A car alarm shrieked, breaking the silence that perpetually blanketed the city these days.

"Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIIIIIIIIIII-"

Daryl heard Glenn long before he saw him.

When Glenn came skidding around the corner and flew past him like a bat fresh out of hell, he knew he didn't want to stick around to see what the kid was running from. Daryl took off after him, closing the gap between them quickly.

"The fuck did you do, Short Round?"

"Dude just shut up and RUN!"

Legs pumping, the duo careened through a narrow alleyway. Daryl heard the first of the groans filling the air and hazarded a glance behind them, noticing a growing undead horde filing in behind them.

"OH HOLY FU-"

Daryl slammed straight into Glenn's back, knocking both of them to the ground in a tangle of limbs and assorted weaponry.

"Why'd you stop running, man?"

Glenn scrambled to his feet, gesturing with his baseball bat towards the group of walkers that had appeared in front of them, blocking the end of the alleyway.

"They've got us boxed in!"

"Ah hell."

Daryl lurched towards a door some 15 odd feet in front of them. It must have been the back exit to some store; whatever it led to had to be better than sticking around in this alley. He braced himself and kicked the door just below the doorknob. It shuddered, but didn't give. Cursing, he kicked again and this time was rewarded with a distinct cracking noise as the wood splintered. Daryl grabbed the front of Glenn's shirt and bodily threw him through the doorway, dashing inside after him.

Glenn drew out his flashlight and scanned the interior of the building they'd busted into while Daryl swung the remains of the door shut, and looked for something to block it with. Noticing a dusty filing cabinet in a corner, he started to drag it towards the door. It was heavy- that was good, but it made things harder. He panted with the exertion of pushing the cabinet and grunted, "Some help would be nice, kid."

Satisfied that there wasn't an immediate threat to them inside the building, Glenn came over to help. Together they managed to shove the cabinet in front of the door. Just in time, too- the sound of decaying corpses pushing against the door filled their ears.

"Let's not stick around here. C'mon." Daryl headed the opposite direction, crossbow raised. Glenn shined the flashlight in front of them to light the way.

The store they'd broken into was filled with shelves that had been knocked over, their contents spread all over the floor. This was fairly typical in Atlanta- the city was a fucking mess. Between the riots in the early days when the dead first rose and the subsequent fire-bombing, most stores were now filled with only discarded merchandise and burnt rubble. The two navigated the mess effortlessly.

The plate glass windows at the front of the store had been shattered at some point. Glass was everywhere. Unfortunately, so were the walkers. They hadn't noticed the survivors yet, but with the noise the other geeks were making behind them, it was only a matter of time.

This was bad.