The man, Greyson, was more than a head taller than Roy. He was young, probably in his mid twenties, and had a build that announced that this was a man in his prime. His sleeves and pant legs were rolled up to expose well-toned, but not excessive, muscles.

“Level four, two-hundred and eighty-four points of health... what are you, the school punching bag?” the man chuckled, the sound like truck tires ripping over gravel, “Still, you’re not as spineless as you seem!”

Roy focused on the man’s face, trying to eke out some semblance of a smile. Apart from his father, Roy had never personally dealt with someone so... unpleasant; most of those experiences were isolated to forums and games, where a layer of anonymity helped to ease his anxiety. Greyson’s face was as impressive as his body, a strong, firm, chin and a powerful gaze defined his solidly structured features.

“Well uh, thank you sir,” Roy stuttered out, unsure of how to proceed.

“Well, uh...” Greyson mimicked in a soft and high pitched voice, “Where’s you tiara little girl? This ain’t a tea party!”

Greyson stabbed a finger at Roy, the force behind the digit enough to send him stumbling backwards into a cash register. Greyson had led Roy into the grocery store after his impromptu greeting, the inside was flooded as Roy had expected, but the shelves had been tipped over and covered with ply board, forming an elevated ground for the many survivors to rest on. Other shelves acted as dividers between makeshift rooms and were also packed with various consumables.

The older man had stopped near the checkout desks, leading to the current display.

“Getting back on track before Owen pulls a fit, normally, cause you’re a brat, Owen’d stick you some corner and tell you politely, to keep out of the way of the big boys. But I think you’re gonna be a lot more helpful going out with the scavengers,” as Greyson said that he grabbed the few weapons Roy held in his grasp. Roy was reluctant to part with the little he had, but he convinced himself that this was the only way, “You got anything else besides this shit?”

“I have some water and food, and uh... a flashlight, radio and some batteries,” now that he mentioned it, he had forgotten to check for any new broadcasts in the morning, he needed to get into the habit of that or he would forget. Roy gave the other man a fairly accurate picture of what else was on him, if he said too little Greyson would be suspicious. Even if he was willing to part with his pitchfork, fungus fryer, and sledgehammer, he was not willing to be stripped of the dagger and left weaponless. Keeping the gun, even if it was empty, a secret also seemed sensible, that was bound to get confiscated.

“Yeah whatever, you can keep your toys,” Greyson put the fryer and the sledgehammer onto a grocery conveyor, “Here keep the stupid farming implement too; we got enough of this garbage lying around.”

Then Greyson turned around and shouted into the building, “Jonas, get over here, I got something for you!”

They waited awhile for this Jonas fellow, who turned out to be a man in his late fifties, hair graying around the edges and belly beginning to bulge, but still powerfully built, “What do ya want Greyson.”

The man sounded irritated, he sounded like he was perpetually irritated, that mixed with the smell of alcohol which drifted off the man in waves painted a vivid picture.

“Recognize the hammer old man? I think it’s yours,” Greyson easily picked up the weapon with one hand, showing of an astounding level of strength.

“Huh?” Jonas walked up to the hammer and received it with a grunt, then the man carefully looked over the notches in the wood and the dents on the hammer head, “This is from the garage, where’d you get this from Greyson?”

“This kid,” Greyson pushed Roy forwards into the spotlight, “Why don’t you fill the old man in?”

Jonas stared hard at Roy for a second, his features were somewhat wrinkled with age but Roy could see this man’s resemblance to John, and to the man in the photo he had picked up from the car dealership, “You got this from my garage.”

It was more a fact than a question, Roy knew this wasn’t going to turn out pretty, “Well... yeah, I needed some shelter you see, so I got in and found this laying around...”

“You broke into my place, and you take my stuff, and here you are,” the man’s teeth were clenched in anger, the emotion rolled of him like the stench of booze. Before he knew it the man had him by the collar and Roy was staring into two orbs alight with rage.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, calm down old man, you better put the kid down before Owen gets a whiff of this,” Greyson moved beside Roy’s captor and clasped one hand over his shoulder. The motion seemed to drain the energy out of the man and Roy was let down.

“What else you got,” Jonas looked towards Roy, eyes dim and lacking life.

