I own my fan characters and nothing else.

oOo

Unity

Chapter 3: Unwelcome Discoveries

A low, deep roar sounding off from somewhere behind him reached Thomas through the void of sleep, snapping his eyes open faster than any alarm ever could. He jolted violently, resulting in him cracking the back of his head on the concrete ledge he was leaning against. He stifled a shout of pain, instead releasing it in a hiss between his clenched teeth, rubbing the spot and leaning forward in confusion. A mess of ashes peppered the front of his shirt, from his cigarette, which had long since burned itself down to the butt, still dangling from the corner of his mouth. He spat it out, brushing them off and looking up – and realized with a start that it'd gotten completely dark outside. The sky was black and lightless, the moon and stars obscured by the same cloud cover from before, and he'd been sprawled out here on the rooftop, asleep.

Yet another of his cold sweats broke out across the surface of his skin, and he sat up, his hands flying protectively to the rifle still in his lap. He… he'd only closed his eyes for a second! What time was it? How long had he been sleeping out here? His face twisted into a snarl, and it took a copious amount of self-control to only bite his tongue and keep from loosing a loud stream of angry curses at himself. How could he be so fucking careless? He never allowed himself to rest until he was back in his home, where it was safe, and he'd just slipped up big-time. He could've been killed! What if while he'd been sleeping and unaware, one of those… those things had climbed up here and found him? It surely wouldn't have wasted a second to jump on him, tear through the walls of his belly with its claws like hot knives through butter…

Another low roar, more bark-like than the first combined with the squawks of vultures jerked him roughly out of his panic-stricken thoughts, back to reality, and he spun around to peer over the building's ledge and into the street below, squinting to make out what was going on in the darkness. There was the same long-decaying corpse from before, and the same little group of vultures that'd inexplicably hung around it this long, only this time they were flapping their broad wings, cawing and hopping around in agitation at something lurking in the shadows nearby…

Thomas snatched up his rifle and held it at the ready, trying to do so as quickly as he could without possibly catching the attention of whatever it was spooking the vultures. He peered through the scope telescope-style, aimed at the thick shadows surrounding the bases of the opposing buildings, and scanned the weapon slowly back and forth, trying to get a lock on his potential target. For a few moments, he saw nothing. He mumbled under his breath in irritation, mortification and paranoia at his blunder from a minute ago still making him panicky, jumpy. Those roars hadn't come out of nowhere, that much was certain, so where was it hiding...?

A dark shape separated itself from the mass of blackness across the street, coming from an alleyway and sidling in the direction of the vultures, keeping low to the ground. He immediately pointed his rifle at it, squinting through the scope, intent on figuring out what this one was so he'd know the best place to put the bullet and take it out quickly and neatly…

It moved about on all fours, in an awkward sort of "crouch", supporting its weight on its knuckles in an almost gorilla-like fashion. He could just make out the dull glint of long, jagged claws on the ends of the folded fingers from here…

The eye looking through the scope narrowed. A Hunter. One of the most dangerous and ruthless of the Special Infected. Incredibly agile and powerful, and with claws like theirs, capable of spilling your guts about your feet faster than you could even blink. He could feel his heartbeat begin to pick up all the more, his fingers unconsciously tightening around his weapon. He'd have to be fast. Fast and as quiet as he could manage. Hunters were notoriously difficult targets to hit on the move, but that was alright. He needed the challenge.

He leaned forward over the building's ledge, ever so slightly, not wanting to give away his position in trying to see the Infected's features. He couldn't glimpse much detail around the area of the face; most of it was wrapped in shadow, thanks to the hood of the dark-colored hoodie it wore being pulled up around its head. The right sleeve was torn off at the elbow, exposing the boil-dotted forearm, and the left was barely visible, completely bound in a length of dirty caution tape…

Thomas lowered his rifle slowly, his expression a mask of total and absolute shock. Suddenly, he became acutely aware of the caution tape tightened around its barrel, the very same kind, fluttering in the slight breeze…

He knew this Hunter.

He crept along at a slow pace, maintaining a steady crouch, each footfall slow, deliberate, trying not to create any noise. Evening had descended upon Fairfield, the sky a dull, smoky purple, reducing the sun to little more than a faint orange glow hidden behind the nearby buildings. He relied on the growing darkness to help conceal him as he moved; his current objective required a fair amount of silence, and it wouldn't do him very well to draw any more attention to himself than he already HAD - the blood dripping onto his arm from the blade of the machete clenched tightly in his right fist was still warm, and not his own.

