Chapter 26 - Reach for the Sky!

Current Location: Ponderous Peat

Brent woke up alive and uneaten to the sound of birds chirping. He got up from the hardwood floor of the tree hollow, looking around. Everyone else was already awake.

Reisa was still lying down in a relaxed position. Her eyes met his, giving no indication as to whether she knew the full extent of his activities last night.

“Ugh,” Karisma groaned, gathering up her blanket as she sat up, “I feel so gross. Like, the first thing I’m gonna do when we get back home is take a shower. Or better yet, a bubble bath.”

Ray was doing some stretches. “You want a bath, there’s plenty of water outside to take a dip in.”

Karisma rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean.”

Brent noticed someone was missing. “Where’s Harry?”

“Oh, I saw him go into the outhouse earlier,” Ray remarked, “That was a while ago, actually. Dunno why he hasn’t come back yet.”

“I’ll go check on him.” Leaving the hollow, Brent found the swamp looked a little friendlier in the daytime.

He was still a little wary so he didn’t get too close to the outhouse, standing some distance away and calling out.

“Harry? Are you in there? Is everything alright?”

The outhouse door opened and Harry walked out, looking a bit dejected. “Aw, how’d you know I was there?”

“Uh, Ray told me? What are you doing there anyway?”

“Well, I got up to use the john, as you do, and noticed everyone else was still asleep. So I thought, hey, maybe I could surprise you by re-enacting that scene. You know, the opening scene in Shrek?”

Brent was silent for a moment.

Harry waved a hand. “Eh, it was a stupid idea. Let’s get back to the others.”

They made it back just in time for another announcement.

Beep boop beep beep boooop. Everyone looked up. The sound was loud, and came from directly above their heads, implying the existence of a mounted speaker there, hidden in the crown of the massive stump.

“Attention all remaining survivors in the region! The Zombie Apocalypse event is now over, and rewards will now be distributed to all living participants. Congratulations to: Raymond Nguyen -for most portals destroyed and: Brent Davies- for most zombies killed.”

Hm.

The voice was congratulating him, but it still felt very strange to hear his full name called out in this context, especially on a loudspeaker like he was at a school assembly.

It was also surprising that he had the most zombies killed, as he thought Harry had gotten more with all his machine gun spraying.

The Zombies Killed counter disappeared, and another notification took its place.

Event ended!

Total Reward: 40 x $100 = $4000 + special prize for most zombies killed.

You will receive your reward shortly.

Ah, more cash. Brent wanted to say he was thrilled, but if it was like the last drop and came in one dollar bills he’d have trouble carrying it around. He wondered what this “special prize” was.

“Wow. I only destroyed one portal, and that’s the highest?” Ray said.

“I guess nobody else wanted to fight through a horde of zombies to do that. And you only got the last hit. We softened it up for you,” Brent added.

Ray shrugged. “Well, I got a bunch of cash from killing the zombies too, and a ‘special prize’ from destroying the portal. I’m guessing that’s coming by drone too?”

“Probably, yeah.”

“Oh, I got some cash too!” Karisma piped up.

It turned out there was a little something for everyone, even Reisa who had barely done any fighting. If the others were getting even close to the same amount as Brent, they were about to come into a small fortune in cash. They had to be on the lookout for another one of those buy stations.

The five of them finished packing up and getting their things in order.

Weapon .357 Magnum (5/6)

.375 Revolver (6/6)

Weapon M870 Shotgun (0/5) M870 Shotgun (1/5)

M870 Shotgun (2/5)

M870 Shotgun (3/5)

M870 Shotgun (4/5)

M870 Shotgun (5/5)

From looking at the Map Brent saw rectangular shapes jutting out on the southeast edge of the revealed area, so they started going in that direction.

The thick forestry continued, though the terrain began to slope uphill gradually. This brought them above the water level and onto ground that was still muddy, but drier, to Brent’s relief.

They came to a high point of sorts, pausing to look around. The treetops still obscured layout of the surrounding terrain, but in the distance Brent spotted the top of a wooden roof that roughly corresponded to where he’d seen the shapes on the Map.

That was not to say there wasn’t plenty to see above the treetops as well. A flock of birds took flight to the left of the wooden roof. Brent couldn’t make out the details, but they had a lighter plumage.

“Hey, I think I see something in the air over there!” Karisma pointed to the side. “Are those drones?”

He looked in that direction and there were indeed multiple drones, of the same quad-copter model as before. He counted five, and all were headed their way.

“Oh yeah, those must be carrying our rewards,” Brent confirmed. One for each of them.

“Cool, I haven’t gotten one of those before.” Karisma said.

Since there weren’t any other pressing concerns, they decided to just sit down and wait for the drones to reach them. It was funny seeing all of the drones approach them together, almost in formation.

Brent stepped forward, trying to see which one contained his prize. The cases hanging from the drones all looked to be the same size, and the same model.

Hm. If there wasn’t enough room in his backpack to fit all the stuff, maybe he could just carry the case itself around. That might be an inconvenience as it would take up a free hand, but again, he hoped they would find a buy station before too long to spend some of that cash.

The machines did have some way of identifying their recipient though, as when the small fleet of drones reached the top of the hill one of them stopped in front of Brent while the others continued past him.

The drone slowly descended, and Brent held out his arms to grab the case before it fell on the ground.

But then he heard something. Almost drowned out by the constant buzzing of all the drone rotors was the sound of footsteps.

Uh oh. He looked down to see someone burst out of the tree cover below.

It was the blonde woman with the cowboy hat that had nearly killed him earlier.

“Aha!” she cried, her eyes lighting up as she saw Brent and the drone. She raised her submachine gun, pointing it right at him. “Reach for the sky!”

“Guh-” Brent froze in panic. The nearest tree was more than a few steps away. He was completely exposed!

