By Ourself

Chapter 2

Anna and I start to see an abandoned town up ahead, surprisingly with no fort of raging idiots shooting bullets into the sky. It looked abandoned, but there was no vines growing on the buildings, or no broken windows. This city looked nice, but this was weird, because the town was huge, and the lunatics that are walking around this Earth wouldn't leave this city in good condition. I suddenly had a bad feeling, because last time, it was a pristine gas station, and it ended up being an ambush. I guess in a sense, it's good to have the caution rather than pure blindness.

"Oh! This looks like a nice town," Anna says, looking at the nice and kept-up buildings.

Anxiously, I uttered. "Let's be careful, there might be a ambush here. This tends to be a common trick by Toxic Vani.."

"Toxic Vani was taken out a long time ago by Orange Cortidust. Maybe..." Anna put her hands together behind her back, and swung back and forth as she suggested another possibility. "...no one found this area and we're lucky."

I stare blankly at Anna as I consider the possibility that she most likely got lucky through this whole ordeal. I terminate that thought, thinking that there may just be a chance she isn't as traumatized as I am and doesn't understand the risk yet.

"It's been ten years. I'm sure the idiots roaming the world already looted this place. Last time there was a fully stocked area with good conditions, we got attacked," I warn her, very carefully looking around.

Anna raises her eyebrow, questioning me, "We?"

"I used to be in a small group years ago until people ambushed us. It was a clean and stocked area, which should've been our first red flag," I speak quickly, as if its painful to talk about. "I was sitting in the truck waiting for the group when I heard gunshots. When I got there, my group was injured. But I couldn't save them so I had to flee."

Anna put her head down which I can only assume is her form of empathy for me. I turn my head from her, embarrassed to even talk about it any further.

We both enter the town. I was a bit surprised. None of the buildings had bullet holes, the roads had no cracks, and even some cars here were still in pristine condition. We weren't near a nearby clan hideout, at least I think. I've been running behind on my notes about the current clans that are active in this area. A lot of them die off and rise. I wasn't even aware that Toxic Vani had been taken out. I should've been the one to take them out... but I wasn't ready. I was still only a teenager.

I signal to Anna to make her way with me into the closest building that was promoted as some type of liquor store. I wasn't interested in the store but the apartments right above the store. Anna stopped and grabbed a bottle of whiskey, taking the top off. I glared at her as I checked the register and the counter for any important information and with a goofy smirk, she put it back slowly. I turned my head away before turning towards her again, and I see her put it into her bag quickly. I chuckle softly, shaking my head as I keep looking around for an entrance into the apartments above. I find the stairs that lead up and I signal for Anna to follow me.

We both moved up to the apartments and began searching through the rooms one by one. I along with Anna who was searching a dresser, searched a nightstand. I founded a couple of boxes of pistol ammo, and a Little Debbie snack next to it. I found it odd but I grabbed it anyways.

I was starting to be convinced that maybe we had gotten lucky and no one has actually looted this place.

The same silence I heard years ago appears again, and I freeze.

Ironically, a gunshot misses me by a couple inches, hitting the bed frame. Almost instinctively, Anna jumped for cover. Immediately, I looked towards the source of the shot in a quick nature, and I still see the glass breaking from the shot. It was from a sniper in a building across the street. I see another sniper bullet go through the window and it hits the wall on the other side of the room. I keep searching the drawers, although still looking through my peripheral, and its like I can hear the idiot reloading frantically. How do you miss two shots on a standing target?