78Disclaimer: Disclaimed.
Chapter 3
BLACKOUT
"Up the ladder up the ladder! Go, go, go!" Bill ordered, using his dual pistols to pick off the Common Infected one by one. He hoped that, at the very least, his teammates would make it up the ladder to the roof, and safety.
"Pfft, like I'd let you beat me on the Infected-count, Old Man! Up you go!" Francis snapped back, turning briefly to kick Bill in the direction of the fire escape ladder, turning just in time to dive out of the way of the swinging fist of the Tank. "HELL!" The Tank's overgrown fists made it lose balance, causing the behemoth to topple into a wall, dazed. Francis, taking advantage of the Tank's distraction, backed towards the fire escape. He wheeled about, trying to take out every Common with the least amount of ammunition possible; but the problem with Common Infected, was that they could pop out of practically nowhere. A Common that had pulled just the trick when Francis turned his back crumpled to the ground, two bullet holes directly through the top of its head.
Francis looked up, nearly being blinded by a bright streetlight that was visible over the edge of the roof. "Go, I'll hold them off!" Zoey cried, more gunshots following as Commons dropped next to him. Francis leapt into the air, reaching as high as he could on the ladder and scrambling up the rest of the way, giving Zoey a quick pat on the back as he passed her.
Once at the top, he marveled at what he saw. It was surprisingly simple, yet in the world that he was growing accustomed to, it was heaven. Guns and ammo galore, a pile of food and drinks, and a large tent that could easily fit the entire group. The stock of ammunition alone nearly set the biker drooling. His fantasy was cut short when the sound of shredding metal tore right through his thoughts. He spun around, just glimpsing Zoey's face as she fell out of sight. He dashed to the edge of the roof, Zoey coming back into his range of vision; her hand outstretched, her eyes wide as the fire escape fell away from her feet.
"Francis!" She cried. Francis leaned over, gripping the ledge tightly as he made a mad grab for her hand. His fingers brushed her wrist…and she just kept falling, her hand slipping right out of his slick grip. Her eyes widened a fraction of an inch, everything slowing down for the group as she fell away, down towards the Tank that was already recovering from his fall, and the Common that was swarming the metallic wreckage. Zoey was going to fall down to either death-by-pavement or death-by-cannibalism, and there was nothing they could do about it.
Without any warning, something shot past the trio, diving right over the ledge of the building without even hesitating. The figure dropped faster than Zoey, falling like a stone. Strong arms wrapped around her, and right before Zoey and the figure smashed into the pavement, the length of thick rope wrapped around the figure's waist snapped them back up towards the roof like a bungee cord, Commons reaching for their feet a second to late. The rope didn't have enough elasticity to bring them back up to the roof, so the figure reached out with one hand when they reached the height of their flight, long fingers wrapping around a protruding windowsill. For a few seconds, the Survivors - and Zoey's savior - were silent - Zoey was shaking from the sudden fright and adrenaline, her teammates were still trying to get their brains to catch up to the current events, and the mysterious savior was releasing a sigh of relief. It was the savior that broke the silence.
"Paul?" A deep, male voice called from the shadows that cloaked the side of the building. "Not that I don't like dangling by my fingers over a horde of hungry bastards and a freaking Tank…but can you please, oh, I dunno, give me a hand?" Loud clapping echoed from behind the three male Survivors, causing them to jump, startled. "Oh, very funny. Very original. I can hang here all day, you know, but this lady here seems to be in shock, and could probably use some water." The clapping continued. "You're a dick…" The man grumbled, suddenly releasing the windowsill. Before they could fall more than a foot, the man wrapped his now-free hand up in the rope around his waist, and planted his feet on the side of the building, walking up the wall slowly but surely. He kept Zoey close, not letting her get even close to slipping from his grip.
Once at the top, Bill and Louis rushed forward, pulling Zoey up and leaving the blonde to heave himself up. While Bill and Louis checked on Zoey, Francis watched as the stranger stood up, and stalked over to another man that had appeared on the roof from nowhere. "You know, it wouldn't kill you to help." The obviously older man began to mock-choke, flailing about. "You're so funny." The savior growled, sarcasm dripping from his words. The other pointed dramatically.
"WRONG SIR!" He cried; Louis, Bill, and Zoey all jumped, having not been watching the exchange or expecting the sudden shouting. "I'm hysterical." The blonde slapped the other man on the back of the head.
"Leave me to haul myself up a vertical wall with only one arm and a woman in the other again, and I'll be throwing you over the side of the building to the Tank." He looked down, frowning in disgust at the thick rope, which turned out to be a severed Smoker's tongue. "And you'll be the one with a Smoker-Tongue belt." He grumbled, slicing the long muscle off of his waist with a large knife that he had pulled from between his jacket and shirt. He slid the knife back into wherever it had been hidden beforehand, and looked to the Survivors, staring at them as if they didn't notice. "What should we do with them?"
"Hey, they're your responsibility." The younger of the duo snapped his head to the side to glare at the other. "You wanted to save them, not me! So by default, they're now under your protection." He paused. "Wait 'till morning and then send them on their way. That's my opinion."
"We are right here you know." Zoey said, speaking her first words since her near-fall.
"We know." The older man responded, before waltzing over, sticking his hand out to her; he ignored how the other three either twitched their hands towards their guns, or actually trained them on him. "I'm Paul. Nice to meet you." Zoey stared at the offered hand for a moment, before taking it, shaking it with a small smile.
"Zoey. Nice to meet another Survivor…the biker is Francis, the old man is Bill, and the man who looks more ready for an office meeting than an apocalypse is Louis."
"Fantastic!" Paul cried. "My anti-social friend over there is Leon S. Kennedy, the only guy you'll meet who's still clinging to his full name like a life raft." He gave a small chuckle, as if what he had said was one of the funniest things he had said all day.
