After a few more seconds of running, we’d managed to reach the seventh floor without so much as a single zombie or player coming through any of the doors below us.

“Think we’ll be alright in here?” I asked as we went and hid in a small office that, based on the various stickers and the giraffe measuring tape on the wall, used to belong to a pediatrician.

“One would hope so,” Cara replied coolly as she started rummaging through the various drawers and cabinets in the small office, “here you go. Morphine.”

I barely managed to catch the small autoinjector that Cara cast in my direction, but as soon as I did I couldn’t help but feel immensely grateful.

+1 Morphine

-1 Morphine

And with that simple injection, I was healed.

I have to admit, it was always weird how that worked.

The pain was so, so real, but somehow morphine could mend broken bones, dislocated joints, or just about anything else.

Sure, you needed a blood bag if you lost too much, but morphine even helped you bring up your blood levels slowly over time.

“You hear that?” Cara whispered, pulling me out of my amused trance, “I think someone’s coming.”

At first I didn’t hear anything, beyond the sporadic gunfire coming from well below us, but, after a few seconds of straining my ears, the sound of quiet yet heavy footsteps reached me as they slowly made their way toward Cara and I’s hiding place.

“Is there any chance that we left a trail?” I asked as quietly as I could after pulling my AR off my back, “Any doors, or maybe some blood?”

Cara quickly looked herself over then shook her head, “I’m not bleeding, you?”

“No.” I replied, not quite knowing whether I should be grateful or worried, “Alright, let’s go silent.”

Cara simply nodded at that, then gestured for me to go over to the right side of the door, ‘You cover there,’ she mouthed as she made her way to the left side, ‘I’ll cover here.’

‘Do we wanna take them?’ I mouthed back.

Cara shook her head before poking herself in the chest, ‘Low blood.’

I understood her predicament, and while I was confident I’d be able to handle whoever it was on the other side of the door, I didn’t want to force her into a situation where she could accidently get put down.

The owner of the heavy footfalls was mere feet from the door and seemed to be slowing down the closer they got, which I took as a sign that they knew where we were.

‘Have they stopped?’ Cara asked silently.

‘Yeah, I think so.’ I replied after listening for a few more seconds, ‘Should we check?’

‘No, if they come in, then we’ll deal with them.’

Truth be told, I was starting to get a bit antsy, but again, I appreciated Cara’s position and stayed put.

“I know you’re in there,” a familiar voice called through the door, “and I know you’re wounded.”

It took me a moment to place the voice given that it was travelling through the door, but when I finally recognized it I couldn’t help but grin, “Stan?” I laughed, “Is that you?”

“Finn?” Stan chuckled back, “Well, I’ll be damned, what are you doing here?”

“Oh, you know, doin’ my best to survive.” I replied without opening the door, “How ‘bout you? I take it you’re that sniper that flipped my vehicle?”

“That was you?” Stan asked in disbelief, “Shit, I’m sorry about that, I just saw a van coming and panicked.”

“Panicked?” Cara scoffed, “You put a bullet clean through the tire moving at least fifty at, what, well over a half-mile?”

“I said I panicked, I didn’t say I got shaky.” Stan replied with the cool confidence that he only ever got when he talked to girls, “So, who’s the girl? She one of us?”

It took me a moment to realize what he meant, “Oh… No, no I don’t think so.”

“Hey!” Cara snapped boldly, “I saved your ass, didn’t I? That’s gotta be worth something.”

“Trust me, you don’t wanna be one of us.” Stan replied coldly before I could, his voice drooping as he too undoubtedly thought about the shitty situation we were in on the surface, “Well, you two gonna come out or what?”

I wanted to, desperately, but at the same time I wasn’t altogether sure what Stan’s reaction was going to be with Cara, and it wasn’t like I could ask him whether or not he was going to shoot her on sight, that’d make her… jumpy.

“Finn?”

“Yeah,” I replied, hoping that Cara would be okay with it, “yeah, I’m coming out. Sorry, it’s been a weird day.”

“Have to agree with you there,” Stan chuckled as I walked out, “what made it worse was I ended up landing nowhere near that beach.”

“Me too!” I laughed, taking note of Stan’s ghillie suit and the AS50 on his back as I did so, “Heh, packin’ a lot of firepower I see.”

“Yeah, found her in my pod along with about fifty rounds.” Stan replied before taking the sniper rifle off his back as if to show it off.

“Fifty?” I scoffed, “That seems a tad excessive, doesn’t it?”

“Not when you take into account that I can only carry this and a pistol,” Stan said almost as if was genuinely upset, “means I’m next to useless in close-quarters.”

“Well thank God for that,” Cara replied, having finally decided to come out of the office, “means I at least have a fightin’ chance if you turn out to be a dick.”

“And who’s this ray of sunshine?” Stan asked with a grin.

“Cara,” she practically barked back, “who the Hell are you?”

I liked the fact that Cara wasn’t the type to just accept the company she was in, meant that I could count on her if our little team got any bigger, but at the same time I kind of felt like she was being a bit gruffer with Stan than she needed to be.

Stan didn’t appear to mind though, and after a few seconds of regarding Cara curiously, smiled and put his gun back on his back, “I’m Stan,” he announced before shooting his hand out in front of him, “pleasure to meet you.”

The expression on Cara’s face was one I knew well after months of watching Stan’s interactions with women. It was this sort of mix of shock and anger, like she was surprised that he respected her enough to shake her hand, but not enough that he’d let her have the satisfaction of getting a rise out of him.

