Chapter 28

  Jake kept his on aimed at the stranger as he assessed him. The man was well-equipped, with an assault rifle slung over one shoulder and a revolver in a hip holster. He made no attempt to reach for his ons, though.

  “Who are you?” Jake demanded.

  The man’s eyes went wide.

  “Keep your voice down, will you?” he said in the same hushed tone as his eyes darted to the anomaly. “I’m just another survivor, like you. I only wao warn you to be real quiet hat anomaly. It’s noise-sensitive. Loud sounds trigger it. S it and see for yourself.”

  That’s what I was going to do, Jake thought. He still didn’t trust this stranger o.

  Once more, Jake’s gaze flicked to the anomaly behind him before settling ba the stranger.

  “Stay where you are,” he warned him calmly. “You move, you die.”

  The stranger rolled his eyes.

  “If you shoot me, you’ll set off the anomaly, and we’ll both be goners,” he stated with an air of annoying superiority, as if speaking to a child. Jake chose to ighe dession.

  He half-turned so he could have both the anomaly and the survivor in his field of vision. Taking one hand off the shotguook out his PDA and poihe camera at the spot above the fountain. Briefly shifting his focus from the stranger, Jake unlocked his devid pressed the S button with his thumb. He then immediately returned his gaze to the strahe man remained in the same position, but a smug grin spread across his face, pying on his thin lips.

  The stranger appeared genuinely amused by Jake’s distrust, whily heightened Jake’s wariness. He didn’t like the ma. He acted as if he thought Jake’s distrust was unwarranted, whily added to his suspis. He didn’t buy it for a sed that the stranger was oblivious to the fual rule of mistrusting unfamiliar people in this wless world. The man seemed to be striving to e across as trustworthy, but to Jake, it felt forced and insincere.

  He shifted his gaze to the s of his PDA to read the description of the anomaly.

  Name: Meat Grinder

  Descriptioive to noise, extremely dangerous. Draws objects within rao itself, twisting, cutting, and slig them before expelling the remnants.

  Duration: 10 seds

  Cooldown: 60 seds

  Danger Level: 8 (High)

  After stowing away his PDA, Jake turned his focus back to the stranger.

  “Did you s it?” the man asked.

  “Yeah.”

  A smug smile reappeared oranger’s lips.

  “See?” he taunted. “Sensitive to loud sounds, just as I said. Wasn’t lying, was I?”

  “So who are you?” Jake asked.

  From the er of his eye, Jake noticed the anomaly shimmering as it briefly distorted the air iion to his voice. He eaking softly, but the anomaly respoo his voiyway. Uain about the threshold of hat could trigger the anomaly, Jake opted to keep his voice down to avoid setting it off actally.

  The stranger seemed fused by his question.

  “What do you mean?” he asked in his usual loud whisper. “I’m just a survivor, same as you.” He moved closer to the railing on the sed floor, hands still raised. “By the way, I lower my hands now? Or you still don’t trust me?”

  Jake was silent for a sed. Then he nodded. “Go ahead.”

  He lowered his shotgun but kept it in his hands. He still wasn’t sure what to make of the stranger. While he wao ask him some questions, he wasn’t all that keen on talking to the stranger while standio the noise-sensitive anomaly. It was best to secure the anomaly as soon as possible. After all, it was the reason he’d arrived at the mall in the first pce.

  Closing an anomaly required a special spell. He had already read the scroll taining the spell while driving to the mall, so all that remaio do was use the spell on the anomaly. Unfortunately, the process of closing a magical anomaly was a tad long and challenging. It would demand his full tration. He knew he would have to direct all his focus on the anomaly because any distra could disrupt the closing process, causing the spell to fail and rendering his efforts futile. With only one spell at his disposal, Jake khat he had just one ce to close the anomaly. If he failed to do it on the first try, the spell would be wasted, requiring him to locate another scroll before he could attempt to seal the anomaly again.

  After activating the spell, Jake would have to devote his plete attention to the process of closing the anomaly. Having closed several anomalies i days, he was well-versed in the procedure and knew what to expect from it. This particur anomaly was of level 8, indig it would require approximately sixty seds to seal shut—a siderably lengthy period.