"I can speak for myself, Paul!" The newly-dubbed Leon called from the other side of the roof, his back turned to the group as he went through a pile of assorted objects.
"Then get yer ass over here and do so, ya baby!" Paul barked back, his voice falling into a partial-country accent. He snorted when Leon fell silent. "Sorry 'bout him. He doesn't really like strangers."
"Who doesn't like strangers?" Leon asked. The group jumped, the man having snuck up behind Paul in seconds without making a sound. In his hands was a blue metal first aid kit, a white and red cross stamped on the front. "Unless I'm mistaken, you stalked me for a good half-day before actually introducing yourself."
"Not my fault you found it a good idea to walk right down the middle of the street." Paul grumbled, snatching the kit away from Leon, and handing it to Bill.
"A little big, isn't it?" Louis asked, breaking the fresh silence after only a few seconds. "Isn't it difficult to carry around?"
"We've been camping out on this roof for a long time. Lost count, actually." Paul said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Haven't had to carry it around."
"It has more supplies that are also of better quality than the smaller med kits that most humans carry around."
"'Most humans'?" Francis echoed, his eyes narrowing slightly in suspicion.
"…yeeeesss?" Leon dragged out the word, raising an eyebrow to accent his confusion. "You know; 'Immunes,' 'Pures,' 'Uninfected,' 'Survivors'? Humans. They're all the same thing." Leon shrugged, looking to his comrade. "Is every other Survivor this jumpy, because if they are I don't feel like finding an evac camp."
"You haven't met any other Survivors yet?" Zoey asked with a raise of an eyebrow, half occupied with bandaging her sprained ankle. Since the outbreak, her group had met quite a few different groups of Survivors, all ranging in size, age, and gender ratios.
"I have." Paul supplied. "Leon's only met me, and we've been camping out together for around three, four weeks, I think. The entire time we've been right here. There was a superstore just down the street…"
"Was?" Asked Bill.
"Tank." Leon deadpanned, needing no further explanation. "Unless your eavesdropping earlier didn't catch it…you all can stay 'till morning. Then you've got to leave."
"What?" Francis snapped. "We have as much a right to be here as you do!"
"You have the rights to safe rooms. But this isn't a safe room. This is our hideout, not yours. Be happy we're not kicking your unstealthy asses out right now."
"Why you little-"
"Sorry, sorry." Paul broke through before Francis and Leon could come to blows, the two men already glaring daggers at one another from different ends of the roof. "Leon has trust issues, and isn't the most social at the moment. You'll have to forgive him."
"Francis forgives him." Zoey said. Francis looked to Zoey, fully prepared to argue, but fell silent at the death glare that she was sending his way. "Right, Francis?"
"U-uh…yeah…"
"We'll leave tomorrow morning, if that's what you want." Zoey continued. "We're just thankful that we have a place to rest until then. You know, heal, get energy, and all that." She trailed off, her small speech losing steam. Leon looked at the young woman, his blue eyes boring into her own, before he suddenly turned around. When he returned, his arms were laden with a good portion of the food and water that was in Leon and Paul's private stockpile.
"Here." He said, dumping the food at the group's feet. "We have more than enough. You may not be allowed to stay here, but that doesn't mean that you have to starve." She nodded her thanks. "Paul and I will sleep outside tonight. You all can sleep in the tent, or wherever you want."
"Oh, no, we can't take your guy's-" Leon held up a hand, silencing Louis.
"It's fine. We've slept in worse places, believe me." Paul, on the other hand, wasn't in the mood to be quite so chivalrous.
"But I don't wanna sleep outside! What if it rains? What if it's windy? What if a giant pillow falls from they sky and smothers us magically in our sleep?"
"Then nobody will have to hear you talk anymore." Leon responded offhandedly, already back at the food pile and rummaging through, returning with four cans, two being spaghetti in a can, and the other two being cans of green beans. He handed on of each to Paul, keeping the other two for himself.
The two groups ended up crowding around a lantern - with Paul forcing Leon - in some lopsided circle, eating their dinners in relative silence. It had started out quiet, but the noise level had built until Paul was conversing with the Survivors - mostly Louis and Zoey, with Bill and Francis adding their own commentary slightly less than the previously-mentioned duo - like they were best friends. Leon would break in a few times, and answer questions when they were asked, but didn't make much of an effort to start his own conversations. He kept more to himself, glancing from time to time at the firearms that the Survivors had arrived with.
The conversations evolved into what the Survivors had done beforehand, how they had reacted to the outbreak when it had started, and how they had met each other. Apparently Louis and Bill had met in what was supposed to have been an evac center, which had been overrun by carelessness of the guards, while Francis and Zoey had met while just running around, trying to figure out what the hell was going on. The two groups of two had met up after that, and had conjoined to form the group of four that had been traveling together for quite a while. Paul was the one that was left to explain how he and Leon had met, Leon jumping in a few times to correct Paul; no, Paul did not jump in and save him from a Tank, no, Leon had not been crying for a savior when the Tank bitch-slapped him into a Witch, and no, Paul didn't not end up crowning the Witch with a dead bird.
"So we've all exchanged back-stories…" Louis said with a hesitant smile, turning to look at Leon, who was in the middle of trying to shove two king-sized Hershey's bars into his mouth at the same time. "…but we haven't heard yours." Leon forced down the chunks of chocolate, wiping his mouth with a slight frown.
"My name's Leon S. Kennedy. I woke up in Mercy Small-Practice Hospital, a few weeks after the Infection outbreak. I had this equipment with me," He pointed to his belt, with only the ammunition pouches bulging with its contents. "and this." He reached underneath his jacket, and pulled up the bloody dog-tags, the ones he still hadn't bothered to wash off in fear of what he'd find; what if he was some sick experiment? Why would he want to remember that? There was silence as he let the dog-tags fall back against his chest, the metal giving off a dull glow that reflected onto the ground by the lantern. "That's all." Again, there was silence.
