Stevens Street was an unremarkable little road in Peachtree City, but the shops lining both sides formed a tangled web of alleys and side streets that twisted and turned like a labyrinth.
"Hannah, are you sure this is the right direction? I still don't see any sign of this shopping center you mentioned."
On the rooftop of a residential building, a man in his thirties wearing a black vest and carrying a rifle crouched low, scanning the maze of storefronts and shops ahead. He turned to address the girl behind him — a teenager armed with a bow and arrow.
"We're not there yet, Uncle Leo." Hannah surveyed the surrounding blocks, mentally cross-referencing the shopping center's location. "If we keep heading north, it's about three miles out."
"That far, huh..."
Leo shifted his gaze to the woman standing beside the girl — someone who bore a noticeable resemblance to Hannah. "Andrea, are you sure your sister actually saw a soldier? Could've been one of those people."
"I trust what Hannah saw." Andrea's brow furrowed slightly, a flash of irritation crossing her face as she looked at Leo.
"Alright, alright. If you say so."
Leo raised his hands in mock surrender, feigning indifference. But deep down, he desperately hoped Hannah was right. If there really were soldiers from the Quarantine Zone out here, that meant a chance to get inside — to stop living every day in terror, wondering when some unknown group or pack of Infected would finally kill them.
People who'd never wandered the outside couldn't possibly understand how brutal the post-outbreak world truly was. Survival was harder than anyone could imagine, and that was precisely why they'd endured such a grueling journey to reach the QZ. They'd had enough of drifting.
If Bryan had known what Leo was thinking, he would've laughed. The QZ government's corruption and the ongoing clashes with the Fireflies had made life inside the walls its own kind of hell.
Some QZ residents were so fed up with the constant firefights that they actually dreamed of escaping. It created a particularly ironic situation — outsiders were desperate to get in, while insiders were desperate to get out. The absurdity was almost poetic.
"Look — someone's down there!"
Just as Leo and Andrea were about to move out, Hannah — who'd been watching their rear — suddenly hissed a warning, raising her hand to point behind them.
Both Leo and Andrea tensed, pressing themselves lower as they turned to look.
They spotted a man in military fatigues carrying two white plastic buckets, jogging through the street below. He looked young — not even twenty.
They tracked him with their eyes as he passed their position, then watched as he gradually slowed to a walk, apparently tired.
"That's him!"
While the other two were still processing, Hannah let out a gasp of recognition and grabbed her sister's sleeve. "That's the one I saw at the shopping center yesterday!"
"Holy shit, he really is a soldier!"
Leo's shock gave way to excitement so intense he nearly jumped to his feet. He was about to stand and call out when Andrea grabbed his arm.
"Don't be rash. What if he's not actually a soldier — what if he's with them?"
Leo paused, recognizing the logic. He glanced at the soldier's retreating figure. "So what do we do?"
"We follow him. Observe."
After a moment's consideration, Andrea decided to tail the man first — see what he was up to. She also needed to know whether he'd come alone or with a convoy, whether he was a genuine QZ soldier or just some civilian who'd gotten his hands on a uniform. Those were the real questions.
"Works for me."
Leo had no objections. At a time like this, caution could only help.
The three climbed down from the rooftop and used the overgrown weeds and abandoned cars as cover, trailing the soldier and his two buckets of gasoline.
They'd followed him for about half a block when the man suddenly stopped, as if he'd spotted something interesting, then picked up his pace and turned left into a street they couldn't see.
The three had deliberately maintained distance to avoid detection. Caught off guard, they abandoned stealth and hurried to catch up.
But when they reached that street, the soldier had vanished completely.
"Where'd he go?"
Leo scratched his head in frustration, scanning desperately for any trace of the man.
Unlike Leo's agitation, Andrea slowly furrowed her brow. Something felt off, though she couldn't quite put her finger on it. "Don't panic. He went in here, so he must have ducked into one of these shops. Let's split up and search — use the signal to stay in contact."
"Got it."
The three moved forward cautiously, checking the surrounding storefronts before splitting at a three-way junction, each heading in a different direction.
After they left, Bryan slowly rose from the rooftop of a building right next to where they'd been standing. He watched the three figures disperse, mildly surprised that his tail consisted of only three people — two of them women, one a girl about Allen's age. Their equipment was crude at best.
Better yet, things were going more smoothly than he'd expected. Not only had they failed to detect him, they'd voluntarily split up — practically gift-wrapping themselves for him to pick off one by one.
The red-haired woman with the wavy hair nagged at his memory. He felt like he'd seen her somewhere before.
But he quickly pushed the thought aside, dropped from the rooftop in a few practiced movements, and took off after the redhead who was clearly the leader. Whoever these people were, whatever faction they belonged to — grab one first, ask questions later.
Tailing the older redhead, Bryan only glanced at her back occasionally, relying mostly on his peripheral vision. He didn't stare — that was amateur hour.
Once he'd covered enough distance and estimated the other two were too far away to hear anything, he bent low and began closing in rapidly.
On the silent street, two people were moving, but only one set of footsteps echoed.
As the gap narrowed, Bryan extended both hands, tensing to lunge—
Fwip!
In the instant he was about to strike, the sharp whistle of something cutting air reached his ears. An arrow thudded into the door panel of the shop beside him, freezing him mid-stride.
Bryan stared at the arrow embedded inches from his face, pupils contracting. He'd been played. A slight turn of his head confirmed it — the girl with the bow was crouching on a nearby rooftop.
Simultaneously, Andrea — who'd been walking with her back to him — spun around with startling speed, pivoting on her heel and launching a vicious kick behind her without even looking.
Bryan darted backward, nimbly dodging the sweeping leg. He was about to retreat when a thought struck him — the third person hadn't shown up yet.
His mind raced. If these three had set this trap, they wouldn't just let him walk away. His eyes flashed with sudden understanding, and he made a move that must have looked baffling to anyone watching — just as he was about to round the corner, he dropped into a crouch.
The instant he ducked, a figure burst from behind the corner. Leo, arms spread wide, lunged to grab and restrain him.
But Bryan's unexpected drop left Leo grasping at empty air. His own momentum carried him forward, off-balance and stumbling.
Bryan seized Leo's ankle in one hand, yanked hard to prevent him from recovering, then pressed his back against Leo's chest, drove his legs straight, and stood — hoisting the man clean off the ground.
"Ahhh—!"
Leo knew he was in trouble. He thrashed wildly, arms reaching for Bryan's face, fighting to buy his teammates time.
Bryan had no intention of carrying a conscious package. In the same motion, he drove an elbow into Leo's forehead with brutal precision, knocking him out cold.
Using Leo's limp body as a shield, Bryan rendered Hannah helpless on her rooftop perch — she couldn't risk a shot that might hit her companion.
When Andrea charged forward to rescue Leo, Bryan's lips curled into a satisfied grin. He hurled Leo's unconscious body straight at her.
Andrea couldn't dodge — not without letting Leo crash to the ground. She caught him, but the man's weight drove her stumbling backward, completely blocking her view.
She couldn't see Bryan, but Hannah could. The girl loosed an arrow, then dropped to ground level and nocked another, rushing toward the commotion.
The hasty shot — she already knew it wouldn't hit. She wasn't counting on accuracy; she just needed to slow him down and buy time.
But when Hannah rounded the corner with her bowstring drawn, she found Leo sprawled on the ground and the soldier standing behind her sister, one arm wrenching Andrea's right hand behind her back, a knife pressed against her throat.
"Don't move."
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