"-When do you think he's gonna wake up?"

"I don't know, but let's be careful. I'm gonna go check up on him."

William slowly opened his eyes and blinked slowly. He felt slightly disoriented but surprisingly refreshed, like he had been sleeping for days. William shook his head groggily as his muddled thoughts slowly regained coherence.

Oh great. I've been kidnapped.

He sat up, pushing his hands against the soft fabric of the bed he was lying on to support himself. No, I got... saved? William quickly surveyed his surroundings. The room was a simple one. His helmet and crossbow lay neatly on the floor beside the bed. Small rays of light poured in through the barricaded window, illuminating the posters of fighting champions that decorated the light turquoise walls. A light blue bookshelf was filled to the brim with antique digital versatile discs, or DVDs for short.

The room on the whole looked well maintained, a little too well maintained in fact. It was as though no days had passed since the fall of civilization. A holographic calendar hovered over the stack next to an oak brown door.

15 May, 2178. So I've only been asleep for a day...

The sound of a door handle turning interrupted William's thoughts. He swiftly turned around, his hands instinctively balling into fists in front of his body.

"Calm down. If I wanted you dead, I would've just left you for the zombies back at the store."

William slowly lowered his fists, eyeing the lady in front of him suspiciously. She had a slender build and was about 1.7 metres; taller than the average woman of oriental descent. Her long wavy brunette hair parted neatly between her upturned blue eyes. She wore a wry smile on her face, accenting the dimples on her cheeks that softened her confident expression.

"Who are you? Where am I?" William asked warily.

"Oh, he's awake." Another bespectacled young lady with black hair popped her head through the door. She looked slightly younger, though it was probably also due to her petite frame and bob haircut.

"Calm down, you're safe here," she said in a lazy tone.

The girl with brunette hair pulled up a chair. "I'm Marianne, and she's Masako. You're in my apartment. My... old- apartment."

William relaxed his shoulders and leaned back against the bed frame. "I didn't know there were other survivors in this area."

"There weren't. You're the only one we saw," Marianne said. "We came from somewhere else, you see. We only made a temporary stop here to collect more supplies and happened to see you as well. Oh and why were you wearing that thing? It looks awfully stuffy."

William stunned for a moment, before motioning to his protective gear. "This, you mean? It's... so that I don't get bitten and turned into a zombie?"

The two girls looked at him in genuine surprise. "Wait, you don't know?"

"What don't I know?"

Masako rolled up her sleeve to show numerous bite marks on her forearm. "We enhanced mutates are immune."

William sat up in shock. "Immune?! Wait, what do you mean, 'enhanced mutates'?"

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Masako straightened her spectacles. "We're just like you. Our bio-electric field is similar to the mutates; that's why we're so much stronger and faster now. That's also the reason why their bites have no effect on us and we're invisible to their electro-reception. Apparently, we're no longer fully human after the mutation wave, so we're called 'enhanced mutates' now. Or at least that's what the government declared before going MIA on the rest of the world."

She shook her head. "Jerk move though, classifying us as zombies without clarifying anything else. Didn't you hear their announcement back then?"

"You forgot the best part, Masako," Marianne chimed in. "We also have special abilities now. Speaking of which, William, you were quite the show-off back there eh?"

"You saw me in action? You guys could've helped out, you know..." William mumbled. "Wait, how do you know my name?"

"How would I not? A huge internet celebrity famous for your engineering live streams; even a hermit would've at least heard of you, Doctor Toh."

"I..." William's stomach interrupted him with a loud growl, reminding him that he had not eaten in two days.

"I'm hungry," he said pitifully.

----------------------------------------

William wolfed down his seventh can of luncheon meat. "Mmm... it's shooo good..." he mumbled while chewing his food.

"My traditional food functions well as rations," Marianne said. "It's pretty convenient."

"Traditional food?"

"I'm half Korean; my Mom was Caucasian. My surname is Cha."

"I see. I'm surprised you actually remember the name of the country you were from. Those names actually sound half decent. Now we're stuck with boring names like Sector 161. But I guess that makes it easier for the government to manage all nine billion of us after their mass migration policy."

An awkward silence hung in the air.

"I'm sorry for rambling. I haven't spoken to anyone in months." William casted his eyes downward.

"It's okay, man. It's not like the world government can arrest you for hate speech now," Masako chuckled. "My family name is Hayashi. I don't even know if I was a local to Sector 161; I never really paid attention in history class."

"The past doesn't matter anymore," Marianne quickly interjected. "What matters is getting to our next destination. You wanna tag along, William? It's not everyday you get to meet another fellow survivor, let alone an enhanced one."

"Oh right, you guys have abilities too, right? Can I see them?" William asked excitedly. "It's not fair that you got to see my hydrokinesis and I didn't get to see yours."

Marianne shifted uncomfortably. "I can't really show mine here though, but she can." She pointed to Masako. "Her power is... more manageable."

Masako looked up at William with a mischievous look on her face. He started to feel a weird sensation throughout his body.

"Hrrk... Hehehe..." Marianne giggled uncontrollably. William looked up and caught a glimpse of himself in a mirror across the room. Every hair of his body was standing on its end, including his already spiky hair.

"Electrokinesis? That's pretty cool. How much power can you generate?" William touched the tip of his hair curiously.

Masako shook her head. "No more than what is required to power a boat; I'm more of a 'fine control' kind of user."

William stood up abruptly. "Oh I almost forgot. There's a dead zombie on the roof of my apartment. I gotta get some fuel to burn it down-"

"Sorry, but I think we have bigger problems at the moment," Marianne interrupted him. William quickly walked over to the barricaded window where she was looking and peeked through the gaps. The entire street was filled with shuffling zombies, overflowing in from the alley outside the fuel store.

"No, no, no... they must have gotten through that broken barrier," William groaned. "And I was just getting cosy in here..."

"About that..." Marianne shifted uncomfortably with a slightly guilty look. "Never mind. Where do you live, William?"

"Uhm... avenue five? It's just down the street. But I don't think we can make it though; we can't exactly outrun the zombies." William turned to Marianne. She was staring intensely at the ground, her relaxed smile fading away as her demeanour quickly changed to one of urgency.

"I have a proposal," she said sharply. "Let's clear out the zombies on our way out to buy us some time. We're actually on our way to leave Sector 161 and enter the mainland of Sector 162, so we can stop by your place. You'll have until we reach to decide if you wanna join us."

"Well, this area is now infested with zombies so I hardly have a choice, do I?" William sighed.

Masako's eyes widened. "Don't you think it's a little early for us to leave? I mean, we just got here-"

"We do not have time to wait. Let's pack up and go already before our streets get more crowded than a New Year's eve party," Marianne snapped impatiently, while stuffing more canned food into her backpack. William grabbed his crossbow and put on his helmet.

"Quick question. How are we going to get out of this apartment?" he asked. "We're gonna get swarmed by them the moment we step out."

Marianne grunted as she single-handedly ripped off the wooden barricades on the window. She pushed it open and peered at the ground below.

"We jump."