"…you're kidding…right?" Francis asked. Paul sighed, going into one of his serious modes.
"Sadly he's not. Leon's suffering from severe amnesia. Can't remember anything. He wouldn't have even remembered his name if it wasn't for the dog-tags, and even that was a little shaky until he found something that confirmed that he's Leon. He only got a flash of a memory of somebody calling him "Leon" around a week ago. So his back-story's a little blank at the moment. We're working on filling it in, though. Haven't gotten much…"
"A few flashes of crap I can't quite make out or put together, I was on the Raccoon City Police Department at one point for an undetermined amount of time, my name, and I have a sweet-tooth. That's all I know." He paused. "And I apparently like guns."
"Oh…I'm sorry…" Zoey muttered slowly, looking around awkwardly.
"Don't be. Can't miss what you can't remember." Leon grunted, stabbing a plastic fork at a Hershey's kiss the size of his fist; the fork just broke off its tines, leaving the white plastic jutting out of the chocolate at odd angles. "Awwww…" He whined, before tossing the hunk of chocolate off the roof. "Eh, didn't want it anyway." Unseen to the group, was the fact that the point of the kiss sliced through the gut of a Boomer; they did feel the explosion however, making the Survivors jump, and Paul roll his eyes. He leaned over to Leon while the Survivors were distracted.
"Why don't you do something really odd; not this "kill a Boomer without looking with a piece of chocolate" crap! Why don't we just scream to the world that you're not normal?" He hissed.
"Oh relax, they don't even know what that was." Leon replied, quickly pushing Paul away before the Survivors would notice. "I'm going to bed." He announced, climbing to his feet and walking to the ladder that would bring him to the roof of the building over. "I'll keep watch for a few hours, so feel free to go to bed." He added once he got to the roof, then dropped out of sight.
"I think I'm going to go to bed, too." Zoey said, standing. "I call the tent!" In the end, it was decided that Zoey would get the zip-off section of the tent, and the three male Survivors would share the main part. Paul had decided that he would sleep right outside the tent, for two reasons. One, to keep a lookout for any Infected who might think of climbing up onto the roof - though none had really tried that as of yet - and two, to make sure that the Survivors didn't wander off in the middle of the night. Not only would it be annoying to have to go and find them and rescue them if they got attacked without the proper backup, but if they went searching for Leon, he didn't want to have to explain why Leon was missing. He knew that Leon hadn't really gone to bed, or even sat down to keep watch. No, Leon was off doing his Infected thing.
:::With Leon:::
The amnesiac jumped again, sailing through the air, perpendicular with the ground. He landed heavily, bending his knees to absorb some of the impact before rolling with his momentum, popping right back up after rolling twice to continue on in a lazy jog, his eyes scraping the towering landscapes of the center of the city. He had to be careful when patrolling this area; there was supposedly a Survivor camp that had recently been established underground around here, with sentries posted on the roofs of buildings everywhere. If anybody caught him jumping, they'd take him for a Hunter and try to shoot him on the spot. The Infected was, to a certain degree, bulletproof, but he didn't want to find out if he shared their defense against metal projectiles.
'If there is a Survivor camp here, I can give those other Survivors a map to this area. Get them out of my hair.' Leon thought, tilting his head slightly to scent the air. The scent of human was fresh, but held a hint of something that he wasn't fond of. Leon frowned, his eyebrows lowering in confusion. This wasn't a scent he had picked up and memorized before, but it still smelt familiar, as if he should know it but didn't. 'What is this scent? Why can't I remember it?' For a second, Leon wrote it of as amnesia. But something didn't make sense. 'But I didn't have this acute sense of smell when I was human, and I was a human before I lost my memory…right? Or was I already Infected when I got konked on the noggin?' He shook his head with a growl. 'Screw this, I'm going to give myself a headache.' Oops, to late.
Leon leapt down from the two-story building, rolling against to absorb the impact. Thankfully, there were no Infected in the area, so drawing his pistol would have been a waste of energy. The lack of Infected, though, reinforced the rumor that a Survivor camp was nearby. 'Paul said that it was underground…' Leon thought, peaking his head around the corner of the stairs that would lead down into part of the subway tunnels. 'I'll just run in, take a quick peek, and then run back out. Nobody will know I was there…I'll be fine…' Leon snorted. "Famous last words." He mused out loud, before trotting down the stairs, trying to keep his gait as quiet as possible. When he reached the bottom, he darted into the shadows, relying on the dark colors of his clothes to keep himself mostly hidden. He crept forward, keeping his nose and ears alert, searching for any signs of life.
After twenty minutes of searching the winding tunnels, he still came up with nothing. "This isn't right…" Leon muttered, opening his mouth a fraction of an inch and inhaled, his sense of taste amplifying the scents and making everything stand out more. When it came to his sense of smell, it was like comparing two Tvs; a normal TV being just his sense of smell, and an HD TV representing his smelling sense mixed with his taste sense. The scent that hit his nose and tongue sent him reeling, his hands snapping up to clap over his nose and mouth. He had expected the scent of humans, not death and decay. 'Why do I keep doing that?' He whined, blinking away the tears that had started to gather in his eyes.
The smell of death didn't bode well in Leon's mind, but still he continued on, now using the scent of death and the strange scent as his guide. He arrived in a subway station, copses strewn everywhere. He couldn't hear one beating heart, not a single one.
