8 Now we just need a ring to seal our oath, babe!

It had been an hour since they was entering the forest.

They should be already in Brooklyn by now. But the truth was the forest had not shown any sign of reducing. The huge trees and wild plants were still everywhere in sight.

But just when Zhiqiang was thinking about them, he saw something that was so unbelievable and impossible.

"You saw them too, right?"

Zhiqiang whispered in pale face as he pulled Dominick's hand.

A smirk did not even show on the blond man's face like usual as he was also seeing the same thing as the younger man. His teasing handsome face was now looked so serious.

"Yes." Dominick whispered softly, but a moment later a dark glint was flashing in his silvery blue eyes. "I think this world just started to become even more interesting, babe," he chuckled darkly in delight.

Zhiqiang did not say anything in reply. He just gripped the man's hand tighter.

A commotion was soon formed in the group as the survivor began to see the same thing as them. But there was no a surprise expression on the soldiers face, evidently they were already passed this route before, even so a grim expression was shown on their face.

"No way! Is that the Manhattan Bridge?!!"

A loud exclaimed could not help but let out by a survivor who saw the unbelievable sight.

"There is no way it is the bridge, right?" A hushed sound was heard in the group commotion.

"It is really the bridge." The leader of soldiers finally opened his mouth to confirm grimly, causing a lot of survivor to exclaim in shock voices.

The Manhattan and Brooklyn was separated by a large river. To crossing this river, people could use the Two Bridges, Manhattan Bridge and Brooklyn Bridge, which was located in the Lower Manhattan.

From the route they using, they should use the Manhattan Bridge to cross the river.

However, now in front of them, there was a part of broken iron bridge. Don't underestimate it even though it was only a part. The total length of the Manhattan Bridge was about two thousands meter! While this broken part itself was about four hundreds meter! How could they not recognize this thing for a bridge?!

One half of the broken part was buried in the ground with other edge was pointed at the sky like a high tower. A lot of green plants and trees were covering the bridge. It looked as if a giant just broke the bridge in parts and stabbed this part into the ground and decorated it with a lot of plants.

Such unbelievable thing, yet really did happened in front of them.

"Then how are we going to cross the river?!" A loud exclaimed was let out by a survivor in panic, as he finally realized something critical. They needed to cross the river to reach Brooklyn. How were they going to cross the river without the bridge?!

The group immediately turned into loud commotion as the survivor was whispering at each other in panic and fear.

However Zhiqiang immediately turned to the Leader. The military could reach Manhattan safety from their base, so they must have a way to cross the river. Sure enough, the Leader immediately called the survivor to calm down.

But, after the Leader spoke, the truth was so much terrible.

"There is no river anymore."

What?!

A shock immediately caused the survivors to stare at the Leader in great confusion.

The leader did not disappoint as he immediately explained. "The river is gone. There is only a ground with huge forest. In fact, we are already in the middle of crossing the ground that used to be river."

Zhiqiang stared at the Leader in shock. The river was really gone?!

If the water in the river was only drained, then the ground should be sloped into sunken, creating a concave in the center. But the ground they walked through since a while ago was always flat and even, with just a bit upside ground here and there. But there was no a dropped ground!

If this ground was really used to be river, then there was only one possibility.

The ground was expanding.

Zhiqiang took a sharp breath. Just what the hell had happened to make even earth was expanded and the river was gone?!

The survivors turned into a silence fear as they finally comprehended that the river was really gone. The rest of their journey was a bit quiet. They only made a ruckus when after walking for a few hundreds meter they saw another part of the broken bridges. If the phone was still functional, maybe they would already be taking a lot of picture.

After walking a few more kilometers and seeing a few more parts of the bridge, the forest was eventually showing a sign of reducing. Almost everyone was letting out a relief breath as they finally saw ruins of city from a far.

They were at last entering Brooklyn.

They needed to walk about seven more miles before reaching the base. In the middle of their journey, they saw another huge forest stretching to almost three miles wide. After remembering carefully, Zhiqiang realized the forest must be originated from a central park and zoo near Fort Hamilton.

Thankfully, the Leader was leading them to circle around the forest instead entering it. They walked in safe distance from the forest, but still able to see them from a far.

It seemed the military was already scanning the dangerous places in Brooklyn as they took a safer route than in the Manhattan.

After walking for about one hour, they at last saw the gate of the Fort Hamilton.

..

There were already a lot of people in the military base beside the soldiers. They must be survivors that were coming from Brooklyn.

A lot of them were working in the base, chopping down a lot of trees around the base and creating tall walls for base protection.

Zhiqiang stood behind a long queue in front of the gate of base for admission.

From a far, he saw the soldier treated the speed mutated man with his daughter differently. The staff officers welcomed them warmly and quickly brought them inside to take the admission procedure. Zhiqiang guessed the man would be persuaded to enter the military after this.

When it was finally his turn, the staff officer asked him to write some important information like names, gender, age, job, family and so on, in the admission book.

After thinking it for a moment, Zhiqiang eventually still wrote a surgeon on his job description.

"You are surgeon?!" The staff officer's eyes immediately lit up as he saw his job.

"Yes." Zhiqiang nodded without regret. He knew in the time of disaster, a doctor was one of the most needed professions. Beside, NYC Hospital Center was famous so sooner or later someone would notice his former profession.

"That is good! Doctor, wait a minutes! We need your help! I hope you can give your assistance in the base!" The staff officer quickly said and walked inside the office to call someone.

