UFSW Survivor/Issue 5

This is the fifth issue of UFSW Survivor. It is written by Maxwestt.

Please see the Author's Note at the end of the issue.

Issue 5
Two more days had passed since the challenge in Sunshine Meadow. Today, there was a small party in the warehouse of the Red Team, to celebrate Lienne winning. Everyone was enjoying themselves and eating some fresh rabbit, caught by Jay himself this time.

Jay had been getting compliments all day about catching the rabbit bare-handed, and Maria was getting compliments on the cooking. Overall, they were a happy bunch. Even Joel, who was grumpy most often, got into the feel and started laughing. The mood was good.

Even in the Green warehouse, things were going ok. Bobby managed to finally capture a raccoon, which he was trying to do for days now. That night, they made a campfire for all of them to sit around. They were discussing the challenge.

“I mean, I don’t think we did badly. Bobby, you got a bullet, and Peter was also very close, he came in third.” Yuri took a bite from her meat. “Hmm, this tastes good. So, what I’m saying, is that we can do good. We had Keith to drag us down before, but he’s gone now.”

Gwen nodded in agreement. “Yeah, it’s not good to lose someone but we have to press on. Let’s get out there and win the next game. I know we can do it.”

Ken muttered some words in agreement, and Bobby smiled while looking at his bullet. Once again, Peter was the only one not to speak. Yuri noticed this.

“Look, Peter, I know you’re upset, really, I do. But we have to press on right now if we want to win and survive. If we don’t go to council, we won’t lose a person. So, can I count on you?”

Peter looked around the four faces in front of him. In each glare, there was a mixture of confidence and trust. He couldn’t do anything but smile. “Yeah, we’re gonna win this thing.”

Liza had stepped outside for a moment to get some fresh air. She liked the mood, but she needed some alone time once in a while too.

Liza was smoking a cigarette. She’d found a pack a while ago, but had been able to resist it untill now. But with all the recent stress she couldn’t resist anymore. This was her second in half an hour.

A door was opening behind her, revealing the shape of Joel in the doorway. He didn’t seem to notice Liza at first, just walking out the door into the night.

“Hey.”

Joel jumped a bit. He allready brought his hand to his knife, but when he saw Liza he relaxed a bit. “Hey. What’r you doing here?”

Liza just shrugged. “Needed to get some fresh air. It’s fun and all but it’s also kind of choky in there. You?”

Joel also shrugged in response. “The same, I guess. Maybe take a leak or somethin’.” He then noticed the cigarettes in her hand. “You found smokes?”

Liza nodded. “Yep, I did.” She looked down to her hand, a small grin on her face. “Used to smoke 3 packs a day of these. Want one?” She handed him the package. Joel hesitated, but grabbed one in response. Liza smiled again. “You a smoker?”

Joel shook his head. “Nah, not really. Maybe here and there. Like to think it’s bad for you, but that don’t matter anymore now, does it?” Liza chuckled in response.

It was at that moment that she noticed the small piece of paper taped to the wall.

“Tomorrow, noon, the highest building in the financial district. Come prepared, choose your eyes.” Gwen read out the content of the notes in a quick way as not to waste any time.

The part about the eyes made Bobby think. “That isn’t good, that. Do you think we need to choose someone to be our eyes?” He looked around the group, and was met with the stare of Yuri.

“Yeah, I think it does. We have to choose someone to guide us, maybe? Someone with a keen eye? Who’d that be?”

Everyone looked at each other, deep in thought. Peter was the first to speak up.

“Well, if I’m honest.. It seems like the ‘eyes’ will be alone on this one. That’s not my place to be, I like people more. Is that ok with you guys?” The other muttered an agreement, they were relieved to have one less problem.

Ken took up the conversation. “I think we should vote. I vote Gwen, because she’s a good leader and a good communicator. Who’s with me?” Peter and Yuri agreed with him by raising their hands. Bobby doubted for a minute, but then remember how Gwen had done well with the puzzle. He then raised his hand too. Gwen took it all very nonchalant, smiling but not grinning.

The Red Team had a harder time deciding. “I mean, like, you’re valuable to us too. We can’t leave you alone, Hope.” Maria had tried to reason with her friend, but she woudn’t budge. Five feet further, Joel was put up as candidate. That was, untill everyone heard a bang. They all turned aorund to see Jay sitting on a desk, looking at them with glaring eyes.

