-- The City in Turmoil --
Throughout the remainder of the late evening, after Celeste and Dominic had gotten Zane in bed and asleep for the night, the four younger adults sat around the living room. Celeste currently had position of the remote and was flipping through the channels stopping on a breaking new report.
"I'm standing live at Morse road, after a deadly four car accident occurred only minutes earlier. Witnesses report there were two cars, appeared to be street racing, when the driver of the Monte Carlo lost control and smashed head on against another vehicle, sending two in critical condition to..." Through the lens of the camera, anyone watching the news report at that time could see the road was still blocked off as paramedics and police worked to clean up the mess. Still it didn't catch Celeste's attention, and she was back to channel surfing again.
"... after several calls, Mayor Steven Reynolds as issued a state of emergency as the riots continue to grow out of hand. Immediate evacuation is required. If you are capable to leave the city it is ahhhhh..." the reporter screamed into the camera. "Johnnn! hhhhe..."
What the four of them saw next was horrifying and had nearly turned their stomachs. As the cameraman stood where he was, continuing to roll the live footage still frozen with fear. The reporter continued to scream and even called the cameraman's name a few more times, begging for help, as one of the infected --a nearly half naked, very dirty looking, female-- had bit in against the slightly older woman's neck. The blood slowly began to flow freely down the front and side of her shoulder, as the infected female pulled away leaving a large gaping hole in its place, the reporter tried to pull away from her attacker, though the infected lady wasn't having it. Dirty, bony fingers reached for her victim, grabbing a hold of the report's shirt and as she fell backwards along with the infected female, who landed on top of her, before biting once again and this time taking a large junk out of the reporters cheek and part of her nose.
The cameraman, now beginning to panic, swung the camera from side to side as more of the infected began to swarm the area. Finally he got his feet to move and began running, still carrying the camera with him until it became to much weight and was soon tumbling to the ground. Still, it was too late for the man the reporter had called John, as he was soon caught on camera as well, being overwhelmed by the infected, the camera continued to roll the footage even as John's screams and pleas fell on deaf ears. His screams were soon being gargled on as he began choking on his own blood as a horde of the infected fell upon him, ripping, tearing and biting at any part of the male. For Stacie it was like deja vu and what she had seen leaving the city only hours ago.
Unable to stomach much more, Celeste was soon handing the remote off to her brother and headed down the hallway to the room she and Dominic were sharing while they stayed. Wasn't too long after Celeste's departure that Stacie was doing the same thing, heading around the corner into her own shared room with Kaleb, leaving the two boys to watch the live action horror film alone. Kaleb was soon following both his sister and Stacie down the short hallway, turning the corner into the bedroom with Stacie. Unlike his sister however, his night wasn't complete, he still had things to attend to. After all here it was the middle of the night and he had yet to hear anything from Blake and that bothered him.
"Going somewhere?" Stacie asked curious, sitting on the bed as Kaleb came in and began going through the black and blue tackle box, pulling out both knifes, his mini mag-lite and the binoculars.
"Yeah. I haven't heard from Blake since we left the city and since he left me a tail, I'm going hunting." He replied as he strapped the all silver survival knife against his left thigh.
"I'm not letting you go alone. I'm coming with you!" Stacie blurted out sounding a little more forceful then she had meant to as Dominic was just rounding the corner.
"Who's not going where alone?" Dominic asked, now standing in the doorway of the bedroom. Dominic was the complete opposite of Kaleb. A little huskier in his build, by a good sixty pounds, he looked every bit of a solid two-hundred pounds. He kept, what would have been a blonde mop, buzzed short making it easier to manage, mainly cause there was no work involved with combing.
"It's easier if I go on my own." He said, more so directed toward Stacie, now strapping his boot knife around the outer calf of his right leg. "Blake left me a tail to follow and since I haven't heard anything from him since we all left the city, I'm going to go look for Blake and Tara." He replied once again, casting those hazel-browns toward Dominic.
"Well then. I know better then to try and talk you into waiting until morning, you know, when there's more light, so I agree with her. You aren't leaving out of here by yourself. Besides, we don't know exactly -what- is happening." Dominic quickly replied agreeing with Stacie.
Kaleb gave a bit of an annoyed sigh as he rolled his eyes. He really couldn't believe he was even going through this conversation, let alone with Dominic. Really? Dominic was worried about him having no light. "What -is- happening is pretty simple if you ask me. Hell ran out of room and so I'm stuck here." He finally remarked with a slightly twisted smirk before turning his attention back upon the tackle box in front of him. Sadly, Kaleb knew he was fighting a battle he wasn't going to win, neither of them were going to let him leave on his own and so rather then sit and waste time fighting, he simply gave in and pulled the two walkies from the tackle box and handed one to Stacie.