The woman’s words turned out to be just a formality, as she opened fire anyway.

Ratatatata! Brent dove to the ground as a hail of bullets came his way.

Health 54/100

He’d only taken one hit, a chip off the left shoulder. He should have remembered to heal back up to full beforehand. But in the heat of the moment, it didn’t seem to hurt that much, and he felt more angry than scared.

“Shit, it’s one of the psychos!” Ray shouted, “Return fire!”

Click. It was at this particular moment that the drone decided to drop Brent’s case.

The case hit the ground, and tumbled downhill until it hit the base of a tree near the woman. She stopped firing, looked at it, then snatched it up.

No!

Bang! BLAM! Ray and Harry had stepped up beside Brent and started firing down on the woman with their pistols.

“Augh!” The woman winced as she was struck multiple times and ducked behind the tree. “What in tarnation?!”

Hah! She hadn’t expected them to fight back, or that they were working together.

Brent scrambled to his feet, arming himself and aiming at the tree.

Weapon M870 Shotgun (5/5)

Harry kept shooting, blasting bits and splinters out of the tree. The woman peeked her head out for a brief moment, before she turned tail and ran back into the woods.

“She’s got my case!” Brent shouted. He had been so close to claiming it, too.

BOOM! He fired a shot at her retreating form, but none of the pellets seemed to hit.

Damn it, she wasn’t going to get away with this! They had the numbers advantage.

Brent rushed down the hill after her.

“Wait! Brent!”

He ignored Karisma’s cries. The woman looked badly wounded. If he could get close enough, his next shot could down her or make her drop the case.

If he could take the shot. Almost like it was just to inconvenience him, the swamp was extremely dense in the direction the woman had run in. The trees grew tall and wide, their canopies blocking the sunlight and their trunks his line of sight as the woman kept flitting between them.

Splish, splash. The return of the shallow water level and wetlands shrubbery underfoot impeded his pursuit, and made him think twice.

Yeah, this was kind of stupid. Maybe he could try bargaining?

“Drop the case and we’ll leave you alone!” he shouted.

He heard no answer save her rapid footsteps, growing fainter by the second.

Yeah, that was only to be expected.

Through the gaps between drooping willows Brent could glean that there was a brighter clearing up ahead. If he could reach the edge he might have a better shot.

“STOP RIGHT THERE.” A commanding male voice echoed through the swamp. “Don’t move.”

Brent stopped, until he realized it wasn’t referring to him.

“Drop the gun.” The voice did not have a Scottish accent. It did not sound like Shrek at all. It did, however, sound rather menacing, and Brent could almost hear the sneer the owner most certainly wore.

Splash. Something dropped into the shallow water.

“Hm, you look quite lovely,” the man continued, “A fine addition to my collection. What’s your name?”

There was a brief half-choking sound before the woman answered. “Connie Hatrack.”

“Great. You can call me Adrian Donis, or ‘Master’ if that’s too long.”

Wait, it was the glasses guy! Brent peered through the gaps in the foliage, trying to see who was there. He glimpsed several people but could only see their legs, one of which was in black suit pants- when he felt a hand on the shoulder.

He whirled around to see Reisa, a finger to her lips. She beckoned for him to follow, and they took cover behind a particularly gnarled tree.

“That’s him, right?” Brent whispered.

Reisa nodded. “It’s too risky to look at him. If you make eye contact, you’ll be under his control.”

“Then what-”

“Wait. Listen.”

Brent focused on their voices. The woman- Connie was speaking now.

“There were three of them. They’re working together.”

Ah, she hadn’t seen Reisa or Karisma, so they didn’t know there were actually five of them.

“Three? That might be a problem. And you said they were chasing you? No, don’t answer.” The man cleared his throat and called out. “Hello, people out there?”

A chill went down Brent’s spine.

“I know you’re still nearby. Why don’t you come over? The girl you’re looking for is right here.”

Reisa shook her head frantically. Yeah, no, that was an obvious bait to get shot or mind controlled. Brent wasn’t going to fall for that.

Adrian continued. “She’s got your- what is it? -yes, your supply drop case. Hm. Why don’t we see what’s in there. Open it up, Connie.”

Okay, it was a little tempting now.

He heard a soft chuckle, presumably from seeing the contents of the case.

“Oooh, that’s a lot of cash. Are you sure you don’t want any out there? I’ll just keep it for myself if so.”

Brent tightened the grip on his shotgun, but didn’t move a muscle.

Adrian next spoke in a softer voice, one that wasn’t meant to be heard by them.

“Ah… power, beautiful women, and now money, all delivered to me on a silver platter. This place is like a dream come true.”

There was a brief pause before he spoke again.

“Looks like they’re not coming. Alright. You three, step up. Spread out. You’ll go that way, you that way, and you… over there.”

There was probably a lot of pointing going on that Brent couldn’t see.

“Kill anyone you find. Don’t come back until you’ve killed at least one person or you run into the Halo. Everyone else, with me. Understood?“

“Yes, master!” a chorus of female voices answered.

Brent’s heart sank. How many people did the man have under his control?

There was no more talking after that, only the splashing of feet through the swamp. One set of footsteps seemed to be coming their way.

“We need to leave,” Reisa whispered. Brent couldn’t agree more.

The two slowly crept back the way they came, taking care not to make too much noise and alert their pursuer. Brent nervously glanced behind him.

Nobody in sight. So far so good.

It was not to last, though. After Brent’s third backwards glance, he began to feel a little safer, that maybe they had managed to lose the pursuer. But then came the sound.

Fwip! Something fast bounced off the tree in front of Brent, and landed on the ground.

It was an arrow. He looked at Reisa, whose hands were empty. She hadn’t shot it.

They’d been spotted.