Cara eventually gave into her more hospitable nature, and took his hand firmly, but not without saying “I’m sure the pleasure’s all yours.”

Again though, Stan didn’t mind, he actually seemed kind of amused with her, but didn’t say as much and instead turned back to me once the handshake was complete, “So, what’s the plan here? There’re at least a dozen players in here with us, as well as a whole boatload of zombies.”

“You didn’t have an evac plan?” I chuckled, “Man, you must be losing your edge.”

“I’m not losing my edge,” Stan sniped back half-heartedly, “I had a plan, but I know how you’d react if I said ‘Let’s go to the roof’. It’d be all… Why are you missing a shoe?”

I looked at him confusedly for a few moments before turning my attention to my feet and remembering, “Oh, yeah, wire fence.” I replied as if it was enough of a description, “Now, the roof.”

“Are you agreeing?”

“No.” I scoffed, “Why the Hell would I agree to go to the roof?”

“I’m with… Finn, was it?” Cara asked, drawing my attention to the fact that we hadn’t actually properly introduced each other, then waited until I gave her a single nod, “Okay, cool, I agree with Finn. Going to the roof seems like a really good way to get trapped.”

“And coming up here wasn’t?” Stan asked with a level of cockiness that I honestly didn’t think he was capable of.

“No, coming up here was a necessity,” Cara clarified matter-of-factly, “whereas the roof is just a really high place with only one means of entrance and exit.”

“Alright, so we fight our way out.” Stan suggested, “Well, you two fight our way out. I don’t think the AS50’s gonna be all that fun to use inside.”

“No can do,” Cara replied, “I’m low blood. One good shot and I’m as good as dead.”

“Okay,” Stan said, his voice clearly indicating that he was starting to get irritated, “what’s your plan then? Or do you just want to keep shooting down mine all day?”

“Well, I need meds,” Cara said, trying to sound as bold as possible, “I just hit myself with morphine, but that’s gonna take way too long to get me back up to full health.”

“Heh,” Stan huffed amusedly, “well, you see, the thing about the meds is that they’re all on the roof.”

“Why’re all the meds on the roof?” I asked, deciding that that was as good a time as any for me to chime back in.

“Because I went ahead and put ‘em there.” Stan replied.

“No, I mean…” I started then trailed off as I realized he was being deliberately pedantic, apparently taking no mind for the situation we were in, “Ugh, why did you put ‘em up there?”

“Well, to keep ‘em from everyone else, of course.”

Cara and, to a lesser extent, me were less than impressed with this answer for what I feel are completely justifiable and logical reasons.

With that being said, I don’t think Stan quite deserved the jaw-rattling punch he got from Cara, who I’m sure would’ve kept going if I hadn’t have grabbed her as Stan fell backwards onto his ass.

However, with that being said, I think that there were probably a whole lot of people out there that wanted to punch Stan in the face following something annoying he did in-game, but were incapable of doing so due to the previous limitations of mouse and keyboard gaming.

“You’re exactly the kind of dick-hole who makes playin’ this game such a frickin’ pain in the ass!” Cara growled as she struggled and slipped out of my grip, “I mean… What gives you the right to just-”

“This game is about survival,” Stan snapped while rubbing his jaw and getting to his feet as Cara paced angrily in front of me, “it ain’t just about shootin’ as many folk as you possibly can.”

I felt like Stan was getting dangerously close to letting slip why it was he’d been playing the way he had, but I also felt like me saying anything could potentially give it away and, thus, result in the both of us getting killed.

“You just said it though,” Cara replied, having apparently calmed down some on her little pace, “this is a game. Games are meant to be fun. I mean, shit, I know that this ain’t exactly your normal shoot ‘em up, but it’s still just a game.”

“To me it isn’t,” Stan said flatly, bringing my concern to an even higher level, “to me this is a matter of…”

I’m not sure what had made him trail off, whether it was simply him realizing what he was about to say, or if it was because he’d seen the expression of panic on my face, but whatever it was I knew I was grateful for it.

“Look,” Stan started again with a sigh, “I like this game, I like this game a lot.”

“So do I!” Cara shouted back with a little sardonic laugh, “And you’re ruinin’ the experience by hoardin’ all the crap you don’t need.”

“I know, I know, but at the same time…” Stan responded somewhat meekly before looking back over to me with a half-smile, “I don’t know, I guess I figured I’d try to play this round a bit differently.”

“By being a scrub?”

I can honestly say that I was supremely surprised that Stan didn’t shoot her right then and there considering the fact that he absolutely hated being called a ‘scrub’. Hell, he almost made physical contact with someone at a gaming convention over the term a few weeks after I’d first met him.

But no, instead Stan swallowed his pride, half-smiled, and nodded, “Yes, by being a bit of a scrub.”

Now, I’m not sure if Cara knew just how difficult that was for him to say, or if she’d realized that Stan wasn’t that bad of a guy, or even if she’d just had enough time to calm down, but, following Stan’s almost bold self-deprecation, she smiled and let out an amused huff.

“Okay,” I said, hoping that I could steer the conversation to safety after everything had reached a level of semi-tranquility, “the roof, there’s still the problem that there’s only one way off, unless you want to try your luck at jumping.”

Stan seemed somewhat surprised at my existence for a moment, but quickly managed to shake that off with a broad smile and a set of finger-guns being pointed my way, “That’s where you’re wrong, kiddo.”