“I’ll be our eyes, ok? I don’t like it, but we gotta do some stuff here. We can’t just sit on our asses and talk like this, we gotta do something. So, I’ll be our eyes. Allright?”

Nobody interfered, so Jay smiled at them. “Good, now let’s go to sleep. We’ll need it.”

This time, Green team had arrived first, with the general consensus that being the late one wasn’t good. However, after only a few minutes they could see Red Team walk up to them, underneath the big tower, once owned by a huge bank. There, Host was waiting for them.

He smiled. “Well, here we are again, still with 11. Lienne, have you been enjoying your prize? The same goes to you of course, Bobby.”

Lienne and Bobby exchanged a look before speaking up. “Of course. It’s been a good thing to have.” Bobby muttered an agreement to Lienne’s small speech. Host smile was still on his face when he started to explain the activities of the day.

“It’s actually very simple. I will take two people up there,” he said while pointing at the high building, “to guide you through a big maze. Sounds fun, doesn’t it? Makes you think back of your childhood.” Host cocked his head and started daydreaming, while all the contestants exchanged glances, trying to figure out what was happening. Before long though, Host was his normal self again.

“Well, aside from that, it seems the teams are a bit uneven. Looks like Green Team has a person extra, let’s fix that. Wouldn’t want to be rude, do we? Do we have a volunteer?”

“...”

“No?”

“...”

“Fine, then allow me to pick someone. Hmm, who to pick… Joel, let’s do you. You can go with the people on the tower, but you can’t go to the top deck, is that allright with you?”

Joel nodded slowly, wary of any tricks and traps Host might’ve installed. But there were none.


 * BLEEP* “Gwen, come in Gwen, this is Ken, Over.” * BLEEP* “Ken, this is Gwen, Over.” *BLEEP*

The whole Red Team sighed in unison, relieved that their walkie-talkie worden after all. They’ve had some problem with it with faulty batteries, but it seemed to hold on for a while.


 * BLEEP* “I can see you from here, you should be able to see me. Over.” *BLEEP*

Yuri looked up and indeed, she saw the shape of Gwen standing on the roof of the building. She waved back to her.


 * BLEEP* “Allright, we’re going now. Tell us if you see anything. Ken out.”*BLEEP*

Ken looked around and saw the other three standing over the walkie-talkie, all still with confusion in their eyes. They had to get to the big building, but how?

*BLEEP* “Aight, got’cha covered, you can see me from here. I’ll talk to you when I know anything. *BLEEP*

Jay looked around the penthouse he and Gwen arrived in. It was big, spacy, but empty. Even though this was a financial building once there was nothing to set it apart from the outside. It was just a big hump of grey concrete and glass.

Jay walked over to Gwen, who was at the other side of the room. “Yo, lady, Gwen right?”

Gwen turned around, with a distrustfull look in her eyes. “Yeah. What do you want?” Jay tried to smile. “I want to wish you luck, ‘cus one of us is gonna lose. If I maybe don’t ever see you again, I wanna at least be kind of nice.”

Gwen snorted. “Right, niace. Well, I’ll play nice too then.” She extended her hand. Jay accepted.

*BLEEP* “This is Host speaking. You may begin. Good luck.” *BLEEP*

Liza, who was carrying the microphone, dropped it out of surpise because of the bleeps. Lucky, Hope swooped down and grabbed it before it could hit the ground.

“Mind if I keep holding on to this?” Hope made a small cokcy smile to Liza, who blushed away a bit.

Lienne and Maria both chuckled, looking at their lady team. They’d been unfortunate to not have any men with them, but it could also mean something good.

“Should we head out now? Let’s go towards the building.” Lienne was dead focussed, trying to win yet another game. Another win could further secure her victory.

However, they quickly stumbled across a small group of infected, and because they had no weapons they had to hide in an alleyway.

“Shit, what do we do now? Call Jay?” Maria asked with a small voice. The other nodded.

*BLEEP* “Yo, Jay here, where did you girls go? I saw you a min ago.” *BLEEP*

Hope cussed a little. “That damn guy, was it really the best idea to have him go up there?” She looked around the group for bystanders, but found none.

Liza spoke again. “What’s done is done, let’s continue. We won’t win if we don’t.” There was too much truth in that for Maria to ignore.

*BLEEP* “Right here.” *BLEEP*

The group turned right.

*BLEEP “Don’t take that left turn, it’s a dead end.” *BLEEP*

The group continued on.


