" " =Speech

[ ]=Josh’s personal Thoughts

( )= Evans Personal Thoughts

{ }= Authors Notes

Chapter Three: Bearing down

Evan sat on the roof of the library with only his notepad, PSG1, ammo and army gear. *I need to get a list of things I’m going to need. * He thought as he ran his blue pen across the paper, loosely depicting a Hummer from above. He peeked over the edge and saw that he was pretty close to right with the proportions of the vehicle. *Durable tent. Coleman stove, butane, electric cords running from inside to up here, a multi-plug in thingy… outlet! That’s what they are called. An alternate way of getting down, a small fridge and freezer, stuff in the fridge and freezer, cigars, that comp I grabbed, an internet access plug-in. Umm… more ammo… new guns… * Evan thought as he tossed his four full clips beside his gun and lay down on the cold, hard cement. *Small sleeping bag, a light pillow. * He gazed up at the sky and thought of the destruction that had occurred only a day or two ago.

*This is crap. Stef doesn’t get the point. She hits on me and all I want is to see my girlfriend, hopefully alive. I have to distance myself from her. My chauvinistic routine only got me harsh looks from Josh and spit in my breakfast. Stupid Josh, thinks I didn’t notice. You’d think that once the majority of the civilization is wiped out systematically that girl problems would just fade. But nooo! They keep on coming back even after you start accepting the friggen holocaust that you are tossed into! * Evan took off his holsters and grenade belt and set them off to the side and just lay there for a while. After a bit Josh came up to see what he was doing.

"Good hunting?" He asked as he climbed up out of the hole Evan had put in the roof with a few well placed grenades.

"I guess." Evan said, still staring blankly into the sky.

"What’s up with you dude? You seem bummed as hell." Josh said, taking off his own weapons and placing them close to Evan’s.

"Stef. She is constantly hitting on me and trying to get close. I have a girlfriend. I don’t care about the possibility that she could be dead. I won’t cheat on her if there is even a remote possibility that she still lives." Evan breathed deeply. "I don’t think Stef understands that. She seems like one of those girls that is used to getting any guy she wants and having things done for her if she doesn’t want to do them or can’t."

Josh sat down beside Evan and shook his head. "No way dude. Stef is pretty self-reliant. I mean, she can hack, she can cook, and she can’t shoot a gun unless she is trying to castrate somebody. But she is not like what you just said."

Evan laughed. "I guess. Maybe I’m just over reacting because she was getting close. Oh yeah. I kinda want to sleep up here with some gear just to keep watch for any survivors and to continue my theory."

"Theory?"

"Yeah. I think that the disease that makes them zombies is eating them, or at least it does after they die." Evan said nudging his notepad towards Josh who picked it up and read Evan’s inferences and sightings.

"This kinda makes sense, but won’t you need a contained sample of the virus to properly study it?" Josh enquired.

Evan nodded. "Yeah, and that’s not going to be to hard. I just need to shoot a zombie’s legs and arms off and then watch it… in one of the glass showcase containers in the front hall of the library."

Josh shrugged. "Why haven’t you done that yet?"

Evan blushed slightly. "Cause I didn’t want to offend Stef or you." Evan sat up and scanned the street below.

Josh slapped his buddy lightly on the back. "I’ll run it by Stef. I kinda want to know what is going on too."

Evan smiled and watched his friend descend down his makeshift roof entrance. *Hmmm… the first stage of my experiment is set. I just need to get Stef’s permission… ugh… that makes it seem like I’m wiped hardcore! * Evan thought, sounding disgusted with himself. He shook the thought out of his head and put Stabbing Westward into his Discman and put on the earphones. He changed it to The thing I hate and waited for zombies to wander by, trying to find a meal in the rapidly decomposing female he had shot a short while ago. (Last chapter)

Josh jumped off the last rung on Evan’s ladder. *Man, Evan is pretty serious about distancing himself from Stef. I should probably warn her or Evan could get nasty. * With that Josh wandered into the Adult section where Stef had set up a makeshift kitchen, and bedroom for herself without any bedding because Evan neglected to get any on his last run. Stef turned away from a book she had been reading and waved to Josh.

"Hey Josh!"

"Hi Stef. Whatcha reading?" Josh asked sounding genuinely interested.

"I dunno, just some sci-fi book I snagged off the shelf." She said setting the book down on the floor beside her. "Um… when is Evan going to get off the roof? He was supposed to get bedding for everybody when he got the TV and everything."

Josh shrugged. "I don’t know. At the moment he is thinning the zombie population and trying to find out what is making them zombies."

Stef nodded. "Trying to find a cure."

Josh nodded in reply. "I hope he does… though he seems to be more interesting in what is making them decompose so quickly."

"Is he usually this thoughtful and aside from society?" Stef asked getting up.

"No, he is normally a… well… jerk… for lack of a better word."

"Hence the chauvinism before?"

Josh nodded.

"I want to go talk to him." Stef said moving past Josh who didn’t do anything to stop her.

