Run, run, you idiot! The little voice that never yet lied to her screamed inside her head and made her break the paralyzing and hypnotizing eye-lock that the monster tied her with.

Just get home, too many people depend on you. Escape and live.

She looked around and jumped down from the car, the pain of her hurt left ankle making her shriek for the first time. But up she stood and dashed away from them, as fast as her ankle could carry her, the sharp pain clearing her mind, the sobering fear making her forget all about the pain.

The only way that was unobstructed by zombies now was up the street. She did not dare to even look back to the park and all the zombies pouring out of it. There were enough of them to take on the stadium full of soccer hooligans and win.

And they were getting closer.

When the fastest zombie came a mere meters away from her, she turned around and clobbered him, straight over his mouth, sending him and his flying teeth into the body of another zombie. She thought of jumping toward them and finishing them off, but there was no time as his buddies were just a few steps behind.

So, she turned back to running, and when she picked the speed, she turned around trying to locate the black skeleton monster. But there was no trace of him.

“If it has a sword, if it was wielding it so fiercely in its hands, what about other weapons? Arrow? Guns? Shit! I better just get the hell out of here,” she thought and her step suddenly became longer and faster.

After a hundred meters of the fastest sprint her ankle could allow her, she turned the corner and knew exactly where she needed and wanted to go.

There was a large pileup of cars in front of her. She knew it could work to her advantage.

It would buy her plenty of time as zombies needed to crawl over them. Their clumsy coordination would not allow them to just jump on cars tops and hop from one room to another. Those who tried would just knock themselves against the cars, and those who tried standing up as they made it to the tops would slide off and fall down within the first few steps they would take.

Once she hopped over the car roofs and made it across the barrier, she looked back seeing them being held back, and even more relieved as she could not see again the dark shape of the skeleton monster anywhere.

“Should I... worry? Maybe it’s waiting for me somewhere else? But… If it wanted to fight, why did it not learn to run fast?” she said sarcastically, but feeling relived nevertheless as she continued down the street. “Still… The way it was waving with that sword, it almost made me think it wanted to fight. That showed intelligence. Or lack of it. I mean, if it can use weapons, then why not guns?? Yeah, what else can go wrong here? And just when I thought I was getting the hang of this… apocalyptic thing.”

Not wasting any more time to see if and how they were going to go over the cars, she scurried ahead, hoping that was the last run she had to do that day, making the corner of the first street and then turning to her right.

She stopped to hide inside the dark doorway of the nearby building, trying to catch her breath, trying not to breathe too deeply to make too much noise. Still, she needed at least a few seconds, at least enough for one more breath.

[Your RR Energy is now at 25 percent.]

“Okay… I’m here. Just a block away.”

But… what if I… just wait a bit? Maybe just to gain back some air.

[Each minute you wait, your energy will rise by a single percent up to the 40 percent mark. Additional rest or energy ingestion would be required to raise it further]

The sun was setting down, the last of its rays bouncing off the glass windows of tall office buildings. But she had no desire to stop and admire it.

Noticing no zombies and hearing only the distant and occasional zombie's shriek, she reached for her rucksack, pushing the hammer back in its place and pulling out the radio.

“I’m here, Drew, do you copy?”

No answer. She tried again.

“Yes, Tala, I’m here. Waiting for you,” she heard the familiar voice and felt a wave of relief.

“I’ll be there in five.”

She started to walk again, feeling the pain in her ankle flaring up, making her limp and curse.

Their hold-up was in one of the tall marble and glass constructions that two months ago hosted a fancy five-star hotel on the first twenty of its floors. It had an imposing multi-story lobby which they decided to lock down.

The entrance they used was down inside the garage. There was actually a whole procedure for entering the building. First, she would enter the next-door building and a long bookstore there, shaking off any tail she might have picked up. Then she would run down the stairs, go inside the garage, wait for the signal that everything was clear just to come up and swiftly, and then go down her own garage entrance that was right next to it. The guard there would open the walk-in gate just enough for her to sneak in.

Then they would run the water from the hydrant, splashing over the garage driveway and washing away any of the scents she might have left behind. The system worked perfectly and they never had a problem with either zombies or other people who might be looking to raid them.

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But now, she was hurt and tired and she went straight to her garage.

“What happened?” Drew asked seeing her limp as he opened the door.

“A freakin’ mole holes in the park,” she ground the answer through her teeth.

“Are you okay?” he asked “Did they…”

“No, no need to worry. I’ll be fine. Everything okay here?” she asked.

“More or less,” he said as he secured the door again and then opened a water hydrant and let the water cascade down the entrance, washing away their scent.

Do you need help?” he asked, watching her limp to the elevator door.

“No. I’ll be fine,” she said. “What's important is that I give them the medicine and then, I’ll get some rest.”

There was a special reason why they chose this building. It had a backup power generator that ran on gas. While they chose not to run any lights during the night so as not to attract unwanted attention, they still had electricity for the basics, such as refrigeration and the elevators.

Troy, Teresa’s father, a big black guy with a bad knee who used to run maintenance in one of these buildings had periodically checked the supply of their diesel fuel, and the last time he checked, Tala remembered he said they had enough to last them at least for four more months. What was to happen after that, she had no clue.

So, it was pleasant just to walk in the elevator and let it carry her to the tenth floor where they had secured their place.

At her last count, there were about twenty people. But when she entered the space they converted to a dining area where most of them would hang around, it was all empty. Not that she expected a welcoming committee. She’s been gone for only a few hours anyway. Still, it made her wonder.

