A Shephard- ZoC Main Story Vol 1 Chapter 7

Part 7 - A Tunnel in the Heart

Another distant crack, whiz, and shattering as the bullet is stopped right above your head; further splintering the shot up windowsill you are now cowering underneath. You curse, once again noting your bad luck with circumstances. You don’t even have room room to take a peak as another bullet streaks above your head, impacting the crate on the other side of the room. This followed by a rambunctious laugh heard emanating from the outside.

How did it end up like this?

Well, you were just doing as you always had; carrying on in your own way. After saying your goodbyes, and heartfelt gratitude towards Wolf, you headed north. The initial goal was The Bar, a sort of nexus and neutral ground for stalkers to meet, trade, drink, and shoot the shit. You figure it would be a good place as any to start looking for your brother.

To get there, you had to head North through the Cordon, pick your way through The Garbage region, and you’d be home. You’d made half this journey plenty of times now, working for Sid, and you figured this would be no different.

Well the problem was you had worked for Sid.

Another distant voice interrupted your thoughts.

“Give it up, Sid’s Bitch! We know you types always got the good shit. You give it up now and maybe we won’t break so many of your bones! Hah!”
When you had just gotten past the railroad, you noticed a trio of figures walking your way, in the distance. Having run this route a lot lately, you didn’t recognize them through your scope. Caution being the better part of valor, you had ducked right off the road, into a small 2 story house. But as soon as you turned, they followed.

Not the most subtle type, these bandits.

It wasn’t until the bullets started flying as you climbed up the ladder that you realized the serious situation you were in. And now two of them were outside taunting you to pop yourself up and get your head blown off, while the third one was nowhere to be seen.

It was pretty obvious what they were trying to do, pinning you down here while their third guy sneaks up on you and pops a couple into your chest. Boy they’d be surprised when they find you have jack shit except this rifle.

You look at the rifle, trying to formulate a plan. If you can crawl to the other side of the room, and pop out in the shadows, that might give you the time to get a view and shoot one of them.

The thought of killing someone else making you a bit queasy, but you suppress the thought for now. You’ve killed plenty of boars and mutants; these scum are no different.

A creaking floorboard downstairs makes you hurry your crawl, as the time to implement this plan has now been cut drastically short.
    Another shot, this one a bit wider as you don’t see the impact anywhere. You stand up in the back of the room, slowly.

    “Come out you little newbie borscht, we won’t hurt you much.” you hear, pretty close from below.

    You have to move quickly. Another impact on the window gives you your cue to bring up the rifle.

    Quickly thumbing the long safety, you put the scope up to your eye.

    You don’t have long to steady as you note the two of them out there, one sitting lazily on a log, drinking. The other man’s head turned, pistol pointed limply in your direction one as he talks to his friend.

    You exhale, and squeeze.

    The recoil sending the rifle upwards a bit as momentum carried most of the energy into your shoulder.

    As you quickly rescope to confirm, the drunken bandit is sprawled over behind the log, outside of your view. The man you had shot lied in a twisted pile.

    The footsteps quicken underneath you, as you put away the rifle; no time to confirm the mortal status of the man bleeding outside. You ready your makarov pistol, and throw yourself against the wall.

    “ YOU SON OF WHORE, I’LL GET YOU FOR THAT” you hear a cry from right below you. A broken piece of roof gives you an idea, and as carefully as you can, you pull yourself out and ontop of the building. Shimying on the opposite side of the house where the two bandits outside were, you drop down, cursing that your landing wasn’t quieter. You are just recovering when the bandit who was downstairs emerges from the back door, enraged.

There’s no time to line up shots as you dump a few shots in his direction as you round the corner. A corner that explodes as a poorly aimed shotgun blast rips into the wood above your head.

Fuck, you have nowhere to go as you turn back around. You practically run into the corpse of the downstairs bandit, one of your wild shots must have connected, gouging out a portion of this face.

Other side of the house then, as you run. You know for sure now one of the is dead, as you glance back at the man who was a successful victim of your spray and pray. A second outside is wounded or dead, and the shotgun blast came from the third, inebriated one.

You don’t really have specialized training in this; winging it as you go.

And that winging it told you that the third bandit couldn’t hit shit. But you have Lucy, and the godlike ability in this fight to reach out and touch face. With a 7.62 bullet.

