The woods made up a large part of the safe quarantined area, and housed the two main settlements, Jones’ Market and Mike’s Kingdom, with Rider's treehouse in the middle. Outside the forest, was the city, On the surface, a deadzone, Ground Zero. However, rumors have been spread of a city underneath the city itself. The sewers.

Aside from the two main camps, existed four other settlements, one of which was home to a massive hive infestation, that separated the forest from the other three settlements. Using the fully deceased undead, a farming village masks their scent to make deliveries to Jones, but this takes a long time, and by the time they make it over, some of the crops are lost or spoiled. And currently the only other way to get to them was through the cliffside. However, if someone was mad enough to ride through the hive without fear of the horde, then perhaps it could be sped up.

Rider’s radio crackles to life, with a slightly deep laid back southern voice. “Farmboy to Oroboros, over.”

All of them stop to look at it, each with a piece of bread and jerky in their hands or mouths. Rider gets up from the table to grab it, before she can get a bite in of her food, and speaks into the radio.

Eliza looks at Rider from her spot, then to the only other occupant. “I thought she always wore a helmet.”

Jared scoffs. “You think anyone wants to sleep in a helmet?” Eliza looks away from him in embarrassment. Taking a bite of her food again, she takes in Rider’s features, marveling at how similar they look to each other. Pale skin, light blue eyes, freckles and light blonde hair. Her lips were naturally dark, and looked like an anomaly compared to her skin. Her canines were sharp. Her appearance reminded her of something terrifying, and she didn’t want to know what that was.

“Oroboros here, over.” she responds.

“We have a convoy headed to the market, but the off road route is blocked off by a roaming horde. We need you to work your magic and lead them away, over.” the radio sparks to life with the summons.

“Copy, over.” She gets up from her seat, and heads over to her mechanic's paradise. She replaces the engine on her bike with one mounted on the table. “It's a work in progress, but it should be fast enough to outrun that thing. But just in case…” she grabs a dog catcher off of the wall.

With the catcher in hand, she thinks about the situation for a moment. “A horde, this early? And so far from its hive… What the hell is going on?” a herald would be the best option for keeping its attention long enough. “Eliza, you seem eager to learn, come over for a sec.” she calls out to her aid.

She gets a nod in response, as Eliza stands up from her spot, leaving a few leftovers that Jared lazily grabs for himself. “Yes Ma’am?”

“I'm gonna teach you how to use the undead to your advantage. As I've stated before, heralds attract chasers, and then those chasers turn into hordes once there’s a large enough group of them.” She says, fiddling with the engine block. “If you manage to catch a herald, you can guide hordes like cattle. If this sounds familiar, it's the same set up Mike has on his walls.”

Jerad cuts her off, pointing at the slave with a piece of bread. “And you were about to be one, before Nigel found a better use for you.” He grins at her with a malicious glint in his eye. “Whore.” Eliza only scowls at him, but shudders on the inside. With how often Jared visited brothels and bars, and the rumors surrounding him with his conquests, she counted herself lucky to be out of that camp.

Rider continues “We’re going to catch a herald. And I know a few spots where we can find them. See, heralds don't always come from humans. While not animals, they can spawn from dens and hives. As a way to ensure chasers cover more ground. Over the years I've scoured the area, and I’ve found a den that has the highest spawn rate of heralds. We’re going there first. The horde should be dormant. I was actually already there not that long ago.”

“Yeah and what, risk my ass for a herald? It’d be easier to grab someone and turn them. Chain them up and cover them in zombie grease. Easy transport.” Jared replies, leaning in the chair with his feet up on the table.

“The grease would mask the human smell, basically camouflaging it. And turning someone is too slow, around 20 minutes, and can attract too much attention.” Rider replies, humoring him, and Jared rolls his eyes in response.

“The great pacifist is concerned about something being too slow and easy. Fuck it, always wanted to see a nest up close.”