At first, the man thought it was the Infection that had caused all the death. But the familiar scent of the Infected clung to not even one of the bodies. It was something else, something that made an animalistic growl that frightened Leon rise from his chest. He bared his teeth like some threatened animal, clenching his hands into fists and unclenching them to flex his fingers. His shoulders rose and his shoulder blades jutted out of his skin, his toes curling in his boots to scrape at the sole of his shoes. The scent nearly sent the man into a fury, and the thought of losing control over a simple scent scared the amnesiac more than anything he had witnessed since waking up. He knew somewhere in the back of his mind - he didn't know where, and he didn't know why, but he knew - that losing control was not something he wanted to do, something that wasn't an option. Going berserk wasn't and option.
'Berserk…' Leon thought, turning away from the bodies and marching away while trying to find something that would distract him from the scent. 'Berserk…Berserker…' For some reason, the name seemed to fit whatever he was imaging. Berserker; that was him when he lost all semblance of his sanity and humanity, when he wasn't in control, but the Infection.
He exited the subway the same way he had entered, leaping to a balcony above to avoid a diving Hunter; apparently the smell of death hadn't attracted only him. Commons were beginning to roam the streets, and unless he was mistaken, he could see a Witch slowly making its way through the shadows, the female Infected plopping down ever few feet to sob her eyes out, not getting up unless she thought nobody was watching her.
"Leon…" A voice whispered on the wind, almost to quiet for the man to make out. Leon frowned at the sound; it was Paul, he was certain of that. The man was calling him, back from their roof with the other Survivors. "Leeeeoooon…" Leon promptly ignored him, leaping up and swinging onto a balcony, continuing this way until he reached the roof. "…Leon…" Again, ignored. "MR. GRACEFUL!" Leon glared at the jab at his first attempt at jumping - his nose still sometimes hurt whenever he thought of the brick wall - but released his most Hunter-like scream, hoping that Paul would understand and stop calling him. He would go back to the roof with the Survivors that would kill him on the spot if it just meant that Paul would stop calling him. "…was that you?" Apparently Paul didn't know Leon wanted him to shut up.
'Who else sounds like a deep-voiced Hunter?' Leon thought, screeching again. After all, Hunters had a much higher-pitched screech than Leon, Leon's being a bit lower by maybe an octave or two.
"Okay, that was you. Return to the roof, would you? And stop screeching!"
'You piss me off, I piss you off.' Leon thought, screaming once more. No matter how much he hated making the sound, he wouldn't pass up the chance to tick off Paul.
"You're going to wake the Survivors, you know!" Paul's voice echoed off the buildings, carrying a mocking tone. That shut Leon up good, just as Paul knew it would. The man glowered at nothing, gathering energy in his legs for the return trip.
Hopefully he'd be able to get back without any of the Survivors noticing his absence, or the manner in which he would return.
:::Back at the Hideout:::
"Where are the Survivors?" Leon whispered, just in case one or more of the Survivors had good hearing. Not like they'd have an easy time picking out different words; Paul had climbed up the ladder to the adjacent roof to meet Leon where the man would most-likely return to.
"In the tent. Sleeping, hopefully. And if they know what's good for them. They'll need energy for tomorrow, what with the Infected beginning to swarm the only evac site for cities." Paul nodded back towards the tent. "Did you go and check out the Survivor camp like I asked?" Leon hesitated, nodding slowly. Should he tell Paul? The man had been excited at the idea of a camp of humans in the middle of the destroyed city…was it really a good idea to give him the news?
"Yeah…"
"Well? Were the rumors true?"
"They were…past-tense." Leon said, ignoring the way Paul's expression fell. "All of the Survivors were dead. Most of them seemed to have been dead for a while, too." He paused. "But there's something that's a little troubling…"
"Being?" Paul asked, snapping out of his momentary depression. He had thought that the camp had been a rumor, so not like he could miss anything that he hadn't believed in in the first place. And wallowing in pity didn't do much good in the world that he was currently living in; pay respects, and then move on. That was the smartest action.
"There was a scent I couldn't place." Leon began slowly. "It was unfamiliar. I…I feel like I've smelled it before, but I can't remember from where."
"Probably from before your amnesia. Don't worry, kid, it'll come back eventually."
"And if I don't like what I find when it does come back?"
"Then deal with it then. Until that comes, focus on more important things." A grin slowly spread across Paul's face. "Like who's going to get the last sleeping bag!" He cried, whipping around and running like a toddler to the ladder, sliding down it as fast as he could. He spun around, fully intent on claiming the last sleeping bag…only to find Leon already spreading it out by the still-lit lamp, smoothing out wrinkles and placing the built-in, cushiony, poor-excuse-for-a-pillow at just the right angle. Leon looked up, the corners of his mouth kicking up into a smirk.
"Hey." He deadpanned, before flopping down onto the "cushiony goodness"(as proclaimed by Paul later on when the man was complaining) on his side, with his back to the older man.
"So where am I supposed to sleep?" Leon's free shoulder rose and fell in a type of half-shrug, leaving Paul standing in silence. He looked forlornly at the cold cement surface of the roof, not finding the dark gray and solid substance very appealing.
"Heads up." Paul wasn't fast enough. He was smacked in the face by the unrolled sleeping bag that Leon had been laying on a few seconds prior.
"Uh…"
"Here, you can use it." Leon said, dusting off his pants while pulling his jacket back on; he had taken it off before spreading out the sleeping bag, just to be more comfortable. "I don't need it."
"But you're tired to, aren't you?" Leon flashed a brief but genuine grin.
"One upside to being the Predator is a reduced need for sleep. I said I was going to keep watch for a while, and with somebody sleeping out in the open, that's just what I'll do. Don't worry, I'll wake you a few hours before dawn for your watch. That gives you about…" Leon glanced at the watch he had snapped around his wrist a few weeks ago, having been surprised to find one that still actually worked and had the correct time. "…five hours." The Infected nodded to the sky, drawing Paul's attention to the moon. He could practically see it creeping across the sky, counting away his minutes of sleep. "Better get crackin'."
