Chapter 60: 59

As Natalie walked down the road with her bow in hand, she was surprised at what she saw. Along the sides of the roads and in parking lots a tent city was set up. People all around were bartering for supplies, tools, and even some weapons. There had to have been thousands of tents set up, as they went farther than she could see in most directions. It appeared that they evacuated everyone they could to this side of town as fast as they could once monsters started attacking. Turning onto a street, she headed down and approached the institution. She could not help but shake her head though, when she found out this street was called University Drive. Whoever named these before when they were paved must not have been very imaginative. As she headed down the road, people kept shouting out thanks for protecting them. They must have thought that she was one of the barricade guards that was on a break. She did not feel like correcting their mistake, partly because she had just helped the defenders. Mainly though the praise felt really nice.
Moving onto the campus, it appeared that there were more tents, and even people residing inside the buildings. The amount of people they were cramming into such a small space surprised Nat, but not overly. Almost everyone here lived in the city. Surviving in the wild was not something that most people knew how to do. To them, joining together into a larger group helped them feel safe. While this was easily understood by her, she did not share the sentiment. She was not a people person, and the larger of a group she was in, the more uncomfortable she felt. She would have already left the city and headed out if not for her dreams. However there was no clues or hints that she could act on. All she thought she knew was that Shannon was restrained somewhere here on campus, if the nightmares were completely accurate. So she just wandered about, looking for anything that stuck out as odd or out of place.
After fifteen minutes of wandering through the grounds, she felt no closer to discovering her friends whereabouts. She could have asked around, but the paranoia that grew stopped her. Asking about would only let people know that person is being looked for. Unsuspecting people usually ended up talking the most. However, she realized something as she looked around. Neither the people at the barricade nor in the tent city seemed to have the telltale green mist that showed bonding, nor were there any animals. As she asked somebody and explained that she was passing through, the answer she got raised her paranoia to the peak, though not about any of the normal residents. Apparently, the council that had taken charge had claimed that they lacked supplies to keep animals fed, so they either had to be released into the wild or put down. While one might be able to understand if this was a normal apocalypse, Nat was put on edge by this. She knew that animals were key to keeping her supplied right now. That couldn't be the reason that they were sent away. There had to be something more to it.
Finally, as her wandering brought her around to the Fine Arts building, she caught sight of one of the council. People were thanking him as he walked up to the guarded building, which he waved and thanked them for as any politician would. However, as soon as she laid eyes on the man, everything about this place became laid bare. Black mist, thicker than she had seen before, columned off the man. Remembering her discussion with Gertrude, either he had a lot of monsters, or a few really big ones. Either way, the lack of animals was directly due to his influence, and probably the other members of this council. Politicians had historically been corrupt, but this level was unprecedented. Seeing he went inside the building, Natalie tried to follow him to see where he was going. When she approached the doors, the guards levelled their spears at her, warning her not to come too close. She backed off while mentally holding the wolves inside back, as they wanted to jump out and rip apart these two for threatening their Alpha. As she backed away though, she noticed the man uncaringly ignore the whole situation, and walk up a spiral staircase.

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As she backed away into the crowd, she made her decision. Whether or not they had Shannon tied up and being abused now, the people who declared themselves as leaders were corrupt and a threat to the innocent people they claimed to be protecting. That was a tertiary reason though. The main thing that drove her to want to end those scumbags was due to them giving out that order to put down animals or release them into the wild. That would doom most house pets anyways, and was a blatant and inhumane choice of action. With her mind focused, she slipped stealthily out of the crowd and alongside the outside of the building. Slowly she went along, careful not to cause any noise, as she tried each and every possible entrance she could find. Windows, doors, nothing was spared an attempt to enter. However each and every one was solidly locked. Almost giving up, she came across a patio that had wide open glass windows and a glass door. While the other windows were all much closer to where the crowds were at the front, these were at the back of the complex, overlooking the river valley.
After doing a quick check to make sure that no one was around, she got her compound bow traded out for the fire axe. Using the pointed back end of it, she swung it down into the center window. With a loud smash, the window caved inside to the room, which happened to be a small cafeteria. Not waiting to see if anyone heard the noise, Natalie stole inside the building and started to maneuver her way through the unfamiliar building. All she knew was that she had to head upwards. The main staircase was probably the best place to go up, but she did not want to enter it on the first floor, in direct view of the crowd outside. Moving around, she found a couple more rooms, presumably classrooms, before she found a side staircase going up. Heading up it as far as it went, she then turned in the direction of the spiral staircase. While it may not go higher than here, she would stand a better chance at locating the parasites that called themselves leaders.
Huge thanks to my Elder Wolves Jake, Viktor, Nikolas, Saganatsu, Eeleater, Eric, Corgi, Zmal, Lachlan, Coen, Adam, John, Nicholas, Ty, and Kevin for supporting me and my writing! Remember that I keep Patreon ten chapters ahead at all times. Our next goal on Patreon will be getting up to 25 patrons, which I will then open up an official discord for everyone to come and discuss the story in and hang out!

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