“Good. This herald hunt is also for you to see a horde up close, so you don't lock up once you see The Beast.”

“What, in the fuck, is The Beast?” He says the last part mockingly, getting up from his spot to start gearing up.

“The Beast is a roughly two thousand large horde, with around five hundred mutants on the side. From what I figure, It's the hive blocking the path to the farmlands. Each day it grows bigger. And the fact it's already active this early is nothing but bad news. The most likely case is they’re getting ready to colonize.”

Eliza tilts her head slightly, confused, looking up from Rider’s hands working on the engine. “Colonize?”

“A colonization is when the hive grows large enough that it's ready to expand. They send out mutants to find a spot, and once it does, it lets out a howl that calls over the horde. Yesterday I caught a glider that was moving here. And killed it before it could call more over. Another scout must've found a spot. See, they usually send out three scouts, to form a triangle over a new deadzone. If we lead the horde away, we can avoid another hive, and with the size of that thing, another deadzone.”

“Right, you two bitches can finish your lesson.” He says, without explanation, and heads down the ladder, guns and all.

She stops him before he heads down “wait. Take this unless you want to get swarmed. They're also very attracted to sound." She tosses him a crossbow with two pouches containing fifty bolts each. She also hands a set to Eliza. She had four crossbows folded in her backpack, in case she ever needed a ranged option. In case one broke or was helping a survivor who lacked a weapon of their own. Jared grumbles but nods, clipping the crossbow into a hook on the side of his bike, and tossing the pouches into a compartment in his bike.

After the installation is done, she gets on her bike, and Eliza gets in the sidecar. The platform lowers, and the three set off towards the den.

Rider arrives first, and she parks her bike a few yards away, Jared following suit but staying by to guard it. “If you see any bandits, silence them as quietly as possible. We don't want the horde to wake up. Oh and take their gear.” Rider carefully approaches The Pharmacy.

Jared looks around the area, eyes scowling even further than usual. “Bandits? You mean the traitors that ran away or got kicked out? I’ll enjoy putting a bolt in their brains.”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“Good, then keep a lookout for us” Rider says with a dog catcher on her back, climbing onto the roof of the pharmacy.

“Whatever.” he says, staring at her as she peers over the ledge. He scoffs and turns away. Eliza stands under her, looking up.

“Heralds aren't active during the day unless disturbed. So catching one at this hour shouldn't be difficult” Rider whispers, extending her arm towards Eliza. She takes hold of it, and gets pulled up. Eliza looks over Rider’s shoulder, mounted on her back.

“See that? It's asleep, down in the fetal position.” Eliza nods, and Rider can feel Eliza’s heartbeat increase. “It'll be okay as long as we don't wake it up.” she reassures, patting her on the head with a free arm. Eliza recoils slightly, her mind rushing with unpleasant memories. But, she eases into it. “Eliza, I know it's a big ask for your first task, but I want you to catch it.” her heart beats faster “I know you can do it, you have great hands and even greater potential.” Eliza gulps, her bottom lip trembles at the thought of getting up close. “If something goes wrong, I'll be right here”

Eliza takes a deep breath. “I can do it… I can do it…” she repeats to herself over and over. She grabs the dog catcher from Rider’s back, and readies herself to climb up. After a few more deep breaths, she exhales, quickly climbing up. She is standing at the edge of the roof. Her legs tremble, but she keeps going forward.

“That's it, one step at a time” Rider thinks to herself. Eliza raises the dog catcher and readies herself to swoop the leash over the Heralds head.

But before she could, a gang of bandits rolled up to the pharmacy. Their loud bikes alert the trio, startling Eliza who stumbles over herself and trips backwards, falling from the roof. As she falls, Rider jumps from her position and catches her in her arms. “Eliza! Are you okay?” Rider asks, desperately.

“Y-yeah…” she says, looking at her tearful reflection on Rider’s visor.

