All of us were resting by the sleeping quarter, with Raisa messing around with one of the TV as she huffed, finding nothing but only white noises after pressing the remote many times. “There’s no channels at all!”

“Sis, all television cable got cut off.” I replied to her curiosity.

“They all are??” Yep, still a good girl at heart alright.

Luh De came with a plate of drinks filled with medicine and snacks to get us ready for the day, placing it in the middle of the sleeping bags for us to take. “Sattvam and Wisnu haven’t returned yet now for awhile. It’s kinda worrying now…”

“They’ll be fine, I’m sure. Maybe the intercom got stuck or something, so they need some time to get it running again.” Martha took a sip of the drink, as he squinted his face hard enough it looked like salts just seeped down to the core of his tongue.

Luh De can only sighed, looking down to her cup before taking a sip of it to relieve herself. “You better be right, Mar.”

For a moment, it’s quiet, uncanny, but it’s better than the loud screeches of those things tearing my ear down. Something came over me as I stood up from my place and take my bag along. “Hey, Mar, I’m going to go out for a little walk, you mind?” He simply shook his head, trying to take a sip of the drink before accidentally spatting tiny bit of it to his own sleeping bag.

“I’m going with you brother!” Raisa ran up to me, already carrying all of her bag like a prepared camper going out for a hike up to the mountain.

“I appreciate your spirit sis, but it’s too dangerous. Beside, I’m probably not going far anyway.” She pouted her face, giving me that ‘please’ look with the extra beady, sparkled eyes that I cannot say no to. This is such a hard decision but I then looked over to see Martha and Luh De nodding onto me, I can tell they don’t wanna deal with my sister’s shenanigans so I take a deep breath… “Alriiight, you can come with me.” Raisa just went giddy, about to ran first as I stopped her on her tracks.

“But, do not stray far from me, got it?” I had to say it sternly so that she know this is a serious matter. She nodded in response, still full of bright smile.

“Take care you two, careful around the rubbles!” Luh De said as she waved us a goodbye, with us waving back at her.

“Don’t get killed!” Martha followed, as he got a firm punch on the face from Luh. Never get too ahead of yourself about getting away with it, Mar.

We both then ascended the stairs, going through the hallway that grows dusty and infested with spiders by every second of it. The lobby remained as messy as ever, with dried blood and corpses from last night fight. I stared at those for awhile before continuing our walk outside.

The places near Northern District are oddly still intact, with only few buildings fell apart from the first eruption of chaos. Some of the places have these hanging strings or…wires? They dangle from one building to another, filled with many shiny trinkets and empty cans that ringed whenever the wind blew onto them. I keep looking around the place, admiring the view while following Raisa who seems to enjoy the stroll as she slid from pile of rubbles and peeked through many of the old market’s windows, taking what’s left from there.

It was when we ran to one of those strings again I felt something odd. They only stretch to certain part of the street, particularly one that are clear from ruins. My curiosity got the best of me, so I had to go a little further than planned, stopping by a wide open road with buildings left and right. I then placed Raisa behind me, seemingly concerned from my sudden behavior, pulling out my rifle just for safety. “…If anyone is in there, come out. We won’t hurt you.”

Stupid? Maybe. Worth a shot? Definitely not, but I’m betting on my life that I’m right.

Out of the walls, a girl at the same age as I am walked out, guns at her hand, seemingly all on her own. I lowered my rifle, putting it away to my bag as the stranger looked at me with an intimidating look. “You aren’t one of the infected aren’t you?” She asked aloud from afar, keeping quiet a distance from us

“Does those bastard know how to talk?” Seemingly convinced by my word, she walked up to me, taking a closer look and pinched my cheek hard, as I rubbed off the stinging pain away after. God, what’s with people and me these days, I’m not a punching bag you can just take on.

“Hmm….well, if you are looking for a place to stay, then you come just to the right spot!” Before I can answer or ask about her, she quickly dragged me to one of the building, with Raisa following behind as we are presented with blank, empty darkness of a room.

Suddenly, a lever were pulled and the building began to light up, showing many papers sticked to the walls and floors covered in graffiti. I was in awe of the view, mesmerized even I dare say. “You made all of this yourself?” The girl nodded, sitting by a sofa with soda can at hand as she took a sip.

“All the shit ton of trashes here were recyclable enough for to make a good schoolboard! Research, research, something something like that if you get what I mean.” She burped at the end of her sentence, throwing the can away to a whole pile of it sitting by the corner.

We took a closer look to the paperboard, filled with many drawings and scribbles of those things. Mimicry of voice, bending the flesh of it’s victim, and…just a huge, cancerous lump? Oddly enough, most of these were accurate to the one we’ve been encountered so far, but the lump are rather worrying from how it takes almost half of the board.

“Heey, they look just like the one back at home!” The girl jolted from Raisa’s excitement, as she ran up to my sister and looked down at her, holding her shoulder firmly with a bright face.

