A Factor

The girl, tired, sat down on the roof, she was covered in blood but none of it was her own.

"Fuck… When will I get out of this city…"

She chugged a bottle of water carefully saving more for later. When she rested enough she stood up and started walking off.

She was walking from roof to roof of those buildings. The fat infected that fell from the ceiling provided a good way of entry to the locked building.

Though she saw an entire family laying there lifeless, she needed to keep herself together. Because if she didn't, she'd end up like them.

"What the?"

She then saw lights on the manhole, then it went dark moments later. Here she learned more about her change as her sense of hearing caught up to some noise as far she was from the manhole.

"Did you think those bastards saw the light?"

"Fuck! I told you that there's a manhole unprotected!"

"Those bastards are learning John, cautious isn't enough."

This brought hope to the girl. Looking left and right she then picked a ceramic out of her bag, the ceramic is just a broken piece of a jar.

However, the girl had an idea. She heard that ceramic could break a window, and the idea that popped into her head is simple. She aimed at a carefully, untouched, and pristine car parked on another block. Her position was good enough to see from that distance.

She raised her arm… and threw, her power was monstrous as the ceramic broke the window and also activated the car's alarm.

"Good… "

"Screech!!"

Not even seconds later a screech was heard in the silent town. And tons and tons of snarling. What do you know, a lot gathered in the car. When the coast was clear she went down the building by jumping down the alley.

Since the infected was busy inspecting the car the girl went to the manhole and opened it.

"What the!?"

The people were still there and they were aiming a gun toward the girl, their expressions anxious.

"Shh."

She hushed, and went inside, swiftly closing the manhole.

"Was that you?"

A young man asked the girl.

"Yes…"

"That's like… Two blocks away, do you have a gun?"

"only a spear."

She raised her spear, making the others aware that it was a makeshift spear.

"Anyways…"

When they all calmed down they looked at the girl. One of them is a young man, a middle-aged woman, and a man with stubble.

"I'm Martha." The girl introduced herself

"You're too young to be here Martha." The middle-aged woman replied with worried looks "Anyway, I'm Jane."

"I'm Daniel" the man with the stubble introduced himself.

"And I'm Kris." lastly, the young man introduced himself.

"Kid, did you see us by any chance?" Jane asked.

"Yeah, I saw the light coming here. And I don't want to put the attention on you so I made a distraction." Martha answered politely.

Jane nodded and the trio looked at each other.

"Say, you want to join us in the colony?"

"Colony?"

"Yeah, survivors banding together to get some work done. We're here to scavenge as we speak."

"Oh…"

When Jane and Martha were done talking the two looked at Jane with a bit of worry. Martha is a new mouth to feed nonetheless a stranger, but if she pulled her weight then they wouldn't have anything to worry about.

"Say, Martha," Kris interjected

"Yes?"

"How long have you been out there?"

"18 days? That's how long I was out there."

Kris nodded, she can pull her weight might as well let her join. When they were done talking they let Martha follow them back to the colony.

The sewer was filled with drawings— symbols that all have different meanings as the trio was easily traversing the sewer system.

When they got to a certain point, footsteps could be heard, they were quiet, deliberately being quiet.

"We're almost there."

They turned left and saw a fort, a fort built in the sewers, it was guarded by people equipped with firearms and a few people with custom-made weapons, probably ones with cultivation methods.

"Woah…" Martha explained.

When they walked to the entrance two people walked toward Jane.

"Who's the newcomer?"

"Martha, I don't know but the kid survived in the city, tough lad," Jane responded.

"Uhuh. Get in and get yourself checked."

Jane walked in but the other two stayed outside, waiting. This got Martha curious so she walked up to Kris.

"What's happening?"

"Oh, we forgot to tell you. There's a doctor there who's going to check up on you and will have you naked."

This got Martha surprised, seeing her reaction Kris waved his hand.

"Don't worry, girls to a girl doctor and a man to a boy doctor. We got this system because there was an asshole who hid his bite mark and got the colony in shambles for a week."

Martha nodded, a girl doctor, she could at least agree to that. The checkup continued till it was Martha's turn. It was embarrassing but it was necessary. This is better going in the colony rather than being alone on the surface.

"Okay, you're clean."

The doctor said and had Martha go. When she dressed herself up and went inside the fort-like gate, the trio was very much waiting for her.

"Welcome to the colony."

There's… silence, only footsteps could be heard. They were keeping the noise up to footsteps only.

"You got to understand the rules of the colony alright?" Kris said.

And Martha only nodded.

***

3months ago, the start of Termon's chaos.

"Headmaster…"

A young man in a tank top had a frown on his face, the headmaster had his fingers on his wrinkled forehead.

"What do we do?"

"I don't know either, Termon's show is canceled because of some disease going around in that place. We prepared for so much dammit!"

The Headmaster who's on his polo shirt, sleeves folded up to his forearm.

"Do we… Do we go somewhere else?"

"Where is there to go? We planned this for months!"

The headmaster went to his laptop and started typing on the keyboard, seemingly trying to find a way.

"We have two choices… but we need permission from the respective noble governing the area." The Headmaster sighed.

"Which is?"

"The Marchen Duchy or the Hummel Marquisate."

The young man's forehead wrinkled. The Marchen Duchy was a very secure place, and the Hummel Marquisate might wring them dry if they went to have a show there. Both are near Termon as well.

"We have three more months… three…" the headmaster mumbled.

The young man was looking at the excel on the taskbar of the laptop, and he sighed. Knew full well that if they didn't do another show they would be gone. The circus is.

The young man walked away and to another colleague of his. A girl who's just drying her hair.

"Tough ain't it, Shelley?"

"It is, Quint, how's the Headmaster?"

"He's trying. Hard."

"Why, what did he tell you?"

"We have two choices, roughly we either perform in Marchen or Hummel."

"Marchen or Hummel?" Shelley spoke curiously.

"Yeah… what bad luck we had."

"Choose, Marchen," Shelley said confidently. "I know someone who can get us permission."

"R-really?!"

"Yep. She's my sister, she's probably working in the Duke's mansion."

When Quint heard her sister was working in the Duchy he was shocked, working in nobility means a lot of screening. For her sister to pass the screening means she was trustworthy.

"That's great! Let's tell the Headmaster!"

Quint dragged Shelley away towards the headmaster, meanwhile, in the Marchen mansion.

"Lucy, go prepare the bath."

The maid bowed at Lenneza's command. Lucy went to the bathroom which was bigger than an apartment room and she started preparing the water, shampoo, conditioner, etc.

"Phew… I wonder how Shelley's doing."