Which one do you want?

(Ray)

Ray stared at his phone, too overwhelmed to even speak.

He had no idea what had happened to Rody and Samantha. Going by what he just heard, they had gotten attacked by Deathless. He wasn't even sure if they were alive.

"No…" Ray muttered to himself, "No, no… Please be alive man. Please. Don't die on me."

Ray raced towards A Block, dodging past the Deathless on the way. He sped past several of them that they had seen before, including the woman who threw herself onto the car. She tried running after them but Ray was going too fast for her to keep up.

They reached behind the A Block building much faster than when they had left. Ray parked the car, threw his head back into the headrest and closed his eyes.

"What do we do now?" Meghan asked.

"I—I don't know," Ray replied glumly, "We wait maybe?" We'll give them a couple of seconds. If we hear from them by then, we'll stay. Else…"

Meghan placed a hand on his shoulder.

"You okay?" she asked.

Ray shook his head. He couldn't meet her eyes. He had a feeling he wouldn't be able to control his emotions if he did. This whole thing had been really hard on him. He never could have imagined that he would have to endure this much pressure, stress and anxiety all in one day. Seeing Adam turned into a Deathless was bad enough. But now there was a high possibility that something terrible had happened to Rody.

Ray couldn't shake the overbearing guilt of letting him go upstairs. Even though it was Rody's decision, he should have stopped him more forcefully. He should have insisted against it. Why didn't he? Why?

Ray felt like banging his head against a wall. If anything happened to Rody, it would be on him.

"Ray," Meghan called suddenly, "I know you're stressed but there's a few Deathless coming our way."

Ray opened his eyes and saw two Deathless teetering towards them.

He had half a mind to shift the car to drive and just leave. Go down the entry ramp and out the main gate. If Rody was indeed dead, he at least wanted to make sure that the same thing didn't happen to Meghan.

He placed a hand on the gear lever, ready to follow through with his plan.

'No,' he told himself, 'don't give up on him yet. He'll make it. Give him some time. Rody will pull through, he always does.'

Ray lifted up his hand.

"Momo, hand me my weapon." He told her.

"What are you planning to do?" she asked, as she passed him the javelin.

"He's going to make it," Ray assured her, "We need to kill those Deathless and make sure it's safe when Rody and Samantha get here."

Ray clutched his javelin tightly as he eyed the Deathless approaching them. They were only a couple of feet away from the car. He didn't have time to sit around any longer.

"I'm sorry to ask you this but can you…"

"Of course I'm helping." Meghan said as she grabbed her spear, "We're in this together, remember?"

Ray smiled weakly at her, "I remember."

The two of them got out of the car and confronted the Deathless before them: A man and a young girl.

The man looked genuinely terrifying, mainly because he was missing most of his face. His nose, cheeks and lips had been ripped off. Ray could see his bloody flesh far more clearly than he would have liked. Certain parts of his head even had bits of exposed bone. Apart from his horrifying facial appearance, the rest of him was pretty ordinary. He had on a blue and white polo shirt paired with light colored jeans.

The girl looked about twelve years of age. Her short, black hair was tied in pigtails on either side of her head. She wore jeans shorts and a faded green top that had a large bloodstain near her waist. The most noticeable thing about her though, was her missing right arm. Her slender shoulder ended in a weird, bloody stump that slowly dripped blood onto the concrete.

Ray couldn't help but wonder if she was the man's daughter. He shook that idea out of his head. These two weren't human. They were Deathless, nothing more.

"Which one do you want?" he asked, half-jokingly.

"You can have both!" Meghan retorted before saying, "The girl."

"Try not to die."

"That's a good plan."

Ray then walked forward, his eyes fixed on his target. The man seemed to be moving towards him too, stretching out both arms like an overgrown toddler.

'Perfect,' he thought, 'come at me, you piece of shit.'

Ray clutched his javelin firmly with both hands and jogged up closer. He then swung his weapon at the man's head and struck him hard on the temple with the back of it.

The Deathless staggered to the right and groaned loudly as it tried to regain its balance. Ray turned his weapon in his hands and shoved the javelin straight at the man. The sharpened tip pierced through his neck and came out the other end.

"Fuck!" Ray cursed. He was aiming for his head.

He swiftly pulled out the javelin as a rush of blood shot out from the open wound. The Deathless seemed unfazed by the gaping hole in its neck. Instead, he lunged forward in an attempted bear hug.

Ray dodged past it and struck the javelin into the back of his knee. The Deathless dropped down on all fours as he struggled to try and stand back up. Ray quickly pulled out his knife and got behind the man. He yanked his head backwards by the hair and drove the knife into the back of his skull.

In an instant, the Deathless collapsed onto the ground; unmoving and stiff.

Ray quickly looked over to Meghan just in time to see her shove her spear deep into the girl's forehead. When she pulled out her weapon, the little girl dropped to her knees and fell face first onto the ground.

Ray panted lightly and gave her a quick nod, "Good job!" he said.

"That honestly doesn't make me feel good" she started saying, "being praised for killing a small child."

Ray smiled apologetically, "Well, it helps if you don't consider them as people anymore."

"Not really…" Meghan complained.

Just then they heard a sound coming from their left, "Yo!"

Ray and Meghan whipped their heads in the direction of the sound. It was Rody. He was standing outside the building's back exit, waving at them with a big smile on his face.