Needless to say, I was absolutely terrified.

Beyond warning me to stay still and to stay silent, nothing had been said, and after a few seconds I’d started getting shoved along by the guys who had nabbed me.

At first I was just worried about my safety, which I think is pretty fair given my situation, but after I’d assured myself that I could grab my SVD off my back should things get too dicey, or even just start slashing wildly with my knife, I got to thinking about Stan and Cara.

Had I really abandoned them?

Had they been snatched like I had?

Were they at the bottom of the bog?

I genuinely had no idea, and at that time I wasn’t sure which of the options I preferred, if any.

It took significantly more effort than I thought it would not to ask the question ‘Where are you taking me?’ as they pushed me and guided me through what felt like some kind of maze for mice in a lab, but I did managed to suppress the urge long enough for them to get me to our destination.

Based only on what little I could touch I correctly assumed we were at a door, as proven by one of the guys who started knocking on it.

“Vape.” the guy knocking said flatly.

“Good to have you back, bro!” his friend exclaimed as he opened the door for us and gestured for us to come through into a small room lit with a relaxing orange light, “See you brought us back another one. This one cool?”

One of my ‘captors’ chuckled and nodded as he pulled off his night vision goggles, “Yeah, bit less panicky than the girl. This your mate?”

I looked around to he was addressing and saw that Cara and Stan were standing in the corner regarding me confusedly as another of the guys tapped me on the shoulder, bringing my attention back to them.

There were four of them, including the guy who’d opened the door for us, and they all looked reasonably friendly, but as Stan had recently proven, assumptions were a good way to get disappointed.

“Sorry ‘bout snatchin’ you like that,” the one who tapped me said before handing me back my gun, “just needed to make sure you were clear of the zeds as quickly as possible. Name’s Matt, you?”

+AR-15

I spent a few seconds looking between my gun and the surprisingly nice Matt before forcing a smile and saying “Finn.” as politely as I could through a mostly clenched jaw.

“I know y’all must be pretty confused,” the doorman said before any further introductions could be pursued, “but I just want you to know that we ain’t fixin’ to hurt you, alright? We’re just tryin’ to build something for ourselves.”

“What?” I practically laughed before seeing just how offended the ‘kidnappers’ by that, “I mean… I mean what exactly are you trying to build?”

“Ideally a group that’ll see us through to the last few minutes of the round,” Matt replied, “if only so that we have a fighting chance when it comes to the rest of the guys who’ve done that.”

“Like who?” Stan asked slightly more aggressively than I think was appropriate given how the guys hadn’t killed us already.

“Well… there’s the After Skewl guys,” the doorman said with a little shrug, “and while those dudes are pretty cool, they do tend to encourage other, less friendly groups to form.”

He had a point, the After Skewl clan were nice as far as KillStreak groups went, and they did sort of indirectly force more aggressive people to form together and just go through butchering everyone in sight.

Still, I wasn’t quite ready to get all ‘buddy-buddy’ with a barely formed group who, up until about minute prior, had basically kidnapped me.

“I see that you guys are worried,” Matt said after a few seconds of awkward silence, “but the truth is that we just want safety in numbers, you know? Hell, I hadn’t met these dudes before today.”

“Yeah,” one of the other people who’d nabbed me said before pointing his head over to the doorman, “Tim and I are the only ones who know each other outside the game.”

“Len picked me up from Voltown,” the last of the guys added, gesturing to Tim’s friend, “and that was only about an hour ago. And then we went out to pick up Matt. I’m Fred, by the way.”

“See?” Matt interjected before I could muster up the courage to give Fred a wave, “We’re all strangers here.”

“See,” Cara practically seethed as she came to stand beside me, “you’re saying that like it’s s’posed to make us feel better, but I can guarantee it ain’t. How’re we supposed to trust you guys if you know absolutely nothing about each other?”

“I’m with Cara on this,” Stan added, “you grab us in the sewer, bring us to this… panic room, and want us to just join your little group because, what, it’d be a really cool thing to do? No thanks, I think we’d rather ride this one out by ourselves.”

“We could always just shoot you.” Tim proclaimed boldly, a statement that I was absolutely positive he would come to regret, “I mean, it’s not like anyone’s going to hear, is it? And it’s certainly no skin off our backs.”

“Hey, hey,” Cara said as coolly as she could, “there’s no need for that. Look, all my… friend here is saying is that we have to be cautious.”

