Adventure of Xander Sea 1

Behind the counter, Xander opens a swollen drawer and finds folded regional maps beneath receipt rolls. One sheet shows the roads leading toward Central Texas Outpost #4.

He selects the least damaged map, then checks the shelves for compact food. Protein bars and sealed crackers slide into the pack without disturbing the medical supplies.

Xander spreads the map across a dusty shelf and weighs its corners with a bottle and two loose tins. The marked road home disappears behind the clinic blockage.

He traces a possible detour through smaller service roads, comparing the printed turns with what he remembers beyond the pharmacy. Outside, scraping feet and shuffling bodies draw nearer.

The broken frontage still hides him, but shadows pass intermittently across the dust beyond it. The map offers two routes, neither clearly safe, while the pharmacy remains quiet for now.

A faint scrape stops directly outside the shattered window, followed by silence. The route lines wait beneath Xander’s hand.

From behind the counter, Xander spots a narrow back corridor between leaning shelves. A gray service door stands closed at its end, away from the clinic entrance and the road-facing windows.

No shadows cross the rear threshold. Dust lies undisturbed across the concrete outside, and the weeds beyond the door bend only under the steady wind.

Across the pharmacy, the Clinic Zombies continue pressing toward the clinic, their scraping feet muffled by walls and fallen shelving. None turns toward the back corridor.

The map’s smaller service roads now have a practical starting point. The rear exit leads into a narrow loading lane that runs behind the buildings before joining the route home.

The pharmacy remains still around Xander, supplies secured in his pack. Beyond the rear door, the empty lane offers cover, distance from the dead, and a way around the blocked frontage.

Xander Sea leaves Pharmacy behind and arrives at Central Texas Outpost #4.

Central Texas Outpost #4 rises beyond the fields in a patchwork of fencing, salvaged sheet metal, and low farm buildings. Late sunlight glints off the watch platform, but no guard calls down.

Xander reaches the outer gate with the medicine and food secured in his pack. The familiar dirt lane is empty, wind stirring chaff against the fence posts.

The gate stands open by less than a foot, its chain hanging loose. Inside, the usual barter tables are abandoned, and a handcart lies overturned beside the well.

A strip of red cloth is tied to the nearest fence post, snapping sharply in the breeze. Beneath it, fresh boot prints lead from the gate toward the community hall.

From the hall comes one muffled impact, then another. The outpost remains standing, but its silence has a deliberate shape, as if everyone inside is waiting for something to break.

Xander shifts the pack clear of his shoulder and brings the shovel up in both hands. The worn handle settles firmly against his palm as he moves toward the community hall.

He crosses the yard along the fence line, keeping the overturned handcart between himself and the hall windows. The red cloth snaps behind him, while the open gate remains visible over his shoulder.

At the hall wall, Xander lowers into a crouch beside the side door and presses one ear near the warped frame. Voices murmur inside, subdued and tense, with at least two people moving across the floor.

A chair leg drags across the boards. Someone whispers too softly to make out, then another voice answers from deeper in the hall. No shuffling or wet breathing joins the sounds.

Through the narrow gap beneath the door, a strip of light cuts across the dust. Xander hears a latch click somewhere inside, followed by hurried footsteps approaching the entrance.

Xander shifts the shovel into his off hand and draws the revolver. The motion pulls his shoulder hard, leaving a hot ache beneath his coat, but the weapon settles aimed at the door.

The latch turns. Xander keeps the sights fixed as the warped door opens inward, revealing the first voice inside, a middle-aged man with a gray-streaked beard and a blood-dark work shirt.

The man stops with both hands visible. Behind him, the second voice inside, a woman in her forties with cropped black hair and a green utility vest, watches from beside a braced table.

The revolver remains trained on the doorway. The ache in Xander’s shoulder deepens, but the open entrance gives him a clear view of both survivors and the hall beyond.

