#deadwalkstarter

But it was not only the thought of encountering a herd  that weighed heavily on Chloe's mind. A herd, it was quite possibly to outwit and wait to pass. But a living breathing human whose heart was full of malice because the world had changed them was a different story. The possession of a backpack full of medical supplies would be trigger enough for someone desperate. 

So, it was with a heavy sigh that Chloe pushed the thoughts of herds and bandits to the back of her mind and stepped out into the Georgia light. It was late when the thought had crossed her mind. She had been thinking of Cassandra, a fellow resident, whose husband was a vet technician. Cass had never told her where the office was, but she had told her the name. The address was easy enough to get from a yellow pages book in the administrative office at the prison. And, when she had run the prospective trip to the office by the council, she was sure to make it clear that she wasn't looking to go it alone. Word at been put put, she just hoped she'd had some, if only one, taker.

"Hey," Chloe called out to the back of someone's head as she ambled over to the SUV she had been told to take, "Are you my partner in crime?" she asked chuckling a bit.

Since his arrival, Lincoln never dare step foot aside. He couldn't risk getting injured, leaving his sister alone. His thoughts in his last moments would be wishing for his sister's happiness and safety, but mostly having regretted leaving her in the first place.  But it was moments like this, him alone with his thoughts, looking at the stars, he thought maybe the risk was worth it. He would wish for an adventure   

"Okay, I don't why I'm doing this," he muttered, keeping focus on one star. He sighed, knowing he was wasting his time. He knew, way deep down, no one was listening. If there really was someone up there, this apocalypse would have come to an end a long time ago, considering how many times Lincoln prayed for the happy ending. "But I thought maybe you could help me...I dunno."

That was a lie.

By chance, Lincoln noticed a four leaf clover. He was never one for superstitions. He always believed things happened for a reason, but you could change your fate.  Still, he tugged on the clover, pulling it up to his nose, and clamping his eyes shut.

"Starlight, star bright," he began. "The first star I see tonight. I wish I may. I wish I might  Have the wish I wish tonight."

Like a moment from a movie, wind blew through his brown hair as he muttered those last words. It was almost as if he hadn't muttered what followed a million times before: "Bring my Mom back to me... Please."

Elias had simply found the house, and locked the door. The loot didn’t even interest him as of present – he sat, knees to his chin, in the empty bathtub. Hyperventilation was making his head lighter, but he could hear the lock on the front door break down the hall, and his hands fumbled for his gun.

“Who’s there?” He barked.

Nadine didn’t get it. For some ungodly reason, she could not wrap her head around the fact that she had been caught in yet another turf war. 

There was a whole slew of men that littered the parking lot of an abandoned gun shop. She had crashed in one of the storage closets inside overnight. But at the time, it had been late and Nadine’s flashlight batteries had bit the dust long before the sun disappeared behind the earth so she couldn’t quite jump at the opportunity to stuff her bag full of goodies just yet. Her original plan was to loot the ever living shit out of this rifle shop the second she saw the faintest hint of daylight creep in through the windows. She was practically sitting on top of a gold mine. And for the first time in what seemed like an eternity, Nadine was ecstatic. Every single pistol, and grenades was hers for the taking. And not to mention an abundance amount of ammo was also ripe for the pickin’. 

Or so she thought.

Beams of sunlight spilled in through the front window and Nadine managed to snag a sniper rifle and found herself able to get a pretty good scope of the empty lot. She was more than ready and willing to pick them off one by one if any of ‘em showed signs of trouble. She hated this. The idea of a human being pulling a gun on another human. It was sickening and the thought alone sent chills down her spine. But just because Nadine was against it, didn’t mean she was going to holster her weapon and put away the only protection she had. She would never start a gun fight, but she sure as hell would finish one. 

Peering through the scope of her rifle, Nadine noticed a quarrel had broken out between two men. One, huskier and taller man had begun to shout while the other, much shorter one insisted on keeping his mouth shut. Most likely because it was only attracting any walkers in the area to their exact location. Nadine agreed with shorty over there. If she had been in his shoes, she would have probably done everything in her power to calm him down, as well. But alas. They were out there and she was in here. 

