The rooftop stirred like a nest of bees about to be kicked open.
Everyone had their task—Glenn was wiring the noisemaker with his hands trembling slightly, Morales and Jacqui helping gather what junk they could. Andrea and T-Dog stood by the roof's edge, scanning the street, rifle ready. Jack, Rick, and Grant were already by the rooftop stairwell, suppressors checked, blades ready.
T-Dog unhooked the battered walkie from his vest and clicked it twice.
"Quarry camp. Quarry camp, this is T. Do you copy?" His voice was calm but tight with tension. "We are pinned down in a building near the city center. Walkers are surrounding the structure. Repeat—surrounded."
He paused, eyes flicking to Grant who nodded to continue.
"Listen up—we've run into three armed friendlies. I say again, three armed individuals. They're helping us get out. They're not a threat."
He waited.
Only static.
"Shane? Dale? Anybody—copy?"
Nothing. T-Dog glanced at Andrea, who shook her head, worried.
But back at the quarry, the message came through crystal clear. Everyone in the camp heard it. Lori dropped the can of beans she was holding. Shane stepped out of the tent, stunned. While Dale was trying to respond but his voice did not come through the radio.
T-Dog's voice buzzed again from the speaker
"We're trying to move east. Headed for the bridge building if we can make it. Will update when clear. T-Dog out."
Still no reply.
But they were listening.
———
The rooftop buzzed with quiet, urgent movement. Glenn knelt by the HVAC unit, tying off wires from a small car battery he'd salvaged. He looked up at Morales and Jacqui.
"Ten seconds once I spark it," he whispered. "Once it pops, we book it for the shaft."
Morales had rigged a tin sheet and a chain from a ceiling fixture—primitive but loud. Jacqui held the firecrackers, waiting for the cue.
Glenn twisted the wires together.
Fzzzt.
A crackling hum began. A moment later, a string of firecrackers burst in loud, echoing pops that danced across the rooftop, followed by a loud clang-clang-clang from Morales's chain setup as he slammed it into the HVAC vent.
Below, the walkers responded immediately.
A groaning roar surged upward, the sound of bodies pressing harder against the building, funneling toward the west side where the chaos echoed loudest.
T-Dog looked over the edge and grinned.
"Damn. That's a good chunk of 'em."
Grant gave a subtle nod.
"Move."
The group moved quickly to the janitor's access shaft: a narrow vertical duct with rusted ladder rungs bolted to the side wall.
"Rick, you're second. Morales, follow me. Everyone else in order."
Grant disappeared down the shaft like a shadow. Rick followed, his supressed AR-15 slung tight. Jack glanced back toward the rooftop—Merle lingered, still sulking—then dropped in after the others.
Inside, it was narrow and close, the smell of mildew thick. Glenn moved fast despite the tight quarters, while Jacqui behind him muttered, "If I die in this damn vent, I'm haunting all of you."
After ten tense minutes, they reached the second floor landing. Glenn popped the maintenance hatch.
They emerged into a dusty office hallway, abandoned and silent. Old blood smeared the walls in hand-shaped streaks. Desks were overturned. A ceiling tile hung like a broken jawbone.
"Skybridge is this way," Glenn said, pointing toward a metal double door.
"Stay quiet," Jack whispered, motioning toward the darkened corridor ahead. "We clear this like we're in Fallujah."
They advanced in formation—Grant up front, Rick and Jack side by side, T-Dog watching rear. Rick passed a corpse slumped in a swivel chair, its skull caved in. A sticky trail led toward a stairwell.
The group reached the skybridge. The windows along its length were mostly intact, though one was cracked by some long-ago impact. Through them, they could see the horde gathering, dense on the street three stories down. A constant river of death.
Grant gave the go.
"Rick, clear left. Jack, cover the right."
They stormed through. Andrea and Glenn hustled the rest of the group across while Jack scanned with his rifle, finger on the trigger. The metal groaned under their boots but held. Rick checked the doors on the far side: locked.
He reared back and kicked.
BOOM.
The old wood splintered.
They entered the far office building—darker, colder. The lights were dead. Jacqui almost tripped over a filing cabinet blocking part of the hall.
Then a low groan sounded nearby.
"Contact left," Jack said.
Three walkers stumbled into view.
"Quiet," Grant ordered.
Andrea, without hesitation, rushed forward and drove her blade into the first one's head. Glenn dispatched the second with a sharpened screwdriver. Morales crushed the third with a fire extinguisher.
Grant only sighed.
The hallway now silent again, Grant looked to Rick.
"East stairwell. You're on point."
Rick nodded, adrenaline in his veins.
They descended one floor, then two. The exit was in sight.
Outside, Ghost's voice crackled through the radio.
"I'm at the alley. Ten seconds."
Grant smiled slightly.
"Right on time."
Glenn reached the lobby door and peeked through.
"There's at least twenty out there."
"Not for long," Ghost replied.
Then, from outside, they saw it—a flare arced through the air, trailing smoke as it bounced across the street, crashing through a glass window of a storefront.
The walkers turned as one.
Ghost revved the Humvee.
"Now!" Grant shouted.
They burst through the lobby doors, weapons drawn.
Grant led. Jack and Rick flanked. Glenn waved them toward the alley.
The team sprinted. Walkers turned too late. A few lurched toward them, but Jack dropped two with suppressed bursts from his AR-15.
Rick gunned down another with suppressed shots from his AR-15, steady-handed.
