Chapter 179: Scouting Atlantic City [2]

"Why the hell did we stop the cars in the middle of the damn road like this?!"

Billy’s voice carried excessive volume given our current situation—loud enough that I grimaced reflexively, already imagining how far that sound might carry through empty streets and potentially alert infected to our presence before we’d even begun proper reconnaissance.

"Yeah, seriously! Shouldn’t we have just driven straight into Atlantic City with the cars?" Kyle added with equal volume and even more indignation, as if we’d personally offended him by requiring a short walk. "This is stupid—we’re wasting time and energy when we could be driving!"

The complaints had started almost immediately after we’d exited the vehicles, Brad’s faction apparently unable to tolerate even minimal physical exertion or caution without voicing their displeasure.

"Already complaining before we’ve even started the actual mission?" Christopher asked with withering contempt. "We don’t want to enter the city stupidly and blindly without checking conditions first and establishing our bearings. Anything unexpected can happen in urban environments filled with infected—vehicle traps, blocked streets, concentrated infected presence that could surround and immobilize us. It’s better to advance slowly and cautiously on foot like this, maintaining maximum flexibility."

He paused, letting that sink in before adding pointedly, "At worst, if we encounter overwhelming threats, we’ll just have to run back to where the cars are parked. You can at least manage running a few hundred yards, right? Or is basic cardiovascular fitness beyond your capabilities too?"

Christopher’s reasoning was absolutely sound, but there were additional considerations he hadn’t mentioned that had influenced my decision to approach on foot rather than driving directly into Atlantic City’s urban core.

Getting vehicles deep inside the city and then suddenly finding ourselves cornered from all sides by massive infected hordes while trapped inside metal boxes—that scenario was genuinely more frightening and dangerous than any threat we might face on foot. Inside a surrounded vehicle, we’d have no escape routes except through windows too small for quick egress, no ability to fight effectively in such confined spaces, and the very real possibility of infected simply overwhelming the car through sheer numbers and eventually breaking through windows or doors.

As counterintuitive as it might sound to civilians accustomed to viewing vehicles as safety and protection, in certain situations—particularly when dealing with surrounded positions and overwhelming numbers—people with enhanced abilities like Rachel, Sydney, and myself were actually better positioned on the ground where we could leverage our speed, strength, and weapon skills fully rather than being trapped inside vulnerable metal coffins.

Regardless, it wasn’t as if we’d parked the vehicles several miles away and were forcing everyone to march exhausting distances before even beginning reconnaissance. We’d walked maybe five or six minutes at a steady but unhurried pace, covering perhaps a third of a mile. Just moments ago we’d passed the large weathered sign welcoming visitors to Atlantic City—its paint faded and peeling, one corner damaged by what looked like vehicle impact, but still legible in the moonlight.

The famous resort city now lay ahead of us, dark and silent.

"No unnecessary sounds from this point forward," I said quietly particularly targeting Brad’s faction who seemed constitutionally incapable of shutting up. "Speak only in low voices and only when absolutely necessary to communicate critical information. We move together in the formation I described, maintaining tight cohesion while watching our surroundings carefully in all directions."

My words came just as we began encountering the first residential blocks—rows of houses lining both sides of the street, creating that distinctive suburban-transitioning-to-urban landscape that characterized Atlantic City’s inland neighborhoods. These weren’t the famous beachfront hotels and casino towers that dominated the city’s tourist identity, but rather the ordinary residential areas where workers and year-round residents had lived: modest single-family homes, small apartment complexes, the occasional corner store or neighborhood business.

We would need to venture through several long blocks of these residential areas to penetrate deeper into Atlantic City’s commercial and tourist districts unfortunately. But this was entirely expected and not our first experience navigating urban residential zones—we’d done similar approaches in Long Branch, in various towns during our travels, even in parts of Jackson Township before it fell.

The key was maintaining awareness, controlling noise, and making smart decisions about which threats to engage versus which to avoid entirely.

Soon enough, inevitably, we began hearing and spotting infected wandering through the streets ahead of us.

Our tight formation allowed us to ignore infected that were sufficiently far away—solitary figures wandering a block or more distant posed no immediate threat if we maintained quiet movement and didn’t draw their attention through sound or obvious motion. Those we could simply bypass, letting them continue their aimless patrol patterns while we moved through their territory like ghosts.

