A small group of people walked by the cold dead street. Bodies barely recognizable covered the field. The bodies still intact were turned into zombies. Those still left were so battered that even t-virus couldn’t reanimate them.

The combined forces of STARS, police, mercenaries, and Umbrella carefully navigated their way. Men and women with guns formed a circle and protected the civilians within. Their gazes were alert. Their weapon’s safeties were off.

“How much longer?” Carl whispered as he walked.

“At this pace, less than ten minutes.” Kaplan checked the map again.

Suddenly, a wave of noise appeared from the second half of the group. The advancement came to a sudden halt. Soldiers and civilians alike turned around in confusion.

“Stay here.” Carl told Rain and Alice before turning and walking to the back. Jean followed him. The soldiers from the first half of the group scanned the surrounding with weapons raised.

At the back, the mother and daughter Carl just saw were at the center of the heat. The mother was on the ground, coughing. Her daughter knelt beside her, tears on her cheek. A ring of soldiers pointed their weapons at the woman on the ground.

They were way too aware of what was happening. That same thing has happened countless times in front of them and have turned countless innocent into mindless beasts.

The woman must have been bitten before, and now she was turning into a zombie.

Carl immediately grabbed onto the girl and ripped her away from her infected mother. This was brutal, but it was better than risking the daughter being bit by her own mother. The girl cried and screamed and kicked, but Carl held a straight face. Passing the girl to Jean, Carl knelt down beside the woman. His pistol was in his grip and pointing at the woman.

He knew Alice’s blood could counter the infection, but for some reason, it only worked on him and Jean. He had tried giving the same treatment to other infected, but they always ended up dying and turning. He decided that was because voyagers were special. Alice didn’t have enough blood to give every single wounded person a dose of blood. Carl had no idea what to do with the infected woman.

The woman knew her fate. She has seen her own husband go through the same process, and she knew she was going to die. The only thing she couldn’t lay down was her daughter. She was so young. She was so innocent. There was no way she could live through this hell.

Her gaze rested on the man standing above her.

“Please...save her…” She begged, still coughing.

Carl silently nodded. A look of relief appeared in the woman’s eyes. She closed her eyes and finished her last breath. Carl remained in his position for a second, knowing what would come.

That was when the mother growled and stood up. Jean didn’t cover the girl’s eyes as Carl put a bullet in her mother’s face.

The entire group, now one woman less, continued to move.

Carl held his fist up and halted the group’s movement. Jean, Alice, and Kaplan gathered around him.

Carlos and Valentine walked up after realizing the team stopped. “Why are we stopping.” Valentine asked with a slight urgency. Every second wasted would be more people lost to the infected.

“Something’s wrong.” Carl explained, glancing through the houses on both sides. They were on a street. Something was screaming trouble, but he just couldn’t come to grip what that was.

Alice’s mind turned faster than ever. Suddenly, she realized what the problem was.

“Where are the undead?” Ever since the group was on the move they have been continuously harassed by random zombies jumping out from all directions, whether it was from the streets, from the houses, or from the roofs. Of course, they were easily spotted and gunned down, but for the last minute, there wasn’t a single zombie from any direction. “Where are the undead?” She repeated.

Normally not having any stinking zombie was a good thing, but this was not normal. There should be zombies here, and the fact that they weren’t jumping out into the open meant they were already dealt with. The question was by who.

In one of the houses, a man in black battle suit frowned as the team they were sent to ambush came to a sudden stop. It was as if they realized something was wrong. Then again, even if they realized it was a trap, it was too late. Their entire force was already in the trap. He turned to a fellow soldier and nodded.

Behind them, two headless zombies laid lifelessly on the ground.

On the street, four metal orbs suddenly fell down from above and landed among the group. Carl subconsciously caught one of the orbs like catching a tin of coke…

...and realized it was a grenade with its safety clip off.

Carl didn’t even bother going through his mind as he threw the grenade into the air and leaped back, covering his head with his arms to minimize the damage done.

“Grenade!” His desperate warning was instantly overpowered by the loud explosion of the four grenades. Carl felt himself being tossed back and crashing into the ground. A burning pain was inside his body, hinting some internal damage. His ears buzzed, rendering him temporarily deaf. Something salty was in his mouth.

Blood.

“Incoming!” Carlos screamed, but whoever the attackers were they were planned. Following the four grenades, dozens of gun barrels poked out of the multiple houses on the two sides and started spitting fire. Glass was shattered. Building walls were penetrated. Men were killed.

The combined force fought back. Bullets were exchanged and there were losses on both sides, but the first four grenades landed in the center mass. The four explosions killed over ten men and wounded twice that number. More importantly, it created chaos. Civilians started to scream and run around blindly, and the only thing they accomplished was mess up the defensive formation of their protectors. That didn’t save their lives either as they were gunned down mercilessly by the attackers. Armed soldiers fired back, but they have lost the upper hand. Sometimes in battle, the upper hand was everything.

Carl groaned on his back and turned around before seeing a bloody face. It was captain Hansen. Just like Carl, a grenade landed just beside him. Unlike Carl, he wasn’t lucky enough to have the time to throw the grenade away. The explosion happened in his face and killed the experienced soldier instantly.

Carl couldn’t understand who would want to do such a thing. They were merely protecting civilians and guiding them to safety. Why would someone want to ambush and massacre them?

His recovered hearing and the loud gunshots all around him told Carl this was no place to think. Crouching behind an abandoned vehicle and taking out a SMG from his watch, he pointed the weapon at a window of the second floor of a house. A gun barallel was poking out of the window. The attacker had no idea he was being spotted.

The muzzle jumped, and a man in black suit collapsed out of the window and fell onto the street. His Umbrella symbol showed who his loyalty belonged to.

Not having time to wonder why Umbrella wanted them dead, Carl continued to ravage through the attackers. He took down several man, but the strength of one man couldn’t change the tide of battle. All around him police and soldiers were dying. Civilians were pretty much gone. Automatic weapons of the Umbrella attackers, with the advantage of the high ground, tore their way through kevlar vests and human flesh. The ground was covered by blood. It was a massacre.

Jill rolled beside Carl. “We need to fall back! We’re pinned down here!” If the soldiers could pull back, then they might live through this. Even if the attackers came after them they could still fight back with a lesser disadvantage.

Carl agreed as he put down another attacker. “Retreat! Fall back!” The few survivors that heard her turned and retreated orderly. Carl, Jill, Carlos, and Alice poked their head out of their cover and opened fire.

An Umbrella soldier popped out of a window with a rocket launcher in his arm. He aimed at the defenders with a bloodthirsty grin, but the next second a hole appeared in his forehead. Carl pulled the trigger.

The man fell out of the window and was reduced to a bag of flesh. However, as he fell, his finger was still on the trigger of his weapon. At the same time as he made contact with the ground, he unintentionally pulled the trigger.

A projectile, followed by a trail of smoke, smashed into a house from beside. The flame consumed four Umbrella soldiers within the house and provided sufficient cover.

When the smoke cleared, Carl and his team were nowhere to be seen.

“Sir, should we go after them?” A soldier asked.

“No,” The captain denied as his eyes landed on a captured girl. “we have got what we came for.”

Running past two more streets, Carl finally had a chance to count the losses. That was when he realized…

“Where’s Jean?”