Frank, Mai, and Kevin walked into the mall’s lobby. Most of the lights in the building were off. Shop lights and the occasional beam of moonlight sneaking its way in from outside were the only competition against the dark of the night. The sound of their footsteps echoed through the space, bouncing off the hard surfaces and making sure that they stayed on alert. After the adrenaline spike of running through the plaza, they were still hyper aware of their surroundings.

Mai led them through the lobby. It was a large space, not too dissimilar to the plaza they had just left. Circular, it extended up a few floors to a domed roof. From here, the mall split off into a couple corridors, down which were a number of stores. They could see some of them were still open, with light spilling out. Many also had scattered trails of goods coming out of them, like a looters cornucopia.

Glancing from the East wing to the West wing, Frank stopped in shock. Both wings of the mall were a mess, but he didn’t think much looting had gone on in the West wing.

From what he could see of the first floor, most of it had been destroyed. Not with intent, but as part of a colossal struggle. The floor was slick with blood in large swathes, like some giant, ill-intentioned artist had chosen to paint with an actively bleeding body, alive or dead, as their brush. The various benches and bits of decorational greenery were in pieces, store windows shattered, shutters dented in where some large body had collided with them.

The lights in a shop flickered, briefly illuminating the chaotic scene. Frank let out a sigh of relief. The blood was dry. It didn’t look like whatever had caused this mess had done it recently.

Nevertheless, he gave a quick look to his companions. Whispering carefully, he said “Is there any chance whatever did that is still here?”

The two looked at each other. Kevin cupped a hand to his ear and closed his eyes, listening. After a few seconds, he shrugged. “I can’t hear anything big, so we’re probably in the clear.”

Mai nodded, and pointed down the West wing. “From what I can see, it looks like whatever won that fight went down the hall, toward the exit over there.” Gesturing toward the East wing, she continued. “There aren’t many signs of beasts down the East side, and that’s where we need to go.”

Frank relaxed. “So we’ll be alone down there? Great.”

Kevin wagged his finger at him. “Hmm, not quite. I don’t hear anything big, but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing.”

“We should be able to avoid running into anything fatal at least.” Mai said, walking over to the nearest pile of loose goods in the East wing. “But we can help tip the odds a bit more than just hoping. If we get some cloth wrapped around our shoes, we can muffle our footsteps a bit.”

Watching her tear into some scattered clothes, Frank had a thought. Reaching down, he squeezed his finger where he’d cut it earlier, when he’d written the ‘shiny’ enchantment to distract the crows. On each of his shoes, he wrote the word ‘silent’. He took a few experimental steps, and grinned.

Not a sound.

He quickly did the same for the others, and winced as he held some scrap cloth against his finger. He’d only done a few enchantments so far on their trip, but he was already down several percent on his health stat. If he threw out enchantments willy-nilly, it might put him in bad shape if they had to fight.

Maybe next time, I’ll go with the mundane option instead of just trying to throw magic at everything.

They continued on, ghosting through the mall.

On the third floor, they stopped in front of their destination. This floor, or at least this area of this floor, seemed to have been hit pretty hard by looters, but in a notably different manner. There was no sign of a panicked smash and grab, no impulsive grabbing of luxury goods now that there was no one to stop it.

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Here, standing in sight of both a small tool shop and sporting goods store, he could see that a lot of things had been taken from both stores. There was still a decent selection for their small group, but it was likely these shops would be stripped bare soon enough.

He chuckled. Assuming anyone else is crazy enough to risk it.

It wasn’t totally out of the realm of possibility. Even still, there were plenty of useful things in the stores, especially for anyone who had a Skill that could make them better. The automatic door slid open easily for them, the sound of the doors sliding on their tracks eerily loud in the quiet mall. They stepped into the still lit store.

Mai frowned, looking at what was available. “It looks like we’ll be able to make a start on protective gear, but I was hoping there would be more potential weapons available.”

Hanging on one of the walls was a variety of protective gear. Padded gloves, chest pieces, elbow pads, and a few padded leggings. Frank could see tags labeling different pieces as being for hockey, lacrosse, or football. He sifted through them trying to figure out what the difference was. “I’m a little surprised there’s so many of these left, but also… As they are, they probably wouldn’t do much against the wildlife.”

She nodded, grabbing a few athletic bags off the wall. “That’s true, but something is better than nothing. I’m just worried that a lot of people still out there aren’t making the best choices for survival.”

He glanced at her as they started shoving gear into the bags. “Do you think there are many people still on their own?”

“On their own? No. Not many, at least. I’m sure there are other groups out there though, however small they may be. There could even be more groups in the city itself.” She sighed. “It’s all just a mess. I’m sure when the Council starts sending people out on missions, we’ll start to get a better idea where everyone else splintered off to.”

Frank tossed a few lacrosse balls and tennis balls in his bag as he looked at Mai, who had a pensive expression on her face. “So… Is there someone specific you're hoping to find?”

She laughed. “No, not particularly. I left most of my family behind in a different country. I came here for a new start, but… Well. Nothing really started for me.” She glances over at the direction Kevin went with a light smile. “I think I’ve already found the people I want to.”

Suddenly, Kevin called from further back in the store. “Yo! They sold guns here!”

Mai looked confused. “In a mall?”

Frank chuckled, zipping up his bag. “Welcome to America.”

The two of them made their way to the back of the store where Kevin was. He was behind the counter, squatting carefully on the broken shards of the gun counters glass display. He glanced at them as he poked around in the counter, and other storage behind it. “Looks like they’re all sold out.”

“But!” He said, popping up. “I found these!” Excitedly, he placed his finds on the remains of the counter. He had a hunting knife, a woodcarving knife, and a slingshot with ammo.

Frank grabbed the hunting knife, turning it over in his hands. It was sharp toward the tip, with some serrations at the base. “Well, the knives will be useful for crafting, I guess.” He eyed the slingshot dubiously. “I don’t know how good a slingshot will be for taking down monsters though.”

Mai bounced one of its metal shots in her hand, feeling its weight. “They can be pretty effective actually, but it’s more blunt force than anything. If the mutated animals have stronger bones, a regular slingshot might not be very effective.”

“Well, hopefully I can take care of that.” Frank said. He glanced around the store, hoping to see anything else they could use as a weapon. The guns were gone, along with any baseball bats, hockey sticks, and anything vaguely club shaped. He sighed. “I’m not sure there’s anything else in here worth grabbing.”

Kevin hopped back over the counter, shoes crunching on glass. “We can hit up the tool store across the way. It probably got hit just as hard, but we might find something interesting at least.”

Mai nodded. “It’s worth a look.”

Suddenly, resounding through the halls of the mall, they heard a low, bassy groaning call, followed by a distant crashing sound.

They looked at each other in sudden panic.

“I think we’ve overstayed our welcome. Let’s go!”

They started a race back to the ground floor, footsteps still silenced by Franks enchantment, hearts racing a little faster with each bestial noise they heard. The creature, whatever it was, seemed to be slowly meandering toward the section of the mall they were in.

Silently, they hit the ground floor and continued running, away from the lobby, which it was now clear was the direction the sounds were coming from. Toward the end of the East wing they found an emergency exit and carefully peeked outside. The door let out onto a wide side street beside the building. There were a few wandering creatures in the distance, but the immediate area was clear.

They ran on, headed back for safety. Frank chose to believe that he only imagined hearing a distant roaring from behind them.