Ghost threw open the Humvee's side door.
"Move, move, move!"
One by one they piled in—T-Dog first, then Andrea, Jacqui, Glenn, Morales, Merle (shoved hard by Grant), then Jack and Rick.
Grant was last—he paused to fire a shot into a walker lunging for the bumper, then climbed in and slammed the door.
Ghost hit the gas.
The Humvee roared down the alley, crushing walkers in its path. As it turned the corner, Rick looked back through the dust-smeared rear window.
The building vanished behind them.
They were clear.
For now.
x
The Humvee rumbled down the cracked road, its suspension groaning under the weight of ten cramped bodies, a collection of boots, rifles, elbows, and sweat-packed gear jammed in shoulder-to-shoulder like sardines in a can. The air inside was heavy, a mix of metal, gun oil, dried blood, and breath.
Glenn, his knees practically touching his chin where he sat awkwardly between Jacqui and Morales, exhaled hard.
"Hey, guys—can we stop here for a second? I think we're too cramped up in here. I can't feel my legs," he said, wriggling to get comfortable, only to bump Jacqui's elbow with his own.
Merle grunted from the corner, where he had one arm awkwardly cradled against his ribs. "Yeah, no shit. Feels like I've been stuffed up a bull's ass in here."
From the front seat, Grant tapped Ghost's shoulder twice—sharp and precise.
"Pull over."
The Humvee slowed and came to a stop by the roadside—just outside the ruins of Atlanta, where pine trees began to swallow the city's edges and the buzz of walkers had thinned to a dull silence behind them.
One by one, the doors opened, creaking like old bones. Glenn, Merle, Andrea, and T-Dog practically tumbled out first, stretching like people who'd been folded in half for 15 minutes.
"Damn," T-Dog said, cracking his neck. "That was one hell of a plan you came up with, Grant." He slapped Grant's arm as the man climbed out of the passenger side.
Grant gave him a nod, checking the horizon with habit more than curiosity. "Thanks. Still tight, but it worked."
Morales followed them out, wiping sweat from his brow and eyeing the four strangers who had just saved their asses. He jabbed a finger toward Grant, Jack, Ghost, and Rick.
"Were you people military or somethin'?"
Grant nodded once. "Yeah. We were."
Glenn raised an eyebrow, still stretching out his legs. "I guess not the regular kind, huh? You're not like the ones we saw when the outbreak started. You move... different."
Grant gave a faint smile—but no answer.
Rick stepped forward then, standing by the side of the Humvee, still catching his breath. "I wasn't. Not military, I mean. I was a cop. Sheriff's department."
Merle, now wrapping the gauze around the graze on his ear, looked over with a half-laugh. "Cop, huh? Like that bastard Shane?"
Rick froze. Eyes flicked to him.
"You know Shane?" he asked slowly.
Merle shrugged. "Yeah, he rolled in with a woman named Lori and the kid. Big fella. Military buzzcut. Thought he ran the damn place."
Rick's expression softened into a wry, disbelieving smile. "Shane was my partner. On the force. Best friend before the world went to hell."
Andrea blinked, processing the connection. "That... actually makes a lot of sense. Shane brought your wife, Lori and Carl to us. Said he lost everything."
T-Dog crossed his arms. "I didn't know that."
Morales chuckled. "Of course you didn't. You weren't there when he told us, man."
Grant, meanwhile, walked back to the Humvee, opened the side door, and pulled out a compact med kit. He tossed a gauze roll toward Merle.
"Patch it."
Merle caught it, muttered something unintelligible, and pressed the gauze to his ear.
Then Jacqui piped up, wiping her forehead. "Grant, you got any water in there? Feels like my mouth's full of sandpaper."
"We've got water," Grant said, then called over his shoulder, "Ghost, Jack—open the rear cargo."
The back of the Humvee swung open with a mechanical click, revealing crates of essentials: ammo, MREs, medical kits, and several cases of bottled water.
"Everyone—hydrate," Grant barked, handing out bottles.
One by one, the group grabbed their share. The crackle of plastic and the sound of water bottles twisting open echoed like music.
T-Dog took one swig, then two—then three. "Wooo! That's what I'm talkin' about!"
Jacqui nearly downed hers in one go. "Thank God. I was so thirsty. I could've drunk out of a sewer."
Glenn gulped his, then sighed and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Man. I forgot what cold water tasted like. That's better than soda right now."
Andrea leaned against the side of the truck, sipping slow, savoring. "This is the best thing I've had in days."
Morales nodded, finishing his and tossing the empty into the nearby ditch. "That's the first time I haven't tasted panic in every breath."
Merle, as usual, remained apart. He drank with one hand, his bandaged other still sore, muttering. "Could've used some whiskey instead."
Rick wandered a few paces away toward an old flatbed truck parked in the overgrown shoulder. He examined the dash through the window, then called out to the group.
"This truck's intact. I think it might still run. Anyone know how to hotwire?"
Glenn raised his hand casually, like a kid in class. "I do."
Rick raised an eyebrow.
"Don't ask," Glenn said, already walking over.
A few minutes later, the sound of a growling engine filled the air. Glenn leaned out of the driver's side, grinning.
"She's good to go."
Jack and Ghost closed the Humvee's cargo, slapping the frame.
The convoy was now two-strong: Glenn driving in the truck, the Humvee following behind, engines humming down the backroads toward the quarry.
Behind them, Atlanta smoldered in the haze.