But the infected close enough to potentially spot us despite darkness and their poor vision—those required immediate elimination before they could make the kind of loud growling noises that would alert every other infected in hearing range to fresh prey’s presence.

We weren’t conducting offensive operations meant to clear the city of infected presence at least not yet. We were here purely for reconnaissance. We couldn’t afford to get bogged down in extended combat sequences when our objective was observation and assessment, not extermination.

"Three infected approaching from our right," Clara whispered.

"Go ahead," I said, nodding.

Sydney and Clara moved immediately, peeling off from us quietly. They advanced toward the infected with careful, controlled steps.

The three infected weren’t particularly far from our position, maybe fifty feet at most, which meant they represented genuine detection risk if left unaddressed. They had to be dealt with swiftly and silently before they could make any noise that might trigger chain reactions—one infected’s growl alerting another, which alerts three more, which brings a dozen, snowballing into overwhelming numbers.

"I’ll take the two walking together, you handle the lone one trailing behind them," Sydney murmured to Clara. Then she surged ahead with enhanced speed—not her full Dullahan-boosted velocity which would have been blindingly fast, but still considerably faster than normal human sprint capability.

She intercepted the first infected from behind with perfect execution, and her knife’s blade buried itself deep into the infected’s skull through the base of the cranium—the sweet spot where bone was thinnest and brain stem most accessible. She twisted the knife viciously inside the wound, ensuring maximum tissue destruction and immediate cessation of all motor function.

The infected collapsed without making a sound, already dead before its corrupted nervous system could process the trauma and trigger vocal response.

Before the second infected in the pair could even begin turning toward the commotion Sydney had already moved to engage. Her knife flashed across its throat in a deep horizontal slash that severed both carotid arteries and the windpipe, preventing any possibility of the growling sounds infected made when threatened or pursuing prey.

Then, continuing the same fluid motion without pause, she drove the blade upward through the infected’s eye socket, angling the strike to penetrate deep into the brain cavity and carve upward. The infected went completely rigid for a moment before collapsing like a puppet with cut strings.

Two kills in perhaps three seconds, executed with the kind of lethal efficiency that came from doing this hundreds or thousands of times until it became as natural as breathing.

I heard Brad and his two friends gasp even a little seeing that dumbfounded.

Sydney by the way hadn’t employed her Dullahan enhancement abilities during the engagement despite not strictly needing to limit herself. She was just following the instruction I’d given both her and Rachel before we’d even left Galloway: avoid using obvious supernatural abilities unless absolutely necessary for survival.

The reasoning was simple—Dullahan abilities and the Symbiosis presence they manifested seemed to trigger heightened responses in infected, particularly Enhanced Infected who demonstrated genuine awareness of Symbiosis hosts and actively hunted them. Using our powers was essentially sending out a signal flare announcing ’valuable target here’ to anything capable of detecting that signature.

Better to rely on enhanced physical capabilities—strength, speed, durability that exceeded human norms—while keeping the more distinctive supernatural manifestations suppressed unless circumstances forced us to reveal them.

Clara had dealt with her assigned target during the same timeframe Sydney had handled her two, using a heavy machete to deliver a devastating downward strike that split the infected’s skull and destroyed enough brain tissue to guarantee immediate cessation of all function. She cleaned her blade quickly on the infected’s clothing before both women rejoined our formation.

We continued walking through the residential blocks, maintaining our tight formation while our eyes constantly scanned windows, doorways, alleys, rooftops—anywhere threats might emerge from. The houses around us showed varying states of abandonment: some appeared almost pristine from external examination, as if their occupants had simply left for vacation and would return momentarily; others showed obvious signs of violent evacuation—broken windows, doors hanging open, belongings scattered across lawns where people had dropped them during panicked flight.

"There don’t seem to be particularly large numbers of infected in these residential areas," Christopher observed quietly. "Should we be relieved by that or suspicious about where they’ve all concentrated?"

"I honestly don’t know yet—we’ve only just entered the city’s outskirts," Martin replied with equal caution. "It’s far too early to draw conclusions about overall infected distribution patterns based on one residential neighborhood. They might have migrated toward the commercial districts and tourist areas where crowds were densest during the initial outbreak."

"Setting aside infected presence for a moment, what do you think of these residential houses from a settlement perspective?" Clara asked, her gaze sweeping across the neat rows of suburban homes. "Aren’t they good?"