Zhiqiang turned at Dominick beside him, seeing him staring at him in silence. Zhiqiang stared at those emotionless blue eyes for a while before finally said, "It is only in the infirmary. Helping them will not be dangerous."

Dominick stared at him for a moment before turning away from him at last. He walked forward to the admission book and wrote his turn. When he reached the job description, he wrote 'fighter' on the paper. Zhiqiang looked at the man in surprise. He already knew the man's profession from the police documents he found in the van was a boxing athlete. But he did not know the man would honestly wrote them, instead of a randomly lie.

However it was only a small surprise, because when the man reached a family description, he wrote blatantly on the paper : Zhiqiang's husband.

"You—!!" Zhiqiang yelped in shock, quickly snatched the pen away from the man. But just as he was about to cross out the words, the staff officer from before already came back to the room.

"Doctor!" the staff officer called him with a bright voice.

Zhiqiang forced to put down the pen and glared hatefully at the blond man.

Dominick only gave him a small smirk and did not say anything.

Zhiqiang sighed and looked toward the door seeing the staff officer was walking in with a female soldier. She had an upright appearance with a short blond hair.

"You are the doctor?" The female soldier nodded at him with a smile. She reached out her hand for hand shaking and Zhiqiang received them in polite gesture.

"My name is Anne Garcia, one of captain in Hamilton Military Garrison. Nice to meet you, Doctor."

"Nice to meet you, Captain." Zhiqiang only nodded in respect.

"Ah!" The staff officer beside them suddenly let out of surprise sound. Captain Garcia immediately looked at him in question.

The staff officer blushed slightly in embarrassment. "S-sorry, Captain. I am just surprise that the doctor is already married." He explained awkwardly as he held the admission book in his hand.

Captain Garcia raised her eyebrow even more in question since there was no strange thing in a married status.

"N-no, I mean, t-this man—" The staff officer explained awkwardly about the blond man beside the doctor.

"He means me, Captain." Dominick slipped in with a very smooth voice. A bright smile was curled on his lips as he reached out his hand to the captain for hand shake. "My name is Dominick. I am the doctor's husband."

The female captain immediately raised her eyebrows in surprise, but she quickly shook the man's hand politely. "I see."

Zhiqiang quickly palmed his face in defeat, deciding to really ignore this pervert from now on.

Even though same sex marriage was already legal, it was still a rare occurrence. Not to mention there was still many people who had some prejudices. Zhiqiang only hoped his new status did not bring him troubles.

After a short introduction, Captain Garcia then led them toward the main infirmary in the base.

"Your arrival is a blessing to the base, Doctor. I will not lie. We are really on short of staffs. There are a lot of soldiers with severe injury because of this disaster. Now we are receiving survivors from the city, the patients would only increase even more. The bad news is, because of this disaster, we only have one surgeon, two doctors and a few nurses left in the base. The medicines here are also limited."

"My condolences, Captain Garcia." Zhiqiang nodded at the female captain. Obviously there was a lot more hospital staffs in the base before the disaster and what had happened to them, Zhiqiang did not ask.

"Yes, thank you. We hope there will be more civilian doctors that are coming to the base." Captain Garcia nodded back simply without much expression, evidently did not really mourn them, just sad that they are gone, or maybe she was just expert in hiding her expression.

Inside infirmary was packed with a lot of patients. A lack of staff was so much obvious from outside as many of patients were left ignore on the bed. There were also some civilian who was helping as nurses for the doctors.

A man with white hair came out from the infirmary office after Captain Garcia called. He wore a familiar white coat that doctor used with a pair of glasses on his eyes.

"Captain Garcia." The old doctor nodded at the female captain with a warm smile, causing the wrinkles on his eyes even more obvious.

The female captain smiled back and brought forward about the new doctor beside her. "Doctor, this is Doctor Zhou, he just arrived today, he will help you in the infirmary start tomorrow. Doctor Zhou, this is Doctor Lewis, the head doctor of the military base." Captain Garcia introduced two doctors to each other.

The old doctor's face immediately lit up as soon as he heard about a new doctor. "Thanks god! We finally receive a new doctor!" He said brightly as he grabbed Zhiqiang's hand in strong handshake.

"Nice to meet you, Doctor Lewis." Zhiqiang nodded politely, internally flinching at the excited hand shake that the old doctor kept doing to his hand. This old doctor did not act old at all.

A larger hand then suddenly grabbed the old doctor's hand and forced him to change hand shake. The old doctor blinked and looked up in surprise to the tall blond man beside the new doctor.

Dominick sent him a bright smile that was so warm almost causing Zhiqiang cringed. "Nice to meet you, Doctor. I am Doctor Zhou's husband."

"Ah?" the old doctor blinked in surprise.

Zhiqiang quickly coughed and directed the topic back to the captain. "Captain, do you said you will lead us to the living quarter? My fri—cough—husband is tired, so…"

"Ah, yes. Then we will not disturb your works any longer, Doctor Lewis. I will lead them to the living quarter first so they could understand the rules here." Captain Garcia immediately said. They nodded politely at the disappointed old doctor before walking away.

Zhiqiang glared at the blond man beside him as soon as the female captain turned away from them.

Dominick only smirked and sent him a flirty wink, causing the black haired man glowered even more.

After walking a few more blocks, they finally arrived at the living quarter for survivor from city.