Paul didn't have to be told twice, and lay down on the sleeping bag. Not five minutes after he closed his eyes, he was asleep, snoring away. Leon winced. Thankfully, Paul's snoring didn't register to the Infected as a sound that prey made, so the man's snoring never called swarms of Infected like car alarms did(Something Leon would never admit was that even he found the sounds of a car alarm a bit…alluring. Like it was calling to him, and he just had to go and investigate. And then kill whatever was making the noise that made his ears want to bleed.). But the loud noise never ceased to make Leon worried that an Infected would finally answer the call.
Two hours before dawn, Leon woke Paul up just like he had promised. He had given the man an extra two hours of rest, earning a glare from the man at his own lack of time to sleep. Leon had just chuckled, snuggling into the sleeping bag until it was pulled clear over his head, his blue eyes glowing ominously from the shadows as he stared out at Paul like some cat.
"Stop doing that, it's creepy." Paul had said, earning another chuckle, and the eyes disappearing as Leon's eyelids slid over his eyes. Sleep came easy for the man, his more animalistic and Infected instincts whispering that he had nothing to fear, unless a Tank or a Witch decided to attack him. He was a predator, and a predator should never fear being attacked by what should be its prey.
Paul's watch passed in relative silence, the man occasionally pulling the trigger of his pistol while trying to get a headshot on a few of the Commons that still wandered the road below. Out of the fifty-two shots he made, only five were actual headshots, ones that made the heads of his targets burst. A few times he shot them in the head but their heads stayed intact. That didn't count as a headshot, according to the rules that he and Leon had agreed with when they had gotten bored one afternoon. The other times he either missed, or hit their shoulders or chests.
After an hour, the Survivors began to wake up, their whispering from inside the tent being evidence of that. Ten minutes after the whispering first started, Zoey crawled out, followed by Bill. A groggy Louis followed six minutes later, leaving just Francis to sleep away in the tent on his own. "Where's the other guy? Uh…Leon?" Zoey asked, her sleep-fogged mind trying to recall the name of the man who had saved her. Paul pointed over his shoulder at the sleeping bag on the ground, not looking away from the street below in case a Hunter of Smoker decided to try and get in a staring match with him. Or a Boomer, but he doubted that Infected's long-range attack could reach all the way to the roof.
"He woke me up around an hour ago for my watch. He's sleeping right now."
"He kept watch all night?" Bill asked, incredulous. "Wouldn't he have nodded off by then?" What with the apocalypse, energy was used up quickly, leaving almost none to stay up to the early hours of the morning, even if it was fueled by the threat of death.
"Uh, no. He took a nap yesterday afternoon when the Infected in the area began to clear out." Paul lied. "Now that I think about it, it was probably the Tank and Witch coming into the area that had made them all scatter." Well, it wasn't a complete lie. The Common Infected and most of the Special Infected had left yesterday, and it probably had been on account of the two more powerful Specials.
"How'd you know there was a Witch?" Bill asked, trying to sound nonchalant. They hadn't mentioned the Witch yesterday. At least, not to his knowledge.
"Heard her screaming bloody murder." Another lie, but he couldn't exactly say that Leon had heard her crying, scream, then suddenly fall silent after she had been shot twelve to many times. "Francis still asleep?" Asked the middle-aged man, trying to change the topic as best he could without making it obvious that that was his plan.
"Yeah." Zoey said, before yawning. "Sleeping…something I wish I could be doing right now…"
"Then, uh, why don't you?"
"Have a schedule ground into my head now." Was her simple answer, one that Paul could understand. Sleep was something that was usually rare to come by, and long hours of continuous sleep was practically impossible now.
"Speaking of internal schedules…" Grumbled a voice from the sleeping bag, the bag rippling as Leon, who was still hidden underneath the thick layers of cloth, moved out from where he had curled up in the last two feet of the bag, crawling out of the remaining five feet so that most of his body was pulled out of the bag. He rolled over onto his back, tilting his head to look "up" at Paul. "…mine sucks."
"It's only been an hour, kid. Go back to sleep."
"Nope." Leon grunted as he pushed himself to his feet, stretching his arms over his head. "I'm good."
"You didn't sleep the night before."
"Your point?"
"You only slept for one hour."
"Still not seeing your point."
"…if I had any NyQuil I'd drug your ass until you're so high you think you're riding unicorns and crapping rainbows."
"If I was riding unicorns and crapping rainbows, that would mean that I'm still awake, and therefore causing you to fail in your mission in drugging me."
"Stop talking like that."
"Bite me."
"Give me your hand and I will."
"Screw you sideways with a cactus."
"Well, look who's the five year old now."
"A five year old with a gun." Leon pulled out his pistol, aiming it at Paul's left eye. "You should really lock this thing up when you let kids play in the house."
"Stop pointing that gun at me or you're grounded." Leon stamped his foot on the ground like a child having a temper tantrum, his face completely blank the entire time.
"Meanie poopy-head jerk-face!" Still with a blank face.
"Grow up!"
"Smoker."
"Smoker? That makes no- oi oi oi, don't pull the trigger- GAH!" Paul yelped, ducking as Leon pulled the trigger twice, the bullets flying from the barrel of the gun that nobody had seen be switched off of safety mode. A hollow pop sounded from the other side of the road, a puff of green smoke being the only evidence that anything had been there in the first place. "COULDN'T YOU HAVE GIVEN ME A WARNING?"
"I did."
"Something better than 'Smoker!' Like 'duck!'"
"Duck."
"A little late now!"
"Better late than never."
"That doesn't apply to when you're shooting at something DIRECTLY BEHIND ME HEAD!"