“These guys were cautious too,” Tim replied coldly, “but neither o’ them made me concerned for what they might do to me.”

The tension was building, justifiably, and I decided that that was the best chance for me to throw in my two cents.

I didn’t get the chance though.

No, instead Stan, out of nowhere, pulled out a handgun and just started shooting like crazy, popping Tim in the head first, then Len through the eye, Fred clean through the heart, and finally Matt in both his kneecaps.

BillytheTeenagedMenace murdered Lololololol

-1 Player (144 Players Remaining)

BillytheTeenagedMenace murdered RabbitBoi

-1 Player (143 Players Remaining)

BillytheTeenagedMenace murdered Fredenstein

-1 Player (142 Players Remaining)

BillytheTeenagedMenace incapacitated CoolKid

“You dick!” Matt growled as Stan stalked his way over to him, “Why’d you do that!? We let you guys live!”

“That was your mistake.” Stan replied flatly before sticking the barrel of his pistol to Matt’s head and pulling the trigger.

BillytheTeenagedMenace murdered CoolKid

-1 Player (141 Players Remaining)

“What. The. Actual. Fuck?” Cara muttered as we both looked over the mess that Stan had created.

“I saw a problem, I remedied it.” Stan said with a smile as he tucked his handgun back away, “Besides, those guys weren’t to be trusted. They always end up turning on you.”

Cara opened her mouth a few times but failed to find any words before turning to me, “Have you got anything to say about what just happened? Or are you just gonna stand there gawpin’?”

I hadn’t noticed that my mouth was hanging open until Cara pointed it out, but being aware of it didn’t fix it.

“Finn?” Stan asked somewhat concernedly, “You alright, buddy?”

My heart was thumping faster than it had the entire time I’d been in the game, my eyes shooting around between Stan and his victims, before nodding, half-smiling, and gulping hard, “You’re… You’re quicker than I remembered.”

“Heh, yeah, I’ve been practicing.” Stan replied proudly.

I was glad that he’d taken it well, but my intention hadn’t been to compliment him, it was simply a statement of fact that was mostly a reflection of just how scared I was of him.

A few months prior I knew I’d have been able to take him should the proverbial shit hit the fan, but with that speed? That level of accuracy and pure brutality?

There was no way I’d be able to take him in gunfight unless I magically managed to get up behind him, and even then he’d be quick to turn.

That’s when I noticed that both Cara and Stan were staring at me and I realized that I hadn’t responded, “Yeah, yeah, it shows.” I said as confidently as I could, “Sorry, just thinkin’ about what we do from here.”

“Well, first things first,” Stan said with an uncomfortable amount of calm in his voice, “let’s nab these guys’ goggles. We might get lucky and we won’t get stuck in a night cycle, but I reckon it’s best to be prepared.”

“Yeah,” I replied coolly as I walked over to the body furthest away from Stan and started looting it, “couldn’t agree with you more.”

+Night Vision Goggles

+78 5.56mm

With the exception of the ammo, I was actually pretty disappointed in the haul, and I was just about to stand up and voice that disappointment when Cara came up behind me, put her hand on the back of my head, and leaned in close, “We have to do something about your friend. Soon.”

I wanted to respond, but I simply didn’t know how.

“You guys okay?” Stan called over, “Did one of those dicks manage to get a shot off?”

“Nah, we’re fine,” Cara answered before I could as we got up, “turns out that grabbin’ a shoe off of a zombie comes with some pretty nasty blisters.”

“Blisters?” Stan asked confusedly after we turned to face him, “Can you get blisters in KillStreak?”

“It would seem so.” I replied coolly, “You know how they’re always adding in new functionality.”

For a few seconds there I was absolutely terrified that Stan hadn’t bought the obvious lie that I was feeding him, but then he let out an amused huff and shook his head, “I swear, the amount of things they could tweak and they always go for the weirdest crap.”

“Right?” Cara chuckled, “The amount of audio bugs and stuff that are constantly ignored, and they decide that the best use of their resources is to give us blisters? What next, athlete’s foot?”

“Heh, that’ll be the day.” Stan laughed back in response as we all adjusted the goggles on our heads, “Anyway, time to move, you guys ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.” I replied somewhat uneasily before catching my audible discomfort, “Runnin’ around with you guys through a sewer riddled with zombies? What could be better?”

In that moment I could name at least five things, and one of those involved skinny-dipping in the lake of filth with papercuts between my toes.