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The biker that dismounted from his Harley and advanced on the prone form of the girl who lay cowering on the warm asphalt of the two-lane carriageway looked like a roadie for Motorhead.

His faded denims and ZZ Top beard were capped off by a pair of wide-lensed sunglasses and unsightly WW2 infantryman's helmet, his features grizzled and stained in blood, sweat and gasoline, a toothy grin etched across his knarled and weather-beaten face.

"I gave you an order little lady, and you will comply the next-time I order you to do something by God, oh yes you shall!"

The girl, who looked as though she had been entombed in a library all her life, lay cowering in a heap by the wrecked remains of her motorcycle, big brown eyes wide-eyed in fear of what she doubtless expected at the bikers roughened hands.

"Please!" She whimpered weakly as she tried to back up on the ground, her wide brimmed black glasses sliding down the bridge of her rounded nose as her hands, cut and bleeding from the crash when her bike had flipped over, stung agonisngly as they rested against the heat of the seething hot tarmac. "Please, don't hurt me!"

The leering smile across the grizzled bikers face broadened as he continued to walk forwards, the ominous twin-bores of the 12-Gauge he carried in his sand-paper like hands ready if need be to ensure her obediance.

Behind the biker, other live shapes dismounted from their machines and moved forwards, foot-falls crunching against the swelteringly hot ashphalt underneath as they closed in, four warm blooded shapes, infinately more dangerous than the ghouls that the girl had been trying so hard to escape.

"Don't make requests!" The hulking biker replied with another grizzled chuckle, "you'll receive what you deserve in time!"

The girl sobbed, her denims cut and torn, thin trickles of crimson stained across the material. She was lucky to still be alive following the crash, her machine crippled by a bullet from one of the men resulting in it catherine wheeling across the highway.

She hurt. But for now the adrenaline would keep the pain away.

The biker lowered the shotgun, the twin cavern-like expanses of the 12-Gauge weapon pointing towards the ground as the smile remained across his face.

"Ya' had to go and run you bitch!" He spat. "well, we'll punish you for that disobediance. By God yes we shall!"

Jan whimpered as the other men moved forwards, wide smiles on their faces as they closed in on warm fresh-meat as if in some cruel parody.

As she lay alone, abandoned, the sound of the motorcycle engines continued to rumble relentlessly north.

"Stop the fucking bike! Stop the fucking bike right now!"

Claire shook Kidd sharply, making the boy curse as he felt the girl gesture him to pull into the roadside, the other two bikes that followed behind taking his lead as they headed into the hard-shoulder near the abandoned remains of a roadside motel.

Kidd ground the Kawasaki to a halt and dismounted, Claire likewise clambering off before stumbling a few steps forward with her back turned to the others, fighting back the tears as the other live bodies gunned their engines off and dismounted from their machines.

The girl didn't notice. She was in pain.

"What the fuck are you doing?!" Kidd growled as he glared at the girl. "Your a crazy bitch Claire! They might be right behind us!"

Claire simply continued to stand with her back turned to the rugged blonde haired boy whose eyes continued to burn through her. He was a big muscular youth, handsome and well educated, in his day the school heart-throb, now leader elect of a group of survivors from a dead city.

His upper body was a maze of ammo belts and straps, a 92F Beretta holstered around his waist alongside various tools and peices of equipment vital to the new world, including several large knives and a backup Browning automatic for emergencies.

Claire continued to stand with her back turned, her eyes looking out towards the incinerated remains of the Little Chef and motel complex that lay in ruins a quarter of a mile further down the road.

It looked as though a bomb had gone off, the front of the motel lay blown out across the parking lot which was by and large deserted except for what looked like two vehicles, one overturned and the other parked up on the grass near an overhead walkway that bisected the four-lane highway.

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