He stopped in the shadow cast by a tall construction crane and crouched down, holding his breath to listen. Yes, there it was – a soft moaning, sobbing sound. A Witch. He'd been trailing after her for about fifteen minutes now, staying as close as he could without risking his safety. His intent, to kill. He'd nearly run right into her, and that would've proved DISASTROUS; he didn't particularly WANT to do it, but he had to take her out. Witches were powerful enough to apparently be feared by even OTHER Infected, very dangerous, and the fewer of them around there were, the better. Besides, maybe he could put the poor girl out of her misery…

It sounded like it was coming from behind him, at some distance away. After a moment he turned and started climbing up the side of the crane, grunting with the effort. He'd followed her into this abandoned construction site, which (luckily for him) had no shortage of hiding places… but, then again, that could mean SHE'd use them, too. He reached the steering cabin (evidently left ajar in the chaos from a couple of weeks before) and climbed inside, settling into the driver's seat. He had a good view of most of the site from up here through the broken windows, which was excellent. He swung his rifle from his shoulder and loaded it from his ammo belt as quickly as he could, eyes flicking up from his task every few seconds to take in his surroundings…

Ah, there she was, maybe twenty feet away – shuffling along, barefoot and filthy, her face buried in her lengthy claws, weeping for whatever reason Witches wept. Judging by her build and her attire, which had obviously once been flashy or fashionable despite now being caked in blood and dirt, she probably hadn't been much older than his own daughter. Poor thing.

She was heading towards a low concrete wall; he'd have to try and make this quick, or she'd end up out of shot and he'd have to move all over again. He peered through the scope and honed in on her, shifting around to find JUST the right spot where her head would be…

His finger was on the trigger when a flicker of movement in the corner of his right eye caught his attention, made him lose his focus, his timing. He cursed at his jumpiness, turning to see what had disturbed him. A figure was creeping along the top of the concrete wall in a slow, methodical manner, a figure dressed in a dingy gray hoodie and tan pants, both bound to their respective limbs with caution tape. Even from here, he thought he could make out the soft click of its claws against the concrete. A Hunter.

And immediately, Thomas' eyes narrowed into slits, his scowling face flushing a deep reddish-purple. It looked (and felt) as though somebody had drained his blood and replaced it with boiling water, a perfect picture of barely-suppressed rage.

He HATED Hunters.

Well, to say he HATED Hunters felt like he wasn't doing the emotion justice; he LOATHED them. He loathed them and everything ABOUT them. He loathed the way they looked, with their nasty sharp teeth and razor-edged claws, the way they smelled, like rotting carrion. He loathed how fast and strong and difficult to hit they were, and how they seemed just a TAD bit smarter than any other Infected… like they KNEW. He loathed how that made them unpredictable, how he could never tell if they'd be traveling alone or in a whole goddamn PACK, their unholy shrieks making him shudder and sweat restlessly in his bed at night. And he loathed how in just a few brief seconds, they could destroy everything, take ANYTHING they wanted to, like the lives of the five innocent men who only a week before had been alive, had been with him, had then been cruelly torn to pieces as he'd listened, powerless to stop it, leaving him all alone…

He'd scarcely noticed he'd begun sweating, trembling, the screams of his dying friends still as fresh and raw in his mind as they'd been a week ago. He reached up to wipe the tears from his eyes. The loneliness, it was real. The pain, it was real, too. The nightmares, so vivid, so TERRIBLE he still screamed himself awake at night, were REAL. And, as he watched the limber form hop down from the wall onto the ground, he knew… it was all because of THEM.

He turned the weapon away from the wandering Witch, instead training it on the Hunter, now slinking its way along the base of the wall in her direction. He was no longer interested in her. Given this new development, she was HARDLY a worthwhile prize to him now.

Thomas smirked as he followed the Hunter's movement with the barrel of his rifle. It had no idea it was only moments from death.

No Hunter had EVER gotten away from him alive.

He hunkered down low over his weapon, adrenaline surging, afraid to move, afraid to even BREATHE lest the Hunter notice his presence with its heightened senses. It didn't even seem to be very aware of its surroundings; for whatever reason, it seemed interested in the Witch, too. Did it want to prey on her, perhaps? He chuckled. Dumb creature would probably regret that decision once it got into range of her claws. Potentially an amusing sight, but he wasn't about to let it get that far now, was he?

He watched as it reached the end of the wall, where the Witch had just wandered by, and paused. It sat up on its heels and rested its back up against the bricks… trying to conceal itself? Its head was turned away from him, trying to peek past the wall's edge… leaving the back of its skull completely exposed.