At least they should wonder how it went. And if I got something else worth eating. Not that I did this for them anyway.

Teresa and Troy greeted her first, coming out of the room two doors down, and she swiftly dropped her rucksack down.

“I’ve got it,” she told them as they stared at her with full anticipation of the good news. Drew must have told them already.

She picked up the insulin packages and shoved them into his lap. It would be good for a few weeks. But what then?

Maybe they hoped this mess would blow over by then, she thought to herself, thinking it was a hell lot of hoping.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” Troy said and rushed to hug her. “You saved us yet again.”

She let him hug her but swiftly moved out of his embrace and coldly turned around. It’s not like she did it for his thanks. She did it for a whole different reason and fidgeted nervously her fingers against her belt to hear about her award.

“And where is Eaton?” She picked up the bottles with antibiotic tablets inside and gave them to Lorain, an older overweight woman who was their designated medic.

“He’s in his room, not feeling good at all. I’ll give him a shot right away. You’re a true lifesaver.”

“Yeah, well this time around it was a bit more difficult,” she said and moved around, found her favorite armchair against a window, and dropped her tired body down.

She was ready to close her eyes, thinking that maybe something was wrong. But then she got a complementary message that rang inside her head and that made her forget all about being tired. It said,

[Congratulations: Your mission has been completed successfully.]

“Sys, display it for me, please,” she muttered quietly, trying to contain her excitement, looking around and making sure nobody was there to hear her. “Let’s see what it comes down to.”

[Mission Awards:

Agency Points: 500 marks

Level Improvement: 1

New Abilities Available

Use your Level Improvement to improve your existing special abilities or pick from the list of the newly available Abilities.]

The reward was nothing spectacular. About the same as the last mission. She sighed. She had to wait and see if those 500 marks would push her up to a higher class finally.

But 'New Abilities' drew her attention, and she decided to check it out.

[Night Owl Vision Ability

Cat's Jump Ability

Structural Analyzer Ability]

That looked interesting. Three choices, but she could only pick one.

Cat's Jump ability seemed really interesting. She was guessing it did not only entail the jumping up but also the landing abilities.

Good point was that she didn’t need to rush to make up her mind yet. During the last few weeks, she found by far that the smartest thing to do was to wait and see what her next mission would entail. And then, pick her improvement accordingly.

“Where is everyone?” she asked suddenly, noting that there was hardly anyone around. “Where is my crew?”

“Mario’s group is on the rooftop,” Drew started to speak, suddenly not feeling comfortable at all. “Trying to find a good way to collect rainwater, you know. He’s afraid our water system would soon go down.”

“Yeah, I know. He’s been talking about that for days. But, what about… my group?” she asked, suddenly feeling anxious, noticing how Drew got all nervous.

“They left,” he muttered out

“What?”

“About twenty minutes ago.”

“What?”

“They went to the Observation Dock, to do a trade.”

“Say again?”

“There were two bikers who rode around the block a few times. They carried a huge board with a message that said they were looking to trade.”

“What? They should have waited for me!”

“I told them that. Told them that you’d get upset.”

“Shit,” Tala cursed, not believing what was happening. “Are they stupid or something?”

“The bikers said they had guns and ammo ready to trade. And said, the trade had to happen now. Or never…. And you know, we almost have no.. Guns. Or ammo.”

“You’re freakin’ kidding me, right?”

“No.”

“And they fell for it?”

“Frank went down to talk to them."

"Did he used a decoyed exit?"

"Yes. He went around the building as we always do."

"And they let him go?"

"Yes. They actually agreed on a trade. Six handguns and five hundred rounds for 120 pounds of rice and 200 cans of beans and ham.”

“Shit. That’s not a bad trade. Actually a good one since we have a full truckload of those. But… They should have waited for me.”

“It had to happen like right now. The bikers said…”

“I know. Damn. That was stupid,” Tala said, already lifting herself up from the chair. "If they are so desperate for food, they would have accepted to trade at a later time."

“Tony went with his hunting rifle as a backup.”

“Yeah, but, these guys probably have a backup of their own.”

Drew grew even more uncomfortable. “I was telling him the same. But... you know Frank. He said we could not just hide. And that it was not right for one little girl to always save our ass.”

“Well, he should have gone to a pharmacy then. I’ll make sure to remember that for the next time. And now… You said the Observation Dock?”

“Yes. The lobby. They left like fifteen minutes ago. I think they’ll be back soon.”

“Good. I assume you talked to them?”

The look of worry shadowed again Drew’s face.

“Shit, Drew, don’t tell me…”

“Let’s try them again. Maybe they’ll answer now,” he said, a flash of sudden hope in his eyes.

“Yeah, let’s do that,” she said and got up from the comfort of her armchair, then limped as she followed Drew to the next-door room they converted into their comm center.

She waited just for a few seconds, seeing his futile attempts at establishing communication with the group.

Then cussing them all in a language they did not understand, she said. “I need to go and find them.”

“I’ll go with you,” Drew said readily.

“No, you dumb ass! You stay next to the radio. Let me know if they report back. You understand?”

He nodded his head in silence while swallowing a big ball of saliva.

“Troy!” she yelled in the direction of the big guy. “You need to let me out. On a double!!” she yelled seeing him walk cautiously out of one of the rooms. “Need to get our people back. Who knows in what kind of trouble those knuckleheads got themselves in!”