Dead Frontier/Issue 110

This is a preview for Issue #110 of Dead Frontier by Walkerbait22, titled ''Bad Blood. ''The entire issue is planned to be posted idk maybe sometime today or tomorrow this is just in case i get lazy and don't post the entire thing today wow this is so unprofessional.

Issue 110 - Bad Blood
They've left behind the safety of the house and proceeded with their journey, still no set destination in place. Iowa doesn't really provide much in terms of scenery, with its long stretches of barren land and the occasional small town with nothing that distinguishes it from the others. All four of the trucks are filled with uncomfortable silence. Winston's stunt at the store is a topic better left unspoken; opinions vary wildly, and talking about it will only lead to harsh arguments, as they've already found out. Their empty stomachs have them frustrated enough, so they leave the issue alone for now.

Adam pulls his his car to a stop, prompting the three behind him to do the same. He offers the usual instructions: split up, scour through every inch of whatever building you decide to search, and be careful. He, oddly, stays behind this time. It's easy to see he didn't sleep very much the night before, if at all. Slowly, he trudges back to his car and stretches out in the front seat. The car is empty, and he closes his eyes. He gets about ten minutes of relaxation before hearing a tapping on the passenger window. He sees Duke peeking at him through the glass, so he rolls the window down halfway. "What's up?" Adam asks, and he forces himself to suppress a yawn.

"Uh...nothin'. I wanted to make sure you were doing alright over here," Duke says hesitantly. "Can barely tell you're alive, man."

"That's the case for half of us," Adam says bitterly. Duke sighs and opens the door, closing it quietly once he's inside.

"You can give yourself a break once in a while," Duke says. "Don't think all this is your fault."

Adam taps his fingers impatiently on the steering wheel. They're starving. They've got no medicine. The people that were so close just two months ago have pretty much divided themselves over Winston's split-second decision to kill that woman. And it was Adam's own choice to take responsibility for everyone here, to decide where they go, where they stay, who eats and who doesn't. Who else's fault can it be, other than his own? That's what he tells himself at least, and he can't stop thoughts like that from driving him crazy every minute of the day.

Duke expects him to respond, but when he doesn't, he continues on. "You're a smart dude, Adam, everyone here has crazy respect for you. If you wanna keep being that guy everyone looks up to, don't beat yourself up so much. It'll drive you out of your mind."

"Pretty hard not to."

"I'll help you out. Chill for the next couple of days, let me take the load off. I'll call whatever shota I need to, and you can relax. If things get outta hand, I'll deal with it. Don’t worry."

Jake roams around a store with Ivy, his mind wandering as aimlessly as he is. He knows he should be looking for food--he is hungry--but he’s tired, too, and anything besides sleeping doesn’t interest him in the slightest. He’s aware of some rustling at the other end of the store, a sound similar to the moving around of shelves, but he knows it’s just Lienne and Tora. If there was any trouble, they warned they’d call out, anyway.

He’s finally snapped out of it, the fog in his mind clearing, when Ivy says his name. “You still don’t talk a lot,” she says.

“So?” he grunts in response.

“I thought you’d talk more by now.”

“Maybe I just d-don’t talk to you,” he says.

“Why not?” she says, ignoring his insult.

“Because I don’t have anything in c-common with a 12 year old girl.”

“Maybe you do. Do you like...reading?” she asks.

“No,” he says simply.

“Movies?”

“We don’t even have any.”

“...Um--what about drawing?” she asks, and she notices the nearly imperceptible change in his expression.

“Yeah. I do,” he says a little reluctantly. “I don’t r-really do it anymore.”

“You should. Then maybe you’ll smile more.” She offers a smile of her own before turning away, continuing down the aisle. He feels the corners of his mouth turn up against his will, but he forces the grin from his face.

They search for a while, and Jake’s hopes of finding anything dwindle with each passing second. There’s not a single speck of food, not a drop of water, not a stitch of clothing. He looks up and down the only shelf in the entire store they haven’t checked, looking behind it, expecting a can of beans to fall out of the sky. But there’s nothing, per usual.

He sits staring at the shelf for a while, the reality of everything setting in. This is the first day they’ve gone completely without food for the last few months; he knew they’d run out sometime if their luck continued on its usual downward spiral, but now that it actually is gone, he’s scared out of his mind. Out of all the plausible ways to perish nowadays, starving to death was one he never really dwelled on, until recently. That thought gives him a terrible feeling in the pit of his stomach, and mixed with his hunger, he suddenly feels nauseous.

“Jake!” Ivy shouts from somewhere far off in the store. He follows the sound of her voice, until he spots her pulling at some metal vent. She doesn’t seem to have much success in getting it open. “I see something...in there…” she mutters.

He crouches down next to her and peeks through. His eyes are met with total darkness, and he looks at her, obviously a little annoyed. “There’s nothing there,” he says.

“No, no, there is,” she says. “Loosen the screws, with your knife.”

He complies and pull his knife. He uses the blade to unscrew the bolts on each of the four corners of the vent. He pulls it off easily, revealing a small, dark tunnel. At the end, he can see a light. It’s just a speck, barely noticeable.

“Whoa, what’re you doing?” he asks when he sees her poke her head in.

“I just wanna see,” she says.

“Uh...no. I’m responsible for y-you right now, I can’t l-let you go down there.”

“No one said you were responsible for me. It’ll be fine.”

He looks at her for a long second, then sighs. If something good’s down there, he doesn’t want to be the one that stops them from getting it. “Okay. But don’t go d-down too far, okay? If I tell you to come b-back, come back.”

She nods quickly and turns her attention back to the vent. She crawls inside cautiously, shivering as the cold metal touches her palms. Squinting down at the light, she continues forward on her hands and knees until the light grows brighter and larger. She thinks she may have gone too far, but she can’t turn back now, not with the curiosity pulling her in. Jake’s warning travels down the vent, but she ignores it as she nears the edge of the vent.

She can see a room at the end of the tunnel, the walls an odd mix of white and crimson. Her first thought is that it’s blood. Instead of scaring her away, that makes her more intrigued than ever. The entirety of the room comes into view; the vent is only a few feet above ground, so she positions herself with her legs dangling off the edge.

“Wow…” she says. The floor is covered in a thin pool of red liquid, and two tables line the back wall. There’s a set of double doors on the other wall, but other than that, it’s empty. The tables are made of metal, covered in terribly blood-stained sheets, and the door is rusted, the paint fading. She drops herself from the vent, landing on the floor and staining her shoes from a puddle of blood.

Careful not to slip, she moves around the room slowly. She doesn’t expect to see anything different, but she stares around in awe anyway, proceeding toward the door. Faintly, she can hear Jake calling for her.