A sinister grin spread across Thomas' face as he brought the scope to his eye, practically TREMBLING with the current of energy running through his body…

He had no idea what happened next, or WHY… but it did. He misfired – maybe his trembling made him pull the trigger too quickly. Or maybe he slipped. Maybe the Hunter had moved JUST before his finger touched the trigger. Or maybe it'd been none of those things at all. But whatever it was, the bullet didn't hit its intended mark. Instead, it went at a downward angle, burying itself into the lower right portion of the Hunter's chest instead of the back of its head.

The Hunter spasmed, writhed, fell back against the wall, jaw stretched in a soundless wail of surprise and agony. Thomas swore, but before he had a chance to regain his bearings and aim again, the Hunter was on the move, now bellowing with rage. It tried to barrel around the side of the wall but was jerked back; its right sleeve had snagged on a crevice in the brickwork. It snarled and thrashed, clawing at the gray cloth in a desperate effort to free itself…

He desperately tried to lock on, but it was already too late. The Hunter had quickly managed to tear off the sleeve and in the blink of an eye, it was past the wall and gone. From here, he could just barely see it, a dark gray blotch racing on all fours across the road, between the buildings beyond and out of sight.

His face contorted with fury, and Thomas slammed his fist down on the crane's control panel so hard that it HURT. He tasted blood; it took him a moment to realize that he'd clamped his teeth down on his tongue to keep from shouting out of anger. He hastily slung the rifle back over his shoulder and scrambled out of the steering cabin, sliding down the side of the crane and jogging around it, to the spot the Hunter had been crouched in only a minute or two ago. The ripped-off sleeve was still there, stuck on a jagged edge, along with the strip of caution tape it'd been using to keep it tied down to its arm. A trail of blood droplets leading around the wall and into the shadows was the only other thing left of it.

Thomas knelt, scowling at the pathetic sight of his first failed Hunter kill. He didn't even have the Witch as a consolation prize now; she was long gone. He reached out and grabbed the sleeve, turning it over in his hand. The gray fabric felt worn and unpleasantly damp to the touch, probably with blood. His nose wrinkled, but he took a moment to unwrap the caution tape from around it and stretch it out. The bloodstained black and yellow stripes seemed almost glaring, even in the fading light…

His eyes narrowed further. Removing the rifle from his shoulder, he took the caution tape and wrapped it around the barrel and scope several times, making sure to finish it up with a nice, tight knot. There. Now he'd never forget this evening. It'd serve as a constant reminder to him to never slip up again. Every time he picked up his rifle, he'd see this damned black and yellow strip and be motivated to try all the harder. No Hunter would EVER get away from him again.

He stood back up, re-shouldering the weapon and watching as the sun's last rays dipped below the tops of the buildings. He turned back in what he knew was the direction of his home and started walking. Time to get back before it got too dark to see… and too dangerous.

And if he ever saw THAT Hunter again, well… it wouldn't be so lucky next time.

The entire recollection couldn't have lasted more than a few seconds, but to him it felt like a few years. He stared down at the rifle in his hands. It was shaking; he was shaking. This seemed so surreal, so… improbable. He wondered for a minute if he was still asleep and this was just some sort of bizarre dream, but he disregarded that notion with a bitter smile - these days, reality was pretty tame compared to the horrors his dreams would show him.

He looked back into the scope, tracking the Hunter as it continued shuffling towards the vultures, unaware of him. He could even just see the bloodstain on the right side of the hoodie, the very hole he himself had put there months before. Frankly, he was amazed (and annoyed) the thing had managed to survive this long with such a nasty and surely inhibiting wound – he would've thought it'd run off only to later die of blood loss or some other related complication. At the very least, he had to give it credit for sturdiness…

Before he could go for the trigger it suddenly broke into a swift lope, heading straight for the flock of vultures below. They scattered, several taking to the air with shrieks of alarm. For a moment he thought it was trying to scavenge the corpse they'd been feeding on, but instead it launched itself a good fifteen feet in the air with its powerful limbs, sinking its claws into a vulture that'd flown just a little too low. Thomas couldn't help but flinch; even after so many weeks, it wasn't a sight you got used to easily.

The Hunter came down with its prize, but awkwardly; it buckled a bit on the right side, a little weak. This close, he could hear its wheezing and panting of exertion, saw it rub at the irritated bullet wound in its side. He smiled with a morbid sense of self-satisfaction. He hadn't managed to kill the bastard the first time around, but somehow it heartened him to see that he'd at least made its life miserable since.

