章節 37: The Two Families

"Sorry for the intrusion."

"No, it's no problem at all. Your American friend, Oscar, was it? He came here yesterday with the group you brought over here. He asked us to come to your compound but we said that we preferred to live here. Oh right, my name is Andrew Jr., that is my beautiful wife Isabelle and those are my kids: Jonathan, Esther, Madison, and Billy. My parents are in their room sleeping but their names are Andrew Sr. and Estrella. You said your name was Sky, right?" Andrew said before he offered his hand for a handshake.

"Yes, good to meet you all." I shook his hand and I then introduced my group.

I made a quick glance at their place and they seemed to be well-stocked. There were a lot of canned goods in their glass cabinet and they didn't seem to be famished.

Andrew and Isabelle were a middle-aged couple while their eldest was probably close to my age and the youngest close to Jun's age. They mentioned that Oscar gave his parents a small checkup yesterday and they seemed to be doing fine. His eldest son, Jonathan, seemed to be interested in joining our scouting group but Isabelle was against it. Andrew was the only one who had a firearm and it was an FN Five-Seven, concealed by his sweater vest.

'Nice piece. Does he have a P90 too?'

"So, what brought you here, young man?" Isabelle approached us with drinks.

"Well, we were just continuing our scouting of the place and I would like to share with you a few pieces of information when I went outside. I..." I started as I told them everything from yesterday.

They seemed apprehensive at first but I saw his daughter, Esther, looking at me quite closely. Kaley saw it and she immediately moved closer to me to mark her territory.

'Umm...'

We talked for a while and we decided to let Jonathan come with us for skill training, though he would just observe for now. Although their mother was against it, she relented after a bout of talking it out with Andrew and me.

However, Isabelle then asked me if she could come to the compound because she wished to talk to the kid's mothers. It was because she wanted to ask them if she could teach their kids school lessons. That was when we found out that she was a school teacher so I agreed immediately. The world had gone to shit but we still need our young ones to be properly educated.

We then said our goodbyes and Jonathan excitedly came with us. Isabelle and Esther went to the compound while they were accompanied by Andrew.

Jonathan walked next to me carrying an aluminum bat, "Thanks for convincing them, I'll—"

I cut off his excitement about the situation, "Know how to use firearms?"

"Umm... sorry no, but I would like to learn how to."

"That's good. Stay at the back for now, yeah? We're not out here to play, remember?"

"Y-Yes..."

A few moments later, we finally reached the second area where Oscar reported to have people inside. It had two houses enveloped by a 6-foot wall of hollow blocks and it had a medium-sized gate. The houses were two stories high and they were bilaterally symmetrical as to how they were designed.

That small enclosure was housing four people in total: An older couple living on the right while a younger couple living on the left. Their relationship with each other was that the woman from the younger couple was the daughter of the older couple living on the right side.

The younger couple had no children yet but I was told that the husband was a cop.

"Here we go..."

I knocked on the gate but no one answered after a few tries. After that, I tried the radio that Oscar gave them but still nothing. Two cars were still in their driveway and when I checked the clock, it was 9:22 AM. The door on the left house was open but after calling them a few times more, no one was still answering.

"They couldn't still be sleeping at this time," Kaley said with a worried face.

"They would've come out right about now..." Jared added.

"Something's off, get ready. Mark, give me a boost."

Mark backed against the gate and he formed a foothold with his hands. I ran towards him then he pushed my foot upwards so I could vault over the gate. I managed to reach the top of it and I slowly readied myself for the landing. Like a cat, I made the smallest noise possible then I opened the gate for them.

We then checked the perimeter first then we headed to the left house. It seemed like no one had left and everything still seemed to be here.

"Hello? Mrs. Luna? Are you there?" I called out but there was no response.

We went upstairs and carefully opened each door, even the restrooms, but we still found nothing. We finally headed down and we decided to go to the next house. I drew my wakizashi just in case something pops up and I slowly placed my hand on the knob.

As soon as I opened the door, everyone gagged. We covered our mouths with our hands and we tried to stop ourselves from vomiting.