Jared hides behind an abandoned car, keeping his crossbow trained onto one of the bandits. They each get off their bikes, immediately spreading out to loot the area, and one notices the herald jumping off the roof and disappearing in a mad dash. That same one then notices the two girls, opening his mouth to shout.

Thwick!

Jared reloads his crossbow, staring in smug satisfaction as a bolt lodges itself into the bandits head. After a few seconds, he aims up again. Fires at one that had turned around to the noise. Two left. Once again, reload, aim, fire. The other two had already brought up their weapons, mostly tools they had found, a hammer and a crowbar. Crowbar guy dies with a bolt stuck in his neck.

The last one drops his weapon, shouting out, “I SURRENDER!” Jared stills, confusion on his face. None of the bandits that ran from the Kingdom would ever surrender under fear of becoming a herald. This was an outsider.

He grinned to himself, raising himself up and taking out his sledgehammer. “Good. Now get the fuck down on the ground, hands on your head!” The bandit nods, whimpering and complies.

Rider winces, at the bandit shouting, half expecting a tsunami of corpses to burst out of the pharmacy. “Lapdog! You still got some corpse flesh?” Jared asks, keeping his eye on the bandit as the other two come closer, keeping an eye out around him for zombies. She shakes her head, not shouting to avoid alerting the horde. “This fucker cost us a herald.” Jared grins even wider. “He’ll pay us back for that, and then some. Get me some flesh, and Slave, loot the bodies. I’m going to keep this guy company.”

Rider lets go of Eliza, and they look at each other. “Thank you…” with that, Eliza runs off to check the bodies. Rider looks towards the pharmacy entrance, and then to Jared.

She felt uneasy. But, he was right. Thanks to the bandits, the herald was scared off. “But should that be a reason to turn someone against their will? After all, it's a fate worse than death.” she thinks to herself. “No… but, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. Circumstances call for this.” she steels herself, and peeks over, into the pharmacy’s shattered window.

The slumbering horde is tense. Jittery. Too much noise was made. Rider looks around on the ground, carefully stepping over the scattered glass, bones, and sticks. “Zombie flesh… how the hell do i get that…” she thinks to herself, before remembering the chaser who’s head she split the other night. “No… they're opportunistic cannibals. At this point, she’d already be gone… but, maybe there's something left… even if it's small…”

Jared finishes up hogtying the bandit “Alright little piggy. Here's the deal. We were here looking for a herald. And you… scared them all away!” he chuckles out the last part, caressing the bandit’s head with the head of the hammer. The bandit winces, trembling and shaking in fear. He even starts to cry. He tries to open his mouth to speak, but Jared puts a finger to his lips and hushes through it “shh shh. Your apple’s coming soon. If you squeal, we all get surrounded by freaks. So, what's it gonna be! Are you gonna behave, and fix our herald problem, or am i gonna have to play golf.” the bandit nods in fear. “Good.”

Eliza looks over to Jared and his display, and after seeing the bandit nod, “personally I'd prefer the quicker option… he might think he can get out of it.” she thinks to herself as she sifts through their items.

Rider, careful to not wake them, slowly makes her way through the horde. She heads to the back of the pharmacy where the chaser who’s head she split open two days ago should be. But, as she finally gets there, there's nothing but small pieces of bloodied bones and hair. “Damn it… fucking, damn it… unless… could it…?” She slowly reaches for a clump of hair. “In theory… it should be infected.”

Once it's in her grasp, she slowly walks back and tries to turn around, only to be met face to face with a chaser. It's still sleeping, yet, its breath fogs up her helmet’s visor. Almost as if by instinct, she reaches for her knife, but stops before she grips the handle. She shifts her eyes to look at the surrounding horde.

As slow as before, moves around the chaser and renavigates her way outside. The smell is unbearable especially when the hoarders are present. Necrotic, rotting flesh. The horrid stench of death itself. It's nauseating, though this time it's different. Before, Rider would have to hold in her vomit. But after a while she got used to it, and now… it's something else entirely. Her jaw is loose, hanging open. She’s… drooling.