"I’ll warn you now. He is kinda mad at you for getting close to him. He is really cut up about what is happening with his girlfriend." Josh warned as Stef approached the ladder.

"Thanks Josh." She said before climbing up to chat with Evan.

Evan hadn’t seen a zombie since Josh had left. The streets were quiet. He took note of this in his notepad. *The zombie population must be pretty thinned around here. * Evan thought as he popped the clip from his rifle out and slapped in a full one. He put a bullet into his last clip and set it beside his other three. He heard his ladder scratch against the rough cement and he turned around quickly to see Stef’s blonde head appear. He turned back around and when he figured that Stef would be mostly up he spoke. "Hey Stef." He said.

Stef smiled. She had seen him turn but decided to let him think that she hadn’t noticed. She put on a surprised face and sat down beside him. "How did you know it was me?"

Evan scanned the street below and shrugged. "Saw your blonde hair just over the cement and didn’t think that Josh had dyed his hair. At least not that blonde."

Stef smiled. *At least he’s honest. * "So, Josh told me you had a theory." She started, Evan pushed his notepad into her lap without her having to say another word. She read over the notes thoroughly. "This isn’t really a theory, it’s more a bunch of points and inferences." Evan tapped his cranium. "Ahh.. In your head." Evan nodded and kept watching the streets. "Not talking?"

"Concentrating actually. See the remains over there?" Evan said, pointing to the spot he had dropped the female zombie earlier.

Stef squinted. "Not really."

Evan moved over a bit and pointed to the scope on his rifle. "Take a look through there." He said. "It should be in focus."

Stef nodded and moved the scope shakily over to where Evan had pointed to earlier. Sure enough there was the decomposing remains of what appeared to be a human. "How old is this body?"

Evan shrugged. "Don’t have a watch, but I would guess maybe fifteen, twenty minutes since I killed it."

Stef moved the gun around, looking the body over. "Where is the head? Did it decompose faster?"

Evan pointed to a blood-covered wall just past the zombie’s corpse. "I think you can still see small bits of skull and grey matter on the wall."

Stef checked and but spotted nothing more than dried blood. "I don’t see any skull or any type of bump that would suggest brain matter or even bone."

Evan looked confused and jotted that down on his pad. "Weird. Perhaps that smaller pieces decompose quicker because there is less matter…"

Stef thought about that for a second. "Could very well be. But from your notes I’d say that you are trying to suggest that the whole body is affected equally by the virus."

Evan nodded in awe that she understood that much from his notes. "Yeah… but if this is true and my theory that once the body is dead then it begins to be eaten by the virus… then it must mean that…" Stef cut him off quickly.

"The majority of the virus infection is in the brain!" She finished Evan’s thoughts perfectly. She smiled and Evan smiled back.

*Maybe I judged her to quickly. * He thought as he set down his notepad after filing that portion of data.

"So are you going to get bedding for us all?" She asked sounding cute.

"Sure. Wanna come?" Evan offered. Stef nodded and Evan packed up his stuff and headed down the ladder, Stef close behind.

Josh sat in front of the 51" TV, a zombie in a different sense. He smiled as he made Mr. Whoopee moon jump in GTA3. *I love this game! * He thought happily as he preformed a drive by shooting in the middle of Chinatown. He broke out laughing as he turned on the ice cream truck music while delivering steaming lead to the civilians of the false city. He pressed pause as he heard Evan and Stef talking, but they were not yelling as he guessed they would be when Stef went up to ‘speak’ to Evan. He listened in for a second and heard the words, ‘cellular mutation’ and ‘viral reproduction’ and decided that Grand Theft Auto was more important. Evan peeked his head into the Children’s section of the library, in which the TV and just about everything else was located and called out to Josh. "Hey dude? Can I borrow the Hummer? Me and Stef have to grab bedding."

"No. You can use the snowplough." Josh said adamantly.

Evan smiled. "You forgot your guns on the roof." He said, the sound of a bullet entering the chamber of a Beretta heard slightly after.

Josh looked himself over and realised that Evan was right. He plucked the keys from his pockets and tossed them towards the door, mumbling about Evan being a chauvinistic bastard who should steal his own ride. Evan smiled and picked the keys off the floor. "Thank you Josh-san." He said with a small bow that Josh didn’t catch because he had turned back into a GTA3 zombie. "Your guns are just inside the room." Evan said, placing said weapons on a fold out table near the doorway and then heading out with Stef to get bedding and anything else they could think of.