And he continued to smile, even as he watched it begin to tear handfuls of feathers out of its prey's chest. Fate… certainly had an odd design, didn't it? Maybe it'd meant for him to fall asleep out here tonight. Meant for him to meet this Hunter again. Meant for him to plant a bullet in its godforsaken skull once and for all like he should've done all those weeks ago…

Perhaps he should've acted faster – the Hunter had already clamped the dead bird's neck in its mouth and was trotting away on all fours back the way it'd come, carrying it just like a damn dog. A disconcerted Thomas growled under his breath in frustration, already turning and bolting back towards the door as quickly as he could without making too much noise.

Oh no you don't, motherfucker. You won't get away from me again.

Thomas took the stairs back down three at a time and practically fell through the broken window onto the fire escape in his rush. He gave barely a thought to the protesting screech of rusted metal as he sprinted down the steps and into the alleyway below, skidding to a halt just at the opening onto the other street. His sharp eyes just managed to catch the flicker of the Hunter's foot disappearing into the shadows farther up the road.

He didn't even pause to make sure that the street was actually deserted before he took off at a full run after it, his rifle held with an almost military precision in front of him. This was foolish behavior, hazardous, yes, but it'd become an unfortunate part of his personality; if something angered him deeply enough, it had potential to occupy his entire attention until he eradicated the problem, no matter how much danger it could put him in.

His expression betrayed his quiet fury as he dove into the darkness after his quarry. It was, as he'd figured, the entrance to yet another maze-like alley system made difficult to navigate thanks to the lack of moon or starlight. He couldn't afford to falter now; Hunters, even injured ones, were usually just as nimble in the dark as they were in good lighting and he knew there was a good chance he could lose it if he fell too far behind. Luckily for him he was making good time, and the thing wasn't exactly quiet – he could hear it huffing and puffing a little ways in front of him, just tantalizingly out of sight enough to keep him moving, one hand on the brick wall beside him for guidance.

It was quickly becoming an irritating game of catch-me-if-you-can, especially when at several points he had to slow down dramatically to give himself time to sneak past meandering Common Infected that the Hunter could freely saunter right by. He was starting to worry, as he rolled past one with its back to him, that he might get caught in one place long enough to lose the damned creature altogether, or accidentally engage other infected that'd give away his position… if he lived, that is.

A flash of lightning from above briefly illuminated his surroundings, giving him a lucky break – he could see an expanse of more open space past the end of this alleyway, the end of the annoying maze. He stepped out cautiously, scanning the area the Hunter had led him into. Another flash of lightning showed him that it seemed to be a collection of old warehouses and their respective fenced-in yard areas, separated by small "streets" just wide enough for cargo trucks to drive through. It didn't seem as though anybody but Infected had been back here in a long time, however; the heavy chain-link fences were ill-tended, broken and falling apart in many places along their lengths. And directly across the way from him, he could see a dark, hooded silhouette scaling one, easily flipping itself over the top and onto the ground on the opposite side before disappearing underneath a loading dock door left ajar several feet.

He trotted towards it without hesitation, eyes and ears peeled for any sounds of movements indicative that he wasn't alone out here. The air had become uncomfortably still and heavy since before he'd fallen asleep. A low rumble of thunder rolled in from a distance. Both signs of a coming storm. He'd have to make this quick… being caught out in the dark and rain among flesh-eating cannibals was never a good idea.

He felt along the fence until he found a hole large enough for him to squeeze through, and as he did so he curbed his movements to a snail's pace, making sure each footfall came down without a sound. His breaths came out as slow and shallow as he could get them, given his racing pulse. Most Hunters seemed to have senses of smell and hearing elevated far above those of any ordinary human being, and the last thing he wanted was to look under that door only to have a possible two-hundred pounds of angry Hunter expecting him.

Thomas crouched beside the opening of the loading dock door, perfectly still like he'd so often practiced. Holding his breath, he lowered his head and squinted into the shadows within, tapping his finger against the trigger guard of his rifle impatiently as he waited for his eyes to adjust…

There it was, maybe about thirty feet inside the building, facing away from him, its caution tape by far the easiest thing to make out. He could hear its rattling wheezing, and he thanked whatever lucky stars he had that the injury he'd caused it had ultimately made this moment possible. It lifted its head and loosed a low bellow that reverberated throughout the wide room and into his skull, sending a gentle shudder down his spine. Just like before he positioned his weapon as best he could at this angle, aiming it right at the back of its hood. His finger ran along the worn strip of caution tape tied to the barrel, came to a rest on the trigger. After tonight, he'd no longer need that reminder of his failure...