However, she makes it out of the hive in time. She sees Jared swing his sledge, and stop just before hitting the bandit. He does this several more times. “He’s trying to break him…” she thinks to herself. She looks down at the hair clump in her fingertips. “I've already decided… I can't back down now.” She walks up towards Jared and the bandit.

“What the fuck…” a beating sound is heard. “Shut up, you'll wake the horde” it’s loud.

“Fuck are you on about hound? I haven't said a damn thing. Get over here already.”

She shrugs it off, rolling her eyes.

Jared fakes another swing again just as she steps forward, and the beating is back, harsher, before calming down only slightly. It's sharp, almost piercing her eardrums. She looks towards Jared, towards what seems to be the source of it. Like a game of hot and cold. And that's when she sees it. The bandit, his breathing matches the beating. It was his heart.

His heart beats loudly, increasing in pace, it rings in Rider’s ears, even through the helmet, the frequency never changed, it only got louder, and louder. The pulsating is fast. She tries to shake it out of her head, but then she hears the adrenaline and blood flowing through his body as well.

Her eye twitches, and the drooling seemingly gets worse. But she takes a deep breath, and finally reaches Jared. She hands it to him. “That's it? Couldn't get flesh or bone? Will this even work?” she shrugs in response. He sighs hard, and forces the hair into his mouth, causing the bandit to gag and his eyes tear up. His head is kept to the ground by Jared’s own foot, keeping the bandit from struggling too much. “We got… roughly 20 minutes before we have ourselves some new bait.”

“Congratulations, you're not a golf ball”.

The heartbeat gets stronger, she doesn't understand why it's in her head. Guilt perhaps? It was a tell tale heart, and her ears are keen to its story. She holds her breath, trying to escape its grasp.

She looks at the scattered motorcycles. She approaches one of them and inspects them. “Where the hell did these brutes get a quality motor from?” she takes out some tools from her bag, “if these were stolen, We should have held off on the bait and done some questioning to see where from.”

Jared shrugs, grabbing a loot bag that Eliza had dropped off, and rifled through it himself. Mostly a couple cans of food, a bunch of nudie mags that he throws in his own bag, a few empty glass bottles of alcohol which he stuffs into his bag as well, and general tools like duct-tape, a hammer and a wrench. Those he throws towards Rider, letting them land near her feet. “Fuck all. Alright Slave, pack everything up, strip the bodies, and hide them.” He says, climbing onto the roof of the pharmacy, and sits down on it while opening up a can. “And hurry up.”

Rider’s head perks up. She looks toward Jared on the roof, and down towards the increasing groaning of the waking dead. She hauls ass to her bike and stuffs the motor and a few other parts in the trunk of the sidecar. “Get the hell down here!” she whispers loudly. Jared looks at her dumbfounded. Until he looks down beneath his dangling legs and sees a few corpses creep out of the pharmacy in increasing numbers. He quickly drops the can, throwing it slightly to the side and attracting a few of the dead, but the rest keep going forward. He jumps forward, his foot clipping the head of a zombie, forcing it to fall over.

He lands into a roll, scrambling up to run, dodging the hand of a zombie swiping at him. “FUCKER!” He sprints, as the horde grows, all piling out of the windows and door, roughly a hundred corpses stumble out. After gaining some distance he fires off his gun at a leaping chaser. The shot blows off its arm and the chaser flies back into the horde, like a bowling ball getting a strike.

He hops on his bike, and catches up to Rider and Eliza who sped off as soon as he got on his motorcycle. He takes aim at the chasing horde behind them “Save your ammo, there's too many of them! Focus more on saving your ass before you're ripped apart!” Rider shouts back, his aim is unwavering, but after a frustrated growl he puts his gun back in its strap, revving his bike to speed up.