(That's… one big ass house.)

I was standing in the driveway, next to Rika's home. The place was surrounded by a tall concrete wall, along with some fences that blocked any opening that was left open by said wall. In other words, we were safe. For now anyway.

(Still, this place is nothing compared to Saya's castle sized house. Even if I have never seen it before, the Anime made it obvious how big that place was...)

By the time I finally arrived here, it was already dark. Dark and rather silent, if you don't count the distant sounds of horns and commotion coming from the evacuation center on the bridge that is.

The trip here was also relatively safe, no real surprises there. Other than Kohta's nose bleeding on my back that is. But, well… I don't blame him. Four people on a bike after all, does translate to being stuck pretty close to each other. And Saeko decided to sit behind Kohta, the rest, sort of explains itself.

Now with Takashi being the only exception, the rest of the group had already moved inside. Takashi was still outside with me, moving the now silent bike towards the parking space behind the house. I had also given my stuff to Kohta as he went ahead of me.

I turn my head away from the house and look at Takashi while walking next to him.

(He actually looks much better now, considering how he looked before the outbreak...)

A couple of seconds later Takashi turns his head to me.

"Is there something wrong?" He asks as he parks the bike.

"Hmm… I'm just getting the feeling that you actually seem to be in higher spirits now. At least in contrast with how you looked back at school, where you wasted away at the stairs." I say as we park the bike, fold my arms, and start walking back towards the building's front door.

Takashi raises an eyebrow as he starts walking next to me.

"Uhh, sorry but..."

"You probably don't remember, but this ain't the first time we meet. We met once before the bus as well." I cut him off as I tilt my head.

Takashi just stares at me, seemingly in thought.

"Remember, no shit mode lasts forever. I guess it can always get much worse huh." I finish my sentence with a chuckle and turn to look at him.

And a couple of seconds later, he finally puts two and two together.

"Wait...you're, that guy?" He says, his eyes going slightly wide.

"Yes I'm that guy. Small world ehh, I'm actually surprised you remembered" I respond as I lift an eyebrow.

"Not many people spoke to me back then, and you kind of stood out." He answers as he scratches his forehead.

Before I could speak, Takashi continued.

"Look I'm sorry if I responded in a hostile manner back then. I was… not at my best. Also, thanks for helping the others after we split up." He then puts his hands in his pockets after he finishes talking.

"Don't mention it. Also, we were all helping each other, I did not go the extra mile or anything." I respond with a shrug.

Takashi was about to speak up again, when a wild Kohta burst through the front door, breathing heavily.

"Guys… you need to see this." He says as he points back into the house, taking deep breaths in the process.

(He probably found the metal locker with the bullets. No other reason for Kohta to be this out of breath over something. Not this early.)

Nodding to the excited Kohta I make my way into the house, Takashi following behind me. Once inside, I was about to ask Kohta where he left my bag, when I got distracted by a group of overly hyped girls near the bathroom.

"OHHH! I feel like I haven't taken a bath in months" I hear Shizuka squeal.

"Ughh, all this dried blood on my clothes is making me feel horrible, can we go already?" Saya 'asks' as she looks at the rest of the girls.

"The house has solar panels for heating water. So it should have hot water we can use right now" Shizuka adds with a smile.

"Well? Let's go already then." Saya groans as she starts walking into the bathroom.

After the girls left, while totally ignoring the three of us, we started going up the stairs.

(The girls better not use up all the hot water, or there is going to be a damn war in here.)

Going up the stairs, Takashi and I followed Kohta until he stopped in front of a door that led to a bedroom.

"There is a metal locker in here, and you won't believe what I found inside it..." Kohta grins as he grabs the doorknob. Going inside the room, Kohta walks up next to a metal locker and then turns to us.

"Bullets, there are bullets in here!" Kohta says as he points to the single open door of the double door locker.

"How about the other door?" I ask as I walk up to Kohta, already knowing the answer.

"It's locked, and that's what I needed help with. There's a crowbar in the unlocked part of the locker so we can use it to pry open the second door, and if there are bullets here, then…"

"I see shotgun shells. If there's a shotgun here, I call dibs. " I cut off Kohta as I comically crack my knuckle.

