"Hey, Matilda!" I called into the store, "Get Rumi and Kyli. There's something out here. It's probably people, but that doesn't mean they're good folk. I'm going to try and talk to them, you three be ready to intervene in case things turn violent."

I heard her shrill agreement and the fluttering of her wings as she dove deeper into the store. As for myself, I slithered out from behind the shelf and pretended to just notice the three creatures standing before the opened gate into the store warily. They appeared to be a rather well balanced team of monsters at first glance, a harpy eagle the size of a man, a pitch black wolf with two heads that seemed to make me innately uncomfortable, and the one I was most wary of an eight foot tall sasquatch carrying a blacksmith hammer and machete. By the looks of it, all of them had been in a fight recently judging by the darker fluid splotches on their weapons and bodies. They appeared to be mirroring my own wariness as they took in the blood that still coated me and the knife strapped to my side.

Time to test the waters.

Drawing on all my years working at this place I plastered on a polite smile that didn't reach my eyes and greeted them in a polite and peppy tone, "Hello! Thank you for coming to Lowes Depot. I'm sorry but I'm afraid the store has a strict dress code requiring you to wear pants and I have to ask you to leave."

"What the fuck?" the sasquatch said with a hint of a Hispanic accent, Salvadorian if I didn't miss my guess. I was rather familiar with that one. "Nah nah nah chief, you ain't about to just kick us out after all that walking we just did. Hell! I was here first! Actually broke out of a damn egg inside that very store so we got first dibs on staying here."

"Yeah!" the eagle squawked with very obvious false bravado, his eyes very firmly locked onto my knife, "We also out number you so if anything it's you who should be leaving!"

"Omar, you said there was no one here?" the two head wolf whined as his other head said, "Rafael, I'd really not have to fight this guy if we don't have to. He looks tough." at the same time.

Omar? "You claim you hatched here?" I dropped the 'polite employee' bit, "That would mean you were here at the time of the Event, but I happen to know that this store closes around ten and the Event happened around Midnight."

"That's because I work here after hours restocking the store dumbass," the salvadorian sasquatch was squinting at my hat intently. "Fell off the damn ladder when that shit started, so I've earned my stay here. Who the fuck are you to try and stop me?"

I had a pretty good idea I knew who this man had been, there was a pretty easy way of testing. I gave a loud dramatic gasp, placed my tail over where I was fairly sure my heart was, and with a weepy voice dramatically exclaimed, "My favorite little bean doesn't recognize me!? After all the years we spent together! All the memories! Was it all for nothing!? Boo hoo hoo hoo!"

The eagle and wolf looked utterly bewildered by the sudden change in my behavior, the sasquatch? He had the biggest, toothiest grin I'd ever seen an ape give. "Joe!? You son of a bitch, I knew I recognized that hat! The fuck you doing over here cracker?"

I switched to my best nasally Karen voice and placed my tail on my 'hip', "Ach! Oh em gee Omar! I can't believe you just said that! I'm not a cracker! Cracker's are rich! I'm a poor, so I'm a peckerwood, gosh! You're so insensitive! I should report you to HR!"

"This Dude~!" my old work friend laughed, setting his weapons aside and spreading his arms wide as he approached, "Get your beanpole of an ass over here!" We both laughed happily as we met in as fierce and tight a hug as we could both manage without hurting each other, Omar actually making a good attempt to try and pick me up before my pointed scales convinced him it was a bad idea. "You have no idea how good it is to see you again my guy! What are you doing here though? Don't you live, on like, the other side of town?"

"I came over here to help get supplies," I answered truthfully, "I've kinda sorta maybe ended up half in charge of the people from my apartment complex because I was actually nutty enough to have a plan for something half way resembling this whole mess."

"I fucking knew you would," Omar laughed jamming his finger repeatedly into my chest, "Your crazy ass was always going on about your zombie plans. I actually tried to call you first thing because I knew you'd know what to do!"

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

"Uh Omar?" Both heads on the wolf nervously broached, "You mind explaining what's going on?"

"Right, right, yeah. Will, Rafael, this crazy ass cracker is Joe." He wrapped a big hairy arm around me and pulled me to his side, "He's easily one of my favorite people who I've ever worked with. Joe, this is Will and Rafael. A couple of my neighbors I hooked up with when I went to check on my home."

"None of your family there I take it?" I ask, already knowing the answer.

"Nah," his smile turned a bit brittle, "How about you?"

"Nearest one is about two hundred miles away so no way to know so far," I tilted my head in the closest thing I could do to a shrug now, "Heck I don't even know if I'm still a guy."

"What? Of course you're still a dude dude!" he said, giving me a quizzical look.

I shifted my voice up as high as I could and pretended to be flicking hair out of my eyes, "As if you know anything about snakes! For all you know I’m a serpentine super model now."