You ready your rifle once more, a bit more nervously checking that you have ammo.
Another bang as the bandit sends a shot wide somewhere, and yells

“ANNUUUUU, CHEEKI BREEKI IV DAMKE!”

He thinks he has you cornered, like in a game of checkers.

You’re not wasting time during this, trying your best to get around the other side where his addled mind wouldn’t suspect. There. He’s a lot closer than you think, almost stumbling around the corner he shot earlier. It’s incredibly close, so you use the exposed sights below the scope. Once again, a breath escapes your mouth as you press the trigger. And not wasting time, you send another into the center of mass; watching with morbid fascination as he just drops where he is. Poor bastard wasn’t even looking at you when he fell.

You don’t let yourself go here, however. You’re not sure what protocol is like for killing other stalkers, especially ones that tried to rob you, but you’re not sticking around for anyone, or anything, that heard those shots to show up. There's a small tunnel you sometimes use to go around the occasional military patrol at the railroad bridge. You head there, making sure to collect your pack you left upstairs.

The swishing of your leather jacket and pants, coupled with your heavy breathing, your only audible companions as you run as fast as you can, being sure to avoid the road.


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You had set down your pack and rifle behind the burned out wreck of a truck, and just leaned against the wall.

Staring into space.

Trying to organize your thoughts.

“Am I a criminal now?” you mumble, and then laugh. You were already trespassing, being in The Zone. A distant thought of an explanation you received, “We are all criminals anyways.” makes you chuckle.

And then fall silent again.

You just got caught up, in this foolish adventure. Really, what were you doing here, playing hero for your brother? A brother who never treated you with respect? You clutch the bullet necklace around your neck.

So what, you could kill a few mutants? Run around with a gun and act all tough after running through a fence a couple times?

This place is out to kill you, and takes no prisoners. You were lucky enough to run into the kind people you did.

This is way over your head, Rambo-wanabe.

These thoughts swirling, emotions building.

You killed some men over it. Over this adventure of yours. Was it worth it? They were scum sure, but did you really have to murder them?

“I had no choice”
“We had no choice” A muffled voice echos.
An object enters your vision. It’s too much effort to focus, but even from the close proximity you can tell who it was.

The young voice belonged to that stalker of yours. Standing tall, arms at their side, they are standing right before you now, that faded army jacket with the blue and white armband prominent in your vision.

You have no energy to deal with this bullshit, not now. You just continue to stare, not at them but at nothing in particular.

“Would have been nice for your help,” you mumble, looking down as you slouch against the wall. The crunch as loose gravel slides underneath your boots.

You feel more like trash now, pushing your problems onto someone else. They had pulled your ass out of a fire back in the swamps, and this is how you thank them? You really are a piece of shit.

You failed, once again.

Why would coming here change anything? You’re brother was right to bully you the way he did, he was protecting you from things you couldn’t handle. And here’s the proof. All of this.

A few tears leak from your face. You don’t care, you’ve already forgotten about the stalker in front of you. Christ this was pathetic, if you couldn’t handle this, how could you even go north? The going gets tough and you break down like this? You remove your mask to get some air and wipe the tears.
“I _was_ helping” a voice brings you out of their stupor. There they were again, squatting down in front of you now, incredibly close to your face.

You gaze, as they remove their mask under their hood.

A woman stares back at you. Her scarred face containing a terrible story you couldn’t even imagine. And those eyes. Two beautiful deep blue irises surrounding peculiar white pupils gouge into you.. Her dark chestnut hair cascading down from around her face, seemingly freed by her hood.

You can’t think anymore, absolutely stunned.

Her right arm moving up, almost mechanically. She hesitates for a moment, and then closes the distance with her hand. It now resting on your head.

“I don’t understand,” she pauses, “a lot of things.”

She continues the simple, clumsy motion of her hand, ruffling the hairs on your head.

“But I understand you. You are a good person. We will protect each other, just as we always have. I understand this, is my purpose.”

You can’t respond, all thoughts and worries being washed away in the motions of her soft touch.

“Rest now. I will watch.” she commands, calmly.

The weight of the entire day's events hitting you, you fall deeper into your slouch.

The only thing you manage to process as you fall asleep in soft serenity is a question you are compelled to ask.

“Who… are you?”

She looks back, her deadpan expression mustering the smallest of smiles.

“I’m Lucy.”