We were about to give the whole thing a try when. We heard the girls squealing from downstairs.

"They sure seem to be having fun in there," Takashi speaks up.

"Want to spy on them like real men?" Kohta asks.

"...I don't feel like dying yet," Takashi adds right after.

"Getting killed immediately is actually a blessing, considering that the girls will probably treat you like trash if they spot you. Good luck surviving in a group where almost half your team is giving you the stink eye. In any case, focus on the locker, or we'll never pry it open." I respond.

And just like that, we focused back on the closed door.

After shoving the crowbar in the gap between the door and the locker itself, Takashi and Kohta took position along the crowbar to push it.

(The crowbar is too small for me to also push, so I pull? That would mean that the guys will probably fall on me though...)

"Hey, Naier! Come on, grab the crowbar from the opposite side and pull. Kohta and I will push it." I hear Takashi say as he prepares to try and force the locker door open.

I sigh under my breath and grab the crowbar, then prepare to pull it towards me.

"Three, two, one. GO!" I start a countdown and with the last number, I start pulling the crowbar towards me.

A few seconds later, the door gives in and flies open. I quickly let go of the crowbar and jump to my right. Kohta and Takashi then fly right past me, landing face flat on the floor.

(And time for Kohta to go nuts.)

"And, we got guns." I say as I look into the now open locker from where I was standing.

(Three guns, like in the anime, no wait. There's… more?.)

Kohta, upon hearing the word guns, springs back up from the floor and pretty much sticks his upper torso in the locker. He then took the M1A1 out along with one of its empty magazines, before taking some steps away and kneeling down with the weapon.

While Kohta was drooling over the gun I walked over to the locker.

(I am pretty sure that these were NOT in the anime.)

I reach in the corner of the now unlocked locker and grab a belt with two stun grenades strapped on to it.

(These will definitely come in handy. They are insanely loud, and would work excellently as a distraction. Shame there's only two of them though)

I quickly strap the belt on my waist before grabbing the shotgun.

"Called dibs on the shotgun, so… this is mine now." I say as I hold the empty M37 Ithaca with both hands.

Kohta turned to me, his face one like from a kid that just got a mountain of Christmas toys.

"That's a..."

"Shotgun" I butt in, trying to stop the oncoming nerd talk.

Not that it stopped him from starting a long-winded infomercial on the gun's attributes and the use it had in the USA military. While Kohta kept talking, I turned towards the locker

(Later in the anime the shotgun also had a sling. I wonder if they got it from here…)

I looked around the locker for any rolled up fabrics. And, I did find several in the unlocked part of the locker. I grab the slings and unroll them to check their compatibility.

(Three two-point slings and two three-point slings. We got more slings than guns… the two guns that the rest of the slings are supposed to go with are probably with Rika. No matter, I'm taking one of the three-point slings. It will let me have the shotgun hanging on my sides without needing to strap it on the backpack every time I'm not using it. The two-point sling does not let me use the shotgun instantly without needing to take it off every time I need to use it, unlike with the three-point one. So the three-sided one is better)

By the time I was done thinking, Kohta had already started taking the ammo for the guns out of the locker.

"Hmm, there's plenty of ammo here. Enough to last a couple of heated firefights." I say, looking at the assorted carton boxes filled with ammo.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

"Yea... I wonder who's that friend that Shizuka mentioned. She has a small armory in here." Kohta says as he keeps laying the magazines and ammo boxes on the floor.

"Somebody we owe a big friggin favor to." I respond with a chuckle as I start helping Kohta with the stuff. Takashi joins in after a few seconds, and a couple of minutes later. Everything was on the floor.

"We'll have to manually load the bullets in the magazines now." Kohta sits down after speaking and picks a magazine to load.

"You would expect that there would be a weapon clip to load the bullets in the mags quickly with everything the locker had inside. But, well… I'm just looking a gift horse in the mouth now." I say as I sit down opposite of Kohta and start loading a random magazine with its appropriate bullet.

After a couple of 'which way does the bullet go in' questions from Takashi, the three of us seemed to have found a rhythm to the monotonous task.

"You two are pretty good at this. Have you done this before with airguns?" Takashi asks as he glances at us.