"Hm." Leon grunted, staring at where the Smoker had been. He had barely noticed the Smoker until he had heard its raspy breathing that signaled it would be attacking soon. So the Special Infected were getting stealthier. Smarter. At least, the Smoker was. Hopefully there would be a loss of aggression with their increase in intelligence. Maybe that was what happened to him; insane and blood-thirsty until he regained his intelligence. But if that was the case, then how many people died, how many people did he kill?
"'ello? Earth to Leon, come in Leon!" Paul's voice broke through his thoughts, the blonde man snapping to attention with a blink. He stared at the hand that was waving in front of his face with a frown.
"What?"
"You zoned out. And it's breakfast time!" Paul held up one of the remaining boxes of Lucky Charms, shaking it with a grin. Leon snatched the box away, his eyes narrowing suspiciously. If Paul had touched even one of the marshmallows…
But Paul was already prancing - yes, prancing - away, handing out food to the other Survivors. Absentmindedly, Leon flipped open the box, reaching his hand in to pull out a handful of the cereal. He used his thumb to push most of the cereal bits back into the box, tossing the marshmallows into his mouth.
"Eating only marshmallows?" Louis asked from where he sat in one of the chairs. "That's not healthy."
Surprising everybody on the roof, including himself, Leon stuck his tongue out at the man, before shoving another handful of marshmallows down his throat, every move being dramatic. That is, until he started to gag and cough when a marshmallow went down the wrong pipe.
"Told you it's not healthy!"
"S-shut uh-p." Leon managed through his gasps, pounding on his chest until his throat was cleared. He spent a long minute just gazing at the stupid grinning leprechaun on the font of the bright box, before tossing it at a wall. "I'm done eating that crap."
"What? Rainbows and shooting stars and four-leaf clovers to scary for the big bad Infected-Predator?" Paul called over his shoulder, his play on words going right over the heads of the Survivors. He turned around to continue to mock Leon…but ducked with a loud shriek at the grinning face of the leprechaun that was only four inches away from his own face. While Paul cowered on the ground in the fetal position, Leon stared at the back of the box, mentally completing the little kid puzzles.
"Who's scared of pretty rainbows, twinkly stars, and plants now?"
"…you two argue like an old married couple…" Zoey muttered, snickering when Paul gave an indignant huff and Leon's left eyebrow twitched.
"Don't even joke like that!" Paul grumbled. "I have a wife!"
"Yeah, he has a wife." Leon paused. "And he'd never be able to pull all this off." He motioned to himself, sending Bill cackling like mad, with Zoey giggling and Louis hiding his laughter. Paul was the only one who was flailing, screaming something that nobody really paid attention to. Paul stopped, however, when the shine of mirth in Leon's eyes was quickly snuffed out. While the three Survivors continued to laugh, Leon pulled away from the group, scrambling up the ladder onto the adjacent roof and disappearing from view.
"Something wrong with him?" Zoey asked. She was the first to notice. After her comment the others stopped laughing as well, turning to Paul for an answer.
"Anti-social tendencies." Paul said with a shrug. An uncomfortable silence followed. "I'll go see what's up." He excused himself, and followed Leon onto the roof, glancing over his shoulder to make sure the Survivors were staying put. They were. With a sigh, he turned to where Leon was sitting on the edge of the roof, his legs dangling off the edge. "Okay. What's up with the mood swings? You pregnant?" Leon shot him a glare.
"I want them to leave." He growled. "Now." Paul frowned, crouching next to his friend.
"Why? You seemed to be liking their company a few minutes ago."
"I was. Until I remembered that they'd put a bullet in my skull if they ever found out."
"Oi oi. I never pegged you as the insecure type. Keep this up and I'll have to bring you to the counselor. Or is it the psychiatrist?" Leon didn't laugh, didn't even smile. "You don't give them enough credit, Leon. You don't know for sure if they'd try to kill you."
"It's the freaking apocalypse, Paul. With the Infected being the bad guys, and the Survivors being the good guys. Infected try and kill Survivors, Survivors kill Infected." He pointed to himself. "Infected." He pointed to the edge of the roof. "Survivors." Paul motioned to himself.
"Survivor." He deadpanned.
"You're different."
"How am I any different? I'm trying to survive just as much as them. If you look at it just as Infected and Survivors, then it would be in my best interest to kill you. But I know you, and you know me. I know that you're not bad, and if you gave the other Survivors a chance, they'd learn that you're not bad either. For an Infected." Paul added with a half-hearted grin, one Leon didn't return. "You're really hard to cheer up, you know that?" He paused. "I know the perfect way to get you over your fear of Survivors!"
"I am not afraid of a few gun-toting humans." Leon snapped. "…how?" He added meekly.
"Let's pack up camp and go with them!"
"N-"
"Hear me out first, will you? …good. They're leaving soon anyway, and we need to leave soon. The supermarket was destroyed, and without that, we're going to run out of supplies fast. We need to get to an evac, and don't give me any crap of you not being able to get in because you're Infected. If I couldn't tell the difference, I doubt anybody else can unless you decide to try and earn to fly in front of a soldier. Traveling in a larger group could ensure our safety, too."
"You can go with them if you want. I'm not traveling with anybody if I don't know if they're going to try and turn my face into Swiss cheese." Leon muttered while getting to his feet, practically doing a backbend until his spine popped.
"Le-"
"Nope! Not gonna do it." He glanced over his shoulder at where he could see over the edge of the roof, spying the heads of the Survivors that were now four; Francis must have woken up. About time, too. "You want to go with them? Be my guest. I'll take my chances out here with the rest of the Infected. I can outrun most of them if I have to, anyway." A pause. "Probably…I'm going for a walk." And with that, he fell backwards off of the edge of the roof. Paul dashed to the ledge, looking over as Leon jogged away at a leisurely pace, a few Common chasing after him. Whatever fate befell them was lost to Paul as Leon turned around a corner and vanished from sight.
