“Why do you guys know so much about guns?” Lara asked innocently. Bette and the others gave her an odd look. Bette shook her head, and Aikane just shrugged.

“The U.S. army has been a rather large and unfortunate presence in Hawaii for quite some time.” One of the men said by way of explanation.

“Ok guys, let’s get ourselves ready…” Bette walked ahead of the others, looking over the list of items that their pilot wanted. “Hey, where is Sarah by the way?” She stopped, looking around.

“Audio video section.” Lara replied, waving in the general direction of the upper floors. “She’s decided to direct films. I think she’s starting with a reality show about this whole ordeal.”

“Weird.” Bette mumbled. They walked slowly toward the front doors of the mall, looking at the empty parking lot ahead of them.

“No infected?” Alice asked curiously. “isn’t it a bit strange? I mean are they hiding and trying to surprise us now?”

“I think they must be.” Bette replied. “I mean they pop up at the more inopportune times. That one researcher, Bud, was able to open our door in the hospital. They’re either smarter than we had thought before, or they’re becoming smarter.”

“And grosser.” Lara wrinkled her nose, pointing through the glass at a stray zombie man, dressed in a brown suit. He was missing the lower half of his jaw and his tongue could be seen in its entirety.

“We can handle him easily. Let’s get one of the doors and lock it behind us.” Bette instructed, and they moved single file through the exit. The stray infected made no move, knowing he’d been caught by six people with guns. He seemed to grin at them, and wave behind him toward the town, just before Alice shot him.

“Was he trying to fucking tell us something? That’s weird.” Lara murmured. They made their way toward the vehicles and Alice immediately hopped on the Chopper, gunning it.

“Puuurrrrfect.” She laughed.

“It had better be.” Bette said dryly. “After all the fucking trouble we had getting that thing down from the hospital roof so that you and Helena could have it in your sights.” She grinned at Alice, while beside her, Lara started their jeep. “All right folks. We’ll wait a bit for you to reach the hospital.” Bette shouted toward the other jeep. The three women looked around, watching for any signs of the infected, as the others drove away.