The Dead World/Issue 55

Two Months later.....

Jogging through the woods, Will sighed as he kept an eye out for any zombies or food before stopping so Lewis could catch up to him.

"see anything?" Lewis asks Will but knows the answer before the man even shook his head.

"no these woods are as empty as George Town" Will stated causing Lewis to run his hand nervously through his hair before responding.

"shit man...we gotta do something, we're running low on supplies for EVERYTHING" Lewis exclaimed pacing around before looking to Will who instantly knew what he was going to say and shook his head.

"No" Will states before walking on, loading and re loading his arrow on his crossbow while Lewis followed him closely.

"man you know we're gonna have to start thinking about going into the dead zone of that town" Lewis stated in reply causing Will to stop abruptly and sigh.

"you know what happened the last time, we nearly lost Karen and Anthony" Will reminded him and Lewis nodded bowing his head sadly as he remembered he'd nearly got them two killed but Will soon patted his shoulder.

"when we get back, we'll see what the rest of the group thinks, ok?" Will asked and Lewis nodded before joining Will in walking again.

"sorry man, I'm just so damn hungry" Lewis stated and his stomach growled just at that moment to prove his point.

"I know, don't worry man it'll get better....hopefully" Will mumbled the last part of his sentence to himself so Lewis didn't hear him which was successful.

"how do you think Anthony and Logan are doing?" Lewis asked breaking their moments silence but before Will could respond they heard a loud male scream and they both looked to each other in shock before speaking.

"was that Anthony?" Lewis asked but Will was already beginning to run over to the sound direction he thought it had come from and they soon came across Logan and Anthony in a small clearing but both men looked un-harmed.

"who the hell screamed?" Will asked and Logan pointed to Anthony who was currently looked down shocked at the floor and with further investigation all of them saw there was a recently sprung animal track near Anthony's foot.

"I was just poking this stick around when it came out nowhere and snapped it in half" Anthony exclaimed looking up shocked at Will and Lewis the latter grinning evily while Will knelt down to examine it.

"so you decided to just scream like a girl?" Lewis asked resulting in him and Logan chuckling while Anthony glared at them.

"it scared the shit outta me, I thought it was a zombie" Anthony stated but the two of them continued chuckling until Will shhh'd them seriously so they all turned to look at him.

"as much as I like the joke we got a problem here" Will stated and they all raised their eyebrows at him so he continued.

"this trap is specially designed" Will states and Anthony squints at the trap before turning to Will confused.

"so?...." Anthony asked and Will sighed as he got up and looked around to make sure no danger was there.

"so that means it would've taken a very skilled person to set it up" Will states and they all ready their weapons looking out for trouble.

"Riley's bandits" Lewis says out loud as the others nod in agreement.

"lets get back to the center and the others and make sure we're prepared" Will stated and carefully, quietly and quickly the four of them headed back to the city.

Taking a deep breath and calming herself while once again checking to make sure the silencer was on the pistol she wasolding right, Emily took aim at one of the chained up zombies in front of her as she ignored the cold air trying to put off her focus and fired letting out a little yelp when she was knocked back a little until she regained body movements.

"did I hit it?" Emily asked shakily refusing to open her eyes while she heard the other woman's laughter but she also received a reassuring pat on the shoulder before she heard someone speaking.

"yeh you hit it honey" Lily whispered to Emily, kissing her cheek while Emily practically bounced in joy due to actually hitting her target.

"However you do need to work on your stance a bit, you nearly fell completely over" Bella said before Natasha brushed off the rules to help Emily get into the right stance being watched by an amused Karen who currently sits on watch.

"like this" Natasha tells her as she spreads Emily's legs apart so she wont fall back like she had before while the woman herself blushed and turned to look at Lily who was just trying not to laugh her head off at her girlfriend's shyness.

"now fire" Natasha told her giving her an encouraging pat on the shoulder before standing back and allowing Emily to do what she had been taught and eventually Emily got enough nerves again and fired hitting the next zombie in the forehead and this time not nearly falling back.

"there ya go" Natasha said clapping while Lily hugged Emily and Bella laughed as she patted Natasha on the shoulder.

"look who just became a trainer" Bella joked causing Natasha to laugh turning to the woman.

"what can I say, I learned from the best" Natasha states and the two woman share a smile before Karen interrupts them all by coughing and when they turn to her she points in the distance and squinting they see the boys have returned from their hunt. However their faces told the girls that something was wrong and they sighed.

"what have they done now" Karen mumbled as she got up slinging her rifle over her back before heading over to the boys like the other girls.

"what's up?" Karen asks the men as Natasha draws Will into a hug and Bella does the same too Lewis making Karen roll her eyes slightly at all the love going on.

"yeh, what is it?" Lily asked hugging Emily still as she looked worriedly at the men and Will sighed before answering.