  Jake found himself in a difficult situation because he couldn’t risk losing focus oranger for a minute while using the spell. Given the anomaly’s high danger level of 8, it likely had a signifit range. Although the stranger appeared to be close enough to the anomaly to be affected by it if it suddenly set off, he could easily step back to safety while Jake was occupied with the spell and attack him from a safe distance.

  He opted not to take any ces. He resolved to either make sure the stranger was trustworthy or wait for him to go away before attempting to secure the anomaly.

  “What are you doing here?” he finally asked in a hushed tone, breaking the silence.

  “In the mall, you mean?” the stranger replied nontly, shrugging his shoulders. “Sging, of course, what else? Lotta goodies spawn in such rge pces.”

  Pointing toward the lifeless bodies nearby, Jake asked, “Were you part of this group?”

  The stranger’s gaze flickered toward the remnants of the fallen survivors. He hesitated to respond immediately, giving Jake the sehat he was pting how much truth to reveal in his reply.

  The stranger finally nodded.

  “Yeah,” he said cautiously. “They were my… well, perhaps not friends yet, more like traveling panions. I met them a few days back. They offered to join them, and I agreed. Safety in numbers, right?”

  Uain about the level of truth in the words spoken by the stranger, Jake asked another question, “How e they are dead, and you are not?”

  This time, the stranger replied right away, without taking time to ponder on his answer. “We split up. I headed to the sed floor while they remained on the first. We went in different dires. Then I heard gunfire and screaming. I ran back. When I saw what was happening to them, I froze. They entered a group of mutants and opened fire on them he anomaly. They must’ve failed to spot it and actally triggered it. The anomaly… What it did to them… Geez, it was truly horrifying, man. It was tearing both them and the mutants apart. It wasn’t a pleasant sight, I tell you that. The worst part was there was nothing I could do to help my friends. I could just watch them die in a horrible way. When the anomaly returo the idle state, I analyzed it with my PDA. That’s how I lear was sensitive to loud noises. Afterward, I thhly explored the sed flathering what I needed before making my way to the exit. As I approached the escators, I spotted you from above. The thought of witnessing another fellow survivor meet such a grisly fate due to the anomaly was too mue to bear. So I decided to alert you about it in the event you hadn’t spotted it, much like my unfortunate panions.”

  Or you may have warned me out of self-preservatinizing the danger of being well within the anomaly’s effective range and the risk of being killed by it if I actally set it off, Jake thought, but he decided not to voice his doubts, keeping these skeptical thoughts to himself instead.

  “Why did you kill the guy at the entrance?” Jake immediately asked another question.

  Even from a distance, he saw a shift iranger’s expression. He was silent for a sed, then asked, feigning ignorance, “e again? What guy?”

  “There was a dead survivor at the entrao the mall,” Jake said. “I assume it was yroup’s doing? Why did you people kill him?”

  “Oh, that guy?” the stranger responded, shaking his head with a tinge of sorrow in his voice. “It wasn’t us who killed him. He was already dead when we pulled up at the mall. Puy. Dunno who did it. It’s a crazy world, man.”

  He retty good liar. Jake almost believed him. Almost. However, the stranger’s initial rea spoke volumes. When he fronted him about the dead guy, a glimmer nition iranger’s eyes betrayed his true knowledge. That fsh nition in his eyes and a trace of guilt momentarily flickering across his expression did not escape Jake’s notice. The timing of the victim’s death suggested that the i occurred shortly before Jake arrived at the mall. With no sounds of gunfire eg through the building, it appeared that there were no other survivors ihe mall. So the identities of the culprits were pretty much obvious. The straanding by the sed-floor railing, along with his now-dead panions, had arrived at the mall just as the red-haired guy was stepping out, and they had killed him in cold blood for no other reason than to loot his body.

  Before Jake could say anything else, the stranger’s gaze shifted beyond him, fog into the distance.

  “Oh fuck,” he muttered as he pointed his fi a spot behind Jake’s back. “We got pany.”

  The stranger’s eyes widened with genuine shock as the menag sounds of fierce growling and scraping cws reached Jake’s ears from behind. Quickly gng over his shoulder, he saw a group of ex-human walkers and leapers verging orium from multiple aisles.