“Some batteries...”

“Did you see a photo... on the front desk,” Roy reached into his bag and extracted the framed photograph depicting John, Jonas, and what Roy assumed to be John’s brother. Jonas took the memento and looked at it for a moment, “You know John?”

“Yeah... that’s why I took the photo, I though, you know,” Roy spluttered out the last bit, feeling as if he was interrupting the mood with his bumbling.

“How was he?”

“Well,” Roy recalled John’s confrontation with Deven and the bullet wound, Leo said it was fine so that was what he would repeat, there was no point bringing John’s father deeper into melancholy, “He’s with a big group, and he’s strong, so I think things are going to be fine.”

He didn’t mention the confrontation outside the gymnasium with the behemoth. The man needed some hope, and Roy was going to try, even if he wasn’t some certified doctor.

“Oh,” the man hefted the sledgehammer and turned around, as he slowly made his way between the makeshift partitions, Roy caught a quiet addendum, “Thanks.”

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Greyson waited until the sound of a door opening and closing resounded through the room before continuing, “Used to be a chipper guy.”

“Oh,” the quick escalation and de-escalation left him drawing blanks, was it fear he felt when the larger man had picked him up by the color, violence so evident in his eyes, or was it pity for the emotions that drifted off the man like smog. Looking at the photograph and the man’s worry reminded Roy of his own family.

He had pushed the though away on the first day, justified by the fact that his both his mom was on the eastern seaboard and his father was on another continent all together. Was he worried about them, were they worried about him, was he not feeling overwhelmed like Jonas, because the present loomed large in his eyes.

“Hey kid, don’t space out on me,” Greyson gave him a light shove that pulled him out of his thoughts, “Aww, now I can’t recall what the hell we were talking about.”

Greyson looked at the rod he had taken from Roy, “Oh, yeah, weapons and shit right?”

“Yeah,” Roy quietly replied, he was hoping that the man would move on and leave the rest of his possessions alone.

“You keep the pitchfork, we take the sizzler,” Greyson announced confidently, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

“The sizzler?” was the man mistaking the weapon for something else they had found, or was that just lingo.

“Cuz’ when you shoot the shrooms’ with it they start to sizzle,” Greyson explained with a matter of fact tone, the man always seemed so sure of himself, it was a confidence that slightly annoyed Roy, least of which because he lacked it, “You ever get one of these to work?”

“Yeah,” it sounded like he wasn’t the only one.

“So you ain’t a halfwit, good, we have a couple of these and we put them to good use against the buggers when they start swarming around,” Greyson pointed towards a row of fungas fryers that stood lined up against the wall, rough wood out of place against the smooth plaster of the wall.

“We get some of the cowards to take turns shooting a load at the shrooms, they leech off our work but at least they're good for something,” Greyson continued, disgust evident in his face.

“Fuck those guys! Anyways, Lestrat’ll get you settled down, meanwhile I’ll hook you up with Nolan, he leads the Task Force,” a small smile crept onto Roy’s face as Greyson mentioned Lestrat, it seemed they had made it and the other boy was still taking an active role in things. On the other hand getting shoved into a team that took frequent trips outside sent Roy’s danger alarms into overdrive, but the position would certainly give him a larger, more important role in things. That would help him convince the group to leave, once he found a good opportunity to broach the subject.

Greyson had Roy wait near the entrance as he looked for Lestrat, it gave him time to take in the scene laid out before him. The inside of the store was dark, the only light came from the windows at the front, as it passed over the rows of makeshift partitions it grew more and more feeble, until Roy could hardly make out the rooms situated at the very back. It was humid too, more so then outside, and it smelled of people, unwashed bodies packed in an enclosed space for days on end.

Roy caught sight of some of the residents, walking between the aisles with stooped shoulders and downturned heads. The man he was currently looking at wore a blue dress shirt, it was still presentable despite the circumstances. The man walked towards the back of the store before disappearing from sight. There were other’s too, people in modern attire sat along the edges of platforms chatting away with their neighbors, their conversations were hushed but one layered atop another, some arising from areas blocked off from Roy’s sight by the maze of shelves that had been set up.