Paul frowned. Something wasn't sitting right with him. Whatever it was, Paul had wanted to warn Leon about it. But with Leon now gone…the feeling just increased. 'I should go find him…' He thought, biting his lip. 'If it's a Tank in the area, then…well, I don't know if Leon can take care of a Tank by himself if the situation calls for it…' So he turned back to the roof to stock up on ammunition, already trying to formulate an excuse to tell the other Survivors as to why Leon had run off, and why he had to go look for him. Though the latter was probably easier to explain. The city was infected, after all. But if his gut was right, then he wouldn't need to much ammo.
Because if he was right, it wasn't a Tank.
:::With Leon:::
Against his will, an inhuman grow rumbled deep in his chest, his lips pulling back to bare his teeth as the sound wrapped around his surroundings. A few miles away, a Hunter's screech responded to the low, reverberating sound. It was at times like this that he could clearly understand what the Infected, namely Hunters, were saying through their strange communication sounds. When he was in more of a "human mood," it would feel awkward and a little unnerving, but he wasn't in a "human mood." Honestly, he was pissed.
'How could he think that I would go along with Survivors?' He thought, leaping over a large gap in a building that had been caused by God-knows-what. 'The people that would kill me without a second thought?' He hadn't told Paul, but sometimes he would flinch whenever an Infected would die, whenever their head would explode in burst of blood, gore, and brain matter. It was all-to easy to picture himself as the unlucky Infected, to imagine that it was his own head that was being popped like a balloon. So what if he had a fear of the Survivors? Anybody would if the mentality of all humans was Shoot Now Ask Questions Never.
He landed in the middle of the street, crouching onto his hands and feet in the classic Hunter-pounce position, before leaning back on his feet to rest in a low crouch, reaching up a hand to rub at the back of his head. 'Jumping around like an animal isn't going to help my mood whatsoever.' He silently amended, planting his palms on the street to push himself up onto his feet, dusting his hands off on his zipped-up jacket. The clicking of a gun behind him almost made him jump, but he refrained from doing so, quietly scenting the air.
He had thought it was Paul just messing with him, but a few things didn't match up. First of all, Paul had never followed him before when he went on one of his "walks." Ever. Second, Paul didn't usually mess around with guns behind Leon's back. They had learned early on not to do that, for it would have a bad reaction on Leon's part. Third, even if Paul had followed him, he wouldn't have managed to keep up, and wouldn't be where he was for a good five to ten minutes. Fourth, and lastly, was the scent in the air. It wasn't Paul's. But the scent still was familiar, carrying a vague similarity to the scent in the one Survivor hideout that had been destroyed. The same scent that had filled Leon with rage.
He spun around, baring his teeth like some enraged animal. In all essences, he was. Smelling the scent as an old, stale scent had been different than seeing, smelling, hearing, and practically tasting the thing right in front of him. Before, it had been fairly easy to push off his anger. Now, though, it was right in his face, pushing him to make some move, to take some sort of action.
Twelve guns were leveled with his head, each gun in front of the faces of twelve men - maybe even a few women, but Leon wasn't really focusing on sorting the scents into the subgroups of male and female - that were dressed all in black, in what looked like full-body riot gear that was slightly more heavy-duty. Twelve red dots from laser sights danced onto Leon's face and chest, twitching around while Leon's eyes practically glowed in the low morning light.
"Are you sure this is the target?" Asked one of the twelve that had lined up in some type of semi-circle before Leon. "It looks to…human."
"Trust me, this is it." Another responded.
'It? I am NO IT.' Leon couldn't help it; he growled, the sound low and monstrous in nature. The guns no longer wavered, but held steady.
"Just tranquilize, right?"
"Right. Boss wants this one alive."
Not wanting to know who this "boss" was - and honestly, being tranquilized like some zoo escapee wasn't on his bucket list - Leon leapt into action. He doubted he had time to draw his gun and fire at the hostiles. Even if he did, there were twelve men, and only one of him. He could take out a few before they would be able to pull the trigger on him. And that was if their armor wasn't bullet proof, which he was pretty sure it was. So hand-to-hand was a better option.
He darted forward, keeping low to the ground. He stuck out one of his feet when he rushed past one of the men, pausing briefly to spin on the ground. The man fell, his legs knocked from under him.
Leon leapt to his feet, turning on his heels and delivering a powerful fist to the jaw of one of the men, who spun around on his toes and dropped like a stone. Either he was horribly dazed, or unconscious. Either way, he was out of the fight for now. The first was still trying to collect himself to get back to his feet. That left ten men.
Pausing to access how many more he had to take out had been a mistake. One had darted in to try and stab at him. Literally. The knife had to be a foot and a half long, if not longer, and while their armor was made to withstand attacks, Leon's coat and skin-tight shirt underneath was not.
Leon didn't know what he disliked more; the sound of a blade slicing through flesh with a wet squelch, or the fact that cold steel had just bit through his left hip with very little resistance. The wound wasn't deep, but it was long, and burned horribly. Who knew if the knife had some type of chemical on it? Leon didn't stand around and wait to get hit again to try and confirm if there was something on the knife; he stuck out his leg, spinning on his grounded foot and connecting his shin with the man's - no, it was a woman - side. The wind was knocked clear out of her lungs, and she dropped, gagging and gasping for air. Three down, nine to go.
He ducked on instinct, hearing the whistle of a dart pass over his head with only centimeters to spare. He winced. Hopefully he wouldn't learn what kind of strength of tranquilizer they had filled the darts with.
To bad is luck sucked.
A dart lodged itself in his chest, right near his right shoulder. He grunted, jerking back as the dart's contents emptied into the artery it had jabbed into. The needle wasn't thin, but was thick, and as soon as he pulled the dart from his chest, blood began to spill from the thick circle that now marked his flesh.