They really didn’t need the Hummer to get to the furniture store, but Evan just wanted to piss Josh off, besides he didn’t want to carry three huge mattresses a few blocks with only Stef as his backup. Once they got into the furniture store the pair noticed that there was about four zombies staggering about inside the store. Evan nodded to Stef who drew the late Josh’s custom Magnum. Evan sighed deeply when he saw it but pointed to the nearest zombie and made a gun with his pointer finger and thumb and jerked the thumb down quickly. Stef caught on and fired a low shot, nailing the male zombie straight in the package. It moaned and Evan almost felt sorry for it. The zombie’s intestines started to spill out of the gaping hole that Stef had put in it and the zombie began to stumble towards the duo. It got maybe three steps before its own large intestine tripped it and it fell tangled in it’s own innards. Evan looked away and took out his Benelli. He walked up to the convulsing zombie and took its head off with a single shell. He then pointed to another zombie and made the gun motion with his free hand. Stef took aim and then looked at Evan who motioned for her to aim slightly higher. She did so and pulled the trigger, the bullet impacted with a wall just beside the zombie and drawing its attention towards the new hole in the wall. Evan smiled. ‘line it up more’ he mouthed. Stef caught on and tried again, this time sending the bullet thorough the back of the female zombie’s neck, shattering the spine. The zombie continued to stand for a few seconds, its head hanging limp and to the right, flayed flesh dangling from the left side of its neck. But in the end it fell, it’s head rolling around till finally coming to a stop beside a chesterfield. Evan felt proud that his ‘student’ was becoming more accurate and not wasting so many precious bullets. Stef took aim at another one of the zombies while Evan lined up the final one with his shotgun. They pulled the trigger at the same time, the explosion of the shells almost deafening the two living teens, the bullet and pellets finding their marks, the bullet passing through the head of the targeted zombie and the pellets riddling the upper torso and skull with holes and turning most of the skin in that area into ribbons. Evan flicked the safety on his shotgun and slung it over his shoulder. Stef fumbled with the safety on her Magnum and tucked it in her holster that she had acquired from the pile of gun accessories.

Evan and Stef split up to find the mattresses they wanted, choosing the best and most comfortable they could find and hauling them into the back of the Hummer. After that they walked around the store attempting to find a decent one for Josh. They settled on a queen sized one that was kinda lumpy but more comfortable than any of the others that hadn’t been splattered with blood. They shoved it on top of the Hummer along with the other two and Evan broke out the duct tape, fixing the mattresses to the top of the vehicle with little effort. The pair walked back into the store and grabbed three different sheet styles and plopped them in the back seat. Then they headed back to the library. The duo unloaded the mattresses with no zombie interventions. Josh put his bed in front of the TV; Evan placed his in the adult section in the middle of a square arrangement of comfortable reading chairs and the magazine rack, on which he placed the magazines he had snagged from the mall. Stef put hers as close to Evan’s as she thought he would allow, which ended up being beside the designated cooking area and bulky wooden tables.

Josh’s bedding was a plain black, Stef chose a red and blue swirl pattern and Evan took the remaining one, Powerpuff girls. The trio went to bed early that night, eating a quick meal of instant mashed potatoes and some instant chicken noodle soup.

Day three.

Evan woke up to the smell of bacon cooking. He sat up in his Powerpuff covers and smiled roughly at Stef who was moving some bacon around on the frying pan that Josh had gotten at some point. Evan really didn’t care. He was hungry. "Morning." He groggily addressed Stef who smiled, looking equally groggy.

"Bacon?" She asked, holding up a napkin in one hand and a few pieces of bacon on a fork in her other. Evan nodded and ate the meat slowly, watching Stef as she opened another pack of bacon so that she and Josh would have some.

"Is Josh awake?" Evan asked, the heat of the bacon taking away some of his fatigues.

"Nah. He was up all night playing Final Fantasy 10 I think it was." Stef said over the sizzle of the cooking bacon.

"Oh… that’s cool." Evan said finishing one strip of bacon and starting another. "Hey, how about you take a break from cooking and I’ll take over. You look tired."

Stef smiled and shook her head. "However bad I look, you look probably ten times worse." She said with a tired laugh.

Evan smirked. "Thanks. But suit yourself I guess." He paused for a second and thought about something. "Um… what are we going to do for showers or baths?" he asked Stef who shrugged in reply. "Hmm… I guess we could go get a bathtub and just boil lots of water to toss in and take turns."

Stef nodded. "Good thinking… but I’m going to want a shower at some point. Baths are good and everything, but I really will need to take a good old fashioned shower."

"Yeah, I know how you feel. I guess I could look up plumbing online and try to figure out what to do to set up a shower and a water heater." Evan said waking up some more with the idea of a task for the day.

Stef smiled. "Thanks Evan! But how will the water get to us? I mean, shouldn’t the water be stopped or something?"

"I think everything is automated, so unless a zombie hits the wrong button then we should have filtered water." Evan said thoughtfully.

"I guess." Stef replied, pondering Evan’s statement and serving up her own bacon. "Josh’s bacon is ready. Want to go wake him up?" Evan gave Stef a nod and headed into the Children’s department to wake his best friend up.

As he entered the children’s side he noticed that the TV was still on. *Electricity around here must be Hydro or a generator that doesn’t require any maintenance… or maybe somebody is alive out there and keeping this stuff running for any other survivors… or their own selves. * Evan thought as he approached Josh’s bed. He kicked the end of the bed that was closest to him, giving Josh a start.

Josh sat up quickly and blinked fast. "Wha! Huh!!" He said, bringing a laugh from Evan. Josh turned around and Evan pointed into the Adult section of the library.

"Breakfast biznoochie."

