would probably sound good. Brendon started the truck and drove slowly up the roadway looking for a place to grab some food and to keep a look out for any signs of the dead. A mini-mart that had seen better days came up on his right hand side. Both front doors were smashed and an F3 tornado seemed to have swept through the inner aisles but there still seemed to be plenty of food available, or at least food-like products, this was a mini-mart after all. Brendon pulled up close to the front doors and then reversed a few feet just in case he needed the extra space to get away from something. He hesitated in the cab whether or not to leave it running or take the keys with him. “At this rate I’ll just end up pissing my pants where I sit so I won’t have to get out.” He smiled at his own grim realization that paranoia was taking more than a foothold. He opted to shut the truck off. The idling diesel engine was loud enough to sufficiently hide the dragging foot falls of zombies. His only middle ground was to leave the keys in the ignition so that there was no chance he’d drop them and not be able to find them. The popping of the door as it opened startled him more than the earlier gunshot. His breath lingered in front of his face causing a momentary smoke screen. The morning was quiet, there was no traffic, no bustle of everyday life. Just the occasional ‘caw’ of a distant crow and the more unsettling barking of dogs that were increasingly becoming feral without ownership. Brendon laughed as he thought of a snarling mad Henry, but then immediately chilled when he thought the same thing about Bear, the Rottweiler. A bunch of poodles and a Chihuahua might not be so bad but throw in a Doberman Pinscher or a German shepherd and things could really start to get ugly. Brendon had his gun drawn as he stepped onto the broken glass. He noted that more than one person had been here just for the fact that most of the glass had been ground down to almost a fine powder. The thought that live humans were in the vicinity was of no comfort. People could be just as deadly as zombies and you had the added bonus of not knowing which side of that line they were on. At least the zombie didn’t try to pretend. As if to confirm his worst fear there were at least six or possibly seven scattered dead people, it was tough to tell because the aforementioned wild dogs had ripped them apart. They were nearly stripped clean and the bones that remained shone a bright white. Even the skulls had been crushed and the contents muzzled out. “ They had to have been humans, the dogs wouldn’t have touched zombies. Right? Who am I asking?” Dogs hadn’t done the initial killing though, various caliber brass littered the floor, and there were no guns around. The empty shells sounded like broken rain as he kicked through it. "It was bound to happen sooner or later." He thought. "Dwindling resources bring out the worst in folks." Brendon shivered as he saw the outline where the previous blood spills were. Tongue marks criss-crossed the floor, leaving red smears behind. His hunger, which had seemed such a pressing need only moments earlier, was rapidly losing its appeal. “You’ve seen worse.” He said aloud trying to bolster his nerve. He nearly cried when he passed a smashed box of pop-tarts on the floor. “Maybe I should grab them and I can use them as an excuse to go back. You know Mike, I was heading to Mexico and I came across these cherry pop-tarts and I turned around because I figured that Tommy would want them. No.” He said shaking his head. “Tommy hated the cherry ones, are there any strawberry?” Brendon was so intent on looking for a different flavor he did not realize when visitors came to join him. The deep bass growl was his first inkling that all might not be right in his world. He looked up at not the largest dog he had ever seen but clearly the most ferocious. A Siberian Husky stared back at Brendon, no wagging tail on its