The Furry Dead
This is a story I wrote for me an my friends, it's my first major story so please be gentle. X3
The Furry Dead
A story by JesterFox
Dedicated to all my friends, I love you guys! :)
Twigs snapped and leaves crunched as Jester ran through the forest as fast as his legs would take him. The fox looked side to side nervously as he gasped in ragged breaths for oxygen. "Have they followed me? Can they smell me?" Jester panicked for a brief moment as the woods around him were silent and he came to rest in a clearing, sitting on a fallen tree as he regained his composure. The stars shined down on the floor of the forest as the amber colored leaves decorated the ground and hung limply from the branches around him. The chill in the air paled in comparison to the one running down his spine as he had heard what he had been fleeing from. They shuffled out of the foliage and groaned and snarled with ravenous hunger as flesh hung from their mouths and fresh blood soaked their tattered clothes. The moonlight illuminating the crowd as they moved in for the kill. "Walkers!" Jester had said aloud and sprung to his feet. He reached a paw back for his M9 pistol but remembered the words of his mate and the group's leader, Zandafrost. "Don't shoot unless you absolutely must. The noise will draw in more of them." Jester holstered his gun and turned on his heels as he ran back to the camp with the walkers on his trail... Kyzie sat atop the gate, cleaning his hunting rifle and watching the tree line for any threat, living or dead as his sensitive ears picked up on the panting of Jester and the sounds of hungry mouths. "WALKERS!" Kyzie alerted the others as they grabbed their guns. In a flash, the entire camp had rushed to the front gate and lined up their weapons through the walls. "Hold fire until they're right in front of us, aim for the head!" Frost shouted as Jester ran out of the trees with his arms raised "Don't shoot!" The fox ran to the gate as he was let in by his Husky friend, Lux. "Don't you know it's rude to bring guests over for dinner without asking?" Lux cracked as Jester forced out a sarcastic laugh. "Ha.Ha.Ha." He said flatly. "Guys, cut the chatter!" Amedeo raised his shotgun and trained his sights on the first walker through the trees as the others did the same. "LIGHT EM' UP!" Frost barked as the nighttime sky was filled with muzzle flashes and gunfire rang out through the streets as the walkers fell, one by one until none remained. Frost jumped down from the top of the truck he was perched on as he spoke to his mate. "How'd the scouting go? Aside from the walkers, I mean." Jester slung his rucksack over his shoulder and put it on the ground before unzipping it. The bag was full of assorted supplies. "Morphine and random meds from the vet's office, some energy bars and bottled water from the corner store, batteries and some wire from the hardware store and three magazines of 9mm ammo that I found in a police car." That's all?" Kyzie asked as his face showed concern. "The area is starting to run low, we can't stay here for much longer." Frost said as he looked at his friends. The group had spent the last few weeks holed up in a library which they had managed to fortify with random scrap brought back from scavenging runs. "Where are we gonna go, Frost? The whole country is probably fucked!" Amedeo voiced his concern as he gave the fox a stern look. "We'll work out plans in the morning, for right now, we need to get some rest. Lux, I want you guarding the gate for the first two hours, then it's Amedeo's shift." Frost ordered as Lux nodded and sat in the chair in place of Kyzie as the group retired into the safety of the library for the night...