"Nah… Real guns." Kohta says with a smirk, and then he starts explaining how he went to America and was trained by a PMC instructor on gun handling.

(Right, they will probably ask me about it now. So… what do I say?)

After Kohta was done he turned to me.

"Actually Naier, when we went to the gun range, you did pretty good considering. Have you used guns before as well?" Kohta asks.

"Wait, you two went to a gun range?" Takashi asks, his eyes going wide.

"Then again you did say you helped somebody with taking videos for hunting rifles so I guess. It's not that far fetched?" Takashi pretty much 'answers' his own question.

"Yeah as for before, I did go to a gun range occasionally." Is all I said as I kept loading the magazines.

The other two, seeing that I was not going to speak about it anymore, just let go of the subject and turned back to loading the bullets into the magazines...

About half an hour later, we were done with the magazine loading.

Takashi was now using the binoculars to look outside. Kohta was just sitting down looking at his new toys. While I kept practicing loading a shell in the shotgun and then pumping it back out, then picking it back up again and loading it back inside, repeating the process again and again.

(I need to get used to this. This shotgun has no way to easily reload after all, except for one shell at a time.)

I had also already attached the three-point sling on the shotgun and was actually wearing it right now, to get myself used to wearing it.

A couple of minutes passed like this, until we heard the girls again.

"They are being too noisy." I hear Kohta say, turning to him I see his face had a frown on it.

"It's fine. The corpses do react to noise. But all the noise we're making right now is being drowned out by… " Takashi trails off as he speaks.

"The evacuation center on the bridge. There's going to be a bloodbath there sooner or later. Most of the people there don't even know what is going on, and by being loud they are pretty much digging their own graves. Just be glad you are here and not there right now, that place is turning into a coffin and it's closing fast." I continued his sentence as I got up, the shotgun hanging on my side.

"By the way. Kohta, where's my bag" Kohta turns to me after hearing my question.

"I left it in the next room along with my bag." Kohta says as he points to the wall behind me before turning back to Takashi who started speaking again.

"Alright, thanks." I say as I move towards the door.

I was about to open the door, when the doorknob started turning by itself...

(Huh? Drunk Shizuka alert? Isn't it too early for her to be here though? The guys haven't even turned the TV on yet… Uhhh, focus.)

I silently walk to the side of the door, so once it opens it will cover me behind it. And the moment I slide behind the door, my view gets blocked as it opens.

Peeking out from the corner, I see Shizuka creeping up on Takashi, slowly getting on the bed.

(For being drunk, she is awfully silent...Wait, is she going to stay there laying on the bed staring at Takashi until the whole event with the TV happens? Yeah… I'm outta here. Have fun you two.)

With that, I silently move out of the room, closing the door behind me, and start walking away towards the room next door.

(How the hell can somebody get drunk in hot water anyway?)

Reaching my destination, I stop in front of it and carefully open it.

(Empty. Ah, and there it is.)

Going inside, I pick my bag and put some shells I picked up into the side pockets. I then open my bag and check my extra clothes.

(With how long they took, I get the feeling I'll be taking a rather cold shower.)

Satisfied with what I saw, I leave my backpack back next to Kohta's. I then looked at Kohta's hiking backpack, the sight of it reminding what just transpired today.

(This is the first time I'm actually alone since this whole thing started huh.)

I walk to the window, taking a look at the distant lights on the bridge.

(The outbreak happened… and I managed to group up with Takashi and co. And now, I'm here, rather than there with the soon to be dead crowd.)

I let out a dry laugh.

(I am actually very lucky with how things played out. Even Saeko is calling me by my first name already. If that counts for something. How did I even manage that?)

I turn and look at Kohta's hiking backpack again.

(To think my starter plan was to get close to Kohta and use him as leverage to get in the group... I'm actually glad I'm pissed with myself right now for thinking of that. The guy probably sees me as his friend now. The least I could do is actually become one.)

I sigh and turn my head to the window and lightly bump my head on it.

(Come on focus. I think it's time to go and take that goddamn bath.)

With that, I turn around and grab my backpack, then exit the room.