Xander lowers the revolver, keeping it in hand but angling the barrel toward the floor. The bearded man exhales, while the woman’s shoulders ease beside the braced table.

The woman points toward a narrow stairwell behind the braced tables. A heavy wooden door below it bears fresh scrape marks, but no movement reaches the hall.

Beyond the hall walls, the outpost stays unnaturally quiet. The open gate and the red cloth remain visible through the side windows, while the cellar door waits below.

From the hall’s side windows, the north route is visible between the fence posts. Fresh tracks cut through the chaff, and a dark shape lies near the far gate, unmistakably human-sized.

The route is clear of any visible dead, but the cost becomes plain: the fallen figure blocks the narrowest passage, and a rifle lies several feet beyond it in the weeds.

Beyond the blocked stretch, the north road bends toward the fields and remains open. Near the body, however, the weeds tremble once, then go still.

The north route is not sealed, and it offers a real exit from the outpost. It is also no longer a quiet path: the abandoned rifle and unseen movement mark a danger waiting ahead.

A faint chorus of scraping reaches the hall from the western lane, the route Xander used from the pharmacy. Shapes drift between the outpost sheds, blocking the return path.

Through the side window, three slow figures emerge beyond the grain bins, then two more. None crosses the yard yet, but their movement closes the western approach.

The woman points past stacked tables toward a narrow passage along the hall’s south wall. A rusted sign marks the shed, and its door remains outside the dead figures’ view.

Xander slips the pack from his shoulder and places it in the woman’s hands. Her grip tightens around the straps as she looks toward the cellar stairs.

Xander eases the hall door shut, lifts the latch without a scrape, and secures it from the inside. The western scraping dulls behind the walls.

He takes the shovel in both hands and moves through the south passage, keeping the wall between him and the yard. The rusted equipment-shed door opens onto the irrigation ditch.

Xander crosses the ditch line low and silent, then angles north along the fence. The fallen guard lies ahead near the weeds, with the rifle still beyond him.

Xander advances along the fence, placing each boot between the chaff and the rifle’s dark stock. The weeds shift again beside the fallen guard.

He lowers into a crouch and studies the movement through the fence gaps. A pale hand belongs to the fallen guard, twitching weakly near the weeds.

The guard’s face turns toward him, eyes open but unfocused. A shallow breath stirs the cloth at his collar, confirming life without revealing how badly he is hurt.

The rifle lies within easy reach beyond the guard, its sling caught under a weed stem. Nothing else moves along the north fence or the open road.

From the hall, a muffled call carries across the yard, too indistinct for words. The wounded guard’s fingers flex once as Xander remains crouched beside the rifle.

Xander hooks the shovel blade beneath the guard’s shoulder and leans into the handle. The body rolls away from the rifle, dragging through the chaff with a muted scrape.

The effort tears a sharp pull across Xander’s lower back, forcing him to catch himself with one knee in the dirt. The rifle’s sling comes free from the weeds.

The guard lies clear of the weapon, breathing shallowly. His open eyes track vaguely toward Xander, but his fingers no longer reach across the ground.

Xander reaches past the disturbed weeds and takes the rifle by its stock. He checks its weight and keeps it angled down, away from the hall.

A muffled call carries again from the hall. The wounded guard gives a weak breath beside the fence, while the north road remains open beyond the rifle.

Get the wounded guard to safety

The fallen guard’s breath steadies when Xander reaches him. A torn trouser leg reveals a deep but compressible wound above the knee, and blood loss has weakened him severely.

His eyes focus at last, and two fingers clamp weakly around the shovel handle. He is alive, and with prompt care he can survive, but he cannot stand or travel unaided.

The information comes with a cost: his voice carries across the open ground. From beyond the bend, slow scraping answers, followed by a shape shifting between the fence posts.

The rifle remains secure, but the wounded guard now needs immediate shelter and treatment. The north road is still open, though the distant movement is turning toward the sound.