younger man holds his hands up in refusal. “I had nothing to do with it” the camp’s leader replies, standing beside the table that Sonya tends to Norman upon, a look of concern still carried in his face over the man’s condition. “Adrian, listen to me-” Sebastian pleads, trying to speak reason into the man that he understands has every reason to react in this way. “What!? What Sebastian!?” Adrian exclaims, his hands thrown out as he steps in the man’s face, refusing to believe the man’s words can bring any sense of reason into the situation at hand. “Nobody let this happen!” Sebastian responds, speaking louder from his initially calm tone of voice in order for it to process within the enraged father’s mind, “No one knew she took the paramotor until she was airborne- at that point, it was too late.” “Well somebody had to have seen her walk off with it!” Adrian shouts, trying to find someone to blame before his eyes fall upon Lou, the finger he points toward the man accompanied by a curious look and a lowered voice, “did you plan this?” “He walked into this camp asking which one of us let Courtney fly off- of course he didn’t plan this” Jenn responds from beside Theo, having sought out the only pair of faces having been familiar to her for longer than a few hours. “If anything, Lou would’ve had me fly off” Courtney doubles down, knowing the man well enough at this point to understand his sensibilities, “I’m sure he’s more confident in Marta going out there than the rest of you, but he’d have asked me first.” “They’re right, I didn’t know she was gonna do this” Lou responds, his answer prompting Adrian to sink his head and turn away, giving up on being confrontational as he sets his sights on the distant corners of camp. “But, if I’m being honest, it might’ve been a good thing that she was the one that went” the man continues, prompting the father to set his sights back toward a person he can consider close enough to call an ally. “I’m sure the rest of you could learn if you needed, but Marta already knows how to make a gorecoat” Lou explains, trying to make his own peace with the circumstance at play, “if my friends are in Vancouver, she’ll walk with the dead until she finds them. At that point, she’ll have people skilled enough to watch after her just like we do.” “That’s not the fucking point, Lou” Adrian replies in a much calmer- yet still agitated- voice, “my little girl’s out there- in Vancouver- all on her own with these fucking lunatics thinking she’s Courtney.” “They won’t be able to find her amongst the dead. As long as she can land the thing- which isn’t that hard- they’ll never pick her out from the crowd” Courtney responds, taking over the defensive end of the conversation from Lou, “if Lou says she can handle herself, I believe him. Since that’s the case, we need to start figuring out what we’re gonna do when these people come back for round two.” “Round two?” Theo questions back, curious as to what’s meant by such a thing as he looks toward his one-armed friend, whose head bows with a subtle nod as the woman speaks. “They think he went out there to buy me time to escape- not to negotiate for peace” Courtney explains, jutting her chin in the man’s direction before returning her sights to the camp’s leader, “he made it very clear he was coming back to take out the rest of us when the job was done.” “Is there something you’re not telling us?” Rudy wonders aloud from the huddled-together group, standing just beside his daughter as she tends to the wounds Norman wears. “I don’t want to imply that I don’t believe you, honey- but these people seem hell-bent on killing you” the man responds, trying to rationalise with what he does- and still doesn’t- know, “I’m sure there’s more to this world that I’m not familiar with yet, but it seems like more trouble than revenge is worth.” “I told you exactly what happened” Courtney replies, speaking from behind Lou as his chin lowers toward the ground, eyelids pressing closer together than they usually do as Sebastian takes notice of this expression. “We were supposed to make a trade, they tried to ambush me, and I killed both of them” the woman continues to speak, the rest of the group watching in utter silence as Sebastian alone continues to single out the man across from him, “that’s the story.” Amidst silence, the group sits with their own thoughts as they look at each other, only two pairs of eyes directed elsewhere- the ones of the young veteran and the older novice. “What is it, Lou?” Sebastian asks aloud, the question prompting his peers and superior to let their eyes venture into the man’s direction, his gaze still held toward the ground as the question that lingers on his mind is given