Zee Mission: RZ (Chapter 2/3)

The day hadn’t started out great and there was no reason, why it should get better any time soon. Actually the same could be said about Snippy’s whole life, before and after the apocalypse. And as if living in a radioactive wasteland wasn’t bad enough already, he had to do it in the possibly worst company ever. Captain with his insane, hazardous missions, Pilot always looking for a method to get rid of Snippy and last but not least Engie the man, who had singlehandedly made his life miserable before the end of the world and then caused the apocalypse.
And now a zombie?
Seriously?
But on the other hand: Was this guy actually a real zombie? Asking had only produced a shrug from the strange fellow.
Did he honestly not know?
How was that even possible?
As they walked down the streets between the ruined buildings, the sniper cast another look at the silent figure scuffling alongside him.

- Damn he even walks like an undead!
But on the other hand he has a gasmask. If he needs to breath, he must still be alive, right?-

Snippy continued to ponder until they reached a huge crossroad, where Zombie suddenly stopped moving and looked around.

“Hey? What’s the matter?“

As an answer Zombie showed Captain’s shoppinglist to him again.

“Well? I know we’re supposed to look for princess Peach, what’s new?“ the sniper inquired, before the zombie turned the paper around and Snippy could see, that there was another note on the backside in the familiar, terrible handwriting of his commander:

“Minions! Any encountered trafficlights shall be destroyed! NO PRISONERS!“

Snippy looked up from the note and around, they were standing at a huge crossroad...
“Awww, no...“ he sighed.

Lot’s of thrown rocks and splintered, three colored glass later, they were back to their main quest. But thanks to Captain’s surefire way to make any rediculous mission even more complicated they had lost so much time, that Snippy was sure they wouldn’t make it back to the base before nightfall.

-And isn’t that just a lovely outlook? Staying out in the wasteland, alone in the dark with a guy, who might or might not be a zombie and doesn’t know the difference anyway?
Hell no!
And if it takes the whole night to walk back to the base!-

But before he could even think about returning, the sniper would have to make sure, that Zombie somehow completed his mission, which seemed more and more unlikely to him at the current state of affairs.
And while they were searching for their target in a decayed shopping street, Snippy came slowly to the conclusion, that the zombie indeed didn’t have a hint of a clue, what they were actually looking for.  
First they had inspected a small supermarket, where Snippy discovered a few cans of food –  at least the day hadn’t been a complete waste of time. Of course there was not a trace of princess Peach.
Their next stop was a toystore. It had looked promising but again no princess Peach. Instead the sniper stumbled over an intact chemistry kit for kids. Had he believed in gods, he would surely have thanked them for letting him find it before Captain or Pilot got their hands on it - Snippy made sure to dispose of it inconspicuously.
From there on the locations they visited made less and less sense. A bookstore, a flowershop, a home improvement store, then a hairdresser - of course without any results. And while Snippy was giving up looking through the mostly empty shelves of an abandoned electronics store, he was sure hoping, that the damn princess would finally be in the next place.

“I think we left no stone unturned in most of the shops here already, is there any place we haven’t looked, yet, Zombie?“

...

“Zombie?“

This was when Snippy noticed, that the other wasn’t around anymore. The zombie had been so quiet the whole time, that the sniper hadn’t even noticed it slipping away.

“Damn! I don’t want to know how unamused Captain will be, if I manage to loose his new zombie minion just like this.“ Snippy cursed under his breath, when he stepped over a broken flatscreen towards the exit.

But what he saw out on the street made his blood freeze.
Zombie had been searching through the contents of a broken display window of a shop once selling sports equipment. He was still standing there, completely motionless as there was a second larger shape slowly circling around him. It seemed the zombie had accidentally rousted a beast.

Snippy had seen those before, double as huge as bears with misshaped heads and claws so sharp they could easily cut through bones. This one looked kind of wrong though. The fur was hanging at it’s body in an odd way, as if it had been meant for an even larger monster. The remains of a shoe with shoelaces and all were still stuck between its fangs.

-It’s starved!- the sniper realized.

There was not enough prey for a predator of this size in the toxic area, if any at all. The beast had probably been lost for days or even weeks not finding its way back to its former hunting grounds, wandering around until it came upon that store. Sports outfits had many leather parts, balls and shoes were mostly made of the same or similar materials so it had probably been feasting on those without actually being able to satiate its hunger. Until it had been disturbed by the silent figure now standing in front of it.

The sniper carefully aimed his rifle but he was very well aware that he couldn’t shoot like this. It was impossible to kill a beast of this size with only a single bullet, even if he hit the heart or an eye it would take a few minutes to die. And in that time, it would certainly rip Zombie’s head off with it’s claws.

On the other hand: Why hadn’t it done so already? The zombie was standing right there in plain sight.

The beast seemed ... uncertain?

Suddenly the monster’s head flicked around, now staring directly at Snippy.
And with a low growl it turned its whole massive body and came dashing at its new prey.