He peered through the scope – only to have something drop from the ceiling and completely block his view, and his shot.

He jumped pretty hard with surprise, ducking out of the way to avoid detection by this unexpected third party. When nothing clawed its way out from under the door to get at him, he allowed himself to peek past the edge and take a closer look at it. It wasn't anything he'd expected; a small, thin figure, smaller than the Hunter, had glommed onto its back in a manner that could only be described as playful, and from it came a series of shrill gibbering noises that honest to God sounded almost like laughter. It too was dressed in a hoodie pulled up around its head… an orange one, trimmed with fur and adorned with leopard spots.

Thomas almost dropped the gun. His fingers, his entire body, seemed to have gone completely numb. It was like someone had flipped a switch deep inside himself, a switch that transformed each and every vein in his body into rivers of ice, constricting the life from his lungs, the strength from his body. He sagged against the wall, no longer able to support himself.

His eyes were wide open, but he was seeing nothing.

No.

He didn't want to look again, God oh God he didn't want to look again but all self-control had been thrown by the wayside. He glanced back around the side underneath the door. It wasn't possible. It just. Wasn't. Possible. It was too perfect, too… too horrible to fathom. It couldn't be. Not her. What were the odds? It had to be someone else, just someone with the same kind of hoodie…

The leopard-spotted Infected gamboled about the enemy Hunter like an excited dog, finally tumbling to rest in front of it, where it plucked at the wings of the dead vulture it'd brought back, picked it up, took a bite out of it. He was quick to zoom in on its face with the scope, desperate to catch a glimpse of any details. Most of it was obscured by darkness beneath the hood, but he could very well see a faint yellow glow where its right eye would be, a rounded face framed by tangled locks of chin-length blonde hair and a bloodied bottom lip marked by the tiniest silver glimmer of a labret piercing.

All at once, the world seemed to cease existing around him. The thunder was slowly drowned out by the rush of blood in his ears, his vision dimmed, and the ground felt more like the bow of a storm-tossed ship underneath his feet. He struggled to breathe, had to cling to every last fiber of common sense he possessed not to cry out his anguish, not to start sobbing like a child and draw both of them and every other Infected for miles around right to him. Though, were that to happen at this very moment, he'd probably welcome being torn to pieces with open arms. It'd hurt less.

This can't be happening. This is just another nightmare. A really, really bad nightmare. Thomas squeezed his eyes shut and sank his teeth into the knuckles of his right hand, biting down so hard he felt them break the skin, tasted blood. He willed the pain to rouse him, to pull him out of this hellhole and back into the waking world, safe in his bed, in his home…

This isn't happening. That Hunter never really came back. I'm only dreaming this. Wake up. Wake up NOW. Wake up, PLEASE…

He opened his eyes, but there were no tangled bed sheets wrapped around him, no drab white ceiling above his head. Just him, crouched alone outside of an abandoned warehouse in the dark, being flecked by raindrops and watching as his daughter reached up a bloody hand, ran a claw gently along the Hunter's cheek, and pressed her mouth against its' in a grotesque mockery of a kiss.

It was too much. He turned and started running back the way he'd come, back through the hole in the fence and towards the alleyways, vaguely hoping that the thunder and rain were enough to mask his presence. He could barely see where he was going, slipping in puddles and letting the frigid rainwater drip from his hair into his eyes and soak him to the bone in a manner eerily reminiscent of the trauma from months before. He was dry-heaving and almost certainly crying, too, but he didn't care. Not right now. All he cared about was the fact that no matter how hard as he ran towards his house, towards safety, the full horror of what he'd just seen was now indelibly seared into his brain like a cattle brand.

His little girl… a monster.

oOo

…Okay. I haven't updated this thing in almost seven months (even when I ironically stated in the LAST chapter that I hoped to have THIS one up faster) and for that, I apologize. I know I'm repeating myself when I say my writing muse is extremely fickle, but hey, I got tired of looking at this sitting half-done on my desktop for so long and decided to pull through and finish it so I could get it posted up before my college break ends. Do I particularly care for the end result? Doubtful, but hey, SUCCESS!

Also, it's worth noting that this chapter gave us our very first guest fan character appearance. Mister "caution tape Hunter" is Cobalt, and belongs to my good friend Nanuka (who's totally worth checking out on deviantART, I might add)! Remember him – he's gonna be a key character in this tale.

That's all for now! I guess I can't exactly GUARANTEE speedy updating of this fanfic in comparison to others at this point but, well… at least I'll TRY to make it worth the wait? Hahaha. I don't intend to abandon it anyway, that's for sure. Until next time, friends!