Chapter: 2
Shine Your Light On Me
Kyzie sat in his favorite place on the roof of the library, scanning the streets of the desolate neighborhood for signs of life as he did on a daily basis. Looking through the scope on his rifle, he saw no life, only the dead that shambled aimlessly through the streets littered with abandoned cars and assorted garbage and debris. "Seen anything of interest?" Jester walked up beside the wolf and shielded his eyes from the sunlight with his paw. "No, no humans or furs. No live ones at least." Jester sat down next to Kyzie and decided to try to begin a conversation about random, anything was better than moping about. Before he could open his mouth, Kyzie spoke first. "Do you really think we'll be better off somewhere else? I mean we don't have much supplies as it is and we're just gonna burn through more moving somewhere different." Jester sat and pondered for a moment as he considered what the sniper said. "Well...if we stay here, we'll just die anyway. It's better to leave and at least have a chance." Kyzie just shrugged as the sound of foot falls could be heard coming up the steps as Lux and Frost had joined the two up on the roof. "Food is becoming an issue, we need to do another supply run today and try to scavenge what's left from wherever we can." Jester stood back up and grabbed his rucksack and checked his pistol before tucking away his survival knife into his sheath around his leg. Traveling light was always important for these scouting and scavenging runs, so he never took anything larger than his pistol. "You're not going alone this time, Jester, not after last time." Frost spoke sternly but his concern was still visible. "Kyzie, you're going with him." The wolf spoke up at this point "Wouldn't it be better to stay right where I am? I'm the only cook we have and I'm the best long range marksman in camp." "That's why you're going." Frost retorted. Kyzie said nothing, but got to his feet as he slung his rifle onto his back and walked down the steps and to the front gate. "Think he's pissed?" Lux asked to the two foxes. Jester thought for a moment and just opened his mouth to speak before shutting it and sighing. "It'll all work out, there has to be something better out there for us all." Frost reassured them both as Jester joined the wolf at the gate as Amedeo pulled it open for them both. "Good luck, guys. Try to bring back some better books or something would ya? I've read Catcher in the Rye twelve fuckin' times now." "I'll see what I find, man." Jester nodded and strolled out with the sniper in tow. The duo snuck through the alleyways as they came to the maintenance door to a tenement building in the heart of the city as Jester kneeled in front of the door and slowly pushed it open, Kyzie stood behind him with his rifle raised and ready. Jester stepped inside first as he shined his flashlight into the inky blackness of the dilapidated building as he motioned his hand for Kyzie to follow. The wolf crouched close behind as the two sat and whispered out their plan. "I'm gonna go room to room and clean em' out for whatever we can use and then we're getting outta here." Jester spoke in a hushed tone as the sniper voiced his own idea. "I'll stay down here and watch the bottom of the steps for anything that may wander in." Jester nodded as he pulled his knife from its scabbard and slowly ascended up the old, wooden staircase which was caked heavily with dust and cobwebs. Reaching the landing at the top of the steps, he shined his light around the area and crept up to the first room he saw, room 105. The fox tried to turn the knob as the door wouldn't budge. "Locked, hmm? Lets see what I can do." The fox put his flashlight in his mouth as he reached for the keyhole and sunk a razor sharp claw into it and wiggled it around slightly before hearing a very subtle *Click* as the lock gave way. "Might as well lock it with a piece of gum." The fox chuckled as he gloated to himself for a brief moment. Kyzie stood at the bottom of the stairs and continued shining his own light around the dark room while thinking to himself. "We're only delaying the inevitable by doing this. We need to leave this town and go somewhere quiet, like the countryside." The wolf decided to look around the room and walked to the front desk of the lobby of the building and searched the counter for anything useful. Jester had been rummaging through drawers and boxes and cabinets as he tried to find something. Someone had left behind an old book on the nightstand as the fox picked it up and blew the dust off the front cover. "Interview With The Vampire" by Anne Rice. "Well, Amedeo will be happy to have a new book, at least." Jester opened a suitcase left behind by the room's former inhabitant and found some assorted medications, a large bag of white powder and a few stacks of money. "Cute" he said with sarcasm on his breath while grabbing the useful medicines and leaving the room with a few random supplies in his bag. Kyzie had been rifling around through the drawers of the front desk and found nothing as he sighed in an irritated tone and gave up on finding anything in the lobby. Walking back to the stairs in the dark room, the sniper nearly trips over random debris but manages to steady himself on a grandfather clock he fell into. Standing up and dusting himself off with a quick curse, Kyzie began to walk back to his post, when the large clock tilted forward and slammed into the dust covered floor as the impact caused it to chime loudly. The sound rang out through the lobby and caused Jester to jump in shock of the sudden racket before running into the hallway to question Kyzie. "What the fuck was that?!" "The clock fell over!" Kyzie explained as the pair stared at each other and Jester opened his mouth to speak again as the sound of screams and groans could be heard, paired with banging against the front door of the building. "Oh shit..." Jester exclaimed as Kyzie ran up the stairs past him before turning around. "C'mon, don't just stand there!" The fox followed close behind as the two ran for the end of the hall and to the window near a fire escape stairwell. The wolf smashed the window as the two climbed through it only to see that the noise had attracted more of the undead to the bottom of the escape. "We don't have enough ammo to kill them all!" Jester exclaimed as he looked up the stairwell and headed up. "To the roof?!" Kyzie yelled, bewildered at the idea of trapping themselves atop this building. "You have any better ideas?!" Came the foxes voice as he continued up the stairwell and clambered up the side until he had pulled himself onto the roof before reaching over to pull Kyzie up next to him. The duo sat for a moment before Kyzie had looked over the side and saw the streets were filled with the dead." For the moment, they were trapped...
