The Dead World Ch. 01

Charlie brought her slim fingers up to twist her ponytail into a tight bun atop her head and secure it with a sharp pin before sliding her husband's beanie onto her head, and his second-favorite pair of goggles he used to wear when out on his motorcycle just overtop them. Finally she placed her fingers firmly inside of a pair of black leather gloves.

She hoisted the strap of his machete sheath firmly over her chest so that the weapon was easily accessed from her back, and hastily swung the pack over her shoulder. With one final glance over the suite she had called home for the longest time, her eyes dipped down to where the sleek silver band with its sparkling diamond center rested on her finger just beneath her gloves, and she whispered ever so gently to the essence of the room, "Goodbye..."

Her watch beeped twice. She just hit the fifteen minute mark. She had fifteen minutes to get whatever food she could carry and get down to the vehicle. Determination ablaze in her warm coffee colored eyes, Charlie rushed down the hall and back to the elevator, mashing the button down several times impatiently. She tapped her foot again, an anxious habit. The flutter in her stomach would not subside, churning as she tried to muster her courage for this moment.

So many bad things could come from leaving the resort. Even if she knew she couldn't possibly live there forever, the timing was awful—they were over the brink of the changing of seasons. The nights were growing colder and the leaves on the trees had been putting on their brilliant autumn display for a few weeks now. The world was surely an awful, fearful place. It was bad enough without the worry of starving, or freezing over winter. It was terrifying more than ever without Matthew.

The greatest joy in the world though was thinking that he might still be alive, and that he knew where she would go. He might have made it there, and could be waiting for her. Knowing him though, it was highly unlikely. He would have come back for her.

She often fantasized about situations in which he simply had been forced to leave the area and wait for her to arrive there. It eased the loneliness and pain so much more than thinking of what had become of him. He'd given her instructions, though... She was safe here, and so long as she was safe here he wanted her to stay put. At any point that changed, he wanted her to flee for the mountains. So that's precisely what she was doing.

She half jogged her way down the hall to the dining room, hurrying inside, ever so slightly winded with the pack on her shoulder. She abandoned the cigarette back just beyond the elevator, half smoked and burned out in her trembling grasp as she spaced out waiting on the lift and tried not to drag her mind down the dark paths of an unfortunate encounter with her uninvited guests. Nimble digits grasped the edges of the sack Matthew had prepared not long before his disappearance with the packaged rations they'd obtained at a military evacuation camp a few years ago. MREs were the longest lasting of the food items, and he had set them aside for a moment specifically like this one.

Charlie hurried the dolly out of the kitchen and loaded the sack on it with trained accuracy, as well as the remaining three cases of water stored for emergency evacuation. Now significantly slower than she had come down from her suite, she made her way out toward the greenhouse to gather a few fresh items and her seed case. Leaving the dolly just outside, Charlotte pushed aside the glass sliding door and disappeared inside, breathing fondly the warm moist air of her greenhouse certainly for the last time.

She hurried through the herbs, checking for the ripest vegetables that might last a while—the squash and cucumber were especially treasured this time of year. She plucked apples from the tree on the far side, pausing to stoop down and gather some of the soft soil in her hands before smearing it gingerly against her cheeks, hoping to further assume the appearance of a scrawny teenage boy rather than a gaunt, lone female.

She gathered both ripe and green tomatoes, dug out a ginger root and a few bulbs of garlic, and tossed them atop a bag of potatoes that she had harvested the week prior before loading all along with her service pack and duffle bag onto the dolly. Her last stop would be the armory. She fished the key from the right breast of her bra and placed it tenderly between her teeth, prepared to swallow it should she come across trouble on her way. The last thing she wanted to do was supply a group of unstable, violent lunatics the tools they needed to wage fresh hell and genocide on the last of humanity.

She didn't glance back at the green house as she hurried off as quickly as she could drag the loaded dolly with her, back into the northern tower, leaving it aside the utility elevator for easy access down into the basement garage. It had been a year or so since she had gone down.

