Apocalypse: Branch Chapter Five
#1 of Apocalypse #1 Branch
Apocalypse: Branch Chapter Five
I jerked awake and searched through the dark for one of my guns as somebody knocked on the door swinging it open. I panicked not remembering were I was. All I saw was the flash of eyes reflecting the small amount of light in the room.
"Hey man calm down your safe here, I'm just here to tell you your free to go and breakfast is in the mess hall. Just follow the signs and you should find it pretty fast." He dropped a bag with all our clothes in it onto the table and walked out.
We all got up and dressed quickly headed out the door. We followed the exit signs out of the building and onto a small street outside. I blinked in the bright sunlight admiring the scene before me. It was a town, a normal one that hadn't been ransacked or destroyed. Aside from the perimeter wall you couldn't tell anything was wrong at all.
Random people were walking around minding their own business. It was odd everyone seemed to know everyone else here. We got a few strange looks as we followed some markers on the street corners to a large building with a sign out front that said "MESS HALL" in large print and "first meals free" in smaller print underneath.
"Bout time we found it I'm dieing for some hot food." Pyro said walking through the double doors. He stopped in his tracks as every head in the room turned and stared at us as we walked in.
The mess looked like a school cafeteria, it only had long tables with bench seats. There was a serving area at the front with stacks of trays and plates. There was even a fugly old lady with a hairy mole wearing a hair net and serving the food.
The lion who had examined me stood up and clapped his paws together. "Alright now folks I know its been awhile since we saw anyone new but these nice people are here to rest trade and maybe even become residents. So lets make 'em feel at home."
Everyone went back to eating and we were able to eat our breakfast in peace. After we finished we all walked out the door wondering what to do next. As we started to walk down a random street and try to explore the town a young fox wearing camouflage pants and a dark green shirt walked up to us.
"Your equipment has been sterilized and you can retrieve it now if you follow me."
'Well then lead the way."
He turned on his heal and walked back the way he had come. He let us through a residential area to small warehouse type building next to the gate we had come in through. It looked sort of like a firehouse in the sense that it had five large doors on the front for vehicles to be pulled in and out. We walked over to the first open door and walked in to find my jeep had been very thoroughly washed inside and out.
All of our supplies had been organized and stacked neatly in back with a printed list of everything we had. The one odd thing was that there was a red line through teriyaki jerky with "FEE" written next to it in large red print. I grabbed my pack and pulled it open to find that my last bag of jerky was gone.
"Hey, who the hell took my jerky?"
"That would be me." The fox said backing away slightly.
"Why the fuck did you steal my last bag of jerky?"
"It's the cleaning fee. Residents usually pay with tokens but since your new I just took your jerky instead. Besides we don't have any here so I gave you a big discount."
I grabbed him by the collar and lifted him off the ground. "Where did you put it thief?"
Jen grabbed my arm. "Hey just let him go I'm sure he didn't mean any harm by it."
"Hey if you go out scavenging and bring me back some I'll pay you a fair price and sanitize your gear for free."
"Fine but tell ask before you rummage through our things and take the best stuff for yourself." I dropped him and climbed into the jeep with the others. "So where are we staying?"
"I'll show you." He said hopping into the backseat between Pyro and Nicole. "Turn right and go three blocks then take a left."
I followed all his directions and we soon pulled into the driveway of a small two story house. It had what looked like solid steel shutters on all the windows and a retractable ramp that went from a deck on the second story to identical ones on the three surrounding houses.
"Okay so this is it. You can stay as long as you pull your weight in the community. No rent or utilities, you eat in the mess and barter for what you need. Once you find a job you will get paid in tokens." He pulled a golden arcade token from his pocket and showed it to us all. "it nothing fancy but it passes for money here. Since you guys have been roaming the wastes for awhile I would suggest you take up scavenging jobs. If you have any questions just look around for the big lion he's our mayor founder and head physician."
"Thanks but how do we go about finding jobs here?"
"If you want to scavenge ask the mayor for anything else ask around town to find out who needs help and confirm you position with the mayor."
"Does he do everything?"
"No but he does his best to make sure everything runs smoothly. Oh and I forgot I need to confiscate those short wave radios you have. They aren't allowed inside the perimeter, Except for use by the guards."
"Fine their in the back but keep em safe I want those back if we leave."
He grabbed the radios and hopped out walking off quickly. We grabbed our stuff and headed inside.
"HOLY SHIT IT HAS AC!" Nicole squealed excitedly.
We all walked in and began exploring excitedly. The house had four levels, two above ground and two below. The main level held the living room kitchen and dining room. The second story had two large bedroom, the first basement level directly under the main floor was a storage room. The lowest level was a big open room, the only way down was with a small cargo lift.
Nicole and Pyro took the two rooms upstairs while me and Jen decided to make the lowest level into one big bedroom/armory. We spent the rest of the day bringing in and organizing the few things we had brought with us. We put all our canned food in the storage room, Me and Pyro even found a few spare board and build a gun rack with some tools we borrowed from one of our neighbors.
He was a Doberman who had managed to survive by fighting his way out of the city with a sledgehammer and a .45 ACP. He told us that only three other people had managed to survive and find this place, and that the first one had been infected and almost started an outbreak in the town. We found out that the row of houses we lived in was nicknamed survivors street because its where all the survivors lived. He also told us that if we decided to go back out scavenging to leave somebody here to guard our house because the other townspeople had a habit of stealing from the scavengers while they were away.
After we finished organizing everything we headed off to bed. For the first time since this all happened we all left our guns on the rack as we turned out the lights.