by Megan Berry
“It’s paintball armor,” Ryan answers instead of Silas, a grin splitting his face, and I’m stunned.
“The bite didn’t go through?” I double check, my mind spinning. Silas gingerly peels off the Lycra-padded sleeve to check it out. His arm is sweaty underneath the sleeve, and there is a large bruise from the zombie’s jaw, but nothing broke the skin. Silas sags in relief, and that’s when I know for certain that he wasn’t sure his padding would work either.
I’m so relieved, I reach out and slap him. “I thought you were going to die!” I yell at him, feeling immense relief. I reach out and slap him again.
“What was that for?” Silas demands, and I give him an angry look.
“When were you going to share your little zombie armor idea with the rest of us?” I yell, and Silas glares back, refusing to be cow-toed.
“This was my own paintball gear, from before the outbreak, and we haven’t come across any places that stocked it. I checked the mall, they didn’t have it.” His answer makes me settle down a little. I glance up and see that Natalie has gotten out of the truck and is staring at us with tears in her eyes, clutching her swollen belly.
“It was too late?” she asks, and I glance at Silas—crap!
“Hank’s still alive,” I tell everyone, and Natalie blinks in surprise.
“Then where is he?” she demands, her face changing from despair to hope to anger in a matter of seconds.
“We had to leave him back at the cop shop…” I start to say, trailing off at the look on Natalie’s face.
“What?” she demands, her voice raising an octave.
“He was too weak to walk. We’ll have to go back for him with the truck—and a bag of guns,” Silas says, taking over for me.
“How could you leave him like that?” Natalie demands, and I begin to feel a prick of anger. We were almost killed trying to rescue this guy!
“If we’d brought him with us, he would have been dead back there. If you think you could have done a better job, you would have been dead too. You weren’t in that building, and you should thank your lucky stars you weren’t,” Silas snaps, obviously feeling a little pissed at how ungrateful she’s being. Natalie blinks at us, and the anger melts off her face.
“I’m sorry,” she says, rubbing her belly. “It’s the baby, the hormones make me crazy,” she says with an awkward chuckle.
“I think everyone’s emotions are running high right now,” Ryan interjects, trying to diffuse the situation. “Is he in a safe spot?” he asks, and I think about the closet we shoved Hank into, though there isn’t a chance in hell I’m going to tell crazy, preggo Natalie that. Silas and I look at each other and then nod to the rest of the group.
Ryan catches our glance and looks suspicious about what exactly we did to the guy, but like us, he doesn’t want to risk setting Natalie off. “Then we’ll let the zombies settle down and go back.” Ryan decides, but Silas shakes his head.
“No offense intended, Natalie, but this guy seems like a bit of an idiot,” Silas says baldly, and Natalie winces. “I don’t think you have that much time to waste before he’s gonna decide we’re all dead and set off on his own.”
“Silas might be right,” I have to agree. Even though I just met him, I can see Hank doing this—he definitely didn’t like going into that closet—and we never did discuss a timeframe.
“The truck is faster than the zombs, we can be in and out in a matter of minutes,” Silas decides, once again taking over the rescue mission. “Ryan, you’re driving again. Take us around to the back of the building, and you’ll see two windows broke out, you’ll need to head to the farthest one. If everything is clear, Blondie, and I can be in and out.”
Ryan is already shaking his head. “I don’t think Jane should go back, you almost bit the big one last time,” he says, and I feel hurt by his lack of faith in me.
“Jane can handle it,” Silas interjects, surprising the hell out of me. “Besides, she already knows what we’re doing once we get inside. It would be a huge waste of time bringing in a new person—plus, you know we can’t trust her to drive,” Silas adds in just as I was beginning to feel charitable towards him. I shake my head at him as we all hop back into the truck. Ryan, Sunny, and Natalie are squeezed into the front seat; Silas and I are in the back. This way we won’t have to open numerous doors and risk letting zombies inside to get at Sunny.
We speed back into town with Ryan at the wheel, driving far more recklessly than I’m used to. At high speeds, he goes up on curbs to avoid zombies, races across lawns, takes out mail boxes, and hits the occasional zombie. The front end is already dented in from when he saved us earlier—so I guess he figures, screw it!
We reach the building quickly, and a lot of the zombies are still hanging around where we left them, jostling each other around like a nest of stirred up hornets.
“We aren’t going to have a lot of time,” Silas tells me as we zip around them, the truck tires tearing up the overgrown lawn. Ryan passes the first window we broke and keeps going until he screeches to a halt outside the second window where we encounter a bit of a hold up.
The group of six zombies we passed earlier is now scratching around the window, and I wonder how they can possibly sense Hank tucked away in the closet. Silas and I burst out of the truck, and even Ryan gets out and starts helping us clear the window. I walk up to the closest zombie and put a bullet in the back of his head, making his brains blow out his forehead.
“You came back!” I hear Hank yell from inside the room and frown. No wonder the zombies are so excited, the moron wasn’t in the closet anymore.