 * BLEEP* “Go left now.” *BLEEP*

Bobby slowed down. “No, wait, that can’t be it, we going further from the building! Are we sure Gwen’s telling the truth?”

Yuri made a grunting sound. “I don’t know Bobby, but if we can’t trust her we won’t win for sure. She’s up there, she got overview.”

*BLEEP* “What’s the matter, go left, now!” *BLEEP*

Bobby turned to Ken. “What do you think, Ken? Can we trust Gwen or should we go straight instead of left?”

Ken hesitated for a split second, before the walkie-talkie bleeped again.

*BLEEP* “What the hell is taking you so long? The others are getting closer, hurry up.” *BLEEP*

Bobby grunted his teeth as they took a left turn, turning their backs on the tower.

Peter saw this angryness in Bobby, and while running, decided to whisper to him: “Don’t worry, I trust her. She’s telling the truth.”

Stunned by Peter’s sudden trust, Bobby sprinted to the next corner.

“Are you sure you don’t want to do this?”


 * BLEEP* “What now Jay? Left, right?” *BLEEP* The voice of Hope cracked over the radio.

Jay glanced briefly out of the window before quickly giving his awnser. “Uhm, left.”

Host chuckled. He’d just sent his teammates on a detour. “You can help them win this, if you do this, you know. I’m not forcing you, but there’s the option. Think about it, but don’t take too much time. I can see Red Team closing in fast.”

Jay bit his lip trying to think. He couldn’t concentrate, even with the near-dead silence of the room, only interrupted by Gwen giving quick instructions to her team.

*BLEEP* “Doing great guys, take the second right and then just sprint till you see it.” *BLEEP*

Jay wanted to walk to Gwen when he heard the voice of Hope once again, now coming from his hand “Jay this is a dead end, are you focussing?”

Jay scrambled for the walkie-talkie. “Uhm, yeah yeah, I thought I saw a thingy but it’s nothing. Go back, and hurry.” *BLEEP*

The walkie stayed silent after that.

Frustration with Hope had reached a critical point. “God damnit, can’t he pay attention? It’s not that hard is it?”

Maria and Liza looked to the ground sullenly, but Lienne spoke up. “Look, I know you’re upset, and I’m too, but cursing or yelling won’t fix a thing. What we should do is focus, and run. Let’s not listen to him anymore for now. He’s not got it figured out. We gotta do it ourselves.”

And with that, Lienne suddenly became the leader of the small group of women, traversing the city towards the big financial building in the centre. After a few turns and another dead end, the found the tower to be right in front of them, about 200 yards away.

Liza beamed. “There it is, good job Lienne! Knew we should trust you.” Maria seemed to share this thought, and even Hope wasn’t angry anymore, but focussed.

However, Lienne was not happy. Because under the tower, there were 5 people. Four males and a woman.

“Well, it seems we have a winner, doesn’t it?” Host kept is everlasting smile on his face, as the four women joined them at the door. “Let’s call the people from up top.” He prduced a walkie-talkie for himself, pressed three buttons and called Joel, Gwen and Jay down.

Within a minute, Joel was allready downstairs, looking for any information from his teammates. He had only been able to hear the talk over the walkies, not seeing anything. He hadn’t heard who won, however.

But as a depressed Jay followed him seconds later, he realised what happened, sighed, and went to stand with his team.

Host kept smiling. “Come on Gwen, don’t take too long. Good. Well, we have a winner, Red Team, congratulations. You won’t go to council tomorrow. That of course means Green Team does have to go to council. And remember, Jay, Maria, Hope and Liza have immunity. Hope you’re ready, Joel and Lienne. Makes some friends and win some votes. Tomorrow, midnight, the lake. If you need directions, ask Red.”

And with that, Host left again. Red Team left in cheers, while Green Team stood for another few minutes, studying the ground.

Author's Note
Here we are again, time for voting. The following people have to vote: Remember, you can ONLY vote on Lienne and Joel on this one, because all the others have immunity. DO THIS IN PM TO EITHER MAX OR KAFFE. DO NOT DO THIS IN A COMMENT, UNLESS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY. Voting before saturday night. For any tips and/or tricks, PM.
 * Jamie141 (Hope)
 * Walkerbait22 (Lienne)
 * TheInfected (Joel)
 * WalkerMage (Maria)
 * Warfare (Jay)
 * TheFlyingDutchman (Liza)