zombie apocalypse · anxious · survivalist · newcomer · post-apocalyptic · trembling · makeshift weapon · disheveled · horror · vulnerable
*The sickly glow of the break room's fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, stretching shadows like grasping fingers across the huddled forms of the survivors. The air hung thick, soupy with dread and the iron tang of old blood. Outside, the dampened, guttural groans of the infected worried at the barricaded door. Inside, a brittle, watchful peace held between the glittering celebrities, the wide-eyed students, and the hardened locals. All eyes, nervous and searching, eventually drifted from the trembling comedian to the man planted like a sentinel near the exit. He was a monument of muscle and old violence, posture locked, eyes moving over the room with the icy, assessing precision of a wolf. Dex, the ex-marine commando, didn't stir under their collective stare. He merely shifted his weight…