The New World

!! Chapter Eight !!

Four Months Later...

Maxis POV:

When I joined Evan's group, I didn't plan on staying for more than a month. However, my plans quickly changed because of the way things were done around here. Evan rotated jobs weekly and that meant that I didn't get put on scavenging duty for some of the weeks, which has led to me not being able to gather enough supplies for my planned journey. The other thing that threw a wrench into my plans was that the days were becoming shorter and it was getting colder. This could only mean one thing. Winter was coming...

Currently, Vanoss, or Evan, called for a meeting because it was the beginning of the "week" and he was assigning new jobs to everyone. I ended up with scavenging duty, which was what I wanted. A few others were assigned the same job, those being Tyler, Shannon, Brock, Anthony and Scotty. After everyone else was assigned their jobs, they broke off and went about their ways while Evan continued to talk to the scavenging crew, which included yours truly. 

"I've marked the area that I want you guys to scavenge." Evan stated as he handed Tyler the map, "one of the stores in that area is a hardware store."

I nodded and heard Tyler ask, "And why do we need to go there?" His question caused me to mentally sigh. He does this every week, ever since we got here. He tries to find fault with everything Evan does, or at least tries to question everything done. I could understand if it were still the first month of us being here, but it wasn't.

"Because, I want you guys to get some supplies for the coming winter." Evan responded and handed the list to me, which caught me by surprise. However I took the list and looked over it, seeing that it had things like shovels, ice melt/salt and other necessary items. With there being no further questions or comments, Evan let us go and we were soon headed out after that. 

***

Our trek to the area Evan had marked for us took a while. This was evident by the fact that the sun was starting to set when we had finally reached the hardware store. There was a good possibility that we'd have to use the hardware store as a makeshift shelter for the night, however that was a problem for us in the future. Tyler and Scotty forced the sliding doors open, letting the rest of us kill the nearby zombies, and when that was done, our group entered the dark store, with all of us clicking on our flashlights moments later. 

"Let me see what's on the list." Tyler stated.

I took my bag off and pulled out the folded piece of paper before handing it to Tyler. He began to read over it before giving instructions on who'd look for what. Shannon and I were tasked with getting the ice melt/salt. Shannon grabbed one of the shopping carts and the two of us headed towards the direction of where that stuff would be. 

After we reached the correct aisle, we began to load up the cart with a few bags of salt/ice melt. As we did that, we heard a sound that pierced through the silence. It sounded like two vehicles of sorts and the noise was getting louder and louder. Thankfully I wasn't the only one who noticed it.

"Is that a car?" Shannon asked, "in the middle of the apocalypse?" she added. 

It was definitely a weird thing to hear, especially nowadays. Shannon and I decided to abandon our shopping cart and check out what was going on. We picked up the pace when we heard Tyler's voice along with a new and unfamiliar voice. 

"Don't touch our shit." Tyler's voice said.

I could hear a chuckle come from the unfamiliar sounding person, followed by them speaking, "finder's keepers, plus you're outnumbered, bud." 

Shannon and I remained hidden in the aisles, however we did manage to get close enough to see what was happening. Tyler was standing by the checkout registers with a cart full of stuff and there were three people standing in front of and surrounding him. One of those people had a hat on and was wearing a shirt that had what appeared to be a zombified looking squirrel on it, he also seemed to be the one talking to Tyler. 

"Now hand over the shit." The dude said while now pulling a gun out on Tyler. The other two that were with them did the same.

My hand began to reach for my pistol, however just as I grabbed hold of it there was a loud bang as something came crashing to the ground in a nearby aisle. The next thing I knew was that gunfire was being exchanged between Tyler and those three guys around him. I finally pulled my gun out and started to fire a few rounds off.

As I fired, I heard Shannon's gun shooting behind me. Quickly turning around, I saw another stranger, now dead on the ground. Apparently those three that had surrounded Tyler weren't the only ones here. If that's the case, then how many people were really here? 

There was gunfire ringing throughout the whole store and it seemed to last for a couple of minutes. A lot of the bullets were missing, this was mostly because of how dark it was in the store. However, in the gunfire I heard someone from the other group yelling.

"Shit! Squirrel's been hit! Retreat! Retreat!"

Soon after, the gunfire died down which led to Shannon and I racing towards the entrance of the store, where we were greeted by two things. One of them being the rest of our group who all appeared to be miraculously unharmed and accounted for, the other thing being the sight of two vans speeding off into the darkness of the night. Those vans had something painted on them, but it they were too fast for any of us to get a clear, good look at what it was. 

"Okay... Who the fuck were those jackasses?" Tyler asked while glaring off into the direction of where the vans drove off.

Brock followed that up with a question of his own, "is everyone okay?" He asked, his voice showing his concern. 

After everyone made sure that they weren't shot or bleeding out, our group went back to gathering the supplies. Although, we made sure to be quick with our scavenging, as we weren't sure if this other group would come back with more people. When our group gathered everything we needed, we left and in a hurry, too.

....

A/N: And that's the end of this chapter! Thankfully no one from Evan's group got injured! The same can't be said about this other group, though, whoever they were. With that being said, I will leave it at that and see you in the next chapter! Peace out and stay safe!