Thrive in Catastrophe by 焦糖冬瓜

Chapter 14

Xiao Yan's heart tightened painfully, it was Heine Burton!

He pressed the release hatch and the moment it opened, Heine picked him up.

"Ah--" Xiao opened his mouth to shout but, since his stomach is jostled atop of Heine's shoulder, vomit almost spilled instead of words.

Is there really no other way to transport him?!

Heine braced one of his legs on the door of the pod and leaps. Fingertips of several Zombies make contact with Xiao's hair, the strands barely sliding through as they attempt to grab onto him, they chase them closely as their efforts are thwarted by Heine's speed.

Xiao looked around and discovered that he seemed to have landed somewhere resembling a farm. There is a rotting fence and lush green grass. However there is no trace of cattle or any other farm animal. The clouds in the sky and the lush greenery are overtaken by the large shadow cast by the zombies trailing their heels.

There are two towering level 1 zombies. Despite their height, their movements are not clumsy and their powerful legs lend them tremendous speed. Their tongues, sliding out of their mouth, are sticky with thick grimy saliva and Xiao Yan is the one they are drooling after.

Suddenly Xiao is thrown to the ground, Heine holds his hands down against the gavel scattered through the grass, the sharp edges scraped against his face. He has no time to think on the pain before Heine threw the container with Manson's head to him.

Without hesitating, he stood in front of Xiao and threw a round of Silver Wings out, slicing through the zombies. One lost its left leg, then Heine's blade takes off his head. The other has lost its right arm, but the flesh is still slightly linked and it begins to knit back together.

It charges at Heine, its heavy shadow almost completely obscuring the sun. Heine kicks out, slamming his foot in its stomach. Xiao can see that the corpse has not yet fully healed, the sliced arm still hanging limply down. Burton strikes at him again, his foot smashing against the zombie's face. Heine's hit has broken its chin, still it staggers back toward them.

Heine kicks the zombie again, this time the force of contact lifts more that 150kg of corpse clear off the ground. As the zombie attempts to right itself, Heine has closed the distance between them as his blade slices through the air.

Xiao is still on the ground attempting to track the rapid movements of Heine, eventually the large zombie collapsed behind him.

"Get up."

Heine's eyes were slits of ice and Xiao's breath froze in his chest. He didn't dare exhale. Hurriedly, he got up and discovered that he had sprained his ankle. After hobbling along, he realized that it was fractured.

He can only push through and try to keep up, he can't show that he is injured in any way. If Heine discovers his limping and realizes he is just dragging him down, he will not hesitate to throw him away.

He can only awkwardly trot behind Heine. No matter the pain, he forced himself not to show it. The container is heavy, adding to his burden, he has to carry it with both hands.

Why was it Burton who found his pod and none of the others?

Does that mean they are dead?

Where is Mark?

Where is Liv...?

Before he was ejected, they had been attacked by the Surge. If the craft went down, not only would they have had to deal with the zombies but also assassins from the Surge organization.