[TWD x Resident Evil] — Chapter 283 - The Water Source Has a Problem

"Get it fixed."

Leon didn't even bother glancing back at Jim's face. The man looked like he'd swallowed a whole lemon.

"I don't care if you use duct tape or prayer. I want this thing running. Soon."

He turned and walked away, leaving Jim alone with his pile of scrap metal.

In the prison yard, a large armed patrol stood watch over the massive fuel depot. Several inmates balanced on wobbling ladders, pouring drum after drum of gasoline, scavenged from gas stations across the county, into the tank's intake.

That sharp, acrid smell. In the apocalypse, it was more comforting than any perfume.

Morgan was among them.

He didn't talk. He just worked, precise and methodical. Set down one empty drum. Pick up another. Repeat.

He liked this feeling, the kind that emptied his head and left nothing behind but burning muscles and the sting of sweat in his eyes.

It let him forget, if only for a little while, the wife he'd killed with his own hands. Even though he'd always known that thing wasn't his wife anymore.

Then Andrea came at a jog, her blonde ponytail bouncing, barely suppressed anxiety written across her face.

"Where's Leon?"

She scanned the yard and spotted him leaning against the fuel tank. She walked straight up to him.

"We have a problem. We're out of water."

Leon frowned. "Isn't the well still working?"

"No." Andrea shook her head. "The well barely gives us enough to drink. Bathing, sanitation, the tomato patch on the farm — all of it runs off the river. And the river is gone."

"What do you mean, gone?"

"The channel's blocked." She drew a slow breath, like she was trying not to revisit something that had turned her stomach. "About five kilometers upstream at the bend — a massive herd washed down from somewhere. Hundreds of them, packed tight, jammed into the channel and damming the whole thing."

"The water is black now, Leon."

"You can smell it from a kilometer out."

"The whole downstream stretch is an open sewer. Nothing but rotting flesh and corpse runoff."

Morgan set his drum down and listened.

"Alright." Leon's reply was flat. "Go back and tell everyone: water rationing, effective immediately. Wait for my word."

That was when Roberta walked over, Doc and 10K at her heels. Her face carried the look of a woman who was done being patient.

"Mr. Leon." Straight to the point. "When do we leave?"

"My people are dying of thirst," Leon said. "You think we're leaving right now?"

Roberta's brow drew tight. She had heard every word.

"That's your problem." Her tone was clipped. "My mission is to deliver Murphy to the destination on schedule. Every minute counts. Right now, your problem is wasting my time."

Beside her, Doc's face twisted into a pained grimace.

Lord Almighty. This woman has real nerve, talking to this man like that.

Leon turned to face her. He looked down at the stubborn soldier, his expression unreadable.

"Lieutenant Warren. Let me clarify a few things."

"First: I'm not wasting your time. Your people need me to get you to the CDC. Not the other way around."

"Second: I agreed to escort you because your mission interests me. Not because I owe you anything."

"Right now, my camp has a problem. Until I handle it, none of us are going anywhere."

The words landed with quiet weight, the kind that dropped the temperature around them.

"If you can't wait, the gate is right there. Take your people and go whenever you like. I won't stop you."

"But Murphy stays."

"You won't be taking him. Trust me on that."

Roberta held his gaze. She'd spent half her life in the military and had seen hard men — real ones, commanders who didn't flinch.

None of them looked like this.

His hardness wasn't posture. It wasn't performance.

She knew, with total certainty, that if she said no one more time, he would throw them out of this prison like garbage. Without a second thought.

"Fine."

She pushed the word out through gritted teeth.

"I'll wait."

Leon was already done with her. He turned back to Andrea.

"Take me there."

"Now?"

Leon glanced at her. "What, you want to wait for the Walkers to learn how to swim first?"

Andrea didn't answer. She went to get the truck.

As Leon passed Morgan, he paused and clapped a hand on the man's shoulder.

"Place is yours while I'm gone. Keep an eye on things. No slacking."

Morgan nodded, picked up his drum, and went back to work.

The pickup rolled out through the prison gate.

Andrea kept both hands on the wheel and said nothing. Leon rode in the passenger seat with his eyes closed, like a man half-asleep.

Andrea knew he wasn't sleeping. He was thinking.

They hadn't driven ten minutes when she eased off the gas.

The smell hit before they saw anything, seeping in through every crack in the windows.

How do you describe it?

Imagine a thousand garbage bags stuffed with rotting meat. Bake them under the summer sun for three months. Then detonate them all at once.

Andrea's stomach lurched hard. She almost stood on the brakes and lost last night's dinner.

Leon didn't even blink. He just opened his eyes and looked ahead.

"We're close." Andrea pointed through the windshield.

The truck stopped on a ridge above the river.

Leon stepped out, walked to the edge, and looked down.

That was not a river.

It was a dam, hundreds of meters of it, built from bloated, rotting, twisted bodies jammed together in the channel like driftwood after a flood.

Still moving.

Pale arms jutted from the mass, clawing at empty air. The river sat dead behind it, stopped cold.

As he watched, a Walker so bloated it barely held shape floated up from the depths like a balloon, then was compressed by the crush of bodies surging from behind. It burst with a wet, muffled pop, spraying a glob of green slime across the surface.

Behind Leon, Andrea was doubled over the car door, vomiting until there was nothing left.

➤ Next: Preemptive Precautions