Dead Man Walking: Living By Day, Dead By Night

*Bang*

The gunshot echoed in the air, but only after a head exploded, which belonged to one of the heavy machine gunners that was mounted in the back of the various pickup trucks used by the marauders.

Before the group of armed bandits even had time to react, another crackle of gunfire echoed across the school grounds, and the next heavy machine gunner fell over dead with a gunshot wound to the head, just like his companion before him.

It became abundantly clear to these men that they were under attack, but Zane was several hundred meters away from them, and perched atop the railing of the school rooftop, using it as a stop against his mag well to help stabilize his rifle.

*Bang*

*Bang*

*Bang*

The weapon was clearly on the semi-automatic setting as Zane fired at the group of armed men who fell to the ground, wounded or dead, with each pull of the trigger. With their two heavy machine gunners dead, the men could not lay down suppressive fire, nor did they even know where they were being shot from.

*Bang*

*Bang*

*Bang*

The shots were fired, and before the men even knew how to react, they were lying dead on the ground. Zane ceased his fire after all the men appeared through his optic to be either dead or wounded. And thus he quickly descended from the rooftop in an attempt to scavenge the weapons.

The moment Zane locked the door behind him, he scaled down the multiple stories of the school building and out its exit. Where he covertly made his way to the parking lot where the marauders lie in wait for him.

Zane shifted between cover, making sure the enemy could not fire at him, assuming they were still able to do so. And before he knew it, he was in the parking lot, looking at the men. Some of them were still breathing, lying on the ground, or behind cover, trying to bandage their wounds, or apply tourniquets to their limbs.

Upon seeing this, Zane switched to automatic fire and unleashed a burst on the wounded men, who were no more than twenty-five meters away from him. They did not know where Zane had come from, and were quickly filled with bullet holes before they could even reach for their weapons.

Once Zane had confirmed that all the men were dead, he began to strip them of their gear. Whether it was their rucksacks, their weapons, their load bearing equipment, anything that was remotely usable, Zane scavenged, making several loads back to the base as he did so.

Zane even scavenged the heavy machine guns, taking them down from their makeshift tripods, sitting in the bed of the pickup trucks, and bringing them into the second building where his camp was established.

By his count, Zane had scored some serious loot. Several M4 carbines, an m249 light machine gun, and two m2 heavy machine guns, along with enough ammo to supply a small fireteam worth of men. But he did not have time to celebrate as Elena and Olivia came running over to Zane, along with five other members of his group.

There was panic on their faces as they informed Zane about what had happened while they were away.

"Zane! It's bad… The other twenty survivors are all infected! From the looks of the system, they only have a short while before they turn. What do we do?"

Zane swapped out the magazine in his rifle for a fresh one and ensured a round was chambered before walking past Elena and the other survivors who were now awakened like himself. There was a callous expression on his face as he told the other exactly what he was going to do.

"There's only one thing we can do… Don't worry, I'll take care of it…"

Everyone felt a bit uneasy, knowing that Zane was about to go kill the infected. But nobody made a move to stop him. After all, they knew it needed to be done. The last thing they needed was for these people to turn into a horde of undead beneath their very noses, or worse, while they slept.

When the gunshots erupted from upstairs where the affected were, everybody flinched, and finally after the twentieth shot there was dead silence. Over the course of the next hour, Zane would drag the bodies to the top of the roof, while everyone else grieved for the loss of their fellow survivors, classmates, and teachers.

---

When Zane dragged the twentieth body to the top of the roof, he was surprised to see a familiar face waiting for him. The Stalker was already snacking on the corpses that Zane had already disposed of. This was a curious sight to Zane as they were infected corpses, but he supposed since they were still living when they died, that was all that mattered to the stalker.

Zane sat by, with his trigger finger on standby as he watched the Stalker devour the corpses one by one. Not a hint of disgust was on Zane's cold face as he watched and waited for the Stalker to finish its meal. And finally, after only bones remained, the Stalker stood up and approached Zane, where it handed him another pouch full of blood crystals.

Zane already had the large blue blood crystal which he was waiting to consume, but now he had another pouch full of the small red blood crystals given to him by the higher rank undead. Before Zane could react to this transaction, the creature suddenly vanished into thin air, as it was prone to do. Leaving Zane with nothing but his thoughts.

The deaths of those who failed to awaken were not entirely without benefit. As Zane clearly found out by the Stalker, which was paying him for corpses… It was a curious endeavor, and one that Zane did not fully understand. Why exactly was the Stalker trading with him, and what exactly did it think he was?