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Mike, Jacob, James and Allen were in the back of the truck helping Sonya hand out the food when we came inside. The simple fact that the AC was back on and that there was food, no matter how little, seemed to really be lifting spirits, especially in the eight or nine Kids. Chy and I walked up stairs to where she was hiding out. I set my FAL down on the table against the wall and took off my web gear, dropping it next to my rifle before slumping back against the wall.

"How do the Primals do it?", I asked aloud.

"Do what?", Chy asked reaching into a mini fridge and pulling out two bottles of water.

"Go around in the dark all the time", I said catching the water bottle as she tossed it to me, "I've spent the last two months of my life in the dark and it was starting to get to me. How long is the day night cycle on this planet?"

"50 hours", Chy said sitting next to me.

"Damn time zones", I sighed taking a drink of the almost frozen water, "damn, that was...refreshing. Last time I had cold water was....about two months ago."

"Two months?", Chy asked leaning on my shoulder, "has it really been going on that long?"

"Longer than that actually", I said, "I don't have a clue how long Sarah and the others had been hiding out before I stumbled into the lab, but we've all got it good compared to how rough Alcatraz has had it."

"What do you mean?", Chy asked.

"Martin decided to use the people he was surviving in the lab with as targets to zero his 20mm Long Range Rifle. Alcatraz watched everyone he cared about blown to pieces and after that, he was so scared Martin was still watching that he hid and stayed awake to the point of running down his batteries and nearly killing himself."

"He's a Synthetic?", Chy asked.

"I wasn't always", Alcatraz said from the back of the room, "mind if I join you guys? It's kind of crowded downstairs and outside."

"Sure", Chy said, "did you guys finish disposing of those bodies?"

Alcatraz nodded, "yeah, there's nothing but ash left."

"Good", Chy said, "it will keep those ghouls away from us. For now at least."

Alcatraz nodded, "to answer your question Chy, I wasn't always a Synthetic. I was born human and became one later."

"How'd that work out?", Chy asked curiously.

Alcatraz sighed, "Well, to condense six months of events into one story, I basically got charred by a blown gas line. When everything was said and done, I had my brain, heart and one eye left that still worked. My Mother, being the amazing biologist that she is, decided to put me in a Synthetic body because she'd already lost my Dad and her second husband. She didn't wanna lose me and since I was like ten and absolutely terrified of dying such a painful death, we risked it."

"Wow", "Chy said.

"After two weeks of sitting in one of Allen Ransol's TEHS machines, the new body arrived", Alcatraz said, "and a week after that, I was up and around again. In the two weeks following I had the Exo Implanted, it's one of the reasons I'm kind of short for my age, as the Exo is attached in such a way that it's stunted my growth. If I were to properly disconnect it and go about my day to day life without it, in four days I'd be too tall for it and have to have it rebuilt, which I should probably do anyway."

"That sucks", Chy said, "my worst inconvenience is that I sometimes have to take a few pills for my headaches."

"I'd take that over the problems I have any day of the week", Alcatraz smiled, "by the way Skyline, Sarah's gathered everyone up, said she had something to say about her progress on the cure."

"Let's go then", I said standing up. Chy stood up as well and followed me downstairs. We walked through the garage, following Alcatraz and stepping over people who were still eating as carefully as we could. Alcatraz then led us inside the main building. It was a fairly spacious layout considering the building's purpose. The hallway was about 7 or eight feet wide with two doors on each side. The two on the left were offices that contained several people each who were eating and talking with each other, while the one on the right lead to a bathroom, the other a supply closet with a depressed looking white guy with blue trunks on sitting in a chair. At the end of the hallway it branched off into what looked like a waiting area that had a tent with a family of Xenomorphs which looked rather beaten down by recent events, while the other end held doors to a bigger waiting room and some more office space that again housed more people, while the door on the left side of that end led into the infirmary. In of itself it wasn't that big. There was a metal counter lining the left side of the wall. A desk with a laptop at the end of the room, with a large metal cabinet beside it. More metal cabinets lined the area where the wall met the ceiling and cast a bit of a shadow on Sarah's lab equipment, which looked like the equivalent of what I had in High-School. Sarah herself had stripped off her lab coat and boots, pacing them on top of the metal cabinet by Desk. Her green tank top was drenched with sweat and she looked tired as shit. The others were sitting on the floor and leaning against the walls.