“You guys came from another shelter too??” Raisa nodded as the two jumped up and down in excitement while spinning, giggling as she let go of Raisa.

“Hah, I don’t know why I just giggled with her, but it’s funny nonetheless!” Raisa, you’re as ticklish as a mouse can get.

“Another? There’s more than ours in here?” I sat next to the girl, who took another of the soda can and took a sip of it.

“Eh, not really. Around here, most of the shelter already got eaten up by those fuckers down to bone or even outright turned them to another.” She stopped for a moment, putting her soda can away as she looked at me with a rather irritated look. “…Can you imagine, having to kill your own sibling in the very first place?” I was stunned from such sudden question, rubbing the back of my neck as she huffed from my look.

“S-sorry for your loss then, er…” She really hadn’t told me any of her name, I can’t just call her girl or some shit like that-

Her face lighten up just a bit, giving me a handshake. “Elissa. And you are Made and Raisa, yeah? Just read this lil silly diary your sis had been writing.” She showed me the diary that should have been inside my sister bag as she then quickly take it back from Elissa’s hand, pouting.

“Not funny!” Raisa walked off while putting the diary back to her bag, still looking at the drawings closer as she seems interested to it.

“Eli, we’re just looking around for maybe ammo, do you by any chance know anywhere to find some?” Her face brighten as she smashed her soda can to the floor, startling us both as she picked up one of the dangling light string and swung herself to a dusty closet.

“Look no further then fellas, lo and behold, heaven itself~” Eli slid open the closet, but got stuck midway as she forcefully pushed it open, chipping some of it’s already broken wood door surface down. It’s filled with ton of ammo box and some spare guns to use. Both of us can’t help but put on a wide smiling face, with Eli having that smug look of a kid who showed their bag of candy during Halloween.

“But how did you…?” I began picking up some of the ammo box, curios of how she can procure this many of a rare item.

“Heh, those stupid military cargos been wasting their tools of trade, so I say fuck it and put these sweet baby to a good use.” She picked up one of the rifles, while Raisa got handed a rather heavy looking handheld railgun. Seriously? They actually have those things? And I thought Area 51 was the spiciest news of the ages…

We began gathering as much as we can bring along, with Raisa still giggling while looking at her new toy. “I think I’m gonna name them...Betsy!” She hugged it like it’s her doll as we looked back at Eli, smiling.

“Thank you for your help, but I’m afraid we can’t stay for much longer. We have to go back home and-” Elissa shushed me, chuckling before slowly backing away with a deep exhale.

“Buddy, I’m happy enough to see another friendly face like you two around, and I’ll be damned if I’m not going to a new, fresh good looking place.” She then hold both of our shoulders, smiling as she take her duffel bag up and looked at us as Raisa squished her face in excitement.

“A new party membeeer!!” We both laughed at Raisa’s excitement, as Eli turned off the building’s light, with each one of the bulb slowly out until one remained. She take a good look to her place one last time, much like us with our first shelter before we take our leave, going back home as the afternoon shone it’s hot weather down.

…..

Wisnu and I ventured deeper through the hallway, and for the record we are not enjoying on how cold this place get as we goes further, with these pipes steam being the only thing that has been keeping us warm throughout the entire run. The end of the hallway lead us to a spiral staircase, filled with what appears to be…flesh substances, sticking onto the railing as I felt my stomach turn from seeing it. We descended down, remaining ready with our spear and guns at hand as our flashlight lead the way.

“Sattvam, what do you think we’ll find down here tho?” I only shooked my head in uncertainty, hoping it’s just a huge engine room of this entire place.

“We’re here to merely look what’s in here, and then bail the hell out of here.” Wisnu nodded to my answer, his hand slightly shivering as I held him close, just a way to tell him it’ll be alright. “I’ll cover you, don’t worry.”

We both reached the depth of this place and find a huge room filled with broken glass tubes, with some that are intact frozen and labelled with a withered ‘Out of commission’ paper over it. “Tvam, over here.” Wisnu seems to find something interesting in here, as I walked over to see it for myself.

It’s a blueprint sticked to the wall, showing what seems to be a construct made out of corpses sewn altogether. “Project End: Plagues…wait, these creatures. It’s the same one that first started the outbreak.” I took further look onto these blueprints, examining every details that’ll help.

“Are there anything about how to grow immunity to it’s effect?” Wisnu took a peek too, resting his chin onto my shoulder.

“These log paper say they tried to make vaccine firsthand but the effect were too potent to be counteracted, so they have to let the disease spread it’s small bits through the water stream and hoped an animal would, uh… ‘rose to godhood’?” I swear the staff here are more of a madman than my chemistry teacher at eight grade, what the hell are these nonsense of a word??

“…The deer. They infected the other animals to see if they were fully immune to it. The white deer’s the only one capable of so, and if the military took it away-” All the pieces finally clicked together now as we looked at each other.

“We all lose.”