"This fucking dude~!" Omar's smile returned and we both shared a laugh. I waved the girls from their hiding spot and began a round of introductions. Matilda was more than happy to meet everyone, though Rumi kept her distance, and Kyli had to be dragged out for introductions. Despite a bit of lingering awkwardness, the atmosphere was still fairly cordial, even though Will seemed to be struggling a bit – apparently both of his heads had a fully independent brain who were both him so he'd keep tripping himselves up when he tried to talk, and worse, heard himself in stereo. "So you guys staying then? I'm more than willing to let any friends of Joe's stay."

"Sorry dear," Matilda said from her perch atop a pile of dirt bags, "But we're just passing through."

"Yeah, we've already got somewhere else picked out," I stated, "This would be a terrible place to live anyways."

I suddenly had the full attention of Omar and his friends, "What? Why? I thought you said this place wouldn't be too bad before?"

"Yes, for a zombie apocalypse this place would be great." I clarified, "Solid walls, easily fortified, tons of melee weapons, access to several food stores, lots of fresh dirt and seed packets. But for this situation? Most of the food is rotten, the bagged seeds have spoiled, no access to fresh water, it makes it a far less appealing option."

"So where are you going then?" Rafael asked, his avian body tense.

"The football stadium," I stated without missing a beat, "It's not the optimum spot in my personal opinion, but still plenty good." I could already feel the beginnings of the building tension and decided to cut it right off, "You guys are more than welcome to join us if you'd like. We still got like a hundred pounds of salted fish, not to mention whatever we can find at the Bullseye across the freeway and dead jackal-snakes we can grab on the way home. The extra manpower would be appreciated." I gave a beat to see people relaxing before finishing with, "You will have to get dressed first. We aren't animals and I refuse to deal with nudists!"

"Oh my god Joe~!" Omar groaned, shaking his head.

With Omar's team joining us, the pillaging of my former place of work went much faster, letting us load up a hitch trailer full of construction material, paint, tools, and fencing inside half an hour and move onto raiding the Bullseye Super-center across the road. Upon arrival I discovered I'd be forced to wait outside again due to the slick tiled floors inside. Omar, now wearing a high vis vest and hard hat, stayed outside to 'watch the cart' and catch up with me. It felt great to just chat with him and get up to date on work gossip while our 'minions' combed through the shopping center for anything worth salvaging. Of course, eventually we had to get onto a more serious topic.

"Man Joe," Omar sighed happily leaning against the store, "You have no idea how big a relief it is to have run across you."

"Same here little bean," I smiled from my position wrapped around a bollard and resting my head atop it, "It's good to finally see someone I know and can fully trust, I'd much rather have you there to keep them in line rather than someone I've only known for a day or two."

"The hell you talkin' about Joe?" Omar asked pausing to take a puff on the cigarette he'd looted from the store, "I thought you said you were in charge of your group? Why would I be in charge of it? Especially when you know way more about camping and survival shit. Fuck man, I was going to school for marketing and that's hardly useful these days."

"Hey, being good with numbers and market projections is still very useful for quartermaster work and trading," I corrected, my face scrunching up a bit as my tongue flicked out and got a whiff of his smoke, "And the reason I'd want you or someone else in charge is because I'm not going to be sticking around. The only reason I'm still here is because these folks needed help and I've always had trouble turning away people in actual need. Figure either tomorrow or the day after they'll be in a good enough place for me to head out."

"Yeah but why though?" he pressed, flicking away the stub of his smoke to more fully face me, "Is staying in the city that bad an idea or something?"

"If it was at full population, absolutely. But with maybe one in every ten thousand people being here it should be fine enough for now. Nah, I'm leaving because of family." a small frown flitted across my face as my mind danced to my blind dad and my mom who had been slowing down last I saw them, "I don't know if anyone else made it into Wave One or not, but we all agreed that if something bad happened we'd meet at the family farm. Even if they didn't make it, I doubt the middle of the countryside a dozen miles from the nearest city will be nearly as safe as the middle of the metroplex. I want to be there to make sure they're as safe as can be when they do hatch."

"Fuck man, I get that, but, fuck." Omar reached over, picking my head up and tucking it under his arm to give me a noogie. I playfully fought back despite barely feeling it through my scales, "I'm going to miss you cracker."

"Bah! You're acting like I'm just going to be abandoning you all to your fates," I shifted to a faux British tone and took the haughtiest pose I could, "As a proper God fearing man, of largely Anglo descent, it is my god given duty to educate the local savages so they are at least somewhat civilized before moving on." Omar laughed and punched my side, I smiled and dropped the accent, "But yeah I plan to spend most of tomorrow teaching people useful survival skills after we've settled into the stadium. I hope you're ready to learn how to tan a hide, because it's a very unpleasant process."

"Didn't you say the process requires a large amount of piss?" he asked curiously, I gave him a coy smile and nodded. "Fuck~"