Chapter 618 - Start - Cracks

To satiate my paranoia, we scouted around the surrounding blocks once more and we put down anything that we missed or just randomly wandered around. As that was happening, I already gave Unc Zardon and his escort to drive to our location so we could start whatever we were planning to do in the first place.

As soon as they arrived, they couldn't help but gave complex looks about what they saw.

Then I heard a familiar voice, "Boss just doing boss things then, I guess..."

I turned around and discovered it was Mark and his group that trailed behind Unc Zardon and delivered our care package. He looked entirely different now since he had long lost the tank top, shorts, and slippers and replaced them with gear appropriate to lead a group outside. More so, the two soldiers I ȧssigned to ȧssist him were actually following his orders and he commanded respect from each of his members.

A few familiar faces were present as well but we only exchanged a few words before we restocked our supplies. Aside from extra ammo and fuel, they also brought fully-charged drones to replace the ones we brought since their battery percentage was already in the red.

Mark approached me once more and he lowered his Remmington 870 with an extended tube magazine and ghost ring sights, "Boss, do you need more hands? We could cover a street corner if you want?"

I fastened my replenished mags on my plate carrier before replying, "Hmm, you could cover Masangkay St. but I think Unc Zardon would be more comfortable if you guys stay with him while his escort covers that spot."

Mark nodded, "Okay, boss. That we could do."

After a short while, we sent our drones to scout ahead of us while our huge truck parked in the way we discussed earlier. It fully blocked the only entrance to the medical center and the rest of us who would come inside used our vehicles to climb atop the shipping containers.

We got a better view of the situation but the situation itself wasn't any better.

The driveway we blocked off was just a mosh pit of dead bodies that were bȧrėly recognizable and the smell was fuċkɨnġ horrible. An ȧssortment of vehicles was parked in an inconsistent manner and a few of them have crashed into the first floor of one of the hospital buildings.

It led the glass walls to sport jagged shards and anything that passed through had been lacerated or cut-up indiscriminately. However, that wasn't the main issue.

After we got a closer look at all of the floors, we discovered that the glass walls that weren't broken into pieces had several deadheads trying to get out. It was because we created a lot of noise from our prior encounters and they were all trying to chase after the source. Whatever was trying to sleep or was just chilling out peacefully got rattled and we had no idea of their exact number.

A few of them managed to squeeze through the gaps and they were the ones below our feet.

Artem crouched down amidst the bloodied and crooked hands reaching for us, "So, a bit of whack-a-mole before we head inside? That's our way, right?"

"Yeah, we do that and we'll try to block most of the openings so we could control their entry on our side."

"Block them? How? I could--"

Katya pulled him up before shaking her head, "That's the idea but don't get too comfortable."

"Haa?"

"I know you're gonna jump down sooner or later. Take it easy for a bit because you have never taken a single breather since this morning!"

"Hmm. I'm fine, I'm fine..."

Jared interjected, "Bro, how about those cars? Shouldn't we try and move them first before we parked our truck here?"

"Nah, those actually work in our favor. They'll act like our small safe zones when we start kiting them away. You guys better pick off anything that comes for us when we're in the process of climbing them. Here's what we'll do..."

I discussed our plan briefly and we really did 'play' a short game of whack-a-mole before a portion of our team jumped down. I was part of the group to cut inside the driveway and take down all we could while a smaller group dragged the bodies away from the vehicles, especially our truck.

I chose a route where a lot of blindspots were present from our shooters' side and I was holding my katana and my pistol.

As soon as I turned wide as I passed an ambulance, I discovered a deadhead that got ran over by it, and its insides were wrapped around the rear wheel. It could only stretch out what was left of its chewed-up arms to try and reach me and seeing its exposed bone was a little unnerving. However, I quickly ended its life before slashing down on another one that crawled up from an SUV wearing a police uniform.

Its darkened blood splattered on the SUV's tinted windows but I heard a dull thud from the inside. I tried to open the doors but they were locked tight.

'I might need to break this open...'

But before I did, I circled around the SUV while lopping off the heads of the one that came after me. My first target was a student missing half of its face off while the last one was a victim of natural selection. The latter seemed to have tried to quickly get out of its car but its large coat got caught up in the door as it closed it and it got feasted upon before it got the chance to free itself.

I simply flicked my wrist holding my katana towards their heads and they landed on the floor before their 'tops' hit the ground.

After that, it was then that I smashed the window adjacent from where the thuds were coming from.

'Fucking knew it...'

I had to shoot all of them with my gun to end it quickly because looking at them a second more was fuċkɨnġ difficult.

What happened was I saw two small figures moving slowly but erratically in their booster seats while two larger figures were doing the same thing while still trapped by their seatbelts. I saw the bites and the scratches from the larger figures but there seemed to be no injuries visible from the smaller ones. Aside from their rotting bodies almost melding into their seats, there wasn't much damage on their person.

There was only one thing I could think of that could've had done this.

'They basically starved to death...'

Their little faces just turned to me and as soon as they tried to move, their discolored and foul-smelling flesh that was stuck on their seats started to get torn apart while an ample amount of blood and pus started pouring out from their wounds.

After I shot them, I just shook my head before quickly moving on but everything was far from over.

We weren't even done halfway when each of us heard a loud crack from where the vehicles smashed through. As soon as we turned our heads in the same direction, one by one, each of the undead from the other side started to get wild as they tried to maniacally push their bodies through the gaps.

The ones at the forefront got crushed before the jagged shards sunk into their bodies.

However, they fell down and got trampled over by the ones behind them and we were met by psychotic deadheads that were left starving for too long. They seemed to be a mix of sprinters and ferals due to the way they moved but they were still fuċkɨnġ stupid.

I was about to join in when their whole right side got rained on with bullets and even Artem who was about to jump them took a few steps back. As soon as their numbers were halved, he instantly jumped in with the rest of his team and it became a one-sided massacre. They began to push them back as they stepped over their dead bodies but I heard another crack from above.

We knew what was about to happen next so I instantly pulled out a grenade from my pouch.

I pulled on the pin, let go of the lever, and let it cook on my hand for a couple of seconds before I threw it up in the air.

I was already cooking up another one before it exploded right at the glass and it pushed back everything that was about to come out. More importantly, the second grenade I threw went inside the huge hole I created and it threw out several body parts when it exploded from the inside. However, it didn't take long before whole bodies came crashing down.

I cut them down as fast as I could but I started hearing more snaps and cracks from above.