(Maybe I should have taken more than just one pair of underwear and socks. Oh well, we will be at Saya's house soon if things play out like in the anime, and so far it seems like things are following that track. Although, I wonder what will happen now that Shido does not have the bus. If this whole world is 'scripted' for things to happen like in the anime, then no matter how hard I try, Shido will just appear at Saya's mansion with something that can ram the barricade. God, I hope that's not the case... I mean, this whole thing feels… too real to believe that everything is scripted here, zombies aside.)

With that cheery thought in mind, I reached the staircase and started going down. Only to immediately pause as I saw Rei slumped on the bottom step.

(Right, of course. The stairs are Rei's territory. And she's half-naked… great.)

Probably hearing my footsteps, Rei turns around.

"Taaakasshiii" She groans looking as drunk as Shizuka.

(Again… how?)

She gets up and goes up the stairs, stopping a few steps away from me, then starts staring at my mask, hard.

"You are not Takashi..." She mumbles.

"No, I'm not." I say, trying to keep my focus on her face and not let my eyes wander.

"Why?" She asks.

"Huh?" Is all I can respond with, as I tilt my head.

"Why are you not Takashi…?" She asks again as she starts pouting.

I sigh and shake my head.

"Go home Rei, you're drunk." Is all I say as I move past her.

I could hear Rei mumble something behind me, but I didn't really understand what she said. Not that it probably mattered much.

(Still... I don't get that girl. Takashi is the only thing that goes through her head, yet she dumped him for his own best friend. If the outbreak didn't happen, she would probably still be with Hisashi. Girls are fucking weird… or she just needs a good slap in the face so she can start considering how others might feel. Oh, wait… she did get slapped.)

I shake my head again and move towards the bath.

On my way there I pass by the living room, with Saya on the sofa, her clothes and pose… not really leaving much to the imagination.

And I stopped in place and just stood there staring.

(You know, seeing this scene from behind a screen, and seeing it from up close is… oh,look… her cleavage is in plain sight.)

A few seconds pass with me rooted at the spot.

(FOCUS!)

I slap my face, aka my mask, then quickly open my bag, pulling out a sleeping bag. I unroll it as I walk up to her.

(I get the feeling that if she wakes up and sees me, she will actually get very pissed at me, because Saya.)

I then cover the provocatively sleeping girl with the sleeping bag. Thankfully all she did was moan, before shifting slightly until she got comfortable under her new blanket.

With that done, I quickly walked away until I reached the bathroom.

(This house. I swear, it's bad for my mental health.)

I stop in front of the bathroom door.

(Ok anime one o' one. Never, ever. Charge into the bathroom. Saya, Rei and Shizuka are out of the bath, as I have seen them. Saeko was not in the kitchen. Sooo.)

I take a deep breath and knock on the door, hard.

Nothing...

(I can't hear any movement from behind the door, so it 'sounds' clear.)

For safe measure, I knock on the door again.

(I must look pretty stupid right now...)

Nothing again… I steel myself and swing the door open, expecting a bucket to land right on my face.

(Empty. I watched too much anime...)

I laugh dryly and walk inside the bathroom after I left the shotgun, backpack and belt with the flashbangs on a nearby sofa, taking only my change of clothes with me. Entering the bathroom I close the door behind me and go to the sink, then look at myself in the mirror.

(Gotta' clean the mask and balaclava. And now I wish I had taken an extra balaclava, oh well.)

With that, I take off my mask. Just as I was about to take off my clothes, I paused.

(I will check the bath, just in case.)

I move away from the mirror and open the second door leading to the bath, then look inside.

(Empty. Ok,so… where was I.)

With the premise clear, I take off my clothes, throw them in the corner and walk to the bath, closing the second door behind me. Then move to the showers in the corner

(The bathtub still has hot water inside. But, I'm not aiming to take too long of a wash, so I'll just take a normal shower.)

5 minutes later.

I was outside the bath with my new clean clothes. Not that I looked much different, this set was as black as the last one, with the exception that I was also wearing a jacket with a hood.

Right now, I was cleaning my mask and balaclava on the sink.

(The balaclava is relatively clean and thankfully it does not smell, so I can probably get away with it.)

After I was done washing my stuff I strap them back on me.

For the finishing touch, after I put the mask back on my face I lift the hood over my head and look at myself in the mirror.