"Fine, but you're staying here." Kaleb said handing Stacie one of the two walkie-talkies and a charger. "I'll keep the other one on me, Dom will manage the CB from inside the truck." He finally said as he pulled the binoculars from the box and shut the lid. Standing back up, he grabbed his new crossbow, shoved the extra bolts into the Styrofoam quiver and slung the strap over his shoulders before turning and facing Dominic. "You ready?"
Was he ready? In all honesty, no. But still he would have rather been the one to go with Kaleb over Stacie. It wasn't that he doubted her skills in any way, but the truth of the matter was, he didn't know her nor her skills. So was he doubting them? Maybe a little. After all, they had just watched a live news report of two people being violently attacked and 'eaten' which was a little more disturbing then watching it made up by Hollywood. "Yeah, I'm ready. Are we taking the explorer or the ram?" Dominic finally asked as he stepped out of the way.
"You're driving! We're taking the truck. Besides I have a motorcycle to still get if we can get back into the city." Kaleb replied as he led the way through the house and out toward the breezeway.
Stacie was following closely behind the two of them as they headed through the living room, around the corner into the kitchen and finally passed through the backdoor into the breezeway. She stood inside the breezeway as they loaded into the silver Dodge Ram and after a moment, pulled out of the driveway and down the road. Once they were out of sight she pressed the button down on the side of the walkie-talkie and spoke into it, before heading back inside the house.
"Please be careful you two." Stacie's softer vocals had come over the speakers of both the CB within the truck, along with the walkie that was currently resting against Kaleb's hip.
Soon Dominic was pulling out of sight of the house and onto state route sixty-two. Dominic was still having mixed thoughts on heading back toward the city so soon after such a hostile news report, his 'what if' anxiety beginning to play at the back of his mind. Kaleb was one that learned from the internet, much like he did, Kaleb just seemed to study different topics off the world-wide web. Dominic was finally giving a quick glance toward Kaleb who had pulled the map, that Blake had given him earlier, out of his pocket and was reading over the directions that were drawn out on it, noticing the way his lips were beginning to curl into a smile. "What?"
"Blake's tail. It's nearly all back roads after you get off state route 33 near Canal Winchester." Kaleb replied as he refolded the map.
Again, Kaleb had managed to find another way to make this a very unpleasant trip. Still Dominic had to do his best to keep his thoughts positive. "So ... how are we doing this? Are we following their point from I-270 and 33 east? Or are we staying near the outskirts and catching their path a little later on?"
"We're picking their trail up at I-270 and 33 east. I'm pretty sure I can say they got away from the main part of the city, but I can't say how far out however and so we're picking up their trail as close to the beginning as possible." Kaleb replied again as he shoved his hand into his pocket and pulling out his cigarettes and lighter. Pulling two from the pack, he lit them both before handing one off to Dominic and finally rolling down his window.
Dominic might not have liked the idea of heading so close into the city, but he knew it as the smartest decision. Taking the cigarette from Kaleb once it was offered over to him, he was soon rolling his own window down, letting the smoke at least have somewhere to go. The drive was pretty smooth sailing as they continued through Johnstown and even along the 161 highway, but as they merged onto the I-270 outer-belt, things became much different. Noticing, almost immediately, that many of the exits leading into the inner city had been blocked off with barricades. As they continued driving down 270, they heard the sound of jet engines and as the two of them looked a little further off in the distance, they soon saw the three jets flying toward -- what they could only assume -- downtown and began dropping napalm bombs on the city.
"Guess my bike will have to wait a little longer." Kaleb said jokingly as he flipped the ash of the cigarette out the window.
Dominic couldn't help but allow a smirk to form over his lips. 'Leave it to Kaleb to find something to laugh about.' He thought to himself as he continued down I-270, finally reaching the exit for US 33 east. The two of them continued driving down highway 33, coming across a 15 mile stretch of construction. At first things appeared to be pretty normal, that was until they slowly crept along the construction and zone and saw a black Mitsubishi Galant planted nose first against the steel guard off to their left, looking as though they were getting ready to take the Diley Rd exit. With no sort of traffic on their tail -- or anywhere else for that matter -- Dom was pulling the full size pickup off to the side, allowing Kaleb to climb from his seat.
