Until the next life, friend

Covenant

(Timeline: 11 months after the Explosion)

Doc was getting irritated. Him, Ren, Xisuma, and False were scouting for any supplies they could come across and their barren search had to come to a halt.

It had started raining. Rain was dangerous scouting conditions. It lowered visibility and could mask any sounds that might alert them to threats. Yet, Doc was having absolutely none of it.

He was so sick of it. The place they have moved to was high up on a plateau, it was cold and drizzled constantly.

"Keep going," he ordered.

"Go back," commanded Xisuma at the same time.

They looked at each other and Doc was about to press on when he saw the others were about to follow Xisuma instead.

"Fine, you guys retreat, I'll keep going."

Xisuma was startled, "Wait, Doc-"

"It's fine, Xisuma, I'll go with him," said Ren, and made his way to Doc's side.

Xisuma and False hesitantly took a step back to the way they came from, looking at Ren and Doc, but when they didn't move, they headed back to the base.

They understood Xisuma and False's hesitance to leave them alone, the pair virtually had no weapons among them.

Doc had retractable spikes which appeared at the knuckles of his cyborg arm and had armed his normal arm with a trench knife.

Ren had no weapon at all and preferred a more direct approach. Ren wasn't a normal human being, most wouldn't even consider him that. He's a hybrid. His genes were modified to be more canine. His sense of smell and hearing were beyond that of a human's. He even had the teeth, ears, and tails of a dog. So when it came to fighting off exanimalis, Ren would outright bite them, immune to the virus.

The rain, it had turned out, came from the direction Ren and Doc were headed, making the rain heavier the more they tread. They took shelter in an abandoned home.

Ren's ears perked when he heard an unusual noise outside the home. "What is it, Ren?" Doc turned on heat vision at his cyborg eye.

Ren gave a low growl to attract any exanimalis nearby.

The knob turned. They positioned themselves to attack than to defend, no exanimalis can use knobs. The door slowly opened.

"Easy there boys," called out a brown-haired woman.

"Oh, Stress." Doc retracted his spikes, Ren

"Funny seeing you lot out here ain't it? What are you doing here? Last time I checked, I'm the one supposed to be scouting."

Stress works in a business that started up during the apocalypse. Member For Hire, or MFH as it's more known. A solo survivor will work with a group as a Scout, in exchange for protection, supply stability, and reputation. It will provide the benefits and disadvantages of being solo and being in a group at the same time. Doc's group, surVIve, has hired Stress as a Scout recently.

"Well we decided that we'd contribute." Stress scoffed at that.

She huffed and set down her bulky backpack, which gave a resounding thud. "Then you have a lot of catching up to do."

Ren removed his padded gloves and took a look at its contents.

The main compartment was filled with cans of food and bottles of water, the sides where water bottles should be had flashlights instead, the front pocket had medicinal herbs. "Worth two weeks of food, assuming you still eat thrice a day with midnight snacks."