the floor to be heard. “You never really told us who these people are” Lou answers, finally lifting his sights from the ground as he turns back toward Courtney, a suspicious look in his eyes carried as his pupils drift toward the woman that stands behind him, “what kind of people are we dealing with?” Courtney’s parted lips reuniting with each other as her eyes collide with Lou’s, the man’s suspicions- just based on the certainty he’s carried himself with in the group’s presence- prompts his peers to join him in curious wonder of what truth has yet to be spoken. As her eyes fall for a moment, the woman attempts to speak before Lee’s voice interjects itself into her reply, his concerns taken to the man that still bleeds heavily beside him. “What’s wrong, Norman?” the man asks, taking the hand that the older gentleman lifts toward him, a look of great pain written across the soldier’s grizzled face. His every breath long and drawn-out, the white-haired, battle-tested survivor looks his much-younger, but well-respected leader in the eyes as he shakes his head. “Talk to me, man- what’s wrong?” Lee asks again, lowering himself to a knee beside the table-bound patient, his hand taken between the wounded’s two. “Just get it over with” Norman calmly requests in between breaths, unable to speak further before being forced to take in another gasp. “Just- just- what? Get what over with?” Lee replies with genuine confusion, feeling the weight of Theo’s hand lower itself upon his shoulder without a clue as to why. “The pain. Just make it stop” the soldier replies, watching the hopeful expression remain upon his superior’s face. “We’re trying, man- we’re trying! Sonya’s doing her best to get you up and-” Lee responds, watching the man’s head shake in refusal before he can finish his thought. “I’m just gonna weigh you down if they come back” Norman speaks through a sigh, pausing mid-breath to gather as much air as he can, “besides, man- it hurts too much.” His hopeful look expensed, Lee shakes his head in refusal, his mind taking to words which offer encouragement, only to find an entirely opposite expression on Sonya’s face upon glancing up. In silence, the woman’s bloody hands release a pair of disinfected pliers from her grasp as her eyes turn toward her employer, their dejected, defeat-stricken appearance rendering whatever he’d intended to say bleak and fruitless. With whatever strength he can muster, the gravely-wounded patient squeezes Lee’s hand tighter in an effort of regaining his focus without having to speak, the look of acceptance more than apparent in his face. “Let me go out honourably, sir” Norman pleads, making himself comfortable with the moments he knows to be amongst his last, the bleeding having worsened to the point that his teeth wear red stains. A deep breath escaping his lungs, Lee’s shoulders fall as he looks to the man’s expression, his mind having to slowly quell itself to support the request brought upon him. Sitting with his own thoughts for a few moments in silence, the camp’s leader presses his lips into a smile and lets out a sombre nod, obliging the plea for mercy being made of him. Grimacing, Theo takes in a deep breath as he readies his rifle, letting his friend return to his feet and give him the signal to follow through before stepping forward. “Take care of these people, Lee” Norman asks, wishing the best upon the souls he’s taken upon himself to serve the duty of protecting as his final proclamation. “I will do all I can, Norman” Lee reassures, stepping away from the man’s side to allow his new lead-commander the floor, looking away from what he knows must be done. “I hope there’s a warm bed wherever I’m going-” Norman remarks, pressing his eyes shut as Theo presses the rifle to the side of his head, “-I could sure use a nap.” *pop* Filled with silence, the air grows as cold as the winter chill that runs over the camp, its only source of warmth coming from the drops that fall from the cloudy skies ahead, fitting the mood that comes over the group perfectly. His face souring, Theo looks back to Lee as the camp’s leader seethes to himself, both expressions noticed fully by the rebar-wielding survivor that watches them from nearby, his silence following suit with the rest of his group- who watch on respectfully. | Crowded around the entrance to an old apartment complex lobby, the withered, element-stricken bodies of the undead horde together en mass, staring through the glass exterior the building gives them full view through. Completely surrounding the doors, the dead slam their fists against the window, the chill that comes over Vancouver preventing them from moving with enough force to make any real impact, forcing