Code Zulu Alpha: Nerd in the Apocalypse!

"Do you live near Chang's? The Chinese guy with the big house?" I asked.

Their group looked at me in shock from what I said. The man gave a bitter smile and looked at me with worry.

"H-how did you know?!" The other guy with a hat said.

"Shut up man!" the guy at back bellowed.

"Too late. Well, I promised you we won't do anything. Back on topic, do you live near Chang's?" I repeated myself.

They looked at each other.

"We'd only tell you if we could have a gun, that's the deal. One of ours got scratched when fighting them up close. He turned after a few hours…" the man said.

"Sorry, I don't think that's a good idea. I could give you protective gear instead. It doesn't run out of bullets like the gun I have here." I negotiated.

"We need guns man!" he said to the other guy.

"Noise attracts them, right?! We need to be quiet!" the guy in the hat said.

"We'll take the protective gear. It's better than nothing." the guy in the middle said.

"C'mon man! We don't even know them and we're telling them where we live?!" the guy in the back bellowed.

"You think I'll take an interest in a place with no food?" I interjected.

"..." everyone in their group.

They contemplated for a while but the man in the middle answered for them.

"Deal. We live near Chang's though a bit further. People are still in there though we heard a couple of gunshots inside." the man said.

My Unc Zardon exclaimed, "Hey! You said gunshots?! Let's go there now!"

I looked at my uncle and he had a worried and disgruntled expression. The other group were startled and they looked worried.

"Come with us, we'll give you a ride. Save you the trouble of encountering a few of them on your way back." I said.

We gave them a ride in the truck and we run through a couple of zombies along the way. My uncle was driving faster than normal since his family was in Chang's place.

"Know someone from Chang's? I'm Jay by the way." the man said.

"Sky, yeah we know someone from there. How many are you in your group? You guys have something secure?" I probed.

"Sorry, still can't tell you guys. We've let someone in before and he stole some food. Is it a relative in there?" Jay said.

"I told you we don't need food. Look at this truck, we're hauling motor parts. I'm looking for the most difficult thing to find. So far, I've only found a few." I said.

"Motor parts?" he asked, confused.

"Good people." I replied.

"…" their group was silent but my group had a faint smile on their faces.

"You guys have a place then? My name is Jon. Do you take people too? We killed a few of them already! We could help you guys! Right, Bing?" the guy with the hat said then he looked at the guy in the back before.

The guy named 'Bing' just nodded and he kept on staring at Kaley and Tatiana. He just disregarded my look at him and kept on ogling at the two. One of them wearing a jacket with a hood and a facemask back-tapped him and he just snorted. The other guy looked at me with worry and I just have a nonchalant expression.

"Go ahead, try your luck. If you try anything with Tatiana, the tall blonde one, you'd be lucky to have brain damage and live. If you try with Kaley on the other hand… hmmm, let's just say that someone will be either sweeping their teeth on the floor or gurgling blood." I said to them nonchalantly.

The girls gave an amused expression from my remark.

"Bing, heard that? Stop it with that dirty look. We're sorry, I'm Daisy. Nice tats by the way." The person with the facemask said.

"Oh? Didn't notice she was a girl." I said to myself.

"Thanks. Name's Sky. Don't apologize to me, tell it to the girls here." I said as she removed her facemask and hood. She had several tattoos on her neck and on her chest when she loosened the jacket she was wearing.

"I see no problem, it's just looking. Sky, I'm allowed to do something when they try something else, correct?" Tatiana said with an even thicker accent and a menacing tone.

"Of course." I replied.

Bing almost immediately averted his gaze while Daisy gave an amused expression. Kaley just gave me a slight elbow and she was giving a relaxed expression.

"To answer your question Jon, we do, stay with us for a while and we'll head to your place if you want to come with us so I could assess you all first, yeah?" I said.

"What do you mean by asses? Like butts?" Bing said with a confused expression.

"..." everyone else.