"Damn sister", Chy said, "you look like your about to flip shit."

"I am", Sarah sighed, "Martin was one step ahead of me."

"What do you mean?", I asked.

"Agent 41 can counter a DNA scissor", Sarah said, "when I introduced the scissor into it's gene base, it turned itself acidic just long enough to destroy the scissor and then reverted to normal. I had hoped I could some how turn this against it and use something immune to the acidic properties that tricked the Agent 41 into turning acidic long enough to destroy itself, but that attempt ended in failure."

"How did it fail?", Allen asked.

"If Agent 41 stays acidic for too long it ends up destroying the host", Sarah sighed, "I don't wanna make a WMD to destroy Agent 41, I wanna make a cure."

"So if screwing with 41's DNA is out", Allen said, "I assume that means were screwed?"

"Well the compound I threw together ain't the cure", Sarah said, "but it's quite efficient in killing 41 infected victims, drawing blood with a Scissor tainted blade and then avoiding the ghouls for several seconds results in them coughing up their own internal organs, don't ask how I found that out. I'll continue to produce that compound along side my cure research, but don't expect much."

"Okay", I said, "so we have a short term weapon, but what about a long term weapon?"

"The way I see it we have two options", Sarah said, "I might not beable to use a Scissor to stop 41, but I might beable to write a patch for it that could brake into it's DNA code and order it to suspend it's attack on the body, doing that would require splitting 41 into individual DNA strands and then observing them one by one, figuring out which strands do what, and then writing a code into a specially designed cell designed to fly under 41's radar and latch onto it, or we could try and design our own virus."

"Our own Virus?", James asked.

"Yes", Sarah said, "a counter virus designed to identify and destroy Agent 41 as well as repair the damage already done to the host, eventually returning them to how they were before they were infected. It wouldn't be easy to produce, we would need to capture test subjects and we would have to find away to make it 100% communicable and 100% effective. Or, we could use it to force the virus to turn on itself. Though this would only allow us to cure patients who have not yet succumbed to the Virus."

"Succumbed?", I asked, "so died, as in dead?"

"Yes", Sarah said.

"So they are Zombies?", Tyler said, "that's wonderful."

"Does it matter what we call them?", Sarah asked, "I doubt it. Anyway, Skyline I should warn you upfront that no mater what you decide I should do, I can do it as long as that AC stays on, but to make it work I'll need better lab equipment, what I got is designed to identify problems existing problems and chose existing solutions, not create new solutions to new problems. It's a miracle that I got as far as I did."

"Would Pharmaceutical grade equipment work?", Chy asked, "there's a Pharmacy near by that went on lock down when the missile landed, assuming it's still in one piece, it might have something you can use."

"I'll need autopsy tools", Sarah began, "a thirty seven five centrifuge, a much more powerful microscope and a load of Potassium Sulfate Chloride. I'd like to have a more powerful computer than this old as Window's Vista and a better text editor than Word pad, bit it is what it is until you get that big thing running Tyler."

"I'm working on it" Tyler said, "wiring and programming 6 towers to function as a super computer isn't easy."

"Neither is trying to save the Confederacy", Sarah said.

"When should I head out?", I asked.

"Under the cover of night" Chy said, "there are a lot of undead in that area of the resort and even more open ground. Since it's a Pharmacy, looters are a given. I'd take Allen with you and have him hide somewhere with that Bravo of his, no looter will challenge you when that thing starts rocking."

"I'll take you too", I said.

"No", Chy said, "Marco and Sonya need me here because of my leadership skills. Sonya is a good girl, but she can't keep these people in line. There are too many hurt taking up Vahq's time, so she can't run things either. Marco's busy keeping a look out for looters and undead and I'm keeping everything from falling apart."