them to watch what unfolds within. Pulled inwards, the building’s doors part at the hand of the figure which provokes such interest, granting the undead entry that- after such fierce demand- they refuse when provided. Inspecting for themselves momentarily, the dead stand by the open entrance to the residential tower for a few seconds before opting to disperse, walking off through the streets of Vancouver as if never captivated for even an instant and taking much of the horde with them. Parted in two directions like the Red Sea, the army of undead figures continue about their day as the true source of their intrigue steps through the building’s glass facade, armed with a pistol in one hand and a blade in the other. The light grey hoodie that she’s splattered with the muck of a gutted corpse that lies in her wake on the complex’s lobby floor just beside her borrowed paramotor, Marta steps into the streets as if she had spent her entire life walking them. Though faced with a light rain, the girl’s composure remains in cheque, her undead-like stroll through the area carrying her wherever the dead roam, her hopes of blending in as if she were one only rising higher as gunshots fire off in the distance, their proximity to the coastline installing a slight worry within her. Continuing along her venture, Marta proceeds onward as she makes her best effort to drown out the sounds of live rounds, each shot emanating from the same place, though sounding closer to the girl than the ones that come before it. Driven toward the noise, the dead that the girl walks with begin to pass her by, intrigued more by the possible presence of survivors than they are by aimless wandering. “Aarrgghh” one particular corpse groans, leant against the side of a building with his head down- almost as if he were just another deceased body- until the firing bullets provoke him into action. With more life than those he joins the ranks of, the undead corpse stands to his feet and begins walking quickly toward the fray, locking eyes with Marta momentarily as she stops in her tracks, shocked at the tenacity of this one corpse in comparison to his peers. As if unaffected by the cold, the corpse simply takes note of the girl’s presence and marches on, eventually bringing himself to the point of a full-on run once a variety of gunshots begin to sound off in unison. Stood out in the open with the dead marching in her direction, Marta watches another few corpses spring to life from rather docile positions, prompted to act at the sound of life that brings them into an equal sprint to the one corpse that had stunned her so greatly. Soon surrounded by an army of the dead with a few running corpses spaced out well enough, Marta finds herself unable to move forward without brushing shoulders with those she wishes to remain invisible to- her problems only beginning there. Picking up in ferocity, the light grey clouds overhead that produce a light drizzle begin to roll out in favour of darker ones, the sound of distant thunder joining the amplified rain that- within seconds- becomes a full on storm. Pelted with each drop that she stands beneath, Marta finds the light grey colour of her sweatshirt darkened as her clothes begin to soak, the gore that she’d smeared herself in beginning to run just as any grime would. Aware of this, Marta’s eyes take back to the dead that surround her, noticing a few side-eyes paid on the undead’s behalf, almost as if they’d begun to question whether or not her veil was just that- protection from being discovered as one of the living. Her time already limited as it is, the girl’s decision presents itself as one of immediate-necessity, the call one to be made now. Her eyes wide and sights set on the surroundings she can spot between each body that surrounds her, Marta crafts a plan within her mind and assures herself of it, sparking the fire that her survival depends upon. Swiping her hand through the air, Marta drives her blade through the skull of the one corpse that stands in her way and reveals herself to the horde, stripping the knife from the corpse’s head as she clears herself a path to the other end of the street. Sought after by both the element-stricken undead and the fresh bodies that solidify their numbers, Marta dashes across the open road and runs her shoulder into the chest of each corpse she can get away with mowing over, pursued by the rest that spot her out from the crowd. Firing a bullet through doors locked with a chain through their handle, Marta sprints through the shattered glass to another residential complex and bolts for the nearest set of stairs, relentlessly chased by four fresh, able-bodied zombies in addition to the horde that slowly