In a residential building a hundred meters from the shopping center, over twenty armed men and women occupied the ground floor — standing, sitting, checking their weapons with bored disinterest, stifling yawns as they waited.
One of them — a powerfully built man with a vicious face — sprang off the couch and stalked to the window, glaring into the night. "Goddammit, what's taking so long?"
"Relax, Balke." A haggard middle-aged man lounged on another couch, dragging deeply on a cigarette with a look of exhausted satisfaction. "Even if they're rookies, they're still QZ military. These things take time."
Balke shot him a contemptuous look. "Please, Lyle — a few greenhorns? How hard can they be? Probably haven't even killed a handful of Infected. We rush them with these numbers and it's over in seconds. Why all this cloak-and-dagger bullshit?"
"God, do you ever think?"
Lyle took another trembling drag, exhaled a perfect smoke ring, and said, "Or have you already forgotten that group of survivors two months ago? Only seven or eight of them — two of whom were kids."
He turned to fix Balke with a cold stare. "If you hadn't charged in like a moron, we wouldn't have lost a dozen fighters. We wouldn't be down to this many people. And by the way — I'm in charge now. Watch your mouth."
Balke's face went rigid, then flushed with fury. His fist rose and he took several steps forward before companions grabbed his arms and held him back.
Shaking them off with a snarl, he stomped toward the exit, muttering, "Big man. If the old boss hadn't caught an arrow from god-knows-where, you wouldn't be sitting there running your mouth."
Lyle's eyes narrowed as the voice faded, murderous intent flickering behind a mask of indifference. He turned to the woman beside him — thin, wearing black-framed glasses. "Speaking of which — any updates on those outsider survivors? Found them yet?"
The woman stood reflexively. "We captured one of their members a while back. Total pushover — said he wanted to stay here. After we released him, he's been feeding us intel ever since. We've picked up a few of their people based on his tips. They keep relocating, so it's been hard to pin them down, but the latest report puts them all in a school. Location confirmed."
"Good."
Lyle nodded with satisfaction, crushed his cigarette underfoot, and addressed the room. "After we deal with this QZ convoy, we hit those survivors tomorrow. For the boss."
The crowd murmured vague agreement, though their faces showed more obligation than enthusiasm.
"B-Boss!"
The front door burst open. The ugly-faced man stumbled in, gasping for air. "C-Cindy's... signal... they're... they're asleep—"
His stuttering delivery, in the already tense heat, immediately grated on everyone's nerves. Balke, who'd just come back inside, planted a boot in the man's backside. "Spit it out properly or I'll put a bullet in you!"
The man crashed to the floor, took a moment to recover, then scrambled up, trembling.
Lyle's knuckles whitened around his fist at Balke's insolence, but he kept his expression friendly. "Now, now, Balke — that's no way to treat him."
He turned to the messenger with a gentle smile. "Take a breath. No rush."
The man swallowed hard, glancing between Lyle's friendly face and Balke's terrifying one. "Cindy says... the sedatives m-might not be fully effective. The soldiers are asleep, but... she says we n-need to move fast. They could wake up any time."
Lyle's brow furrowed. He turned to a scrawny young man nearby.
The youth shrugged thoughtfully. "The drugs came from a hospital. We've kept them in cool storage, but they're way past expiration. Hard to say how much potency is left. But even expired sedatives have side effects — if they don't knock them out cold, they'll at least be in rough shape."
"Good enough. Let's move."
Lyle was on his feet immediately, rallying the group. The report said the targets were already asleep — meaning the drugs were working now. Better to strike before the window closed.
Despite private resentment toward their new leader, the group grabbed their weapons and fell in behind him. Only Balke hung back at the rear, his face dark as a storm cloud.
They crossed the wide road. No Infected in sight — the soldiers had already cleared the area.
At the shopping center entrance, they halted behind a hedge. Lyle turned to a tattooed man carrying a rifle. "Take a few people and stay outside. If anything goes sideways in there, keep the Infected away."
"No problem."
The tattooed man grinned, pointed at several people — including the scrawny youth and the glasses-wearing woman — and peeled off.
The remaining twenty followed Lyle toward the entrance.
Approaching the glowing interior, Lyle crouched at the doorway — and stopped. His brow creased. Something felt wrong.
He wasn't the strongest fighter in the group, but he was the sharpest. An instinct he couldn't articulate told him something was off — a nameless unease gnawing at his gut.
He stayed there, frozen, for a full fifteen minutes.
Behind him, his "followers" grew visibly impatient, exchanging annoyed glances. Nobody wanted to be the first to speak up — because they all knew who would.
Right on cue, Balke shouldered his way to the front, peered inside, and hissed, "How long are we gonna sit here? We got the all-clear. What are you waiting for?"
The interruption shattered Lyle's concentration. The urge to strangle the man was almost physical, but he forced a tight smile. "Since you're so eager — why don't you take point?"
"Follow me!"
Balke read it as cowardice and sneered, waving the others forward as he pushed through the doors.
Lyle's frown deepened. His instincts screamed wrong, but he couldn't articulate why. Then again — as he watched his "subordinates" file inside one by one — a cold smile touched his lips.
Someone else was testing the waters for him now.
Balke led the group into the shopping center. The only passable route was a single corridor; everything else was blocked by debris and furniture.
He didn't think much of it and pressed forward until they reached the cleared central space.
A campfire crackled in the middle. A lone figure sat beside it, head bowed, back turned. Around the fire lay twenty-odd bedrolls, their lumpy shapes vaguely human in the dim light.
Balke signaled his group — some toward the bedrolls, while he approached the figure by the fire alone.
He drew the machete from his back, closing in with a predator's grin replacing his earlier caution. He drove his boot into the figure's back. "Wake up, you stupid—"
The kick connected. No scream. No reaction.
Balke stood frozen, horror and disbelief flooding his face.
What he'd kicked over wasn't a person. It was a bundle of blankets propped up on a frame.
He whipped around to see the others yanking back bedroll covers to find nothing but piles of dirty junk underneath.
"It's a trap!"
Even the dullest among them understood immediately. Balke abandoned every shred of bravado and bolted for the exit, screaming:
"RUN!"
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