(Heh...Ten outta ten.) I chuckle to myself and lower the hood.

With that over with, I walk out with my old clothes in hand. Once outside of the bathroom, I give out a stretch and yawn.

(The water shower was still hot, and this got me way too sleepy. Well, better than being drunk. Too many half-naked girls around.)

I lazily walk to a window, open it and toss the dirty clothes out.

(Rest in pieces school attire.)

That done, I walked to the sofa I placed my stuff at and picked them up. I put the flashbang belt in the backpack, then I wore the shotgun sling and threw the bag over my shoulder.

Then proceeded to walk around the house aimlessly.

And with my brain not giving directional commands to my body, my other organs apparently decided to do something about it. More precisely, my stomach did...

As I ended up in the kitchen… The noise I made caused the only person there to turn to me.

Saeko was now looking at me, next to her a boiling pot.

And once again, I was standing there, just staring. Except this time, the other person was staring back at me and she was not drunk or asleep.

(Keep your eyes on her face… keep your eyes on her face.)

"The food will be ready soon Naier, hope you don't dislike Japanese cuisine." She says with a smile.

"Uhh, no, It's fine with me..." I say, frozen in place.

"You… ughh. Want my jacket or, something?" I ask her, trying to keep my eyes from wandering.

"Ohh… this? I couldn't find anything that fits me. I hope it doesn't bother you too much." She says looking down on her apron, tugging at it, before looking back at me.

(She HAD to ask that !? I swear she is doing this on purpose...)

I take a deep breath and decide to take the best course of action considering my current situation… Avoiding the fucking question.

"Soo… you want the jacket?" I ask again.

Saeko just giggles.

"If you don't mind, then please." She says as she lets go of the kitchen utensils and moves closer to me.

(I. AM. FOCUSED! I think she can see through my mask… FOCUSED!)

I take off the jacket after removing my shotgun and bag, and give it to Saeko. She takes a few steps back and wears it before trying to zip it up

And can you guess what Saeko has that I don't? A giant chest.

The jacket's zipper got stuck midway, just under her large assets.

The black jacket was now making the white apron that covered her chest even more pronounced than before.

And my eyes, attracted by the 'bright contrast' in its periphery, finally trailed down.

(Ohh, look… it's full moons tonight.)

Saeko probably bothered by the zipper, unzipped the jacket a couple of seconds later. Not that it mattered. The damage was done and my eyes were on anywhere but her face.

"Thank you Naier, I'll return it to you when I get my clothes back." She responds with a smile.

I don't know if she could not see where I was staring because of my mask, or if she just didn't care.

"Uhuh..." Is all I said as I slowly turned my sight towards her face.

"Where did you find the clothes anyway?" She asks a few seconds later as she looks at me from head to toe.

"I had a spare change of clothes. For the part-time job I mentioned in the bus." I answer.

"Ahhh, yes. I do remember you mentioning that. In any case, thank you." She says with a slight bow.

I nod like an idiot, and finally manage to take my eyes off Saeko.

And my eyes, much to my dismay, land on the staircase...

Where Takashi and Rei were getting REALLY affectionate towards each other. Like, I think they are actually making out right now?

(GIVE ME A FUCKING BREAK!)

I take a deep breath and

"Moom! Takashi and Rei are making out on the stairs again!" I shout, turning around and walking to the fridge, opening it and looking inside.

(Ohhh look at that, lime juice.)

I was expecting somebody to start talking. Yet instead, what I heard was. Dog barking.

I lift my head immediately from the fridge.

(God, at least let me eat something first damn it.)

I close the fridge and run to my stuff, taking the shotgun in one hand and the bag in the other. Then run to the stairs.

"Wha… what's gotten into you?" Rei asks, probably startled by my actions.

"That barking dog, it sounds close. Too close." Is all I said as I ran past Takashi and Rei, going to the room that the locker was in.

Going outside through the door-sized window, I see Kohta turning to look at me with a serious expression.

"Nice vest, please tell me I'm the only one hearing that barking." I say as I walk up next to him. Kohta shakes his head.

"It looks really bad Naier. They're gathering in the front of the house, a lot of them." He answers, gripping his gun.

I look down at the street as I nod.

(No rest for the wicked, huh.)