When a deadly plague spreads like wildfire, 17-year-old Bren Watts is trapped at Ground Zero of a global pandemic.
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Bren and his classmates are stranded in New York City, now filled with thousands of murderous infected and desperate survivors. F...
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DAY 24: May 2nd, Sunday
Three weeks since Ground Zero
"I feel naked," I said to Logan. I fiddled with my black raincoat and baseball cap, trying to keep the rain out of my face. Days without rain, and it chose this day to pour like cats and dogs. Dark thick clouds hung overhead, and it seemed the downpour wouldn't stop until the next day.
"Is that a good thing?" Logan asked, walking ahead of me. A blue Honda drove by a large puddle, almost splashing the entire sidewalk we were on.
"You know, this," I said, gesturing at my body. I had no armor on; all my weapons were missing except for the pistol and a couple of extra ammunitions snug in my shoulder holster. "I've been running around with all that gear, so it felt odd not wearing one."
"Well, we are going to a coffee shop. Kind of hard to blend in if we're packing."
I looked down at my clothes. I traded my combat uniform for a black poncho raincoat, a baseball cap, slim blue chinos, a gray pullover hoodie jacket, and Timberland waterproof dark boots.
"10:15 was it?" I asked.
"Yeah, that's what Tessa said." Logan checked his watch. "We're ten minutes early. We got time."
"This better be good. I hate walking around without an ID. We should have stolen one."
"And bring attention to ourselves? Yeah, right. Just act cool," Logan said, patting me on the shoulder.
"Just act cool," I repeated.
It had been a week since we were inside the walls, the place where we stayed was an abandoned construction site, and aside from the occasional homeless person, no one had bothered to look. Though, the next day, we realized we were trapped in Pine Hills. Payne's red ID was only carried by active-duty soldiers, taking them from one neighborhood to another through heavily guarded checkpoints and gates. The civilians had either a yellow or green ID card (yellow for non-essentials and green for essentials). We had no way of getting ourselves downtown to look for Major Clemons unless we pretended to be soldiers again, which was dangerous given that we were now wanted criminals. We could steal one, and believe me, we've tried. No success.
We were forced to wait, sleeping in a freezing building with no heater, having to shower and clean ourselves in public bathrooms in the few open businesses around downtown (and made it so that they're not too suspicious of us). We also had to be careful when we light a fire to cook our meals, though we managed to hide the humvees and the bus by putting a massive tarp over them.
We did have another person inside that could go through the gates without suspicion: Tessa.
We turned left at a corner. Even with the pouring rain, there were a lot of people walking around the streets. Some went into the grocery store. Others continued to stroll and window shop even though half of the items were already gone. People pretended that the outbreak hadn't happened inside the walls, continuing with their jobs (those that were left open), mowing their lawn, going to school (albeit only half-days), and having BBQs. Still, the sight of a squad of patrolling soldiers, or a tank rolling through, reminded them of reality. You also couldn't miss the walls surrounding every neighborhood or the checkpoints. We've learned to avoid the latter.