"Hah! Good one, that's not what I meant. I'll see if I could take your people in or not. I'm cautious like you guys and I wouldn't just take anyone I met for the first time outside. It's been a week and I'm not sure how people act now." I said to them.

"Well, so far, I've taken everyone I've met." I said to myself.

The road we took was a back road going on an intersection past the burger place we looted before. It was a straight road for a mile and we need to take a right turn in order to reach the place after driving a quarter of a mile more.

*screech*

We finally reached Chang's place and we cleared a few that were walking around. There was a pile in one corner being invaded by flies and I made a mental note to burn it later.

"It's fewer here than my place." I thought to myself.

My Unc Zardon then went down the truck and called inside.

"KENNY! ARE YOU THERE?!" he shouted for a few times.

A few zombies from afar were starting to look in this direction. Kaley and Jared aimed at a few of them from a few tens of meters and they fell down with each shot. Jared was faster than Kaley even if he was using a bolt-action rifle.

*psshew* *plop*

*psshew* *plop*

*psshew* *plop*

*psshew* *plop*

"They must really be soldiers…" I heard Jon whispering to Jay.

"The one with the sniper gun looks young though…" Jay replied.

A door opened from the inside and a few people walked out.

"Pa?! You're here!" a small voice sounded.

We saw a small kid probably in his elementary, rush outside, and met my uncle at the other side of the gate. An older lady then stepped in and dragged Kenny off the gate.

"Hey! Get away from that drunken fool!" the lady shouted.

"I'm sober for 10 years you bitch! You know you lied at court! I'm taking Kenny and Hannah with me now! Take those two others you brainwashed with yourself and fuck yourselves!" my uncle bellowed.

"What is going on?" Jay asked me.

"It's complicated stuff." I said.

"Hey, can we go ahead for now? We haven't eaten anything since the morning. Just drive a bit forward and look for the yellow gate that is numbered 223." Jay said.

"Woah, why did you tell him our address?!" Bing exclaimed.

"I think we could trust this group." Jay replied.

"Good choice." I thought to myself.

"He looks more like a person we could trust than you though, big guy." Daisy said to Bing.

"What?!" he exclaimed and the rest chuckled.

I nodded and then their group broke off with us.

Three more figures emerged from Chang's large house. A skinny male with pale skin and a disgruntled expression, a female with dark skin like my uncle but petite, and another female with a large forehead though she was not as tall as the first two. The last one went to Kenny's side and held him tight. She whispered something inaudible from my side but it calmed him down. They were Cyrill, Joanna, and Hannah, Kenny's older siblings.

"What do you want, you dumb fuck?!" Cyrill bellowed.

"Didn't the court give you a restraining order? Hmm?!" Joanna added.

"I'm taking Kenny and Hannah with me. Sue me in court if you still could." my uncle replied.

The two grew more furious and they lashed out with their mom.

"Can you even take care of the two?! You barely made a home for us!" Leslie, his wife shouted.

"Bitch?! I was always at work doing overtime after overtime. I was doing all the hard work while not being appreciated even with a proper meal. Do you even know how hard being a truck driver is?! I'd go home in the middle of the night and even not even a cup of rice is in the pot. I'd have to do everything by myself! You could've at least left a cold meal in the table!" my uncle retorted.

"Overtime?! Maybe on your side chick you always went to the bar with!" Cyrill shouted.

"That's my fucking money I earned with my own! You're just a fucking freeloader who can't even find a decent job! Tell your whore of a mother who's seeing who and we'll see!" my uncle bellowed.

"...!" my cousin was stunned.

"How about me then?! I found a job and finished my studies, what did you do?! Where were you?!" Joanna then rebutted with bated breath.

I rolled my eyes.

"That's years of studies down the drain if you can't even figure that out." I thought to myself.

Jared that was with me had a frown on his face and he tightly held his gun. I could feel that he was angry and ready to lash out. We've never heard bullshit like this coming from anyone and what made it worse was it came out from our relatives.