So there ARE other people here.
The first half of the note confirmed what Bryan had suspected. But the second half made him frown. He left the stairwell and walked back to the escalator, scanning the piled Runner corpses.
None matched the description—no recently-turned body among the older ones at the base. He looked up. "Elton!"
"Here!"
A moment later, Elton's head appeared over the second-floor railing. "What is it, Captain?"
"While you're searching up there, look for any bodies with clean, new clothing. Should be recently deceased—within the last few days."
Surprise flickered in Elton's eyes, but he nodded and disappeared back to work.
Bryan pocketed the note and turned to the backpack. Inside: a sketchbook, a set of colored pencils, and various other art supplies. Nothing else.
The sketchbook's cover bore a name—Ed. Bryan opened it. The first page held a strikingly lifelike pencil portrait of a woman.
Red hair, long and wavy, spilling across a grassy hillside. Eyes closed, even in sleep unable to hide the exhaustion etched into her features. The background showed a lake. In the bottom-right corner, black ink: For my darling Andrea — July 21, 2016.
Bryan raised an eyebrow and flipped through the rest. Nearly every page was devoted to this same woman—Andrea. Page after page, spanning years. The dates ran from 2016 all the way to a final sketch dated just two weeks ago.
It seemed Andrea and her companions hadn't found their way here. Whether they'd been caught by the local survivors or had already left Peachtree City for Atlanta, he had no way of knowing.
He closed the sketchbook, slid it back into the backpack, and zipped it shut. He left it by the escalator.
Bryan stepped outside. Nothing had changed—the sun was sinking lower, and a few fresh Infected corpses dotted the ground nearby, but nothing out of the ordinary.
He looked toward the signal tower—Peachtree City's tallest structure—and keyed his radio. "Norman. Come in."
"...kzzzt... Captain, I'm here."
"I've found some intelligence. Peachtree City has other survivors. See if you can spot any activity."
"Copy. Leave it to me."
That done, Bryan glanced back down the road. No sign of the convoy yet. He turned to head back inside and continue searching for usable supplies.
Then he stopped.
A prickling sensation crawled across the back of his neck—the unmistakable feeling of being watched. It came from his left, somewhere across the street.
Bryan's head snapped toward the opposite side of the road, eyes sharp and searching.
The street was empty. A breeze pushed loose debris across the pavement. The feeling vanished as quickly as it had appeared.
Before reading that note, he might have dismissed it as paranoia. Now? He took it very seriously.
He studied the street for several seconds, then casually turned away—feigning the look of someone who'd just shrugged off a false alarm—and walked into the shopping center.
The moment he was through the door and out of sight, he accelerated. He took the escalator at a sprint, making for the second floor.
He identified a shop facing the street where he'd felt the surveillance, slowed to a careful walk as he neared it, and slipped inside. He pressed his back against the wall beside the window, pulled binoculars from his pack, and began scanning for potential hiding spots.
The street was lined with low-rise buildings. On the right: a few restaurants, a pharmacy, a general store, and a heritage bank. On the left: a cemetery—the sign at the entrance read Westminster Memorial Gardens.
Beside the cemetery stood two imposing churches: Holy Trinity Catholic Church and Christ Presbyterian.
Bryan methodically swept his binoculars across every structure. Apart from a few Infected shambling about, he saw no trace of human presence.
Maybe I imagined it.
He lowered the binoculars, muttering to himself. He was about to give up and leave when a flash of reflected light caught his eye—a brief, sharp glint from inside a taller building within the cemetery grounds.
That froze him. He raised the binoculars again and found it—a figure. But the silhouette was small. A woman, or maybe a child.
The instant he locked on, the person inside seemed to sense something. The half-exposed figure jerked back into the building's interior, and then... nothing. No further movement.
Bryan stared at that building for a long time, brow furrowed. Whoever it was had sharp instincts. He was certain they hadn't spotted him—so what had spooked them?
He stowed the binoculars and rubbed his stubbled chin, thinking.
Based on what he now knew, Peachtree City harbored two groups. The first was a local community—original residents—who appeared to be hostile toward outsiders. Though he wasn't about to take the note's account at face value. He'd reserve judgment.
The second group were outsiders who'd entered Peachtree City, apparently trying to reach the Atlanta QZ. Whether they were still here was unclear—making them a tentative, unconfirmed variable.
In this world, Bryan never hesitated to assume the worst about people. The post-apocalyptic landscape ran on one law: survival of the fittest. He was sure that genuinely altruistic, unconditionally trusting people existed—he'd even met a few.
They tended to die fast.
If the person I just spotted is a local, and the locals are hostile to outsiders, and they already know we're here...
"Captain!"
Elton's voice crackled through the radio, interrupting his train of thought.
"Get up to the fourth floor. I found three bodies in a nail salon. Two of them are recent. And... ugh... God, it's disgusting up here. Just come see for yourself."
"On my way."
Bryan cast one more glance through the window, then left the shop.
Fourth floor.
The stench hit him on the stairway—thick and cloying, the kind that coated the back of your throat. Bryan waved a hand in front of his face and surveyed the floor. Elton stood at the entrance to a nail salon, one hand clamped over his nose and mouth, gesturing frantically for Bryan to come over.
"You look terrible. What's in there?"
As Bryan drew closer, he saw Elton's face had gone chalk-white. The younger soldier was patting his own chest repeatedly, clearly fighting the urge to be sick.
Elton waved him off. "I'm fine. Just... go look. They should be arriving soon—I'll head down to guide them in."
He said something else, seemed to remember whatever he'd seen in there, and bolted for the escalator without another word. Clearly, he didn't want to spend one more second on this floor.
Bryan watched him go, then turned to the nail salon. The interior was a mess—scattered furniture, overturned shelves, and footprints everywhere. Evidence of heavy Infected traffic, recently.
A door at the back had been pulled off its hinges—Elton's handiwork.
The room beyond was pitch dark. Bryan moved toward it as the smell intensified—blood and rot, layered so thickly that most people would have vomited on the spot.
He coughed twice, pressed his hand over his nose, and shone his flashlight inside.
Near the doorway: a barricade of furniture, dragged into position to block the entrance. Deeper in: two male corpses lying face-up, their clothes drenched in blood but clearly new clothing—recent deaths.
When Bryan noticed the blood on their faces and hands, his stomach lurched. He whipped the flashlight to the right, deeper into the room, and what the beam revealed stopped him dead.
He stood there, motionless, for a very long time.
...
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