Then out of the blue, a gunshot rang in the air 

Nadine hustled up a heap of courage to glance out the window once more. And to her surprise, everyone had vanished. There wasn’t a single human (nor walker) in sight. 

A heavy sigh of relief exited her chest as she pushed herself across the floor until her back touched the wall. 

"Glad that’s-" Nadine had been cut off from her own sentence as a strong hand clamped over mouth. Anxiety rushed through her body and her heart rate skyrocketed. She was being drug outside by the same powerful hand pressing down on her lips. 

Out of pure instinct, Nadine began to thrash her body, hoping to break free of the stranger’s grasp. She kicked her feet and pulled on the foreign hand with all her might. Her strength was all she had. Screaming would do no good. Who would hear her? Who would care enough to come to her rescue? 

Nadine could feel her skin scrape against the concrete. Her eyes grew wide with horror as the men she had seen earlier were now circled around her. 

Finally, her mouth began free once more. She felt like screaming. She felt like cussing the hell outta these men who had the nerve to lay a hand on her. But truth be told, Nadine was scared out of her goddamn mind. Unsure of her next move, she slowly rose to her feet, making sure no sudden movements were made. Yet. 

She felt at least four pairs of eyes locked onto her. Every muscle fiber in her being begged her to run. But she knew if she tried something stupid like attempting to take off, she’d be shot on sight. 

Then just as when one of the men took a step forward, Nadine’s adrenaline finally kicked in. She had some experience in the hand-to-hand combat field and she was about to take full advantage of those skills. Growing up on the streets of Georgia had taught her a thing or two about self defense, 

Without any further hesitation, Nadine knocked the guns out of the hands of two men closest to her before knocking back the one on her left with a heavy kick.

Everything was happening at once, Chaos had broken loose and now she was being shoved from behind by yet another unknown powerful force. Sure it slowed her for a split second and her guard had been let down, but Nadine recovered quickly and came back swingin’.

Wanting to spend some time in the good ol' outdoors, Ronnie had left the prison earlier than usual that morning. Leaving notice with whoever it was that had been watching the fence during the AM shift - some actually cute looking boy with no sense of humor, a sad fact that she'd learned the hard way. She'd spent the morning walking along the road, keeping her eyes open for anyone - or thing - that could possibly make its way out of the woods. 

Eventually she found herself in a town she had yet to come by, and seemed satisfied at the fact that it was a change of scenery. Not that that was much, mind you, as Ronnie noted that their only seemed to be one building in the neighborhood that had more than a third floor. Tomahawk in hand as she walked through the deserted streets, Ronnie had been glad when she'd discovered that no one had taken her favorite weapon from the armory. 

After maybe an hour or so of exploring that led her nowhere, the faint sounds of the undead began to reach her ears. The moans were faint, though the fact that she was even hearing them indicated that she could be heading in the wrong direction. Stopping to see if she could tell which direction the sounds were coming from, Ronnie noted that there was definitely more than one of them, and quickly moved toward one of the abandoned stores that littered main street.

It wasn't long until the dead came into view, but what shocked her more was the person that ran in front of them. Outnumbered four to one, they seemed to be making a dash, and a large smile flitted to Ronnie's face. She hadn't killed a walker in days - not in the fun way, in a way that didn't involve a fence between them, and so she stepped outside, eager to plunge the metal of the tomahawk between one of their skulls. Their attentions were focused on the individual as they moved ahead, and Ronnie took advantage - running towards it, she swiftly kicked at the back of its knee, forcing the corpse to fall to the ground. With her short stature, it was easier to get a shot at their skull this way, and she paused for only a moment before continuing. 

Moving towards the next zombie, she saw out of the corner of her eye that the individual had taken out one of their own. Wanting to get the third, she all but sprinted to it, jamming the metal into it's skull.

Breath heavy, she turned to the only other living individual in the area, stopping only to wipe the blood of the walkers on one of their shirts. "You're welcome, by the way."