follows along. Gasping for each breath, the girl dashes through the building with her sights simply set on finding the next route forward, disregarding where it leads as long as it buys her time. Though fast herself, Marta’s stamina begins to wane in ways the dead’s simply don’t, forcing her to accept the fact that the ability to evade those that follow her has an expiration. Wishing to extend her allotted time for as long as she can muster, the woman turns her back to the path ahead in favour of tackling the situation head-on, a stand taken against those that mindlessly wish to do her harm. Far ahead of his peers, the first zombie turns the corner Marta now faces, her firearm aimed at the corpse she knows herself to have on chance at. His growls bouncing off the tight walls of the corridor he sprints through, the undead monster shows his teeth to the young woman as he closes the distance between them, throwing himself forward as a bullet rips through his skull, striking him dead before his teeth have the chance to sink into the survivor he wishes to feast upon. Driven to the ground beneath the inadvertent shoulder tackle the flying corpse lays on her, Marta collides with the hallway’s carpeting as the pistol flies from her hand, the collision knocking the wind out of her with the worst timing. Struggling for her breath, Marta’s eyes widen farther than they had upon realising the gorecoat strategy would prove futile beneath the heavy rain, the inability to catch her breath only adding to the impossible task ahead. Able to hear the thud of rushing footsteps from just overhead, the disarmed, breathless woman tries to wriggle out from beneath the corpse before she can pull in even a sliver of air, her hand reaching out for the firearm at her side as the remaining corpses draw near. Unable to process anything more than her need to fight for each second, Marta’s hand continues to extend toward her firearm as the people whose footsteps she’d heard overhead sprint past her, driving their weapons into the zombies that remain as if it were easy work. With the swing of their tomahawks, a pair of women down the first two corpses as a third survivor- a black man whose face the breathless girl does not recognise- puts down the final corpse with a kitchen knife. Yet to process that she’d been spared certain doom, Marta continues to reach her hand toward the firearm as her lungs finally expand with a fresh gasp of air. “Get her up, come on!” one of the two girls from before- this one a blonde, white girl with braided hair- exclaims to the fourth man that stands above the downed survivor, his hand taking Marta’s outstretched palm into his own as he pulls her from beneath the weight of her first kill. “Is she bit?” the second girl- a dark-skinned woman with hair cut purposefully short- asks aloud, the answer uncertain as of yet, all their spared fifth friend can answer with being an exasperatedly-shaken head. “No? You’re saying you’re not bitten?” the man helping her up asks, setting her against the wall as he tries to keep her up, his face- also dark-skinned and drained of energy through what appears like many sleepless nights in a row- as unfamiliar as the rest. “No” Marta gasps, struggling to catch every breath as the mechanisms to her weapon shake with the rest of the gun just across the corridor from her. “Woah, everyone move!” the fourth, heroic, dark-skinned man- having joined the two girls in their undead-killing just seconds prior- exclaims, aiming the woman’s own gun at her head and forcing the rest of his group to pull apart. “Woah, man! What the fuck are you doing!?” the braided-hair, white woman exclaims, the only voice to call into question her friend’s out-of-character behaviour. With a stern voice, the subject of her inquiry looks back to her, staring at her in the eyes as his hold on the weapon grows stiff and unwavering, his finger ready to pull the trigger if prompted by the actions of their as-of-yet untrusted new friend. “This is Halston’s gun” the pistol-wielding man replies, bringing an eerie silence over the rest of his group as their eyes take toward his direction, inevitably returning to the puzzling survivor they’d happen to cross paths with. Taken aback by the revelation, the man who’d helped the young woman to her feet now looks at her with bewildered eyes, unsure of what to think as his lips grasp to speak the first question that comes to mind, unable to consider any other of equal importance. “Who are you?” the man asks, watching the woman meet his eyes with an equally-flummoxed visage all of her own, almost as if wondering the same thing herself. == RISE and REVOLT == |
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