As night fell, Atlanta turned into a hellscape.
Wu Fan lay behind the water tank on the roof, watching the city where he had lived for ten years burn in the darkness.
In the distance, the city center was ablaze, with thick smoke rising into the night sky like writhing black pythons.
Gunshots rang out one after another; some were as dense as a rainstorm, others as sporadic as firecrackers. Each shot represented a living person still resisting—or dying.
Howls were everywhere.
Those sounds emanated from every street, every window, and every dark corner, rising and falling in a chaotic chorus from hell.
Wu Fan couldn't tell how much humanity remained in those howls; perhaps none at all.
They were just pure, hungry sounds.
In the air, three helicopters circled.
The beams of their searchlights swept across the streets, illuminating the stumbling figures.
Where the beams passed, Wu Fan could see hordes of corpses moving—not wandering aimlessly, but heading in the same direction.
Into the city.
Where the gunfire was heaviest.
They were drawn by the sound.
"So, those guys aren't all dead yet."
Wu Fan muttered to himself, his voice too low for anyone else to hear.
He had lain on the roof for nearly an hour, and only after confirming that the surroundings were temporarily safe did he carefully climb down the fire escape.
The moment his feet touched the ground, his knees were still weak.
The location of the defensive line from earlier in the day was not far ahead.
Wu Fan held the M4 he had scavenged and crept forward, keeping close to the wall.
Then he saw it.
He would never forget this scene for as long as he lived.
The defensive line no longer existed.
It had been replaced by a mess of shredded flesh and blood. The barbed wire was torn to shreds, and a hummer lay overturned to the side, its body covered in dense scratch marks.
Severed limbs were everywhere on the ground—an arm still clutching a gun, a foot wearing a military boot, half a face pressed against the broken car window, eyes still open.
Those eyes.
Grayish-white.
It had turned.
Wu Fan looked away, forcing himself not to think about who this face had belonged to.
Was it that nineteen-year-old blonde Soldier? Or the captain who had held a gun to him?
It didn't matter anymore.
They were all dead.
But there were things on the ground he needed.
Wu Fan quickly scanned the battlefield, searching for any usable supplies.
Ammunition boxes were scattered everywhere; some had been crushed, others remained intact.
He picked up two full M4 magazines and tucked them into his belt, then grabbed three more and stuffed them into his backpack.
Pistol ammunition, shotgun shells, and even a few grenades—he took them all.
The door of a military hummer was open, and there were two bulletproof vests on the back seat.
Wu Fan pulled one out and put it on; it was heavy, weighing down his shoulders.
But he didn't take it off.
In this world, any layer of protection could be the difference between life and death.
After gathering his things, he turned and headed toward the roadside.
A Toyota Corolla was parked there with the door unlocked, and two wires hung from under the keyhole—someone had clearly tried to hotwire it just like he would have, but they had been interrupted before succeeding.
Wu Fan sat in the driver's seat, took a deep breath, and began to work.
He had worked as a civilian employee at the police station for five years and had heard plenty of patrol officers bragging about how to steal cars.
He never expected that one day this skill would actually come in handy.
He stripped the two wires, red to red, and touched them together—
The dashboard lit up.
The engine emitted a low roar.
Wu Fan let out a sigh of relief, shifted gears, and stepped on the gas, and the Corolla shot forward.
He dared not drive too fast, nor too slow.
Too fast, and the noise would attract zombies.
Too slow, and he feared being caught by those wandering things.
He kept the speed at forty kilometers per hour, turned off the headlights, and relied only on the moonlight and the glow from the distant fires to navigate.
He often had to detour along the way.
Wrecked cars lay across the road, some still burning.
Corpses lay on the side of the road, some already turned into zombies, still crawling futilely on the spot.
Wu Fan tried his best not to run them over—the vibration would attract more.
Once, he had to drive through the middle of a horde of thirty.
Those things were wandering on the road, at least thirty of them.
Wu Fan had seen them from afar, but this was the only road; both sides were dense forests, and driving in would mean certain death.
He gritted his teeth, floored the gas, and plowed a path through.
Half an hour later, the suburbs.
The sound of gunfire suddenly became clearer.
It wasn't the sporadic gunfire from the city, but the sound of an intense firefight.
M4s, M16s, and the occasional explosion of a grenade.
Wu Fan stepped on the brake, pulled the car over to the side of the road, and pricked up his ears to listen.
The gunfire came from the northeast.
The direction of the CDC.
"Someone is still alive?"
He frowned.
No.
Judging by the intensity of the gunfire, that wasn't just a few Soldiers resisting; it was a real battle.
Was the military guarding the CDC? Or evacuating?
Wu Fan killed the engine and sat in the darkness, listening for a long while.
The gunfire ebbed and flowed, but it never stopped.