Chapter: 3
Reigning Blood
"I'm thinking of an animal" Jester said. "Okay." Came the wolf's reply. "Can it fly?" "Yup" "is it an eagle?" "Wh-what...how did you?" "You're predictable." Was Kyzie's response as the two had been stuck on this roof for the last few hours while trying to avoid becoming furry happy meals. "They still down there?" Kyzie peered over the side to see the horde of ravenous, hungry mouths swarming in the streets below. "Just a few." The fox nodded as he sat and twiddled his thumbs as the team became less and less sure of how they'll escape from this rooftop. "Well, I suppose if they stand in a line, we can kill a few of them." Kyzie joked. "Oh, you're so funny. I thought I was the jester here." "Hey, if you can't say anything to lighten the mood, I will." "Yeah, yeah, yeah." The fox lied down on the roof as he pondered and stewed over their predicament. Jester lied still as his thoughts drifted back to the people at the camp. His friends and his mate, all waiting for the duo to return with the life saving supplies they had found. The fox stood as he looked down over the edge of the building and at all the hungry mouths swarming the streets and alleyway. He looked back at the sniper and spoke his plan. "Get ready to run when you have the opening, don't wait for me and don't fuck about." The fox tossed the rucksack of supplies to the wolf as he began stretching to limber himself up for his plan. Kyzie picked up the bag and slung it onto his back. "Are you fucking mental?! What are you gonna do?!" "Don't worry about me, just get back to the compound, I'll meet you there. Also, for the love of god, don't you dare lose that bag!" The wolf sputtered a reply as Jester brought one of his sharp claws to his hand and sliced open his palm. He extended his hand over the side of the rooftop as his blood dripped into the salivating maws of the undead who swarmed like a pack of rabid dogs awaiting a fresh kill. "NOW!" Jester commanded as he ran to the far side of the roof and to the fire escape as he drew his gun and leaped from the stairs, into the alley below. The sniper took this advantage of the horde following his comrade and jumped to an opening in the swarm as he managed to push and shove his way through the crowd as he lost sight of the fox. Jester panted as he ran through the crowd and fired his pistol at any monster that drew too close, splattering himself with bits of brain and chunks of skull as he forced his way through the mass of the undead. He managed to run through the street into a different alley and fired three more times, dispatching three more of the undead as he turned on his heels and sprinted through the alley. Jester gasped for breath as he leaned against the back door to a small shop before he kicked it in and caused the alarm of the store to sound off. "OH GIMME A FUCKING BREAK!" The fox yelled in frustration as he ran through the front of the store before smashing through a display window and continuing to run as fast as his legs could take him. The horde which had been hot on his heels had flocked to the sound of the alarm and flooded the store attempting to find the source of the blaring sound. Perhaps the alarm's activation had been a blessing in disguise. Jester walked tiredly through the back alleys of the dead city and fell to his knees in exhaustion as his energy had left him. The fox leaned his back against the dry brick wall that was supporting him as the sky grew dark and the rumble of thunder sounded off. The heavens opened up and rain cascaded in a symphony of pitter-patters against the concrete and any surface it touched as the tired fox had no choice but to rest in this alleyway, vulnerable and weak. The minutes ticked by as Jester slowly regained his composure. The fox stood slowly as he poured every ounce of energy into his moment. "That was, without a doubt my dumbest idea yet." The scout scolded himself and was too wrapped in thought to pay attention to his surroundings as a single, roving undead had shambled up from behind, it's shuffling and groans being muffled by the thunder as the fox was completely unaware until at the very last moment. Jester recoiled and spun on his heels as he extended his arm to fire his gun in a desperate attempt to kill the zombie. The creature grabbed him and sunk its teeth into the material of his jacket, which was thankfully just thick enough to prevent the teeth from breaking through. However, the weight of the beast had caused the fox to fall onto his back as his gun slid from his grasp and out of his reach. "FUCK!" Jester wrapped his paws around its throat as he held it back with all his might, so that it couldn't land a second bite. Try as he might, the fox was too tired to resist much longer as the snarling monster's mouth was inches away from his exposed neck. He thought to himself as he came to terms with his fate. "This is