They intermixed, creating a quiet buzz, like the wind as it streamed its way through urban corridors and across asphalt deserts. One individual was heading towards the front of the store, it was an elderly man whose hair line and skin told of far advanced age. The man gave Roy a brief look before dismissing him; he set himself down near the windows on a plastic stool and sat there, gazing out at nothing in particular.

It took a few minutes for Greyson to finally return with Lestrat, who at the sight of Roy sped past the older man and within seconds stood an arm’s length away. He hesitated for a moment before clasping his hand of Roy’s shoulders. Joy and relief were evident in the boy’s face, but it intermixed with something Roy couldn’t quite identify.

“It’s so good to see you Roy,” Lestrat was finally able to vocalize, “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

Roy looked at Lestrat, tears were already beginning to form, and the burst of emotion was making Roy uneasy. He had never been at the receiving end of so much... gratitude, or so many thanks, “Oh, uh, its fine I guess, it’s good to see you too Lestrat, how are the other’s?”

Lestrat sky blue eyes began to shimmer as tears flowed out, dark rings half encircled his eyes, and his hair was a mess, unlike the tidy crop Roy had associated the boy with, “They’re doing well Roy, thank you.”

Lestrat squeezed out the final words before he turned his face towards the ground, taking in deep breaths as he reigned himself in.

“You know each other?” Greyson interjected, as he walked up to Roy, “Whatever, get this show over with, I think I’m gonna barf. Oh and I’m leaving, Lestrat can show you around.”

Then he pushed past the front doors, leaving Roy with his guide.

“Are you ok?” asked Roy, doubting his own choice of words.

“I’m... fine, we’re all fine,” Lestrat raised his head, his mouth forming a small grin and his eyes still wet with tears, “Let’s go, I’ll show you around.”

Lestrat took the lead and Roy followed as they walked deeper into the establishment, the shelves rose up on all sides, overshadowing the narrow and flooded walk spaces. Other horizontal patches intersected the route they took, without a path to the windows they were even darker, resembling tight packed alleyways.

The rooms opened up to the make shift street, most were curtained or blocked off with cardboard, probably to provide the residents with some measure of privacy. Though they were all without roofs and the thin walls provided little when it came to keeping sound from leaking out or drifting in. Despite the decrepitude, the set-up was novel, a makeshift shelter constructed of shelves. The stink, the humidity, the heat, were all made more tolerable by his constitution, though that luxury would not be available to many of the other residents.

The whole grocery had been turned into an emergency shelter, the sort Roy would sometimes glimpse on TV after a natural disaster, but the conditions at this shelter would probably cause a controversy. As they navigated the corridors Lestrat talked and Roy listened, it sucked that he would have to remember all of this considering his lackluster memory, a product of never having studied for a test or memorized a presentation.

“We have the residences here and various workplaces at the back,” Lestrat pointed straight forwards to door that could be barely made out in the dark, “The bathroom are where they used to be, though the toilets and urinals are... inoperable, we have buckets set up...”

“Anyways, we handout food near the front doors every morning, the rations should be sufficient but we provide extra to those that work, physical exertion and all. However, some people need larger portions, for questions and concerns we have an office at the far left corner, there should be a big sign on the door so you can’t miss it,” Lestrat turned a corner and the two made their way through a alley before popping out in the next aisle to the left, “That’s where we’ll be heading, I live in the office and there’s a few empty lofts right outside so I can assign you one of those. People generally prefer the rooms closer to the front, so it’s up to you.”

Lestrat stopped outside a plain aluminum door with a large sign hanging on its surface, a dim light attached to the sign helped to illuminate the words ‘Welcome’ followed by ‘Question and Concerns’ on the line below it, “Here we are, the scavengers are based on the right side, they have their own quarters too. The generator room, storage spaces, and a few other residences are located behind the rest of the doors.”

“Oh and before we go in and I get completely side tracked, Sergeant Owen is in charge, he likes to keep watch on the roof. Officer Greyson handles security, but he does a lot besides that too. I’ll introduce the others once we get settled down,” with that Lestrat turned towards the door and knocked.

“Yes?”

“Madelyn, it’s me. Roy’s here too,” Lestrat responded.