I know, crudpost is crud.

[center][u]Meanwhile: Nisqually Winds Mountain house; Mt Rainer, Washington:[/u][/center]

Mr Cunningham walked out the front-balcony of the service-center/chatue, and breathed-in the surrunding landscape.

Racked behind his neck was a rifle, one of those blackpowder revolver jobbies. He yawned. and peered through a spotting-scope mounted to the railing.

In front of him, laid a seasonal-road... seasonal had it been kept under maintnance. These days it was not, and he would have to wait even longer for the winter snow to clear and the mud to dry; he could just walk, but then he'd leave most of his things behind.

On the road was crawler, one of the many shamblers he'd run-over while driving here, or had been crippled when he decided to sacrifice a building to a gas-explosion to thin the local population. No matter how they came here, the winter-thaw and mud had slowed their approach to such a point that he could easily dispatch them... provided he was ready for it. Besides, this broke the monotony of being apparently the last man on earth... he chuckled at the idea of him being a 'man'... he was just a kid, now a few years older.

Zooming in on one, he saw one of the first horse-flies spring out of dormancy, buzzing around its head with impunity, crawling in its nose, laying more maggots, and crawling out, basking in the sunlight, then finding another place to nibble on...

[center][u]Three years ago: West Coast Armory Indoor range; Bellvue, Washington:[/u][/center]

"Hey, [i]'eagel-eyes'[/i] if you're so great, why not hit that fly?"

Back at St Clarence academy, his attention to detail, straight-laced attitude, and minor indian heritage, had earned him the derisive nickname 'Eagle-eye'... they were on the target-range with a few classmates, trying-out for the local indoor gun-range with air-rifles in the mid-july heat, the AC broke-down and with two dozen bodies inside a confined space things heated-up quick. A fly was becoming quite a nuisance and landed on one of his classmate's targets... hence the challenge...

Robert Cunningham, wasn't really sure he could hit such a small target, it was smaller than a bullseye at those ranges, it also moved... even then, he sighed, let all the air out of his lungs, took a half-breath of fresh air, and then held it as he waited, watching and trying to predict the random movements of a creature whose brain was the size of a hang-nail...

[center][u]Now[/u][/center]

A shot rung-out, nearly deafening Robert. The fly had stopped just on the left brow of the undead creature when he had pulled the trigger... Checking through the scope, he noticed the hole in the woman's skull was about a quarter-inch too close to the bridge of her nose to have made it...

"Dang, I missed again. Looks like your race won't go extinct this year, little fella. I was always more of an Ip-sik shooter, anyways."