Josh shrugged and got out of bed, slipping on his army pants and walking into the adult section of the library. Evan followed him, but stayed for a second in the division that contained two display cases holding traditional Japanese kimonos and sandals. Evan smiled and found the opening to the case. He quickly taped the glass with the rest of his roll of duct tape and elbowed the glass, which let out a muffled crack as it broke under the force of Evan’s assault. Evan slide open the broken glass door and grabbed the male mannequin. He stripped it down and put the clothes on himself he carried the sandals into the adult section and Josh and Stef looked at him strangely. "It was in the display case. I needed a housecoat so I snagged the kimono. There is a woman’s one in the same case that I busted open if you want it Stef." Stef nodded and Evan went out and got her the other kimono. He also took the rice hat from the male mannequin and put it on. He walked back in and handed the kimono to Stef who put it on, covering herself as she had been in only her bra and panties up to this point.

"Thanks Evan." She said politely.

Josh still looked groggy as hell, but finally spoke up. "Oh yeah… Evan. I got an email from Ash Beaver."

Evan turned quickly to face Josh. "AND!?!" He screamed.

"She is the only survivor she has found in Cambridge. I’m sorry Evan." Josh said, snapping to awareness with the seriousness of his message. "Do you want to read the message?"

Evan shook his head. "I’ll be on the roof. Thanks for breakfast Stef." Stef smiled sadly as Evan retreated back onto the rooftop.

"He really cared about her didn’t he?" Stef asked Josh.

Josh shrugged. "I don’t know. We’re guys you know… we don’t talk about that sort of thing. But I’d guess they were close. They met when he was working for the government."

Stef nodded. "It’s to bad that he lost her. We never talked about her or anything, but I could kind of tell whenever he mentioned her that he cared."

Josh returned her nod. "Yeah."

Stef smiled sorrowfully. "We should give him the morning. You know, to think about it." Josh nodded in agreement.

"Yeah."

Evan sat for the first time on the roof without a gun. He stared out across the buildings blankly. Feeling glad that at least Ash was alive. But he lost her, just when he was becoming truly attached. She was special, he knew that and never once when they were together or chatting did he take advantage of that. She had an aura about her, something that had attracted him to her almost immediately. But that was gone now. Or at least Ash said so. Maybe she had survived. There was still hope for her. *I can’t lead myself into delusional hopes. * Evan scorned himself. *I’ll go to Cambridge. Get Ash out of there and search for Rachel. If I find her as a zombie I will put her out of her misery. She would want that… I think… * Then the sorrow of the situation caught up with him and he cried like he had never thought he had cried before.

Stef and Josh sat at one of the bulky library tables across from each other with Evan’s notepad in between them. Stef had been trying to teach Josh what Evan had theorized about. "So his hypothesis is that the majority of the viral cells or ‘mutations’, as Evan enjoys calling them throughout his notepad, are in the brain and skull area. He had originally thought that perhaps there was a ‘queen’ cell that controlled the other viral cells like a brain within a brain."

Josh scratched his chin, which was starting to get stubble, the information sinking in. "So that is what Evan was doing up on the roof all that time yesterday?" Stef nodded. "Whoa. He is a thinker."

Stef smiled. "Brooder is more like it. He finds a subject and obsesses about it until it makes perfect sense to him and then tries to find another. He is like a knowledge bank but once he is full of one subject he dumps most of it and gets something new. It’s kind of weird."

Josh looked at Stef strangely. "How did you figure that out from his notes?"

"He started with the queen theory and almost proved it despite his actual subject testing and then just moved on to another theory and never mentions the queen theory again."

"Ok…" Josh said, looking away from Stef and at the door.

"Go play Final Fantasy." Stef said, laughing at Josh’s love for video games.

Josh complied eagerly leaving Stef alone with Evan’s theories. She looked them over and laughed slightly. *He got all these ideas from sniping a zombie and watching it decompose. Amazing. He is probably the strangest person I have ever met. *

Just then Stef heard the ladder rattle and Evan’s bare feet descended down the rungs slowly. Evan wiped his eyes dry of tears and went over to his makeshift room, not paying any attention to Stef. She just watched him, noting his reddened eyes. He sniffled a few times as he changed into his army gear and folded up the kimono. Then he walked over to one of the computers with internet access and logged onto his hotmail account. He clicked the mouse a few times and then started writing. He pressed the mouse again and then once more and walked out of the library without so much as a goodbye.

*At least he’s armed. * Stef thought as she walked over to Evan’s recently used computer and opened up a window on hotmail. She typed a few things and soon got it up to the page that Evan had typed at. It was an e-mail to Ashley Beaver telling her to meet him at Rachel’s house. Stef nodded and closed the window. *Looks like we’ll have another member in our little crew. * Stef thought to herself.

Josh sat in front of the TV like a slave, he was near the end of the game and doing well when Stef walked into the room and pulled the plug on the TV but thankfully not the PS2. "Evan left." She said.

"Where?"

"Cambridge."

"Ok… but the roads are blocked."