Today had been a bad day. True, giving that it was the apocalypse every day was a bad day but today had been especially bad. He had been chased by both walkers and people, his supplies had ran out and he had one hell of a gunshot wound in his shoulder. Adrian gripped his left shoulder with the opposite hand, the palm pressing firmly against the wound as he walked down the street. It was days like this he felt like giving up. What was the point he was either going to be murdered by some nutjob, starve, dehydrate or end up being a walkers lunch.

If Adrian had a gun and ammo he would seriously consider shooting himself in the head. Truth was, there wasn't really a point, nothing would ever be the same again even if he did manage to find a group of people, something bad would happen. It always does. Shaking his head of the thoughts, he continued down the road. Adrian couldn't afford to think like that but after five minutes of blankness in his head, the thoughts came rushing back. He spotted an old diner about a hundred meters away.

Reaching the diner, Adrian leaned against the wall eventually letting himself slide down it and sit on the freezing concrete ground. He jerked slightly as a bang hit the window from behind him, taking a few breaths to calm himself he was thankful the door was blocked off with some chairs and tables, probably from the diner itself. Lifting his hand off the wound and wincing slightly, Adrian sighed and let his head fall back against the wall of the building. He was going bleed out, he let out a humourless laugh, shaking is head in belief. "I'm gonna die from fucking blood loss. Well that's a heroic way go." He muttered to himself.

It was unfortunate, though, that Chloe wasn't in the intern locker room and it wasn't intern year. She was at the prison and it was worse than intern year. But, regardless, she still  needed toothpaste. Something so easy to get in the world they lived in before had become a luxury item. And, as she stopped at one of the cells in her block, she grabbed the curtain, wiggling it a bit in attempt to let its inhabitant know she was outside.

"Hey, yeah, sorry to bother you. I don't know if this is kind of gross to ask, but, do you have any toothpaste?" the woman asked, slowly drawing back the curtain.

While venturing out on his own probably wasn't the smartest decision he had ever made and his girlfriend Everly would be absolutely furious when he returned, Liev honestly didn't believe any of the prisoners with free time on their hands this morning were capable enough for the job and everyone else that was capable was busy keeping the prison running. Thus, he had chosen to go out alone in his truck in hopes of recovering some solar panels he had scouted out during his time in the woods and, if he was really lucky, some lead-acid deep cycle batteries to start his project of bringing hot water and electricity to the prison. This may seem trivial and stupid on his part, but Liev was determined to take back one luxury of their former lives and he would never forgive himself if someone else came along and got injured or worse because of his little side project that wasn't exactly necessary to their immediate survival. However, Liev had to admit even he was surprised at how well everything was going so far and it'd only been an hour.

He'd only had to kill a couple walkers around the first house he had dismounted the solar panels from and simply used a ladder to climb to the roof instead of facing the unknown dangers inside. Liev had dislodged the panels from the mount without a hitch, even if a couple cells had already sustained damage, and ultimately decided to create his own meter instead of facing an unknown number of walkers inside. He was careful to not take any risks since he was on his own and was armed not only with a loaded pistol but with several knives as well. While Liev resolved to get himself back to Everly in one piece and knew she would certainly yell about him risking his life later, he was also very determined once he set his mind on something and very confident in his ability to defend himself against walkers and humans alike.

Now, having set to work at extending up the ladder at the second house and picking off nearby walkers, Liev carefully tested the sturdiness of the roof before making his way to the singular solar panel. Using a screwdriver and other tools he had brought along, Liev dismounted the solar panel and began carrying the somewhat heavy object back over towards the ladder. Unfortunately, he must have put too much weight on one area of the roof as suddenly his right foot went through and the panel went tumbling out of his hands and was teetering on the edge of the roof. It took all the willpower he had within him not to scream and attract all the walkers in the immediate area as some large splinters and God knows what else went in his foot and lower leg, but instead he let out a muffled choking sound and tried to determine what to do while muttering four letter words in a brilliant mix of Russian and English. Deciding he would have to remove his foot first before worrying about the solar panel or the tools, Liev used his upper body strength to heave his foot out of the new hole in the roof while trying to remain as quiet as possible which still meant some muffled cries on his part as he scraped his wounds once more. With his foot free, he backed up towards the edge of the roof slowly to examine the damage and also took a moment to steady the panel from tumbling off the roof.