Sloane peeked over the dumpster she hid behind. She had only been running for half an hour, that was how much time she had for herself before she encountered a monster.
This one thankfully wasn't one of the humanoids and it was like a wild animal than anything.
It was more like a rodent, if rats can grow as big as this one can, had the spikes of a porcupine, the scaly face of a snake- actually, now that she noticed that one detail, the monster was more of an armadillo-hedgehog hybrid with short bristles than a rat.
It didn't look like a threat at range, and from the way it dug through trash like a raccoon, Sloane assumed that it didn't favor human flesh either. But then again, Raccoons were also carnivorous.
And despite their reputation for messing with grain, rats are also commonly meat eaters.
This thing was a monster, it could eat rocks for all Sloane knew.
That rock eating idea came from the fact that Sloane saw it happily eat plastic, which was a strange thing to be a part of a diet but again, monster.
These things didn't exactly follow normal biological laws.
As unlikely as it was, Sloane thought this thing might even survive a bullet wound while she unholstered her revolver and steadily pointed it at the rodent.
She pressed her index finger against the trigger and fired when she saw the gun's nozzle was pointing at the monster.
Sloane's ears received a distant bang followed shortly by her eyes catching a glimpse of the rodent falling dead.
Sloane walked near it and did a double tap to make sure the rat didn't just play dead, she then tossed the corpse into the trash it was eating moments prior before igniting the plastic with a lighter.
She hoped that doing this would be enough to stop the humanoids from gaining more meat for their nests.
Or themselves for that matter.
Sloane still wasn't sure if that one humanoid emptied her neighbors's fridge because it needed sustenance or if because it wanted to use the protein as some kind of base for its nest. Maybe it could have even been both.
Sloane left the burning corpse and continued with her jog around the neighborhood.
Before killing that giant rat, she was just about to circle back to her home, deeming that she's scouted enough cars.
Out of all of them, Sloane decided that the type she wanted for herself were vans, as having that much space in a vehicle during the apocalypse was simply too good to pass up.
With a single van, she could fit several weeks worth of food and water in the back alone. And that's her not mentioning all the convenient things that an actual van would have installed.
Sloane had a few ideas as for which van she wanted to take, and the one she had her eyes on was of good quality. It was probably expensive too.
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But before that, she first needed to find a way to open the garage without electricity. She couldn't just leave the van out in the open after all.
That was the first thing Sloane did when she got back; she tried opening the garage door on her own but found out that it was heavier than she expected, it did get off the ground slightly though, which gave her an idea.
She just needed to break the electrical lock then install a new much more primitive one in its place.
Sloane searched around the house for the lift her dad used when working on his car in the past, she only watched him back then, so she wasn't sure where he hides the darn thing...
Sloane found it in the basement.
She went back to the garage and placed the lift next to the door, then she bent down and held the door just enough for her to slide the lift beneath it.
Sloane started spinning the lift's crank, pushing the garage door hard enough that whatever electrical lock it had broke apart in a loud fizz of sparks and electricity.
She checked again to see if it was possible for her to lift the door up and found that she could now do so with ease. Now, to find a way to lock this thing again.
After some thought, Sloane settled on not putting a lock on it.
She deemed that there wouldn't be anything important inside of this anyway, so the risk of the humanoids opening it wasn't that much of a threat.
Sloane quickly pulled the lift from under the door, she got her hands out way before the hunk of steel loudly fell to the ground.
To Sloane, the bang was a faraway echo that slightly miffed her ears but that wasn't the case for everyone else. She needed to be more careful about this kind of thing...
After that, she began organizing the garage, using up as little space as she possibly could and opening up an area for the van.
When Sloane finished, the garage had enough space for her to store food in and still have more than enough room to spare for the van.
Tired but not exhausted, Sloane went back to the living room, she looked out the window and saw sunlight, the day was still young. She could use this.
She put on her gear and grabbed her revolver, guess it was time she loots the other neighboring house.
Like last time, she had enough sunlight to make multiple trips back and forth between the two houses, she was able to clean the house for supplies in fact.
Just as she was about to leave, Sloane killed the nest she found inside one of the rooms using the same method as last time; mixing bleach and vinegar.
She didn't burn the house down this time around, since Sloane assumed the humanoids would be able to copy how to make molotovs if she continued to use them while they are watching.
They had the materials, just not the knowledge, and Sloane wasn't keen on giving the latter.
Now stocked up with more food than she knew what to do with, Sloane went to the garage and temporarily turned the space into some kind of gym; it has yoga mats, benches, and a pair of dumbbells she found in the basement.
She also started working on a punching bag, starting with lining the outside of a trash bag with duct tape.
Sloane pulled it inside out, then lined that side with duct tape as well.
She then brought the bag outside and began filling it with dirt, when it was full, she hung the punching bag in one of the hooks on the ceiling.
It rolled back and forth when she tested it with a jab but duct tape and fishing lines did wonders for keeping the bag in place.
Sloane took a small break after this, eating two cans of sardines before going to the backyard and making a makeshift lean-to using the bedsheets she looted to hide a quarter of it from view.
Now done, she went back to the garage and began exercising.
Sloane struck the punching bag with as much force she could muster, it swayed slightly but otherwise stayed in place. She did it again, then again-
She didn't know when it had turned night, but she could hear the creatures outside, skittering and moving about, they were definitely mad that she took out another nest.
Sucks to be them, then, because she'll get overwhelmed either way so she's going to continue killing their nests until none are left.
At least with this she won't have to deal with countless humanoids coming her way, just the ones currently occupying the houses.
Sloane stopped practicing her punches and left the garage. She checked on the boarded windows, all of them were still intact, did the humanoids choose to just scout instead of finding more ways to break in?
Or did the crosses actually work?
Sloane looked at the revolver she left in her work bench, she could go outside and check if the humanoids kept themselves distant from her house...
Doing so from the door wouldn't hurt, right?
Right.
Sloane nodded to herself and picked up her revolver along with her courage, she made her way to the front door and opened it slightly, she looked at the humanoids outside.
A lot of them have decided to gather on the streets, grouping up into a decently sized horde that would have overwhelmed her with ease if not for the fact that they were all keeping a good distance away from her house.
They all stared at her from beyond the sidewalk, Sloane too had a good look at them.
A wide grin and bloodshot eyes were universal features among the species, it seems.
Sloane pointed the barrel of her gun at the head of one of the humanoids.
She held herself steady and fired, the shot connected, piercing the humanoid's forehead and sending it toppling downwards. It fell to the ground back first and didn't get up.
The rest of the humanoids scattered after seeing this.
They ran back to the houses and just stared at her from the windows.
Sloane looked at the cross she placed on the door. She didn't expect for this to actually have an effect on the creatures.
That was good to know, she was going to carry one from now on.
Sloane closed the door and settled down for the night, for once, she didn't need to worry about getting killed in her sleep.
When she was asleep, Sloane found herself back inside the dream.
She fed one of the stars and expectedly, it didn't just get a slight increase in mass, but went up to the third stage.
She was right that the nest also counted as a kill, as multiple, in fact. Even when it runs the risk of pissing off the humanoids, killing nests was very beneficial.