it, this is how I die." The monster was so close Jester swore he could feel its teeth already when suddenly, an arrow had firmly lodged itself into the side of the creatures head as the shocked fox threw the undead off of him and stood once more to face the direction the arrow had been fired from. There, in the rain stood a sergal, a compound bow held in his hands and a quiver with matching arrows slung over his back. The mysterious sergal wore what appeared to be a tactical vest which looked as though it had been modified to fit a series of knives that had been placed in various pouches. A holster was secured around the left leg of his black jeans with a large revolver resting inside of it. The figure stood with his bow still held in a firing position as another arrow was ready to be set free, this one was aimed directly at Jester. The sergal paused for a moment and spoke a single word. "Bit?" The voice came to the foxes ears as he shook his head and replied. "No. Thanks for the help back there, I was almost lunch." The stranger nodded and put away his arrow and slung the bow over his back. Jester paused for a moment before speaking again. "Name's Jester, what's yours?" The sergal looked sternly at him as he introduced himself. "Acid" the fox extended forth his paw to shake the paw of his savior. As he clutched paws with the stranger his eyes had a dark, red hue to them which seemed to flicker their red color for a brief moment. Jester recoiled slightly as he turned to look back into the alleyway he came from. "We have a camp full of other survivors if you wan-" the fox turned around to see that the mysterious stranger was gone, as if he'd never been there in the first place. "Something tells me we haven't seen the last of him." Jester thought to himself as he began to walk back to the direction of the library...
Chapter: 4
Ties That Bind
"What do you mean, you don't know?!" Frost had shouted at Kyzie as he asked the fate of his mate. "He gave me an opening and told me to run, I didn't see what happened to him. He may still be alive!" The sniper defended himself as Lux and Amedeo stood downstairs listening to the quarrel. "What do you think happened, Lux?" Amedeo spoke to break the awkward silence created from the conversation on the roof as Lux turned to face him. "He's not dead, he's more careful than that. He's probably on his way back right now." Amedeo had nodded at the thought and leaned against the wall behind him. Jester had been walking for only a few hours but was relieved to see the familiar surroundings of the library compound as he drew near and walked to the front gate. Soaked from the rain and looked exhausted from his ordeal, the fox stood still as his friends had seen him. "See? I told you so!" Lux said as he walked to the gate and unbarred it, allowing the fox to come back inside. "Dude, you look like hammered shit." Amedeo said as he saw the disheveled state of the scout. "Yeah, that sounds about right." Jester said while stretching. Jester walked up the stairs to the roof and entered with a casual stride as he planted his feet firmly on the rooftop. "Jester, you're alive!" Kyzie was overjoyed to see the fox hadn't been killed as he breathed a sigh of relief. "Holy shit, I...I thought..." Frost stammered as Jester hugged him tightly and comforted the other fox. "I'm not exactly easy to kill, although I did have one hell of a close shave." Jester spoke to his friends which had gathered around to hear his story. "What happened after we split up?" The wolf quizzed as Jester took a deep breath and began to tell them everything that had occurred, from the alarm going off, to being nearly bitten and his encounter with the mysterious stranger. "Wow." Lux said simply as Amedeo spoke up sharply. "So this guy saves you, and doesn't say a word aside from his name and then just vanishes?" "Yup, that or I went crazy from exhaustion and imagined the whole thing and I really just curb stomped that zed to death." Jester looked at all of his friends who hadn't laughed at his joke. "Rough rooftop" He said while rubbing the back of his head. "Well, there is more news, Kyzie found something else on his way back. Show em' what you got." Kyzie had slung the rucksack off his shoulder and onto the roof as he took out all of the things they found inside of the old tenement building as well as something else. "Found this in a hardware store I ran past on the way back." The wolf placed a CB radio on the wooden table they had on the roof and stepped back away from it. In that moment, everyone's eyes lit up with excitement like kids on Christmas morning as they eyed the radio. "Hot damn! Does it work?!" Frost asked. "Not sure, I didn't have much chance to fiddle with it while I was running back here." The bandiyote stepped up and closely examined the radio. "I'll try to see about getting this working." "Well then, since that's