Chapter 1: Bite, Eat, Repeat

An ex-soldier and an ex-con fight their way through the streets of San Francisco.

"I'm out!" Leland shouted as his .38 popped its last round in the horde of advancing bodies. He stood inside the cab of a red '72 Ford Impala, trying to focus on what his next move would be.

Across the street, standing on the door of a Hummer turned on it's side, Sydney chose her shots carefully. The assault rifle she lifted from the gun shop a half a mile away was clean and accurate, but low on ammunition.

"Just drop it." she called over calmly and tossed him the camuflage duffle bag she had slung over her shoulder.

For her, "Desert Storm" took over. Her military training masked her fear, like the military had taught her. At the first sign of the walking dead, she had plotted her kill zone thoroughly. She found her targets within the crosshairs and nailed each body with percision killshots to the chest and stomach.

They fell just like she expected them to...

...and then, got back up again.

It was only when she started shooting them in the head, that the bodies stayed down.

Leland dove into the duffle bag and found a pair of Glock 26's packed in the original casings. He slid a thirteen round clip into each of them and stuff six extra clips into his pockets.

"Headshots, dude." he heard her say. "Make 'em count."

Leland and Sydney took turns with quick concise shots. Nearly each shot was a skull shot. And even though they dropped their share of bodies, there were more and more pouring into the streets.

"This isn't good." he said as he dropped his empty clips and reloaded. "This isn't good!"

"S**t! Move!" Sydney ordered as she scanned the streets on both ends. There was no escape. Both the east and west lanes on Bush street were packed with zombies. Moaning, stumbling zombies; their arms out-stretched for the last two living bodies in the immediate area.

What they lacked in mobility, they made up for in sheer numbers. They poured into the streets from all crevices; the undead, risen from their sleep. How and why it happened, no one could say. The day started like any other Sunday morning. But instead of waking to the sound of sports and religious programming, everyone gathered around televisions, websites and radios alike to witness the horror of crazed figures attacking anything that moved.

Killing them.

Eating them.

Leland slung the dufflebag over his shoulder and followed his retreating partner off the cars and into the street. Arms reached for them, clawing at their clothes. The two of them ducked and dodged the immobile hordes and made their way to a section of the sidewalk that was cordoned off by a diesel truck and two police cars. They quickly climbed the the truck's turned-over underbelly and crossed the trailer to find themselves safely protected by the wreckage and in front of a small clothing store with a big sign that said "AMBIENCE".

Arms stretched through the cracks in the automobile barricade, trying to grab their prey. Sydney backed away until her back slammed into the large glass store window.

"Let's get cover!" she shouted. She raised the butt of her rifle to smash in the window, when Leland grabbed her arm.

"Wait." he said, pointing to the door, which was slightly ajar. "I'm getting the store clerk didn't have time to lock up. That's coming out of her paycheck."

They both slithered into the darkened store, guns raised.

Leland held his right arm out and bent at 90 degrees in front of his chest; a flashlight pointing out infront of him. His gun hand rested ontop, parallel with the flashlight. He'd seen Mulder and Scully do that on 'X-Files'. He kept his knees slightly bent so he could manuveur at a moments notice.

Sydney widened her eyes, trying to adjust to the darkenss, when she saw movement off to the side of the main counter. It was a woman, peaking at them from behind the counter. Her eyes stared at them with brightened shock.

"Oh s**t." Sydney said lowering her gun and going to help the woman. As she bent down to survey the woman's injuries, she glanced the direction of the fallen woman's legs...

...or at least where her legs should've been.

Thats when the brighten look of fear turned into an inhuman snarl. The woman's face frowned up and she swiped at Sydney with the two fingers she had left on her right hand. The fingers caught under Sydney's vest and locked in as the zombie pulled herself up to rip out her throat.

In a flash Leland was in the mix. He'd broght the ghoul's momentum to a dead hault by grabbing her thick mayne of overly permed hair.

Sydney sent a series of palm thrusts under the corpse's chin until she let go. And as the woman turned her attention to Leland, snapping at the hand that held her, he brought the barrel of his Glok to it's eyesocket and pulled the trigger.

The body dropped lifeless to the floor.

Leland slowly rose the gun's sight up from the corpse to put it and the flashlight's radius directly on Sydney.

"You bit?" he asked.

"Don't know." she replied. "Don't think so."

She didn't sweat the fact that he'd drawn his gun on her. They had a pact. They were partners. And if one of them was infected, they wouldn't be allow the other to turn. They'd handle it right then and there.

No questions.

Sydney took off her vest and allowed Leland to survey her body.

"You're clean." he said holstering his gun. "What the f**k was that? You're the military one! You should know not to..."

"I know!" she replied. "I'm just tired. Wasn't thinking straight."

"Well wake the f**k up." he said, pulling a tourist map of San Francisco out of the duffle bag. "You're too f****n' hot for me to be killing, and s**t."

She laughed and shook her head. "Yeah. Judging from the activity outside, I might be the hottest f****n' woman on the planet right about now."

"Naw." Leland replied. "Did you see that little Philly with the pink dress and Knee-high socks? Smokin' hot! Sure, she only had one arm and no bottom lip, but still... HOT!"

"WOW.. It's the end of the world and men are still pigs."

He smiled. "Plus, no teeth? I'm just saying..."

"Shut the f**k up and bring the light here." she replied opening a tourist map and spreading it out on the table. "Now, where are we?"

Leland traced their steps. "We were here on Polk... traveled up to Bush and out to Levenworth... We should be here."

Sydney studied their position. "Okay, we're about four miles out. The last known address of the Doc was at a hotel a couple blocks off of the Wharf."

"You think he's still alive?"

"I don't know. Don't care, either. What we need is his access keycard."

"And then where do we go?"

Sydney lured at him. "You know I can't tell you that yet."

Leland sighed in frustration. "Come on, girl! Haven't i proved you can trust me?"

She laughed. "Hell no. You're a thief and a murder. And sure, we kinda need each other at the moment. But i don't know you from s**t. And i'm not gonna have you stabbing me in the back once you get all the answers." she folded up the map and stuffed it into the duffle bag. "You wanna get out of this alive, Lee? You're gonna have to stick with me and do as I say."

"Whatever you say, Boss." he grinned. He was gonna enjoy screwing her over.

"Whatever you say..."