"If you’ve forgotten already, Clara, we’re specifically trying to locate residences near the Atlantic Ocean coastline," Rachel reminded her gently . "The beach access and ocean resources are quite advantages—fishing for food, water access, maritime evacuation routes if necessary. These inland residential areas don’t provide those advantages."

"Right, of course—beachfront properties," Clara nodded, slightly sheepish about losing track of the specific goal. "I just got distracted by how well-maintained some of these houses look."

"I am genuinely looking forward to oceanfront living," Sydney said, grinning. "Imagine falling asleep to actual waves instead of infected growls. Waking up to sunrise over the Atlantic instead of checking windows for threats. Maybe even swimming if the water’s not too contaminated."

"Let’s hope the beach itself isn’t completely overrun with infected," Christopher said. "Knowing our luck, the entire boardwalk will be packed with thousands of infected tourists who died mid-vacation."

"How can a beach itself be infected, you idiot?" Sydney shot back. "Infected are former humans who need to retain basic motor function. They’re not going to be doing the backstroke in the Atlantic Ocean."

"I personally saw a literal ice-themed infected monster throwing massive ice blocks at me like artillery shells during the Frost Walker attack," Christopher retorted. "Don’t blame me for being cautious about what impossible things might exist. After seeing that, I’m not ruling anything out."

"The Frost Walker wasn’t actually an infected creature," Sydney corrected. "It was Starakian technology—basically a mobile weapons platform with ice-generation capabilities. Completely different category from viral infected."

"Same distinction without difference as far as I’m concerned," Christopher scoffed. "Everything created by the Starakians to kill humans qualifies as ’infected’ in my personal taxonomy. And the aliens themselves are infected in their heads with whatever psychotic ideology makes them treat sentient life as disposable resources."

"Since when did you become a philosopher capable of making taxonomic arguments, Chris?" Sydney asked grinning again. "I’m genuinely going to tear up from pride at this intellectual growth. Our little Christopher is learning to think critically about alien psychology and develop coherent classification systems."

"Speaking like you were the one who attended Lexington Charter, I am not stupid," Christopher snorted.

Their banter continued in whispered exchanges while we walked.

Meanwhile, positioned in the protective center of our formation where I’d relegated them, I could hear Brad’s faction grumbling among themselves with mounting resentment.

"Those hypocritical bastards told us to shut up and stay quiet, but they’re being the absolute noisiest people here," Brad muttered. "Rules for thee but not for me, apparently. Typical elitist bullshit."

"Yeah, seriously, what the fuck are they even talking about?" Billy asked with genuine confusion underlying his anger. "Frost what? Ice monsters? Are they making up fantasy stories to entertain themselves while we’re supposed to be on a serious mission?"

"Must be living in some kind of shared delusion," Kyle replied dismissively. "Probably trying to make themselves feel special and important by inventing dramatic backstories. Typical attention-seeking behavior from people who think having some basic survival skills makes them heroes."

The three of them continued their bitter commentary, completely oblivious to the fact that their whispered complaints were actually louder and more potentially dangerous than the controlled conversation among us.

Putting aside the fact that we were all hearing them, they also remained entirely unaware that the ’fantasy stories’ they were mocking represented actual events we’d survived.

But there was no point trying to convince them of realities they’d already decided not to believe in.

We continued walking forward through the seemingly endless blocks of residential houses, maintaining our tight protective formation while systematically dealing with the scattered infected we encountered. The kills were becoming almost routine—a few here, a couple there, never more than five or six in any single engagement. Clara would spot movement, identify targets, we’d dispatch the threats with minimal noise and continue advancing.

But then we began noticing something that immediately shifted the tactical picture and raised troubling questions.

There were bodies of infected lying dead on the ground throughout the residential streets we were traversing—clearly already killed by human intervention rather than having simply collapsed from viral degradation or environmental exposure.

And there were a lot of these bodies. Not just one or two isolated kills, but dozens scattered across multiple blocks, creating a trail of carnage that told a story of systematic clearing operations conducted by people who knew what they were doing.

"Do you think there are other survivors operating in this area?" Sydney asked me quietly.

I knelt briefly beside one of the fresher corpses, examining the wound and the state of the dried blood pooling beneath the shattered skull. My fingers touched the blood carefully.