"Come on Sky", Allen said, "Alcatraz, Mike, James and I are all the combat support you need, everyone has their role to play."

"True enough", I said, "something about kicking ass and saving the Galaxy with my girlfriend just appeals to me though."

Chy laughed, "God it's like your 7 and going through your superman phase again."

I smiled, "ah, I remember those days."

"You liked Superman?", Tyler asked.

"I loved the guy", I said, "I had pictures in my wallet of Superman that were right behind pictures of Jesus, love both those guys."

"How do you not love Jesus?", James asked as we walked out of the infirmary on Sarah's order.

"A question no man can ever honestly answer", Tyler said, "I'll see ya guys later, I gotta get back to work on that stupid PC."

Tyler departed us and one by one, my friends went back to what they were doing while Chy and I went back up to the balcony of the lifeguard tower.

"You know Sky", Chy said, "if you need something to keep you busy and really wanna do some work with me, I have a few things that I need done that no one wants to do."

"That are?", I asked.

"The day before I came and got you guys", Chy began, "Sonya and I started arranging a giant help sign out of the furniture that got left on the beach before we got chased off by the zombies. Also, there's an alcove a good distance away with some boat wrecks from not that long ago, I'd bet my hide that those boats had emergency equipment, including signal flares and maybe flare guns food rations. There's also a few old bars in the area of where we were building the Help sign that might have food and supplies that would only help us hang on that much longer. Plus, things like knives and boat paddles, mainly as tools and decorations, but since the mutants don't have acidic blood, that makes melee combat practical and the more people we have with weapons the better."

"It's the little things in life", I said smiling grabbing my Fal, Katana and the predator bow, "sounds like we got some work to do."

Chy grabbed her vest and AR ten, throwing them both over her shoulder as we walked downstairs and out the front of the garage, finding that Marco and the other two guys that went to help him burn the bodies were having a smoke.

"What I tell you about those cigarettes?", I asked as Chy and I approached the gate.

"They'll kill me I know", Marco said puffing smoke, "but hell, there a better way to die than getting eaten."

"Not really", I said holding out my hand, "give it here."

Marco took another puff and dropped it in my hand. I put the stub out on the handrail of the FAL and tossed it aside, "if I catch you with another one of these things I'll put my foot in your ass, we clear?"

"Yes master", Marco said sarcastically, "where you guys headed?"

"Down to the beach to finish the giant help sign", Chy said, "we need to kill some time before the sun goes down and I figured finishing a few minor tasks was the best way to do it."

"Why you killing time?", Marco asked.

"There's a pharmacy not far from here I need to raid", I said, "Chy figured it was best to go at night so I would have the dark as cover."

"You'll blend in pretty well", Marco smiled, "being black and all."

"A sad attempt at a race joke", Chy smiled, "when are you gonna learn your really, really shitty at being a racist Marco?"

Marco shrugged, "I'll get it right eventually."

"Yeah right", Chy smiled, "hey, mind getting my Barrett from the tower and giving us some cover fire while we work on the sign?"

"Not at all", Marco said, "I'm bored and killing some zombies will solve that. Where's Sonya? I haven't seen her since I got back."

"Out back shifting through all that scrap with Skyline's friend Tyler", Chy said, "he's convinced there might be something useful out there."

"One man's trash is another man's treasure", Marco said heading for the building. Chy swiped her card and I pulled the door open for her. She stepped out of the fenced in area and I followed suit, shutting the door behind me. I followed Chy down the wooden walkway to a set of stairs that made several ninety degree turns and eventually reached the beach. While I was walking down the stairs, I couldn't help but notice the view. I could see miles and miles of beach head, all of it covered in glowing white sand and bamboo houses, beach towels and umbrellas, Tiki Bars, docks, all kinds of things. I could see endless jungle, Supertrees and the two mountains in the distance that had a huge gap in between them that would allow ships in and out. Some day once this was all over, I wouldn't mind spending a week or two.

"Man", I said to myself pausing on the staircase, "this hell sure does look like paradise."