It was not a good time to be sane, Jagred had found. Not with all these madness surrounding him at the moment. For the last few months, his life had been turned completely inside out, and somehow, he still thought the worst had yet to come. Maybe it was just his pessimistic mind working in overdrive mode these days, but recent turns of events had given more than enough reasons to leave town. The most obvious one of them all was the fact that his supply was running low. He tried to hoard as much food as he could, but ever since he lost his pickup truck to some raiders in the previous town, things had been going downhill fast. Supply was scare down here on the Southern sides, with many competitions from various factions. He should know, the memories of a few last encounters still fresh in his mind. Most people here were desperate, with the strange Vice Patrol going around and taking all their things for minor flaws like the possession of alcohol, cigarettes, or any other substances that was deemed ‘detrimental to the continuing culture of mankind’. Even after weeks of observation, he still wasn’t sure what was up with those people. What was their purpose, besides from robbing their fellow survivor blind, or did they even have one? However, from what he had gathered so far, they were oddly organized, quite different from the unruly he had come across so far. That certainly wouldn’t do much good for what he currently had in mind.

 The plan seemed quite simple, at least in his head it was. Find crazy gang’s truck, steal crazy gang’s truck, then escape with crazy gang’s truck. Seriously, how hard could it be? More than he had expected, apparently. For days he stalked their men from the rooftops, eyes pressed to the scope of his crossbow. He had remembered most of the cleared roads through the town, and more importantly, ones that led out to the highway. And still, he had yet to seen an opening. It was not the right time, he kept telling himself, but it didn’t take a genius to see that the situation was getting worse. Few supplies turned up, and the corpses had been even more agitated than usual. Jagred hadn’t dared to leave the safety of the rooftops for days. 

 Smoke rose in the distance, snapping Jagred out of his thoughts. He slowly got to his feet, squinting his eyes to make out the shapes below. It appeared to be a VP’s truck. Some poor sod must have been caught again. He pressed his lips together, contemplating his options. If there was an execution, there might still be some worthwhile loot, provided that he made it there on time. Wasting no more time, he quickly made his way across the rooftops, heading toward the commotion. Once he arrived, Jagred noticed some corpses below, which halted his steps. Maybe this was not a good time. Yet. That was then he saw someone that might not have been dead. The corpses didn’t use weapons, else he would have been shot ages ago. Which meant this one was a human…

 Jagred watched the young woman swung a bat at one of the dead from the top of a rusty container, his finger twitchy on the trigger. In the end, he gave in, lifted the crossbow and fired a single bolt, attempting to hit one of the mob near the girl to get her attention. If it worked, he would beckon her over to his spot, not intending to get near any of those corpses anytime soon.