"Hard to tell definitively when these kills occurred," I said thoughtfully, processing what my senses were revealing. "The infected blood seems moderately dry, but not completely desiccated either. I’d estimate these particular kills happened somewhere between six to twelve hours ago—recent enough to be relevant, but not so fresh that the killers are necessarily still in the immediate area."

I straightened, scanning our surroundings with renewed alertness. "It wouldn’t be particularly surprising if survivors came to Atlantic City seeking resources and supplies. The city would have massive amounts of useful materials—food in restaurants and grocery stores, medical supplies in pharmacies and clinics, tools and equipment in hardware stores, clothing and camping gear in retail outlets. Anyone would recognize this place as a potential goldmine despite the infected presence."

"There are genuinely a lot of bodies though," Christopher said, walking slowly along the street while counting the visible corpses. "I’m seeing at least twenty or thirty just on this block alone, and we passed similar concentrations on the previous blocks too. That’s way more than one or two people could reasonably kill during a single scavenging run. They must have been a fairly substantial group—at least five or six people, maybe more."

"Or one extremely capable," Rachel suggested. "But yes, Christopher’s right—this volume of kills suggests organized group operations rather than solo activity."

"Shit!!"

Billy’s sudden loud cry shattered the contemplative atmosphere. Every head whipped toward him simultaneously, weapons rising instinctively toward whatever threat had provoked that outcry.

But the scene that greeted us wasn’t some new infected attack or emerging danger—it was pathetically anticlimactic.

Billy stood frozen in obvious terror, staring down at his ankle where an infected we’d all assumed was already dead had somehow retained just enough motor function to grasp his leg weakly. The infected wasn’t even capable of biting or pulling—just that one feeble hand clutching fabric with the last dregs of viral animation before complete system failure.

It was barely a threat. A minor annoyance at most, requiring only a simple finishing blow to eliminate.

"Just kill it already," Sydney said with exasperated contempt. "One quick strike to the head and you’re free. This isn’t complicated."

"I...I know that!" Billy groaned, his voice shaking despite his words projecting false confidence. He fumbled for the knife on his belt with trembling hands. The blade finally emerged from its sheath, but Billy just stood there staring at the weakly grasping infected, gulping repeatedly while apparently building courage to actually deliver the killing blow.

He raised the knife slowly—painfully slowly—clearly working himself up to stab downward into the infected’s skull. But before he could finally force himself to complete the simple action, Martin had already stepped forward and ended the infected with one efficient strike from his own weapon.

"We genuinely don’t have time for this," Martin said. And he was absolutely right.

Just as that thought crossed my mind, I felt it—that distinctive sensation of being observed.

My head whipped around immediately, enhanced senses focusing on the darkness and specifically toward one particular house about forty feet to our left. Two-story colonial style, windows dark, no obvious movement visible. But something about it screamed wrongness, triggered every survival instinct I’d developed.

Someone was there. Watching us. I was certain of it with the kind of bone-deep conviction that couldn’t be dismissed as imagination.

"Ryan?" Rachel’s voice came quietly from beside me. "Something’s wrong? What did you see?"

"I...felt like someone’s observing us," I said slowly, still scanning that house and the surrounding structures for any hint of movement or confirmation of the sensation.

"You’re serious?" Clara asked.

I nodded slightly, trusting my enhanced Dullahan senses even when I couldn’t provide concrete visual evidence. "Yes. Can’t pinpoint exact location or how many, but we’re definitely being watched."

"A survivor, you think?" Martin asked. "Someone who lives in this area and is observing unknown people moving through their territory? That would explain the cleared infected we’ve been seeing—they might have been systematically clearing blocks around their base of operations."

He paused, considering possibilities. "But if it is survivors, why wouldn’t they approach and make contact? We’re obviously human?"

"Maybe they are just cautious?" Rachel said.

"He just imagined the whole thing, that’s all," Brad said dismissivelyL "Paranoid hallucinations from stress. Stop wasting time thinking about imaginary watchers and let’s continue the actual task."

"Maybe you’re right," I said with casualness that clearly surprised Brad based on his expression. "Could have been imagination. Let’s continue moving."

I turned and started walking forward along our planned route. But despite my outward agreement with Brad’s dismissal, my internal state was anything but relaxed.

As I walked, I kept every sense on high alert.