"He took the snowplough." Stef said, still surprised at Evan’s little spur of ingenuity on that part.

"Oh… why is he going?"

"To pick up Ash and find out about his girlfriend."

"How did you find out?" Josh asked, edging to wards the outlet to plug in the Tube again.

"I hacked his email. Found out who he had sent the e-mail to and hacked her e-mail."

"Oh."

"Yeah, we’ll let him go. He is fully armed and quite capable of handling himself."

"Yup." Josh said, finally close enough to the outlet.

Stef turned and left the room and Josh plugged in the TV just to save and turn off his game and follow Stef. "Hey! Did he say when he’ll be back?"

"No… but Cambridge is about three hours from here so he’ll be back maybe tomorrow or late tonight." Stef said still walking into the Adult section of the library.

Josh stopped in the division and looked at the broken case from which Evan had taken his kimono. He spotted the mannequin and stood it up. It stood perfectly. Josh smiled and ran into the Adult section and grabbed Stef and the paintball gun. He made sure that the CO2 was loaded correctly and that there was a full hopper of balls and handed the gun to Stef. "Today you learn to shoot correctly… and so do I."

The pair spent the rest of the day practicing.

At about nine o clock that night Evan returned the passenger side of his snowplough empty. He was exhausted and had no more grenades lining his chest. He staggered into the library, getting both Josh and Stef’s attention. They rushed to his side and helped him to his bed. Stef undressed the teen carefully and noticed many rips and tears in his suit as well as a few bruises on his skin and a gash on his left abdomen. The blood had clotted but she still was worried about it. Evan looked up at her with weary eyes. "I got that from hopping a fence. A zombie grabbed onto my foot and pulled me back as I leapt and I sliced myself open on the wire. " He explained when he noticed that she was observing his wounds.

"I don’t think a fence could make such a deep gash, and if it was a fence wouldn’t there be a set of small holes instead of a clean gash?" Stef said, sounding worried.

"I guess, but I did slip. It cut more when I fell on the other side of the fence than it did when I went over the fence." Evan offered truthfully.

"Ok. But where is Ash?" Stef asked, Evan looked away. "Oh."

"She didn’t make it over the fence. She was dragged down. I tossed a grenade over the fence and ran." Evan said his voice raspy and cold.

Stef walked away for a bit to get some cloth or bandages for Evan’s wound leaving Evan to contemplate his failed mission. He tried to get up but his wounds and fatigue got the better of him and he passed out. Stef returned and bandaged him up roughly and then went to cook the steaks Evan had brought in yesterday.

Evan woke up the next day with thousands of aches and pains. His abdomen wound must have reopened at some point during his sleep because his bandaging was matted to him with his own blood. He noticed the residue of something white and bubbly and guessed that Stef or Josh had sterilised his wound with Hydrogen Peroxide. Evan attempted to sit up and was rewarded with stabbing pain all through his body. Josh and Stef came into Evan’s makeshift room carrying an assortment of different medical aids and breakfast. It was all Chinese Food. " I paid a visit to Friendly’s this morning man I hope you enjoy it" Josh said holding an array of different foods on many plates.

"Thanks Josh-san" Evan said in a painful voice.

"Anytime"

Stef replaced the bandages after she applied vast amounts of Hydrogen Peroxide to Evan’s ghastly wounds.

After the trio had their breakfast Josh and Stef sat together around Evan’s bed and watched Evan sleep painfully, his gash had been ripped open again due to Evan twisting and turning. Stef changed Evan’s bandages carefully. "Why can’t he just stay still?" She asked.

"Don’t worry I have an idea" Josh answered. And with that he went into the Hummer and got some rolls of ducktape. He returned to Stef still adding bandages to Evan. "Here let me try something" Josh said. Josh ran and got a chair and motioned for Stef to help Josh lift Evan into the chair. After the process of getting Evan into the chair Stef helped Josh tape Evan into the chair.

"There that should help" Josh commented

"Yep, Great Idea" Stef added

Josh went onto the roof with Evan’s PSG1. *I don’t think he’ll mind, I mean he DID steal my Hummer that one time. And Its no fair that he gets to use the cool guns all the time* Josh thought as he set himself up on the roof of the library. After what seemed to be forever Josh came back down and saw that Evan was up and walking. Evan looked kind of pissed off.

"What’s wrong Evan-san" Asked a rather scared Josh.

"OK, I don’t mind you taping me to the chair but you used my PSG1 and man that’s just not cool!" Evan yelled.

"Don’t worry, I didn’t shoot anything man, I think you killed everything dude." Josh snapped back

"Naw I mean the pop of Lindsay is 17,000 so I think that there are still zombies out here somewhere. Hey listen I was thinking, wanna go check out the industrial section of Lindsay man?" Said a now happy Evan.

"Sure do!"

"You wanna come Stef?"

"Might as well"

The trio piled into the Hummer and drove off to the industrial section of Lindsay, much to there surprise this part had a good amount of zombies, at least 100 or so. The trio were driving through the streets when Josh slammed on the breaks. "Evan look!" Josh with a sound of relief

"What?" asked Evan

Josh pointed to a building with the initials "H&K" on it. "There Evan look" Josh said after moving Evan’s head to the right direction.