He felt the effects of the tranquilizer right away. It didn't make him tired enough to stop, not by a long shot. It was far to weak for that. But he still felt his limbs grow heavier, felt his reflexes slow. He could take a few more of the darts before he would be out for the count.
Nine to go…
Loud gunfire exploded behind Leon, and for a split second, the blonde Predator thought that the twelve had gotten reinforcements for a fight that seemed to be tipped in their favor. But then Paul was at his side, looking over his two injuries with quick eyes, before leveling his gun on the nine that were still standing. His gun was filled with live rounds, theirs with darts. Guess who would win that fight?
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Paul demanded.
"Nobody said it was the pet of a human!" Hissed one of the nine still standing. For a moment, silence reigned.
"Fall back. We'll regroup at the set coordinates." And just like that, they were gone, splitting up and going in different directions, the standing helping drag away the three that Leon had managed to take out. As soon as they were gone, Leon wrapped an arm around Paul, and shot off of the ground. He barely made it to the roof of a four-story building to the right, dropping to his knees as soon as he landed.
Apparently, the tranquilizer had more of an effect than he had originally thought.
"Kid, you alright?" Paul demanded, putting a hand on Leon's shoulder to help support him in case Leon completely fell over.
"Give me a minute…" Leon breathed. After five minutes, Leon's labored breathing had calmed enough for him to sit down in a more comfortable position, the heel of his palm still grinding into the dart wound in his shoulder, slowing the annoyingly-swift flow of blood.
"What was going on? Why were they attacking you?" Leon was silent, settling for just pulling a crumpled piece of cloth that he had shoved in his pocket.
"I…ripped this from one of their uniforms." Leon said, grunting as he held up the cloth for Paul to take. It annoyed him how hard it was to move his limbs at that point. Whatever they had injected him with seemed to activate the more he tried to move, and his little stunt with jumping onto the roof hadn't helped.
Paul frowned, reading the white-on-black font.
"BLACKOUT?" He read. "The hell is that?"
"Check…my second dog-tag." Leon said, glancing down to the tags that were partially hidden by his jacket. "Not the one…with my name…the other one." Paul lifted the tags from the man's chest, letting the one with "Leon S. Kennedy" fall from his fingers. He squinted, trying to see through the thick layer of blood that covered the entirety of the second tag, the blood that Leon had never wanted to wash off. He tilted it a few different directions, trying to find anything that the new light angles would reveal. There! He found the angle with a few indentations visible.
"Pr***t*r" Only a few letters were legible, the others to clogged to read. But the one directly below that was much easier to read.
"BLA*KO*T"
"Blakot?" Paul read slowly. His head snapped back and forth between the dog-tag and the fraction of cloth. "Blackout!" He filled in the blanks, even though he had had a sneaking suspicion as soon as he read the second partially-blanked-out word. The rest of the tag was mostly unreadable. "BLACKOUT." Paul repeated. "So…they're tied to your past somehow."
"In a way I…probably don't want to know."
"It could have been where you worked before…you know…all this." Paul pointed out, and was met by Leon shaking his head.
"I don't think coworkers…try to shoot each other on their coffee breaks." He was finally regaining his breath - it was harder since the tranquilizer was freezing his muscles, constricting his lungs - and was able to get out more syllables at once.
"You obviously didn't work in the same company I did." At one glare, Paul announced that he was kidding. As if it wasn't obvious. "We need to get back camp. The Survivors are moving out soon, and we're going with."
"I don't want-"
"Don't gimme that shit. I was thinking about letting you rough it by yourself, but definitely not now with people trying to tranquilize you like an animal. You saw what they did when I appeared; they scattered. Obviously, they hadn't been counting on you having anybody with you. They hadn't thought that there would be others to protect you. Sticking to a group is even safer for you now, from the Infected and from whatever this BLACKOUT is." Leon wanted to protest, to have to have Paul resort to pulling him back, kicking and screaming the entire way. But he knew Paul was right. He had to face the facts; Mercy City just wasn't safe anymore despite its very ironic - at the moment - name. Some group was hunting him like game in the forest of cement and metal, and if he wanted to keep out of their clutches, and keep away from whatever they wanted him for - for he felt that it was not something he wanted to know about - he would have to move on.
So, ignoring the stiffness of his muscles and joints, Leon hefted himself to his feet, ignoring Paul's offer to help when he wobbled on his feet, his knees just not wanting to bend, his ankles not wanting to unlock and rotate. For a second, Leon just balanced. Tried to find his center of gravity. "Thanks…" He said suddenly, causing Paul to raise an eyebrow. "You didn't have to come looking for me after I snapped at you, but you did. And saved me because of that." Paul chuckled.
"No prob, kid. You're like the weird younger brother that nobody admits is family. I'd never leave you to get kidnapped by the creepers driving the big white vans." All Paul got for his efforts was a small smile, but considering the injuries that still pumped blood, and his veins that still circulated the tranquilizer through his body that increased in intensity the more he moved, that small smile was the equivalent of having Leon rolling on the ground and laughing hard enough and long enough that he threw up.
"Still, thanks. Now come on, Older-Brother-That-Annoys." Leon said, mentally filing down the name to poke fun at Paul with later. A new name for the weird tribe-like group they were starting to form. What would his be? …it was the tranquilizer making him loopy that had him thinking on such pointless topics. Hopefully.
"Aw, you're so nice! …oi, wait for me asshole!" Paul cried, racing after Leon, who had already made his way to the edge of the roof to try and leap across the street without him.
Yay, another chapter! Hopefully a long one, too. It's 13 pages. WAS over 17, but I took away about four pages and made that the beginning of chapter 4. Which has yet to be named…
Hope y'all liked this chapter. It's been typed for about three months already. XD
Review, please!
Kitsune-242