Rakdarian awoke with a gasp, the previous night's terrors quickly sealing themselves within the recesses of his mind. He rubbed his eyes as he looked around his surroundings, still not quite used to the almost militarized fashion in which his new group lived their life. He was in a corner, as he looked across at the room. Bunk-beds lined the wall next to him, by the wall there was an armory of sorts holding sledge hammers, a few lawnmower blades welded to makeshift handles reminiscent of a Shishkebab from the Fallout series, several shotguns, a couple of baseball bats and even an army issue machine-gun.
"Hey, you should get up and get your rations for today before all the good stuff gets taken. I heard they're serving split pea and ham soup," Said Khamisi, the kid who found Rakdarian.
"Yeah thanks," He said while standing up, trying to shake the dark shadows from his mind.
Rakdarian moved to walk out grabbing his shotgun and machete, picking up a small pouch of 12 gauge rounds. He walked out of the makeshift barracks into the main area of the Wal-mart he lived in. As he walked by, the conversations dwindled to silence as everyone warily looked at him. All of this went completely passed Rakdarian as he walked towards the remains of the food court.
"Hey," Said a voice behind him. Rakdarian turned to see Tanaka, the leader, sheriff, and general hold-togetherer of the wary group of survivors. .
"Yeah?" Rakdarian replied turning around to look at Tanaka. He wore a carefree grin that didn't quite reach his eyes, at his waist there was a double barreled shotgun with a really short barrel across from a makeshift sword made from scavenged lawnmower parts. "What do you need from me?"
"I need you to go on a Scav run. I know you did it last time but you're the best at it, and right now we are really low on food." he replied in a tone that brooked no argument.
Rakdarian sighed, exasperated. He looked at the stores of canned goods in front of him, noting that there were several piles that stood almost as tall as he was. Enough to last a few weeks at least. However, Tanaka's word was law here. Finding food wasn't very hard, if you knew where to look. But feeding a group of eleven people for an extended period of time with no reliable way to store food was hard and severely limited what one could take. And heat drying food brought on The Swarm. "Alright, I'll be back by tonight." Rakdarian walked to the fortified entrance. The heavy shelves lining the two entrances together into a kind of hallway that doubles back and forth on it. It had two gates, one leading into the kill zone and the second one headed outside.
He walked out to the parking lot where stripped cars lie rotting in the hot desert sun. Rakdarian put on his black baseball cap and began walking into town, grabbing a cart on the way out,Placing his shotgun in it within easy reach. "This is going to be a long day."
Tanaka and the others watched him leave. He had a guarded look on his face. He turned to the others and said. " Now we need to discuss our little problem."
******
A few hours later Rakdarian came across a part of The Swarm, It Looked like a walking corpse, with its putrefying flesh almost falling off as it shambled forth. An eyeball hanged from one of its sockets, and you could see the corpses broken teeth through the holes in the cheeks. There was a gurgling sound as it turned to face me. When it focused on the teenager It let out a strangled braying call.
"Fuck!' Rakdarian cursed as he pulled his machete from the leather holster on his back, he rushed the braying zombie, brandishing his shining blade, the blade ate through the flesh of the zombie, hitting its ribs with a satisfactory crunch. The denizen of The Swarm tried to scratch him. Rakdarian ripped the blade from the torso of the decaying body and brought it down on the being's arm severing it cleanly, black tar gushed out of the stump and from its chest, Rakdarian spun and hacked at the creatures neck, cutting halfway through before he pulled it out and hit it on the head breaking open the brittle skull, splattering his arms with gore.
Rakdarian wiped down his machete making sure to use the cloth from the now all-the-way-dead creature. And he moved to sheath the blade when he heard a deep guttural roar echoing on the empty streets. "Goddamn it!" He sheathed the blade and pulled the police issue shotgun from the basket, he pumped the shotgun and prepared to meet a brute.
It came around the corner from an alleyway. A ridiculous amount of putrefied muscle covered it, blood stained the area around it's mouth where it's teeth were as sharp as steak knives. It bellowed an angry roar as it rushed toward Rakdarian with a near orgasmic glee, running on all fours. Rakdarian raised the shotgun and fired. The shot rang out clear and a dozen lead balls flew from the barrel at near the speed of sound. They ripped through the face of the brute knocking him back, and spraying viscera everywhere.. Rakdarian Pumped the shotgun again when the brute leaned forward. The pellets missed his head and tore into his right shoulder tearing free several pounds of putrescent flesh . pushing him back further. Rakdarian pumped the shotgun a third time as the creature roared in rage and sprinted towards him. Rakdarian aimed the hand-cannon at the beasts head as it closed in and at the last possible moment pulled the trigger. The Lead pellets tore through the head at near point blank range, exploding the skull and flinging desiccated brain matter and skull fragments in all directions.
"And stay fucking dead." Rakdarian panted, trying to shake off the jitters of the adrenaline rush.
He turned around to grab his cart which was half full and looked at the scavenged supplies. A few cans of fruit, some dried meat and a large bag of raisins. A very lucky catch. He opened the bag of dried grapes and grabbed a handful and stuffed them into his mouth, relishing the semi-sour flavor. Noticing that it was getting dark he started walking back.
When Rakdarian returned Mike, one of the guards was there to meet him. When he noticed the dried fruit he said "Are those raisins?"
"Not now Mikey, I am so not in the mood."
Rakdarian pointedly ignored Mike as he put the new additions to the food stores. Which he noticed were almost full. "That's odd..." He muttered, remembering what Omisha had said. " He shrugged it off, you can never have too much food.
Omisha came upon behind Rakdarian "Hey, you're back" There was almost a sneer in his voice. Rakdarian jumped.
"Sheesh, are you trying to give me a heart attack?"
"Sorry about that, So me and the rest of the others had a meeting while you were gone"
Rakdarian wasn't liking where this was going, "and what, pray tell, was this 'meeting' about?"
"Well, we deci-" His decision was put on hold for the moment by the alarm going off.
"MASSIVE SWARM ATTACK EVERYONE PREPARE FOR BATTLE!" is what was shouted by the sentry.
"Guess you'll have to tell me later," Rakdarian scowled and ran to the gates. There were several thousand zombies. All in the parking lot advancing to the gates. Rakdarian pumped his shotgun, and grinned. He fired upon the advancing horde killing a couple front-liners. He continued firing, tearing into the faces and torsos of each advancing zombie. When he ran out of shells he turned to retreat. Only to discover, to his horror, that the shelves were moved to prevent access. Meaning he couldn't retreat.
"Fuck you guys!' Rakdarian screamed as he was brought to tears at the prospect of dying. He was on the edge of panic. "I will let the fear take me for five seconds, then it will be gone. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1." the zombies were almost upon the outer gate. " I'm not going to die without a fight." He reloaded his shotgun. The zombies were advancing in a ring. He fired again. And again. Eleven more times. He put the strap across his body, letting the gun drop. He drew his sword, and then leaped over the barricade. Letting out a battle cry he went into a frenzy.
Cutting, slashing, stabbing, he was a machine. Eventually he was surrounded. Beheadeding and dismembering anything that got close. Cut, Stab, behead, Dismember, repeat. Soon after he began to tire. He was grabbed and there was a flash of light. Everything went dark. 'So this is death' Rakdarian thought, as he drifted off.
A pinnacle of light shot from the sky, bringing the gory scene to a stark brilliance, blinding those who were cowering behind the walls. Heat fell from it in waves, as if from a furnace bellows. Then the lights were gone. And with it Rakdarian. In its place was a dark ashy spot where he fell.