The power in the first tower was spotty, so she prayed the damn elevator would still move. The second tower's electricity only went from the lobby level to the fifth floor, with how the generator was rigged. She and Matt had cleared the basement when they first got here before slowly working through the entire resort. It took a little over two weeks, a lot of patience and a lot of blood, sweat and tears. The garage had been the worst.

She was ever so hopeful it was still empty, and none of the dead had stumbled their way on down and gotten stuck there. After they cleared it... or rather, after Matt did, they moved the vehicles in case they needed to make a quick escape.

Charlie's gaze danced down the hall toward the foyer, the wall of luggage unmoved. It was eerily quiet with the exception of soft thumps and scratching from the very far end of the very long corridor... the trapped biter Matthew had left behind to draw attention that way. There were several of them on the first floor of the dilapidated building, and she knew which rooms each of them were in should she need to set it loose as a diversion.

She rushed to the storage room where the weapons were kept, slipped the key from behind her plush pink lips, and inserted it into the lock. She turned the handle, slowly... and all at sudden her head snapped to the right upon hearing the front doors being slowly pried open following the thunderous footsteps of the unfamiliar group entering the building. She dipped into the room in a rush, nervously and quietly closing the door behind her just as a powerful flashlight shined down the hall.

What followed was the rushed movement and echo of swiftly moving boots. Her breath caught in her throat, and she slowly backed into the supply closet, grasping the nearest weapon—a tactical shot-gun—and aiming the barrel for the door. She didn't know how to use the thing, but it was pretty self explanatory she figured, if just holding it wasn't threatening enough. Brace yourself, pump it, pull the trigger, repeat.

Daniel Castiglia was a thin, agile young man... he was also the youngest in the group. The very last one to join them in the winter of the first year after the end of the world. When they found Danny, he was chained to a steam pipe in the hideout of some particularly fucked up fellows with only a pair of old, muddy jeans on. His long dark hair was a wild mess. He was riddled with scars and fresh bruises and seemed more like a feral maniac than a human being. He had only been a boy when the world ended, and he grew up in the harshness of the dead world as man deteriorated into violent shadows of their former glory.

It just so happened though, through the hellish existence Danny lived, he was an impeccable forager—their very best. He acted the part of the scout because when it came to split second sweeps, soundless and effortless, he never failed them. He was always quiet... and for a reason. His tongue had been cut out by the people who bestowed upon him the title he most responded to.

"Dog."

He turned his dark brown eyes, almost black in the dim-lit dusty setting of the abandoned resort, upon his companion. He always said it weird. He really hated the way Ruthless said it, like he was staring down at something weak and inferior. Danny supposed the man said everything weird, and so he tried not to take offense. The older man spoke with a deep, commanding tone that sounded strained and foreign to Dog's ears.

"East. At your six."

A firm nod from the gaunt youngster and he moved down the corridor toward the soft tapping sound radiating from the end of the hall. The wild, shrill, melodic chaos of a guitar screeched in one ear from the ear bud placed inside while the other listened out down the empty hall—he could hear something moving, shuffling, bumping. Definitely dead and stuck. So far, so good... no horde of the walking dead waiting for them beyond the front door. As long as a group of survivors hadn't fallen to infection, ambushes of zombies inside of buildings were rarely a threat these days.

After so many long years since the outbreak the earliest victims were now weak, skeletal figures. Nothing but leathery decaying flesh suits shuffling around with rotting clothing hanging from their bones. They could barely move, they could no longer see, and did not hear well at all. Scent was about the only thing they had left to go by but even if they wanted to, there would be no running or lunging at anything anymore. It would take a lot of them to cause any serious damage. But it could just as easily be a trap the freaks who had taken this place left for them.

The Dog hurried down the hall, keeping tight to the dark wall with the very tall, muscular blonde man at his back. They checked each room quickly, and moved along when nothing was found. Both men were likely to use their close combat weapons rather than turning to the high powered rifles they carried. They saved the bullets for real threats. Bowie knives, machetes, aluminum baseball bats and sledge hammers were far more efficient for clearing these days.

"Status check." The static stricken voice of Oz echoed gently in his ear piece from the radio attached to his hip.

"Everything good this way, da? Clearing east wing. No contact."

