New Friends, Old Problems

Minneapolis, before the apocalypse

 Sitting in the grimy light of the bar, Kelly told the summary of the past month in Minneapolis.  Dawn felt the atmosphere of the bar fit the mood perfectly.
"It started out, well, probably about the same for everyone.  You remember, it was just some disease and crazy people.  I was a nurse downtown, and after a couple of days, I ended up stuck at the hospital."  Kelly took a swig of water.  "I couldn't get back to my husband, he was at our apartment..."  She broke off in tears, Dawn comforted her.

Kelly

 "It's okay, I'll be okay."  Kelly said, getting a drink of water.  "Everyone has lost somebody..."  Gathering herself, Kelly continued.  "As things got worse, I was stuck at the hospital.  The police kept bringing in people, I was lucky early - many nurses and doctors were bitten.  After a couple of days, we all knew better, and we could still function as a trauma center.  A couple of weeks ago, I was tasked to a special ward.  It was set aside nearly from the beginning, by some outside doctors.  They were working with various infected people, trying to save them.  I really thought we had a chance to cure this!"
"I am guessing by that comment, you didn't."  Mark said as dug out a granola bar to eat.
"Not exactly."  Kelly said, shrugging.  "They tried all kinds of drug cocktails and surgeries, I did see someone get an arm amputated that didn't turn.  I don't think that is a great long term solution..."
"Not really, but it may be useful to remember if the worst happens."  Allen said, biting into a apple.  "Why aren't you still in the hospital?"

Larry

"I can help answer that."  Larry replied.  "I was a janitor at the hospital, and I was stuck there from nearly the beginning.  The suits that took over the ward, they didn't want to clean up any messes, so they had me there for weeks.  I didn't mind, it was safe and I didn't have to deal with the zeds on the streets."  He took a drink of water from his bottle.  "It was fine until a couple of days ago.  The military tried to evacuate the hospital, and didn't like that the company men weren't leaving.  In the gunfight that followed, I ran out of there with these three.  We've been running and hiding ever since."

Nadine

"I wish I had been there longer."  Nadine said quietly.  "I had been stuck in my apartment for weeks, luckily I had some food and the water stayed on.  About a week ago, these guys in hazmat outfits came through my building, gathering people to go to the hospital.  They made sure to separate anyone they thought was bitten, but brought me along anyway.  It was nice to feel safe for a change, at least for a time when I got to the hospital."  She looked away from the group.  "I didn't realize what they were going to do until Mike grabbed me when the shooting started, and saw the other rooms..."

Mike started "I was an IT guy, guess I still am, and a good one.  These guys from Phoenix Techsystems showed up a few weeks ago at my data center.  I was managing to keep the network running, and access to internet solid for our customers.  I was living at the center, so many people had been calling in, and while I knew some of what was happening out there, I wasn't paying attention."  

Mike

Mike grabbed a few crackers and snacked on a few ad he continued.  "Anyway, these suits offered me a ton of money to manage a server farm for them, and to keep network access up.  I jumped at the idea, not realizing how crazy everything had become.  Well, they brought me to the hospital, and I got the network up and running.  They had me connect all kinds of security cameras and internet feeds, they were sharing it with other facilities.  what they didn't know was that I could see that they were intentionally infecting people to test out cures."
"Those bastards!"  Allen said and thumped the table.  "They should have been saving people, not experimenting on them!"
"Believe me, I felt the same way.  There wasn't much I could do, but I did get a bunch of footage of the experiments and some of the documents up loaded to wikipedia a few days ago.  I also saw the military when they arrived.  They were trying to relocate the medical staff to the airport, and the old fort they have taken over.  They had no idea about the special ward, and I saw the first firefight breakout.  I knew if any of us were leaving, this would be our chance.  I grabbed my laptop, a couple of bottles of water and found Nadine first."

"Kelly, how did you do that?"  Dawn asked, shocked.  "What kind of monster would infect people?"
"I didn't know.  I wasn't in the isolation room areas, except for a couple of surgeries.  When I saw Mike grab Nadine, I ran after them, and I saw the isolation rooms.  I wasn't going to stay after that regardless.  Luckily we ran into Larry, and grabbed some food and got out of there."

Larry picked up the narration.  "We got out on the street as the army poured into the hospital.  I remember a few tanks and humvees, helicopters and all kinds of gunfire.  Zombies were everywhere, but with all the noise, we were able to sneak away.  The city was in chaos, and for the past few days we have been moving from place to place, dodging gangs and  just scrounging what we could for food and trying to survive.  The military has been broadcasting that they will take anyone to a FEMA camp, if they surrender to an outpost.  I don't trust those camps, I figure they are zombie buffets waiting to happen..."

"That medkit we found in the garage has some samples from the hospital.  I recognize the bag from one of the exam rooms."  Kelly mentioned, gesturing at the bag.  "Maybe we should leave it?  I would hate to have those corporate killers coming after us."
"We haven't found many crash kits like this, I think it may be too useful to just dump."  Allen said.  "I can't believe they would waste a bunch of people looking for one bag."

"Well, let's  get back to it.  Allen, lead the way - let's head for your home."  Mark said, getting up from the table.  "If we can find a truck or a couple of cars we can use to get everyone out of here, we should probably grab them.  Otherwise, we'll have to plan another way out of the city."

New group shot

Two of the survivors (Larry and Kelly) are straight Wargames Factory Survivors:  Men or Women builds.  These are great multipart models, they allow for a fair amount of variation and have some fun extras.  The other two models are rebased Heroclix - Nadine is a Checkmate Knight 007 from The Brave and The Bold set.  The other is a Rip Hunter 021 from the DC Crisis set.  I enjoy using the Heroclix for figs.  In general, they require little modification to make into a decent survivor.

The group is off towards Allens house.  They will try to find some transport, or at least some fuel for the pickup truck.  I am also going to have a chance for the Phoenix Techsystem corporate team to attack the survivors.  I will roll 2d6 at the start of the scenario, if I have 2 successes, the men in black will attack.  Just some more fun for the group to deal with.