“Bwah?“
-You gotta be kidding me? He is less appetizing than a tennis shoe but of course I am looking delicious?-

Snippy fired, fired again and tried to dodge back into the electronics shop behind him.

Too slow, the paw of the now fatally wounded beast pushed into him and he could feel the claws scraping over his gasmask before he stumbled backwarts into one of the shelves.
The impact knocked the air out of his lungs and Snippy instinctively inhaled.
He realized what a bad mistake that had been even before he heard his respirator clattering over concrete somewhere in the darkness between the shelves. The claws had easily cut through the straps holding his mask in place. Now the toxic air was burning in his throat and in his lungs.

Snippy desperately held his breath and fought the urge to cough and with that inhale even more of the poison.

The dying beast was still trashing around near the entrance and the sniper briefly wondered what had happened to the zombie.
Was he still there?
Had he run away?
But that would have to wait, Snippy needed his respirator back: Now!
Where had it fallen?
The Sniper was crawling through the rubble, his vision getting blurry. Falling unconscious now would mean sure death.
Aside from the blood rushing in his ears the world suddenly went quiet, the monster had finally fallen silent.
A shadow blocked the light from the entrance, hasty steps were shuffeling through the rubble.

-Zombie?-

Snippy saw the grey figure aproaching, then everything went black.

ooo

“What is this boobery Mr. Snippy? Why are you sleeping in a place like this?“

“He looks like a drunken shoe on monday morning that jiggly slug!“

“Gwah? Captain? Pilot?“ Snippy opened his eyes, tried to get up and almost fell out of the wheelbarrow, he was lying in.

“Where am I? What happened?“ he asked groggily.

“About the where: Right in front of our base, Charles. You were gone quite long. It’s dark already and so we were just about to go looking, what was keeping you. Just to find you sleeping here like this. Hell for a moment I actually thought you were dead. And about the what: We wanted to ask you the same.“ Engie explained.

Yes, what had happened, shouldn’t he be dead?

Snippy had lost his respirator, now it was back covering his face and doing its duty. His throat was still burning some but it wasn’t too bad anymore. The backpack with the supplies he had collected was leaning to the next wall, as was his rifle, both looked intact. But something else was missing... or rather someone.  

“Where is zee zombie, Mr. Snippy? Before it reports back to me on zee mission, it can not become an official minion of mein.“ Captain inquired.

“Don’t know, he must have been here just a moment ago, maybe he decided to head out again to continue searching for that princess Peach, since we weren’t able to complete that stupid quest of yours.“

“No, mein sniper, zee mission was actually a complete success.“ with this the Captain held up a can of preserved fruits he had picked up from the wheelbarrow. The label read:

‘Royal Peaches’.

“Zee princess is rescued, her whole family assembled, zee kingdom is safe once more. You took too long for zee mission, though.“

“Hello? We were attacked by a monster!“

“Was it a giant turtle?“

“What? No!“

“Then it doesn’t count! Let’s get back in, meine minions. Your Captain has to think about fun new missions for you for tomorrow.“

They followed him.
Two out of three minions were groaning.

ooo

Later that night, Snippy and Engie were sitting back at the table in their hideout. The sniper was replacing the broken straps of his respirator.

“I can’t believe he actually taped the gasmask back to my face! What was that zombie thinking?“ Snippy glared angrily at the loose strips of ducktape now lying on the table.  

“Well looks like it worked, you are still alive, Charles. So you shouldn’t complain about some lost hair. And at least he didn’t use super glue instead.“ Engie remarked with a grin.  

“By the way I highly doubt that guy was a real zombie, you see, while the two of you were out, I inspected that place, where we found him. Looks like he somehow broke through some rotten floorboards from the level above, when running away from Pilot and ended up stuck behind that wall. He was lucky, that those wallboards weren’t in the best shape anymore either.
See? One riddle solved! Nothing mysterious behind it at all.“ Gromov explained proudly.

“And the other two skeletons? Why were those in there?“ Snippy wanted to know.

“Hell! Do I look like a goddamn CSI-team to you, Charles? I have no idea, maybe they crashed down there together with him, maybe they’ve been in that wall since long before the apocalypse, who cares?
Rather tell me, what you managed to find out about that zombie... guy... whatever. “

“A few things: His aim when throwing rocks was miserable, a monster didn’t recognize him as prey, I think he gave me his gasmask, when I lost mine ... and just before I passed out...I could swear I saw only bones under that cape of his.“

“Hey hey! Are you trying to scare me, Charles? That’s completely impossible, you were probably halucinating from the toxic gas.“

“Well how about this then? He must have searched for my lost respirator in the darkness, after giving his mask to me, how long do you think he could have possibly been holding his breath?“

“Maybe he found your mask at once, or he had a spare mask. Charles, be reasonable!“

Snippy sighed.

“Anyway, he was able to locate our base without me pointing him here, and...“
Snippy glanced at the can of ‘Royal Peaches’, that was now resting like a trophy on top of a sideboard, focusing his gaze on the pricetag, which was from the very same supermarket, they had visited first.
“... I don’t think he can be trusted.“