From her hiding place Charlie could hear the footsteps fade, and rapidly turned to grab all that she could—three rifles, with the shotgun swung around her back crossing the machete, two handguns, and several large knives. The slender, petite woman held her breath the entire time as she dipped out and set the weapons down gently atop her mountain of supplies, before quietly slipping back into the room. She grabbed as many boxes of bullets as she could, not at all certain which box belonged with which weapon, before rushing back with the dolly to the elevator. She pressed the button frantically while watching nervously over her shoulder. She just had to get to the garage... and then she was home free.

She was so close!

As the pair of men approached the door the tapping was coming from, Dog rapped gently on the heavy door, and they were met with a vicious guttural snarl. Ruthless nodded to the younger male who confirmed with a solid nod of his own head, and the larger man wriggled his knife into the space between the strike plate and the latch. He turned the knob slowly, stepping back for Danny to kick the door inward, hard, sending the rotter stumbling backwards and into the wall. She groaned lowly, almost pathetically, before lurching forward with a wild screech toward the men in the doorway. The dull thunk of the blade embedding in her skull caused him to cringe a bit internally. Dog yanked free the weapon and wiped it clean upon her tattered blouse, nodding back to Ruthless before silently mouthing the familiar word to him, 'Clear.'

"Clear on East, headed West. How are you looking?"

"There's another tower behind you... Beta team cleared the perimeter, Skully and I are checking the place out. Smells of smoke right here in the lobby. Stay on red, we got company. Rendezvous at the front in twenty."

"Roger that." The Russian man dubbed Ruthless by his peers spoke again in his deep soft accented tone, and tossed a glance to the younger man, who's mellow expression was as unreadable as ever. His fluid gait suggested he wasn't in the slightest worried, though. The lanky youngster turned to watch their back and cover his companion as they made their way back to the foyer, pausing for a moment to stoop down and swipe an opened pack of Marlboro Reds from the walkway aside what he assumed was a pile of rubbish near the elevator.

The long haired man ahead of him in his faded gray denim jacket tossed a look back his way, swinging his aluminum bat impatiently as the boyish young man rummaged through a few of the old suitcases piled there searching for a lighter.

"Bring your ass, Dog. Before you get us killed." Ruthless barked as quietly as one could expect from such a gruff man, pushing his long unruly locks out of his face. The heavy semi-automatic rifle strapped to his back wasn't liable to mean they'd be the ones dying should anyone decide to leap out and engage them, but all the same...

A devious grin was tossed his way before the Dog flicked him off, jogging back languidly to pluck a lighter from the dust covered valet desk before lighting the end of the stale cigarette and lazily trailing along after Ruthless to finish their sweep of the opposite wing... this hall was crowded with luggage. The scent of cigarette smoke escaped him as he puffed idly on his newfound treasure, not noticing that the "rubbish pile" by the elevator had vanished.

"Waste-a fuckin' time.. this is some bullshit, maaaan..." The sound of a hatchet striking thick rubber and deflating rapidly echoed into the empty parking lot. The man who had thrown the weapon retrieved it, wrenching it free in irritation before flinging it again with deadly accuracy at another. He growled low to himself, moving to grab the ivory handle carved from bison bone, giving a disapproving grunt to find the thick tire of the Jeep he'd embedded the weapon into didn't give so easy.

He continued to try and jerk it free, his growling turning to angry grunts, and when he finally ripped the hatchet free he turned it around and smashed out the window of the passenger seat and proceeded to pound his fist into the door until the metal dented, with each blow shouting out his frustration.

"WASTE-A..!" SMASH.

"—FUCKIN'—" SMASH! SMASH!

"—TIME—UGGHHHH! ARRRGGHHH!" His final scream echoed into the emptiness of the parking lot and road leading back toward the bridge, carrying over the cliffs behind them with the strong ocean breeze.

"Will you calm the fuck down?! Dude—calm... the fuck... down! Chill!" Lorenzo Morales rolled his eyes as he snapped at the man punching the car, causing him to turn on him sharply, drawing back the hatchet as if he meant to let it fly. A few tendrils of his wild, unruly hair—so light it was all but a silver-shine of blonde—had escaped the ponytail he had pulled it back into. Enzo brought his rifle up to his eye and aimed at Ricky's head quite in hasty retaliation, wrinkling his nose as he leered at him pointedly.