"its Riley's bandits...they might be back" Will stated and the girls looked surprised, they had expected it a while ago but after two months of no sighting they had began to think the bandits were gone.

"what? how can you be sure?" Natasha asked but he just sighed again looking into her eyes deeply.

"we found a animal trap in the woods, it was a specially designed trap" Lewis answered for Will while Logan and Karen shared a look before Bella spoke up.

"so what do we do defense wise?" Bella asked and they all looked to each other thinking before Will suddenly realized that being out in the open was probably not the best thing and began lightly pushing Natasha inside and the others caught on what he was doing.

"go back to normal duty, keep the watchers by the doors though and not outside and we'll have a group discussion later this evening, ok?" Will asked and they all nodded before entering the building one by one.

Will going last after he took one look around the area to make sure they wasn't being watched.

A couple of hours later, the whole group except for Maria who had gone to her room to read had gathered around the living room all sitting in a mix of shock, sadness and confusion.

They had managed to actually stay in a place for more than a week and now they have found out that what they had worked hard to maintain my all be taken away by just the click of a finger.

None of them wanted to leave and they didn't even know where to go if they did but they couldn't deny the fact their situation was getting worse and worse.

At first they had been doing well and had settled in nicely and managed to survive with out having to go into the "dead zone" of the town and had actually been having fun.

However it had slowly begun to get worse when they were running low on supplies of all sorts and they had practically looked in every inch of the town except its "dead zone" and now with the apparent return of Riley's bandits they knew they were all thinking the same thing.

Is there any point in fighting for a town that seems to already be lost?

"alright" Will said suddenly standing up drawing everyone's attention to him.

"we all know we have two options here, we can stay here and keep trying to make this work or we can go" Will said looking to each of them in turn but they all just looked back at him expecting him to make the choice so he continued.

"I aint going to make the decision for you all, its up to you this time" Will clarified and also finished as he sat back down in his chair awaiting for their Reponses.

After a few moments of silence, Anthony stood up and gulped as all attention turned to him "honestly I don't know, whatever you guys decide I'm with you 100% of the way" Anthony says as he shuffles on his feet.

"but what I am going to say is...we know there must be supplies in the "dead zone" and we successfully done dangerous missions before, I think if anyone's willing to go we should try that at least once more before we think about leaving" he finished nodding to each of them as he sat back down.

Looking around to the other members of the group, Will could tell that they agreed with Anthony and thought about if for a moment before getting them to turn their attention back to him.

"so we all agree with Anthony....for once" Will added the little joke on the end which resulted in a success as Anthony exclaimed a "hey" and the rest of them had some giggles and chuckles between them before they nodded in response to Will's question.

"alright, go to your rooms or whatever you want to do and we'll discuss who wants to go and when we do it in the morning" Will said getting up quickly followed by everyone else as they began exiting to their rooms.

Moving over to Anthony, Will slipped his arm on the man's shoulders drawing him away from the rest of the group and heading towards a sofa while Anthony just went along with it expecting that Will wanted to talk to him about something.

Once they had got settled on the sofa, Anthony sat waiting for Will to speak who looked like he was thinking of what to say until he finally said it.

"I appreciate you stepping up to speak, man" Will said and Anthony nodded but raised an eyebrow.

"well you did ask us our opinion?" Anthony asked a little confused causing Will to chuckle and nod his head before speaking.

"yes but sometimes it feels as if this group expects me to make every decision for them and I know I'm there leader but...I want this group to make some of their own decisions cause sooner or later I might not be here to make the hard choices and what the group going to do then?" Will asked Anthony but the man didn't know how to respond.

Anthony knew that what Will was saying was true. The group depended on the man and if he suddenly went, Anthony didn't know what the group would do, all he knew was he would try his best to make everyone happy.

"look man...what I'm getting at is, I'm asking that if I die, get separated from you or whatever else, that you'd not take over but...make sure the group doesn't fall apart, ok?" Will asked and Anthony was even more confused, why was Will asking him and not Lewis but he didn't question it and instead nodded his head looking into Will's eyes seriously.

"I'll make sure it doesn't happen" Anthony finally responds.

Meanwhile the bear trap remained in the forest with the bit of chopped off stick still inside it before its suddenly disturbed when a baseball bat pokes at it until it finally stops and its revealed who the owner of said baseball bat is.

"hey Riley?" Leon asks looking at his boss who turns around giving him a blank look so Leon gulps before continuing.

"we've found tracks sir...they lead into George Town" Leon stated and Riley nodded swinging his bat around randomly in the air.

"ready the truck, tell them we're moving into the town" Riley says with a smirk and Leon nods before pointing to the nearest bandit and ordering him to do what Riley just said before he turned back to the boss himself.

"you think its them...the motel group?" Leon asked but Riley just shrugged as he continued swinging his baseball bat beginning to whistle a nursery rhyme.

"guess we're about to find out...." Riley finally responded before looking out to the distance and giving his trademark evil grin.....