This meant the battle was still ongoing, and that the CDC had not yet completely fallen.
But it also meant that it was extremely dangerous over there right now.
He had watched that show.
He knew what the ultimate fate of the CDC was.
"Going there now is just asking for death."
Wu Fan muttered to himself, "Wait until dawn."
He didn't want to approach in the dark and be shot dead by some twitchy Soldier who mistook him for a zombie; besides, with no moral or legal constraints now, dying would be for nothing.
He restarted the car, slowly drove off the main road, and turned into a residential area.
This was a typical suburban community in Atlanta—detached houses, neatly trimmed lawns, and two cars parked in front of every house.
Now, suitcases, children's toys, and miscellaneous items of unknown origin were scattered across those lawns.
The doors were open, the windows were dark, and the people were gone.
Wu Fan chose a house that looked the most inconspicuous.
A small two-story building with white exterior walls; a large oak tree at the entrance blocked the moonlight.
He parked the car and walked to the door with his gun raised. The door was ajar, and it was pitch black inside.
He pushed the door open gently.
"Hello, is anyone there?"
He asked in a low voice.
There was no answer.
Only the humming of the refrigerator.
Wu Fan turned on his flashlight and began to check.
The living room was messy; a half-eaten pizza sat on the coffee table, and the TV was still on, showing static on the screen.
A child's jacket was thrown on the sofa, and Lego bricks were scattered on the floor.
The owners had left in a hurry.
Unwashed dishes were soaking in the kitchen sink.
There was still food in the fridge—the milk had soured, but the canned goods, pasta, and sauces were still edible.
Wu Fan didn't touch those; he hadn't finished clearing the house yet and wouldn't eat this stuff for now.
He went upstairs.
The bed in the master bedroom was unmade, the wardrobe was open, and hangers were scattered all over the floor.
The second bedroom was a child's room, with cartoon dinosaur wallpaper on the walls and a teddy bear thrown on the small bed.
No one.
Wu Fan breathed a sigh of relief.
He went back downstairs and checked all the doors and windows.
The front door locked, the back door locked, all the first-floor windows closed, and the blinds pulled down.
Only after doing all this did he dare to turn on the kitchen light.
The moment the light came on, he had a dazed illusion—as if this were just an ordinary night, as if everything outside were a nightmare, as if the next second, the owners of the house would come down from upstairs and ask him why he had broken into their home.
But the howls from outside shattered this illusion.
Wu Fan turned off the light and stood in the darkness.
He found an unopened bottle of whiskey in the kitchen, unscrewed the cap, and took a big gulp.
The spicy liquid slid down his throat, and the burning sensation made him a little clearer.
Then he went upstairs and walked into the master bedroom's bathroom.
The water heater was gas-powered and, surprisingly, still worked.
Wu Fan turned on the showerhead, and the moment the hot water rushed down, he almost cried.
He stood under the water for a full ten minutes, watching the gray, dirty water swirl into the drain.
That was the blood, sweat, dust, and fear of the day.
After showering, he found a white shirt and a suit in the master bedroom's wardrobe and put them on.
The original owner was slightly heavier than him, so the clothes were a bit loose, but they were still more comfortable than that blood-stained police uniform.
He lay on the bed.
The mattress was soft, and the pillow smelled of laundry detergent.
Outside the window, the gunfire continued in the distance.
Closer by, there were occasional howls from zombies.
Wu Fan stared at the ceiling, and the scenes of the day flashed through his mind like a movie—
The morning alarm clock.
Karen slamming the door and leaving.
The chaos in the streets.
The black hand grabbing Maddie's hair in the back seat of the police car.
The gunfire.
The notification sound of that system.
The military's defensive line.
Shredded flesh and blood.
Sliding through the horde of corpses at night.
Maddie.
She was sent to the hospital.
Would she turn into a zombie?
Or had she already turned?
Wu Fan didn't know.
He might never know.
In this world, missing meant dead.
He closed his eyes.
Exhaustion surged in like a tide, drowning out all fear, all anxiety, and all emotions.
Thirty seconds later, he fell asleep.
There were no zombies in his dream.
Only a hive, dreaming of that one from Resident Evil.
An underground hexagonal hive, layer upon layer, endless.
A voice was saying:
"Unlock me."
"Unlock me."
"Unlock..."
Wu Fan opened his eyes abruptly.
It was already dawn.
The gunfire outside the window had stopped.
The entire suburb was deathly silent.
He lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, taking a few seconds to remember where he was and what had happened.
Then he sat up, got out of bed, walked to the window, and carefully lifted a corner of the blinds.
In the distance, the outline of the CDC building loomed in the morning mist.
Several black plumes of smoke rose from that direction, drifting silently toward the grayish-white sky.
Wu Fan took a deep breath.
"Alright."
He whispered, "Let's go take a look."