"Sweet-ass!" Evan yelled followed by a moan. "Damn that hurt"

The Hummer pulled into the driveway of H&K and Josh turned it off. Josh went out to stretch his legs leaving Evan and Stef alone in the Hummer.

"Evan, I think you should stay in the car, with your wound it could be dangerous and no offence but I think you could slow us down" Stef said to Evan in a Marge Simpson type voice.

"You’re right, I will keep cover from inside the Hummer" Answered a rather depressed Evan.

With that Josh and Stef began to get their guns and ammo ready. "Oh I almost forgot" Evan started to say. "I picked up these walky-talkies from Radio Shack, I thought they could be useful" Evan began to give Josh and Stef their walkie-talkies. "I’ll be on Channel four" Josh said. The others nodded and they all turned on their radios.

Josh and Stef started into the factory and Evan called out behind them. "If you can, get me an MSG90! Oh and two HK23Es! We can strap them to the hood of the Hummer." The advancing pair nodded and entered the factory.

They entered the lobby of the factory cautiously checking for the undead. Josh walked up to the glass encased secritary desk and was rewarded with a shock. The zombie of the secritary leapt up at him and flattened against the glass. Josh fired a shot from his left 9mm pistol, which ricocheted off the glass and bounced around the room for a minute before loosing velocity and coming to a stop. Stef took cover as she noticed the ricochet. Once the bullet stopped Josh walked calmly into the factory itself nervously glancing back and forth. Stef followed him and they entered the assembly line. Josh looked over the weapons on the line and noticed that the majority of them were incomplete. The belt was still running and the machinery was still completing the weapons ignorant to the fact that humanity had been pretty near wiped from the Earth. Josh shrugged and followed the assembly line, Stef covering him from behind her Magnum drawn and ready. Eventually the pair found where the guns were being dumped off. There was a huge pile of the weapons that had been on the line, it appeared to be a submachine gun reminiscent to Evan’s MP5s. Josh picked out four of the 9mm submachine guns and handed two of them to Stef tucking the other two in his belt. They didn’t have any clips for them but that didn’t matter, they were in a friggen gun factory. Accessories were surely created here as well.

Stef looked around and grabbed the guns Josh offered her. They looked cool but she noted that there were no clips. *Useless. * She thought as he shoved them in her belt and followed Josh slowly, hanging back in case a zombie popped up. She noticed a door and radioed to Evan and Josh. "I’m heading off by myself. There is a door that I want to investigate."

Evan radioed back. "Ok. But make sure to keep your guard up."

Stef smiled. "Sure thing. Josh? Is that OK?"

In another room Josh smiled. "Sure. But I’ve found the mother load of guns. There are bins of marked guns. There are the HK23Es you wanted. These things are huge though. I might need a hand. Oh and that other gun you wanted? What was it called?"

Evan radioed back. "MSG90."

"There is a bin of them."

"Grab me one. Oh and try to find the accessories storage room. I need more clips… and check for an ammo depot."

"Roger."

Evan groaned and clipped his radio to his belt. He repositioned his PSG1 and took careful aim on a zombie that had been wandering in a nearby parking lot. He shot once and dropped the monster.

Stef had found the ammo room. "Holy crap." She muttered as she looked around. There was bin upon bin of unboxed ammo and on the far wall box upon box of boxed ammo. She clicked her radio on and spoke. "Ammo room located. I’m going to mark the door with a large X in my nail polish." She walked outside and brought out her nail polish and drew a large red X on the door then turned around. A solitary zombie shuffled towards her. She fired once missing her target narrowly, the zombie did not seem amused. She fired again, missing on the other side. *Shit! * She mentally screamed as she fired for the third time, the bullet connecting but low of the mark, creating a gaping hole in the zombie’s abdomen. The zombie stumbled and fell but was soon up again. Stef fired again and blew off the right arm of the undead creature. She cursed her aim again and pulled the trigger.

CLICK.

The sound was ominous. Stef swore loudly and drew her pistol, putting away her Magnum in the same motion. She fired twice wildly and took off the zombie’s other arm. It didn’t seem to care and only a low moan escaped its lips. Stef fired again and the bullet impacted with the zombie’s right knee, demolishing the cap and making the zombie stop for a second. She took aim and pulled the trigger again.

CLICK.

"FUCK!!" Stef turned and ran into the ammo room, locking the door behind her. She fumbled around for her extra clips and found one taking her spent clip from the pistol. She heard the zombie thumping against the door and fired a random shot, a low moan followed and she dared a peak out of the newly formed hole in the door. She spotted the zombie lying on the floor, its arms close by. Stef opened the door slowly and saw the zombie stir. She burst from the door and emptied her new clip into the zombie’s upper torso and head, a small pool of blood spread from a central point under the zombie. She smirked and realised the amount of ammo she wasted. She turned and re-entered the ammo room.

