Sorry. Been on a lazy streak and kinda busy these few weeks. Don't know when i'll continue but i'll do it when i do it. Will let you guys know. Sorry.



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holosync

Silence. That was good. It should mean that I disabled the alarm system. “It should be safe to open the door now, right?” I asked Mary. “I guess so,” she replied, with an uncertain tone in her voice, “Let’s just try and see. And if it still goes off, we hide and wait and see what happens. Everyone get ready your weapons.”

I reached for the handle and turned it. From above me a deafening siren went off. Part of me expected this - Murphy's law was right. The worst did happen. I turned around and told everyone to calm down but they were already panicking. The alarm was very loud and I had to shout over the noise. Then behind the doors at the other end something moved. A shadow. Was I imagining it? I stared hard into the darkness. Then I saw it. A screecher. I didn't want to alarm the others but there was no choice. It would see us sonner or later and there was no point laying low. But before I could say or do anything, one of the guys turned around and saw it. Without thinking, he let out a loud scream. I grabbed him and covered his mouth with my palm, but it was too late. The scream had drawn the attention of the screecher.

"Everyone climb down now!" I pushed open the door of the fire escape and ushered everyone out the door. The screecher made a mad dash towards us. I fired a few shots at it and only hit it after missing three shots. It fell to the ground, but then there were more coming. There were too many of them. I switched to burst-fire mode and mashed the trigger. I managed to kill four and injure two but there were still about five coming at me. I pulled the trigger but it responded with an empty click. Shit! What else could go wrong? Everyone had exited and I immediately jumped out and pulled shut the door. There was no way to lock it from the outside. The screechers were hammering away furiously at the door. I was hoping that they were not smart enough to figure out that they had to pull the door.

Quickly we hurried down the fire escape. When we had gone down about one story suddenly the door flew open. It fell past us and landed with a loud bang onto the ground floor. The screechers had rammed down the door with sheer force. "Hurry," I shouted, "Everybody get down and head towards Cape Street now!"

We reached the ground level and turned left towards the exit of the alley out to Cape Street. The screechers were climbing down the sides of the railings rapidly. Was I going to die here? I shrugged that thought aside. I had to focus on escaping first.

As I was only carrying one backpack with minimal food supplies and ammo, I could easily outrun the others. The screechers were just two meters behind us. Then without warning one of them leapt. I looked over my shoulder and there it was, in mid-air. Reflexively I sidestepped and dodged it. But it managed to catch one of the guys. I was in a dilemma; to turn back and help him or to keep running. I hesitated. Oh for crying out loud. I turned back and with the pistol in hand, I whipped it right smack in it's skull. But it was ineffective. It looked at me and then with one swift action it knocked the gun out of my hand. Shit! I thought.

Then it raised it's hand and landed a blow on the guy it had pinned under him. Blood shot out of his arm and I could hear his shoulder crack. He let out a ghastly scream. It was unhumanly. Mary turned around and shouted "James! Leave him, save yourself!" I knew that she was right, there was nothing I could do and there were four more of them coming. I turned and ran for it.

I couldn't get the image out of my head. My mind was picturing it, but my legs kept running. Then a screecher managed to catch another guy. I wasn't thinking straight anymore. I just kept running on. I could hear screams echo through the alley. Bouncing off it's walls into the night. Still I kept running. I managed to catch up with Mary and we made it to Cape Street. When we came out Mary, one of the guys and I turned right; while the other four turned left. We were seperated. It wasn't a good thing. We were about to turn around but the three screechers jumped out of the alley - blocking our path. There was no choice. We ran ahead as the other four ran in the other direction.

The screechers stopped and looked at both groups. Two of them ran after the other group, while one of them came after us. Why did they split up? Maybe they do have some sort of intelligence after all. The two went after the group of four so that they each would have two preys. And the one coming after us would have us to himself. It seemed like they made a logical decision at that point.

It wasn't important. What mattered was that there was one screecher coming after us, and pretty soon there would be more. We kept running down Cape Street. We were reaching Formouth Lane and after that was Westlake Street; which was where Elizabeth probably was.

Suddenly the screecher that was chasing us, stopped. I looked over my shoulder and it was just standing there in the middle of the road. And then without explanation, it turned around and ran in the other direction. It had stopped chasing us. What was going on? Why did it stop chasing us for no reason at all? At least it was over. We stopped running and just collapsed in the middle of the road, panting. We were safe, but I still had to go and find Elizabeth. "Westlake Street is just up ahead. Elizabeth would probably still be there. I'll be going there to look for her. The city border is just straight ahead. I guess that's where you two will be heading to. Let's get going. Staying out here in the open isn't a good idea." They were too tired to say anything and they just let out a half-assed gesture of agreement. We continued walking on. Why did the screecher suddenly stop chasing us? It was something i knew no one had an answer to, at least not yet. But I had to find out.