Dead Man Walking: Living By Day, Dead By Night - Chapter 33

Traveling Into the Unknown
After finishing the construction of the barricades, that Zane hoped would prevent a more powerful undead from breaking into the second building of the high school campus where he had established his camp. The young loner decided to embark on a far more daring journey.

Supplies were limited in the school, and because of this, Zane knew what he had gathered, and what was left in the cafeteria would last a few days at the most. With this in mind, he began to plot in his own mind, an expedition deeper into the city, in an attempt to scavenge for some much needed supplies.

Whether that was food, medicine, or just simply raw materials. After all. Although Zane had barricaded the doors, there was still some work that needed to be done on the windows. Which as of this moment was the weakest point of potential entry for the undead.

Not only was scavenging for supplies necessary for the short-term survival of him and the others in his group. But going deeper into the city and scouting out the ongoing situation would allow Zane to properly formulate a plan for when he decided to abandon the high school altogether, and stake out on his own.

Though by now, he had invested some resources into both Elena and Olivia, that he felt compelled to bring them along with him. Not that they would allow him to escape from their sight, even if he wanted to. These were the many things Zane thought about as he waited for the sun to go down.

First and foremost, Zane knew that night was more precarious for the living. Not only did they have a disadvantage in terms of being able to properly see at night, whereupon his prior investigation, Zane had determined the dead did not suffer from this penalty.

But the undead were far more active at night. As were those higher tier undead. Leading Zane to believe that the majority of living, who had already come to understand these risks, would choose to stay in their camps during the darkest hours of the day.

And soon enough, night fell upon the world. Allowing Zane to safely abscond from his encampment without alerting anyone else. While this did pose a risk to the camp, by leaving one of the doors unbarricaded.

Zane decided this was a risk worth taking, as he knew neither Elena nor Olivia would permit him to go deeper into the city without telling him off first. And frankly, Zane did not feel the need to suffer through such a nonsensical situation.

Because of his skill [Dead Man Walking], Zane was able to effortlessly pass through those undead who were still gathered on school campus. They paid him no mind as he walked past the monsters without incident. Only to approach the school gates where Zane had first witnessed the apocalypse unfold.

Zane took a deep breath, his heart beating slightly more rapidly than normal, as he took a step outside the school gates. On his way back, he would be certain to fasten them shut and perhaps form a barricade. The reason being was simple. As long as these gates were open, the undead could more easily enter the campus that was otherwise walled off.

The moment Zane took a step outside the school’s gates, he found that the city was in a state of complete and total disarray. Damage had been done to many buildings. Most of it was caused by fires that had spread.

How these fires had occurred, Zane was not entirely sure, but in times of chaos, this was to be expected. Meanwhile, buildings had been shot up, and windows shattered. Zane was thankful that he was wearing some proper footwear, or else the risk of him cutting himself on the broken glass which was scattered across the streets would be significantly higher.

And while the buildings he walked past looked like they had suffered through a Warzone, the bodies that lied in the streets added to this atmosphere. Many of which had been picked clean to the bones by the Undead Hordes, which Zane walked by with each step.

Cars laid abandoned in the streets, making the path virtually impassable by vehicle. One would need a motorcycle or possibly a quad of some kind of they wished to make it through the graveyard of derelict transportations.

Within some of these abandoned cars and trucks were bodies that the Undead had not managed to devour, probably because they were not intelligent enough to open doors. Many of which had perished either through a collision or via gunshots.

It was clear that looting had already begun, and Zane felt the need to keep one hand on his pistol at all times in case he came across a band of Marauders. But aside from the grasping and groaning of the Undead which surrounded him, the streets of the city were otherwise silent.

Almost as if Zane were the only living being to walk among them. This thought was most certainly sobering. But luckily for Zane, the voice in his head was silenced when he came across a local gas station. Which he hoped to scavenge some supplies from.

Zane of course needed to be careful, and thus he gripped his bat in his hand, ready to strike at a moment’s notice when he entered the gas station, only to find that it had already, for the most part, been pilfered by looters.

The clerk who once attended this store appeared a little older than Zane himself, and his body was lying behind the register. The man had a bullet wound in his head, which no doubt was caused by one of the looters.

But Zane paid no heed to the dead. If his corpse wasn’t reanimated, then Zane had no interest in him. Instead, he searched the ransacked shelves of the convenience store for anything that might help quench his thirst, or quell the hunger in his gut.

Luckily for him, there were still some supplies. But it wasn’t much. What lied in front of him were a few forties of malt liquor, a couple of energy drinks. And some unhealthy snacks such as candy, chips, and other such items.

Considering that this was the best Zane could get his hands on. He quickly stuffed the items into one of the backpacks he brought with him. However, it was immediately after doing this that he heard the sound of a vehicle’s engine pull up just outside the gas station.

Knowing that he was about to make contact with potential hostiles. Zane quickly ducked behind the shelves, and silently placed his bat on the ground, while withdrawing his pistol from its holster, silently ensuring a round was in the chamber via a slight press check, before taking aim at those who might dare to cause him harm.

But what happened next was completely out of Zane’s expectations.