Josh strapped the HK23Es to his back and groaned about the weight. He then strapped on two of the MSG902 and complained even more. Josh struggled to get his radio off his belt and when he did radioed the others. "A small amount of weapons are secured. I’m transporting them to the Hummer."

Evan laughed. "Roger." He smiled as he sniped off another zombie and then changed his empty clip. "How is our ammo situation Stef?"

Stef looked around the room and smiled. "Boxed or non-boxed?" She asked.

"Get maybe twelve strings of shells for the HK23E which is 5.56mmX45. And as much of the boxes of 9mm and 7.62mmX51 as you can carry."

Stef started to load up and put away her radio stringing twelve rows of machine gun ammo across her chest and roughly grabbing four boxes of 30 9mm bullets as well as two boxes of 20 sniper rounds. She lugged the ammo out and piled it into the Hummer gently. Josh following suit with the guns. Evan smiled. "Good. Now, I want to limp my busted ass in there and get a few more weapons. You guys should come too."

The uninjured pair laughed and followed him. They had no problems with zombies as Evan and Josh vanquished them quickly with well-placed shots from Evan’s PSG1 and bursts from Josh’s M-16. An hour later they had filled the Hummer with guns and a lot of ammo. (Check the H&K website from last chapter and know that we have every gun other than pistols. We even got flare guns.)

That night at the library Stef, Josh and Evan sorted through the weapons of mass destruction.

"I want to put one of those grenade machine guns on top of the library." Evan said, moving one of the two GMGs to the side.

Josh and Stef nodded and moved a few boxes of ammo for that gun over to where Evan had put the GMG he wanted to strap to the roof.

"Ok, but I get two HK23Es for the top of the Hummer." Josh said, moving two of the three machine guns behind him.

Stef smiled. "I want to turn one of the windows into a defence platform so I’m going to need the remaining HK23E and GMG."

Evan rubbed his chin. "I’ll let you have the GMG. But I think we’ll need the other HK23E for the plough. I want to strap it to the hood and get a hydraulic trigger pusher thing and have that hooked to my steering wheel." Stef nodded.

"Ok. But I get the other GMG right." Josh and Evan gave her a nod of approval.

"Ok then, that is the big guns out of the way." He said wincing about the pain in his left side.

Stef moved closer to him and checked the bandage. It seemed fine, the bleeding had stopped and the wound had closed again. "Yeah." She then moved the remaining boxes of ammo for a GMG over behind her and gave Josh eight strings of HK23E ammo and Evan four.

Evan nodded a thanks to her and piled the ammo behind himself and took the final machine gun. "Josh, I believe it is your pick for the heavy weapons that aren’t platform based."

Josh smiled and rubbed his hands together eagerly. "One MSG90 and four boxes of 7.62 ammo." Evan nodded and Stef pushed those items to Josh.

"I’ll take two UMPs, four clips and three boxes of 9mm ammo." Josh moved those things over to her.

"MSG90, nine boxes 7.62." He took the items he wanted and then paused. "And four clips for the MSG90." He grabbed those things and sat back down on the carpeted floor.

"HK69A1. Three boxes ammo and five clips for my MSG90."

The weapon choosing went on till early in the morning and the three participants moved their stash into their own little areas of the library and went to bed… except Josh who played about an hour worth of Armoured Core 3 before succumbing to the joys of sleep.

Evan awoke rested and happy, except for the wound in his side, which had healed over slightly since the night before and had not, thankfully, reopened. He walked over to the makeshift kitchen and fired up the Coleman, putting the frying pan on it and slapping down about eight pieces of bacon. He sat down on one of the chairs by the bulky table that they had placed the Coleman on and waited for the bacon to cook. He looked down on Stef, who was currently sleeping and smiled at her. *She is pretty cute. * He thought as he heard the bacon grease start to sizzle. He turned to the stove and flipped the bacon over with a nearby fork and then walked over to his ‘bedroom’. He slipped on his kimono and rice hat and slipped his wakasachi onto his belt as he headed back to the stove. He watched Stef sleep for a bit longer and then decided that it was finished and took the currently cooked bacon off and put down another six strips as that was all that remained. He sighed deeply and shook Stef gently to wake her up.

She moaned quietly and blinked twice to get the sleep out of her eyes. "Huh?" She saw a blurry image of Evan and smiled. "What is it?"

"Want some bacon?" He asked kindly offering some bacon on one of the remaining pieces of napkin that was in their current stores.

"Sure, Thanks Evan" Stef said as she took the bacon from Evan and began to eat profusely. "Man, This is good" Stef added after eating about 9 or 10 strips of bacon. *What A pig* Evan thought as he walked over to Josh’s ‘Bedroom’. Evan came into Josh’s bedroom just in time to see the ending credits of Armoured Core 3. Josh was sitting there smiling and glued to the TV.

"Mastered another game?" Evan asked while offering Josh some bacon.

"You bet man, so far that Dynasty Warriors 3, Final Fantasy 10 AND AC3!" Josh answered after taking the remaining 2 strips of bacon. "Hey Evan, today I think we should take our car’s into the shop and sup them up" Offered Josh.

