Rebirth in the Apocalypse: Third Time's a Charm



"We know you are here," yelled a voice from the front of the camping supply store. Xing Xin Ya and I had pretty much cleared out everything of use, so it wasn't like there was a lot blocking our view of the 10 guys pouring in through the front door.

And when I said pretty much cleared everything out, I think I should clarify that we only left behind the racks that the clothes were hanging on and a few of the shelves. Even then I had been debating whether or not they would be useful in my space. 

You never knew when you needed shelves for jars of preserved food. Now if only there were mason jars in this world, I could die a happy woman… if I could die that was.

Speaking about death, I was determined to just sit back and let the men handle everything. 

Taking a sip of my coffee, I watched from over the rim of my mug as my guys stood shoulder to shoulder in front of me. Honestly, I appreciated the gesture, but I think that they were more than a little idiotic if they were willing to form a firing line in front of a bunch of cannibals with guns.

Or did I forget to mention that part to the guys?

Weird fact? Those that consume human flesh can actually become infected with a disease called Kuru. Kuru was first discovered in the Fore people of New Guinea and belongs to a class of infectious diseases called transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs). Because it was spread by consuming the flesh and brains of an infected individual, the government started to discourage the practice of cannibalism. There was no known treatment for the disease and it had an extremely long incubation period of months to years to show up.

Another fun fact? There are four other TSEs including mad cow disease in bovines, scrapie in sheep and goats, chronic wasting disease in deer and elk, and my personal favorite; Crutzfeldt-Jakob disease and fatal familial insomnia in humans. 

See, lack of sleep can kill you.

And now you know.

But … if the men in front of us practiced cannibalism in the form of eating human brains, then wouldn't that make them more of a zombie than the actual zombies? And technically, if the traditional zombie was originally a human, and ate another human, then wouldn't they be considered cannibals and not zombies?

If Kuru wasn't 100% fatal, I would think that they were the original zombies.

I shuddered as my mind went down a whole other rabbit hole just thinking about it, and truth be told, I managed to give myself a massive headache as a result.

Letting out a yawn that actually caused my jaw the crack, I took a sip of coffee, hoping that it would keep me awake.

The odds were not in my favor.

-----

Liu Yu Zeng and Chen Zi Han looked at each other in confusion before turning their attention back to the ten men in front of them. They had not recognized a single one of them, and even in an organization as large as theirs, that was next to impossible. They had made it a point to know absolutely everyone, in every level, from the bottom of the totem to the police that were working with them. If they were part of the Red Dragon Syndicate, then Liu Yu Zeng had a picture and bio stored away on his computer. Hell, he could even recognize most of his men's significant others.

Not to mention, he would have killed any man under him that looked like that himself.

Each one of the men was dressed in a brightly colored Hawaiian shirt that was left open just enough that their chests were completely exposed and their gold chains were on display. They also wore thick gold chains around their wrists and tight-fitting pants. They fit into every last Country K criminal stereotype that they could, and frankly, Liu Yu Zeng and Chen Zi Han were a bit insulted by it.

Never once had they worn anything that looked like that, nor had they done business with anyone that looked like that. 

Clearly, they were using the EMP and apocalypse as a way of living out some fantasies. Unfortunately for them, Liu Yu Zeng and Chen Zi Han were going to be waking them up very quickly.

"There you are," said a high-pitched voice coming from the man that stood in front of the others. The bald spot on his head was clearly getting worse, and no amount of combing his hair over would help with that. "You need to come back with us. Dead or alive, but you are coming back."

"Who are you?" asked Liu Yu Zeng, his smirk turning into a snarl the more the other man talked. "I have never seen you before."

"Ha, ha," sneered the first man. "Do you really think you can fool me with such a childish trick? I'll have you know, I am Chen Zi Han, the main enforcer of the Red Dragon Syndicate. I am not that easy to fool."

The men looked at each other in confusion before Chen Zi Han opened his mouth, "You expect me to believe that you are Chen Zi Han?" he asked incredulously. Not once in all his years did he think that he would run into someone that was claiming to be him. 

The whole matter was completely asinine. 

"Who is your leader?" snarled Liu Yu Zeng. It was not like he overly cared about the fact that someone else was using his syndicate's name. As far as he was concerned, he no longer had anything to do with it, so let the name rot under new leadership.

But if they were taking more than the syndicate's name, if they were taking THEIR name, well, that was a completely different story.

And it was one that would need to be addressed fast.

"You don't deserve to know his name," snorted the first man, his gun hanging harmlessly down by his side. "Now, alive or dead? Which do you choose?"

Liu Yu Zeng turned around to look at Li Dai Lu behind him. He would love to say that they were going, just to be able to kill whoever was claiming to be him, but the decision rested firmly on her shoulders. 

He could even give up his name if that was what she wanted. 

Li Dai Lu stood up from the fake log and drained her coffee mug. Placing everything that she wanted into her space, she walked between Liu Yu Zeng and Chen Zi Han and looked at the men in front of them.

"Alive," she said. "I want to see who is claiming to be my man."