squared away, I'm very tired...gonna lie down for a minute now." Jester said as he walked into the library and fell into one of the makeshift bedrolls they had. "Kyzie, you should rest up too, this whole ordeal has taken lots out of you both." Frost spoke as the sniper nodded and walked into the sleeping area and walked passed a very loudly snoring fox as he lied down in his own bedroll and was fast asleep. Frost walked to his own little private corner of the library as he sat in his chair and had a thousand thoughts race through his mind as he pondered the best course of action for the coming weeks ahead of the group. "Low ammo, low food, low everything." The fox rubbed his temples and sighed as he leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes for a moment. On the roof, the mechanic fiddled with the radio as he connected different wires and tinkered with the parts. Lux sat guarding the gate as he twitched and fidgeted out of boredom. Lux had a problem sitting still, even if it was for something as important as gate guarding. The husky propped up his head in his hands and sighed. "I miss the Internet." Amedeo adjusted various dials and knobs as the radio made a faint hissing crackle as it sounded off with static. "C'mon, you piece a shi-" the radio whined for a split second before a voice could be heard on the other end. The voice of a woman who spoke in a hushed, panic stricken tone as the thud of what sounded like footsteps could be heard in the background. "P-please, if anyone can hear this, my name is Carrie Delaney. I'm trapped in an office building on Tanner avenue with my husband. There's other people in here, I don't know who they are or why they're here but they've stolen all of our rations and are ransacking our camp! Please, if you can hear this, please help us!" The message began to replay from the beginning as Amedeo realized it was played on a loop. Standing up from the radio with his eyes widened in shock, the mechanic turned to run to the sleeping quarters to awaken his friends and inform them of the situation...
Chapter: 5
Russian Roulette
"You're sure that they're still alive? They could be dead already and the people who killed them are likely long gone." Zandafrost spoke as Amedeo had relayed the news to the group. Kyzie sat in the corner of the room and just had a distant look on his face, thinking deeply of the situation as he thought more for the group they had than the lives of some random strangers. "There's no solid proof that they're alive or dead, so why don't we check it out? There may be something useful that the looters left behind." Lux sounded off as Jester had been sitting next to Frost, with more of a puzzled look on his face than anything else. The scout had ram multiple scenarios through his mind as all the outcomes played themselves over and over. "This is no time to be paranoid." He thought as his internal monologue was deep enough to drown out the voice of his friends around him. He held his head in his paws and shut his eyes tightly as he did his best to find solace of some kind, while a voice began to thud in his ears, slowly becoming more prominent. "Jester...Jester?...JESTER!" Frost snapped his fingers in front of his mate's eyes as the older fox was brought back to reality. "Are you okay, in there?" Amedeo had asked in a half joking, half serious manner. "Yeah, I'm fine, I'm just thinking about what we should do here." Kyzie stood up at this point and raised his paw in interjection. "I say we stay here, we need to focus on keeping us alive and we barely have enough supplies for that as it is. The last thing we need is more mouths to feed." Amedeo paused and then nodded his head mournfully. "He's right, as much as I think we should save them, we can keep them here." Lux's ears perked up as he made his own point. "Who says we keep them here? Why don't we rescue them and then send them on their way?" Frost turned to Jester as he looked at him with a mix of concern and question. "What do you think we should do, hun?" Jester paused as he ran the scenario through his mind once again and finally spoke up. "I think it's worth checking out, even if they are dead. Kyzie is right that we don't have enough supplies to go around but we also can't just let someone die. I say we check it out, save them if we can and if not, we take what we can carry and that's that." "That settles it then, we're going. We can't leave this place unprotected so I want everyone to stay here to work on the camp. Amedeo, I need you to keep trying different frequencies with the radio. Lux, I need you to guard the gate. Kyzie, I want you on the rooftop scanning the area." The trio nodded and set off to go about their jobs as Frost nodded his head at Jester as the older fox grabbed his gear and rucksack while checking his pistol. Frost had slung his M4 over his shoulder and grabbed his own rucksack as the