"Actin' like a fuckin' loonie-tune, ese!" Lorenzo sucked his teeth and lowered the weapon after a moment, and Ricky backed off accordingly as he mumbled under his breath, "Crazy ass..."

"This right here?!—THIS... is fuckin' stupid man! You calm down!—don't fuckin' tell ME to calm down! I'm not no fuckin' ESS-EYY, either—I'm fuckin' calm!" Sweat beading along his brow, the hatchet wielding man took a breath, moving to snatch a water bottle from the passenger seat of their vehicle. "See? Fuckin' calm as fuck..." He took a non too graceful swig from the bottle and threw it at his comrade. "..stupid ass."

"Man, shut up." The light Spanish accent lacing Lorenzo's voice seemed particularly sharp when he was irritated. The wild green-eyed man at his side was Ricky Thorne, their mechanic. They called him Slash... it really wasn't difficult to understand why. He was always a bit much to swallow, a bit too trigger happy, too vulgar and obnoxious... but he was reliable. He was loyal. He'd covered everyone's ass at least once since they came together, including his own.

Lorenzo, certain he wasn't much younger than Slash, was a tall, dark haired, caramel skinned man who happened to be enjoying his vacation from deployment. He was visiting his family in the States from Venezuela when everything went to hell, and happened upon the older of the brothers and the Russian gunman smack in the middle of the states... they had been seeking out the same community of survivors. It was a pity, there were only charred remains when they made it there.

Still, he kept himself relatively clean cut considering how few and far between shaves and showers could be... and even to the day found himself wondering if anyone he loved and knew were even still alive, across the sea. They had come to call him El Diablo. He wasn't really sure if it was just racist but it was definitely an ironic play on words... he was the closest thing to a hopeless romantic alive these days, and the farthest thing from a devil.

Slash shifted, slipping the hatchet into its holster, throwing his back against the military transport unit with a gruff huff of air. "YOU shut up... am I the only one who thinks this is fuckin' stupid?! This place is a fuckin' shit stack—It's done—been picked through already, man, it's obvious! Look at it!" He threw both hands up at the resort, with its shattered windows, and death threats painted all over the northern tower.

"Ain't nobody here, nobody's firing on us—there ain't shit here to fight for! Whatever crazy fuckin' assholes had this place are long gone... and we need to go too, before we lose a chance at a real fuckin' civilization. I'm tired of all this shit, man, scrounging around, moving around, going into stupid fuckin' death traps like this lookin' for leftovers. I wanna sleep in a fuckin' BED, not worryin' about some fucks comin' along and burnin' shit down, or lightin' my ass up in my sleep, ya feel me?"

"That's fuckin' everybody man... Oz ever led you wrong?" Ricky groaned and rolled his eyes, and Enzo reached over to punch him lightly. "I'm fuckin' serious."

"Naw, he ain't man, c'mon—shut up—he ain't never walked me into some shit... always getting me outta some shit...."

"He knows what he's doing. He wants to check it out, let him..." The radio buzzed,drawing the gaze of both men down to it as they listened to Oz relay their finding. Northern tower clear... Southern tower... suspect? The men glanced at each other, and continued to listen as he described the smell of smoke, bringing a rough grin to Ricky's face. "Somebody got cigs? Nice... worth a damn after all."

"Somebody's home. Not necessarily a good thing, ese... get your ass ready, in case we got a firefight comin' our way?" Ricky was already meandering his way toward the back of the vehicle as Lorenzo turned his gaze back toward the resort. It didn't even look like there was another building behind it from here.

"Yeaaaah, yeah... I got something for they asses."

"North tower clear. Empty. Heading back front."

"Roger that. We're pulling back. There's a greenhouse between the north and south towers, across from the pool house... Skully took a look. It's tended. No other signs of life though. Don't look so bad back here either—no graffiti or biters... probably just some quiet folks here, probably left Granny or Grandpa behind to keep an eye on things while they went hunting."

"Easy pickins then..." Ricky shrugged with a wicked grin, and Enzo shook his head disapprovingly.