"Sounds like a plan man, just let me clean up and ask Stef if she want’s to come" Evan replied.

After some cleaning and a quick change of clothes Evan and Josh drove their Hummer/ Snowplough to the nearest auto shop. They left Stef at the Library to let her build her defence window and to do girl type stuff that she wanted to do. Upon reaching the auto shop the boys were greeted by a small mob of zombies, about six or seven. Josh broke out two of his new guns and killed almost half of the zombies. Josh motioned to Evan that he wanted all the kills. Josh took out his duel pistols and walked up close range to two zombies and shot them in the head. Another zombie lunged out at Josh. He dodged the zombie and shot him in the back of the head with his flare gun. Flame covered blood spewed all over Evan’s snowplough and Evan began to curse at Josh. With the last remaining zombie Josh drew his sword and proceeded to cut off one of the zombie’s arms. Josh picked up the arm and began beating the zombie with it, which gave Evan and Josh laughing attacks. Finally Josh had enough and he took out his taser and plugged it into the zombie’s head, causing it to catch fire and explode.

Josh and Evan drove into the shop to do necessary repairs and paint jobs.

********************************************************************

Later that day at around 6 or 7 Josh and Evan returned in there newly upgraded Hummer and Snowplough only to find that the middle window of the library had been blown up and there was pillbox built into the hole. *Holy crap, she actually did it! * Evan thought. Just then a laser sight was targeted on Josh’s nuts. Evan began laughing hysterically while Josh just punched Evan.

"Stef it’s us, you know Josh and Evan, the LAST two males in the world." Josh yelled up at Stef.

"I know, I’m just messin with ya, come on it’s dinner time!’" Stef yelled back.

When Josh and Evan come to the kitchen they saw Stef dragging something in a body bag. "Umm Stef what ARE we having for dinner?" asked Evan. Stef opened up the body bag and took out a dead zombie. "Were having STEAK tonight!" she yelled. After a moment of silence Stef began to laugh uncontrollably.

"That WASN’T COOL! Stef!" Josh said while Evan began to gag on the decaying flesh of the zombie.

"Sorry guys, I just wanted to show you my kill, this time only ONE shot!" Stef said in a happy-go-lucky voice, and finished with. "Here I walked up to McDonalds and picked up Big Mac’s for us all" and with that Stef handed Josh and Evan Big Mac’s.

After dinner Josh and Evan took Stef out to show them what they had done to their vehicles. Josh’s Hummer was now Black with a glossy finish with red fire on the sides and a happy face on the hood. It had the two HK23Es on the roof and a grenade launcher on the tailgate. The Hummer also had a bullet-proof windshield and Titanium steel around all the wheels.

Evan’s snowplough had a camouflage paint job with a massive smiley face on the hood and his HK23E on the driver side door, the machine gun had a hydraulic pump hooked up to the trigger and a wire ran into the door and attached to the steering wheel. Evan had also added red neon lights underneath the plough and jacked the frame down so that he had a low rider snowplough, he had to reposition the plough but the time involved wasn’t an issue. His plough was black and had a smiley face matching the one on the hood and the words ‘Have a nice day’ painted on in blood red dripping letters. He had also found chrome wheels and exhausts and fuzzy tiger interior. His steering wheel was chain link and the hydraulic switch was placed where the horn would have been. As a finishing touch he put fuzzy pink dice in the mirror.

"Nice." Stef said, admiring the boys’ handiwork. "Very nice."

Josh nodded. "Yeah." He said. "But I need to get the hydraulic trigger things that Evan has or else I need somebody to ride in the back… Want to ride in the back?"

Stef shook her head. "I’ll take the pimping snowplough."

Evan smiled. "Yeah! Oh… and I tossed some Sony Xplodes in the back for extra speakers… I’m sure Josh’s Dad wont mind… and I also took a sweet CD player for the plough… I replaced the crappy ass tape deck and radio."

Josh smiled. "Sweet!… Can you make some more of those hydraulic triggers?"

"Sure."

End of chapter three.

Author’s notes:

(Well. I’m not sure how we got Big Macs and why I was gagging on zombie flesh… and the flame covered blood part was… um… new. But all in all It was a good chapter from my view… yes I cheaped out in the Cambridge sequence, but I felt that I needed to progress the story with the main three characters. Sure I killed off another possible main character without so much as a single line from said character, but I felt that four characters is not needed at this point in the story. Josh may disagree, but he killed the drunken hick who’s blood/alcohol level counteracted the virus. Oh and I have one pimping snowplough!)

Evan McNeely can be reached at evanthewanderer@hotmail.com

And has a website at http://evan_m0.tripod.com

[Remember Evan, I didn’t kill him the zombie did. Speaking of which, it’s hard to look at Lindsay the same way now isn’t it? I mean we walked by the 7-11 the other day and it was there…and people were alive…weird eh? Anyway, thank you to Stef who got us all Big Mac’s from McDonalds by walking there with guns. Well I’m done…RE KICKS ASS!]

And I have no website L