The whole living room was bloody.

Two blood-soaked corpses were on the floor while another two in the same state were on the couch. I went for the windows to have some air come inside but the scene itself was just vomit-inducing. I just hardened myself to check the scene and after a short while, I confirmed that the older couple were the ones on the ground while the other was on the couch.

I examined the bodies on the floor first.

Mrs. Luna was near the door and she had bite marks all over her coupled with a few bullet holes. Meanwhile, Mr. Luna had none of those injuries but his mouth area was covered in blood and his neck was twisted at an awkward angle. Furthermore, he had a head injury where you could see brain matter and parts of his skull peeking out.

'Hmm...'

I checked the couple on the couch and they were both hugging each other tightly. The woman was hugging the guy with both hands while the man was wrapping his left arm around her neck. Their heads were snuggled close and it had a bullet hole that connected their heads. I checked the guy's other hand and he was holding a P226 with a suppressor.

'Suicide?'

I turned my head to look at the woman once more and I saw that a part of her shoulder was missing, but she didn't have the dark lines protruding yet. I nodded a few times and made a scene in my head on how this may have happened. I radioed Oscar and they came in after a few minutes. When Oscar saw the scene, a vein popped out from his forehead and he kicked a table with a vase on top of it.

"Dammit! FUCK!!!" Oscar shouted.

It took a while before Oscar calmed down but once he did, I went back to the subject at hand.

"Mr. Luna must've turned, natural death perhaps?"

"But his neck was broken, did he fall from the stairs? What's with his head though?" Oscar asked as he started examining the scene.

"Maybe, but the head injury is different from where the angle of the neck resulted in."

"Hmm… You're right, kid. Looking at it, the guy there must've bashed the head of this older guy here. There's a splatter here on the side, see it? He probably turned at night and he made a feast of his wife. Then their daughter came and was bitten here?"

We pointed to different locations where we think something might have occurred to piece the puzzle.

"Yeah, the guy must've come late and when he opened the door, his mother-in-law shows up with a fuck ton of bites and in reaction, he shot her multiple times. After that, he saw his father-in-law chewing his wife so he pushed him away then he bashed his head on the wall here..."

Oscar nodded and he concluded, "Probably saw his wife in that sorry state and they opted out even if he wasn't bitten... Damn shame... that guy there was a cop, his name is Gilbert. He should've radioed us first... fuck!"

"They really were a nice couple..." Kaley added.

We all gave them a moment of silence before we transported them to be burned. Everyone got the terrible news and they had solemn expressions while we were watching them reduce to cinders. Glancing at Oscar, it seemed like he got affected the most out of everyone.

"Are you alright, old man?"

"Hmm? Oh. Yeah, yeah, all the deaths I've seen in the war and these things that I've killed made me think that I would've gotten used to seeing it... but seeing people that you have known even for a little while still makes you remember that you're still human and you can still feel emotions."

"You a poet now, old man?" I teased.

"You fucking... I was opening up there, you little shit. You ruined the moment for fuck knows how many times!"

"Just cheering you up, old man. Let's continue the plan, yeah?"

"Haa~ you're right, you're right."

We walked back the way we came from and we reached where Oscar and his group left off yesterday.

To the right were large houses with huge backyards, protected by walls and large, solid gates. There were three of them all-in-all but the last one had a pool in their backyard. They haven't checked if there were people inside yet but we would eventually find out. Furthermore, a small apartment complex was right behind the three houses and what followed that was a covered court, a mismanaged fishing area, and a few strewn, smaller houses here and there.

On the other side of the road were more fishing areas and there were three of them all in all, not including the one by the gravel road and the one right next to the covered court.

These fishing areas were small, man-made bodies of water that had nets surrounding them. People here would breed various types of fish and it could be accessed by throwing a fishing line above the net or walking onto one of the bridges that would lead to the small huts above wooden poles. In those huts, small rowboats were present, allowing for cleaning the surface of the water by boating around or simply getting to a better spot when fishing.

There were more areas to explore and just as we were about to move ahead, our radio buzzed.