"Better close your mouth now or you might just swallow a bug" Rina said as she winked at us and moved forward. It took a few more moments to overcome the shock but we managed to follow after them.
We continued moving and we soon found the police station. It is a simple three story building made of bricks, or at least it was before but now it was nothing but a decrypt building with its top blown off by some kind of explosion. It once had a revolving glass door that was now only a revolving door with no glass. The windows and walls had all shattered. I gave a wary glance around us and was relieved to find nothing.
"Are we going in?" I asked the group.
"We have to" Rina said. "We could salvage some resources while we're at it"
"I agree with…Rina" Jordan said uneasily. This was actually the first time I heard him call Ms. Camille by her name. Rina seemed to think of something for a moment before she smiled and him sweetly.
"Well then lets go" Lydia said.
And that we did. We went into the building that was practically standing on its last legs and as expected, the interior was far worse than the exterior. We were in the reception area that now looked like a tornado had spiraled around here. There was a hole in the ceiling, bulbs hanging loosely and some even lying on the floor broken to pieces. I could see some spikes of metal poking out from the ground and walls somewhere. They were long and sharp and shaped liked spikes. On the end of some spikes was a woman's corpse impaled through the chest.
The woman wore police uniform and her body was slightly decomposed and looked like some parts of her flesh had been bitten off by straying animals on different parts of her body. I froze upon seeing this. There were ten other bodies killed in a similar way. Impaled by metal spikes.
One is okay. Two is a coincidence. Ten? Then that was bloody clear that someone had done this to these people and they were all police officers. Though I didn't know it yet I felt as if I instinctively knew that neither of the bodies were ravids.
Somebody had killed off all these officers and probably more had died.
Jordan's face paled as he looked at this sight. He may have seen a lot of death on the first day of the apocalypse but that had been either beasts, ravids and people killed by beasts. Never people massacred to this extent.
I could see Rina clench her fists tightly and when I looked at Lydia I noticed that she was the one who was hanging this the best.
"Come on. Lets salvage what we can and get out of here" Lydia said and we all got to work.
…
To say that there was little we could scavenge would be an understatement. There was nothing of use or even think to use. I only managed to find some spared magazines for my new Glock 17 but that was it. The entire place had been cleared out. Guns, vests, medical supplies; everything had been cleared out.
I looked at my gun with a thoughtful look as I closed the weapon locker door. And walked back to the receptionist floor. Minutes later Rina, Lydia and Jordan came over with disappointed looks on their faces.
"Guess you didn't find anything too huh?" I said and they all shook there heads.
"There was nothing here" Jordan said.
Rina and Lydia didn't need to say anything. We all left the building in silence. Nobody else spoke about the things we had seen in there. And I did not share the suspicions that I had too. There was no need to do so really.
"There place was already cleared out by someone or some people" I said as we walked deeper into the western sector. Decrypt shops and groceries were now lining either side of the street.
A lot had happened today and it was even hard to believe what kind of rollercoaster we had been on. From killing the two strange men, Blob and Shark, to the small pack of mutated hounds and finally the police station. It still disturbed me and I still wanted to explore and check out other areas but the sun was setting and anyone was smart enough to know that night was the most dangerous part of this world. Night had always been dangerous but maybe now we could say that that danger had multiplied by ten to twenty times.
I looked up at the darkening sun. Something didn't feel right.
"Hey its already night?" Jordan asked and that's when it hit me. It was precisely this reason that I thought that this was strange. This day had ended way too quickly? How many hours had even passed since this morning?
When I did the math my heart trembled when I realized that not even twelve hours had passed.
"I think we need to find shelter as fast as we can" I said. Everyone understood that it would be dangerous to roam around at night. We looked around a bit more. An hour later we decided to settle in a clothing store. It looked to still be in a good condition Its windows were shattered but not too bad and the although the door had been broken down, we could make it work.
Jordan entered first, he cautiously looked left and right to make sure that there were no animals hidden inside. Rina and I helped each other lift some shelves and hangers and barricaded the door with as much junk as we could find. Lydia on the other hand was preparing a make shift fireplace inside the building. She collected some clothes and some broken concrete slabs which she used to make a small fireplace and using some broken wood planks from broken furniture she managed to make a small fire starting.
…
Several minutes later we were gathered around the fire. There were large pieces of meat roasting over the fire and just so you know this was the second star order eagle's meat by the way. Its smell as it burnt was so tantalizing and enticing to the point that Jordan was actually drooling and my stomach was growling. I really craved to have that delicious smelling meat in my mouth.
Lydia and Rina gave us a judgemental look.
"Come on guys I know that the food smells nice and all but do you really need to act like starved pigs?" Lydia finally couldn't hold it in and directly blurted out.
I was about the respond to her but Jordan actually beat me to it.
"Hell yeah" he said and nodded seriously. I nodded too in approval. Usually I wouldn't so much and if I did mom would make sure I ate with eloquent manners or anything remotely close to that but when I was eating with the boys. Jordan, Billy and me; we would actually have some competitions to see who would finish the fastest and of course Billy would always come out on top and Jordan and I would usually call him a fat pig.
I sighed for the umpteenth time today. I really missed mom and I really missed Billy.
Jordan seemed to notice my drop in mood and he immediately slung his arm over me shoulder and gave me a small squeeze.
"Hey how long till the meat is done?" he asked me like I was a braai expert (which I was). I looked at him deeply. I knew that Jordan was trying to get me out of my gloomy mood and I smiled slightly in appreciation before looking at the meat over the fire. It was leaking some body oil and it was slightly crusted on the outside.
"We won't have to wait that long" I said
And we really didn't have to wait that long because ten minutes after the meat was done cooking/roasting and everyone was holding and chewing a piece of meat on a bone. The meat tasted nice. It made my taste buds want to dance and a smiled was on everyone's faces as they ate but I knew that the real reason they were smiling was the same reason I was smiling as well.
[You have acquired Health +2]
I took another bite and another notification popped up on my screen
[You have acquires Mana +1]
With every bite of the meat I would receive a random stat point in any one of my attributes. So far I received a few stat points in Health, Mana, Agility and Stamina. While we ate we talked some light conversation amongst ourselves.
"Wow" Lydia moaned as she took another bite. "Did meat always taste this good?"
"Nah only the one that I cook" I said with a smile to which Lydia rolled her eyes as if she were annoyed but she smiled either way and took another bite.
"I second that brother. You really know how to cook" Jordan said and gave me a thumbs up with his greasy fingers.
"I don't think I need a compliment from someone who burns sausages on a BBQ" I said
"Hey! I thought we had a deal to never talk about that!" he said with wide eyes and a red embarrassed face. Everyone laughed.
"Wait we did? When was that three years ago? It must have slipped my mind" I said and shrugged my shoulders while acting shocked.
"You…" Jordan was about to say something but he decided that a strategic retreat would do him good for now. Mind you a strategic retreat is not the same as admitting defeat and I knew that sooner or later Jordan would get back at me
…
Unbeknownst to our protagonist's party the smell of the freshly cooked meat had spread throughout most of the little cloth store they were harbored in. it even managed to reached the far back of the shop where the dressing stalls were located. In one particular dressing stall Candice's nose twitched involuntarily as she awoke with soft flattering eyelids.
The first thing she noticed was the amazing smell and before the black haired beauty could comprehend exactly what was going on.
*Growl* her stomach grumbled in a not so subtle way. A sound that might have been insignificant in the past was easily picked up by Huey who immediately went on guard.