“Shut up you idiot!” I hear Silas yell back as he cleaves a zombie through the skull with his axe. Ryan shoots the last two. Then Silas picks me up and throws me up on the window sill, and I pull myself into the room.
“Get going,” I tell Hank as I push him towards the window. He lands, not very gracefully, into Ryan and Silas’s arms, and they toss him in the truck. Ryan gets back in the driver’s seat—none of us trusting a bunch of strangers alone in our running truck with Sunny. Silas hops lightly through the window, and I help him push the heavy bag out onto the ground. He winces when it drops with a dull thud.
“I’m sure your precious guns will be okay,” I tease Silas as he hops out of the window. He turns to me with a grin and pulls me down from the window by my waist, setting me down so that we can both lug the enormous duffel bag and toss it into the back of the truck.
Zombies are rounding the corner of the building already, so we don’t have time to tie it down, but if Ryan takes his driving down a few notches from the Fast and the Furious level, then its weight should help keep it from falling out—at least till we get out of town.
Silas holds the door open for me, and I slide in next to Hank, wincing when he bumps me as he reaches up front to hug and kiss Natalie.
“Everybody hold on,” Ryan tells us unnecessarily as he takes off again, cranking the wheel, dodging zombies, and jumping curbs until we are once again out of town. We pull over next to the inaccurate Welcome sign. Natalie and Hank get out and embrace each other, kissing on the mouth. I gag a little and look away. It’s not that their kissing is gross, but Hank had been eating his cellmate, and I know for a fact he didn’t have time to brush his teeth!
I turn to Silas, who also has a grossed out look on his face. He looks at me and shrugs before climbing into the back to strap down the guns.
I feel a pair of arms wrap around me from behind and just about jump out of my skin. I do jump out of the arms, swatting them away and spinning around with my gun up. Ryan looks shocked, and I quickly put my gun away. “I’m so sorry!” I exclaim, feeling guilt at the wounded expression on his face. “I just had a zombie do that exact same thing to me today, and it’s made me a little jumpy,” I admit, and the hurt melts off his face, replaced with a worried expression. “I’m alright,” I reassure him before he can ask. Thankfully, I was lucky today, and it’s nothing a hot shower won’t solve.
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We pile back into the truck, and I end up in the backseat with Natalie and Hank as they play tonsil hockey with each other. As gross as it is, it’s better than ending up pressed up against Silas or Ryan. My mind is spinning from Silas’s confession when we thought we were going to die, and that kiss… I’m not sure what I’m feeling, but I would be lying to myself if I denied that his kiss had thrilled me. It could have just been the adrenaline rush from thinking I was about to die too, but I think there was a bit more to it than just chemical reactions in my body.
I glance up and catch Ryan watching me in the rear-view mirror and give him a small smile.
“You two have a choice to make,” Silas says, breaking the silence as he turns from the front seat and looks into the back—avoiding eye contact with me—and focussing on Natalie and Hank. “We are heading to meet some friends of ours, so you two need to decide if you are going to go your separate way, or come with us.”
Hank and Natalie look at each other with indecision stamped on their faces.
“We are getting close, so you’ll need to make your mind up soon. If you aren’t gonna be part of our group, we can’t risk taking you to the place we’ll be holed up,” Silas explains, and his reasoning is solid. I hadn’t thought of it before, but if Hank and Natalie left us, they could come across another group and give away our location—and who knows what kind of maniacs might decide to pay us a visit.
“You don’t know what it’s like out here, but I think we should stay with these people,” Natalie says softly, her eyes on Hank. “They seem like good people, and there aren’t that many of those left anymore.” Hank’s eyes narrow as he looks at his wife’s face, probably wondering if something happened to her out on the road. I wondered the same thing myself when we first came across her this morning.
“What about your mother?” Hank starts to ask, but Natalie is already shaking her head.
“She didn’t make it,” Natalie says hollowly, and Hank puts his arm around her.
“I’m so sorry, Nat. What about my sister?” Hank asks with obvious trepidation, and Natalie shakes her head.
“She was one of the first to fall sick—it was actually strange—but she wasn’t bit when she turned,” Natalie tells him gently, and Hank looks shell shocked at the news. I feel bad for him. This must be a lot to take in all at once, and I also wonder if his sister had the uncommon blood that changed first, according to that doctor in New York.
“We’ll do whatever you think is best then,” Hank says at last, leaving the decision up to his wife. Natalie reaches over and takes his hand.
“We’ll come with you,” she tells Silas. “With the baby coming soon, I don’t want to be out on the road somewhere…” she looks nervous when she talks about the birth of her baby, and I don’t blame her. I can’t imagine. There are no hospitals, no doctors, not to mention bringing a helpless newborn into this nightmare. I feel bad for her.
“Sounds good,” is all Silas says as he turns back around. I sit and stare uncomfortably out the window as Hank cries and Natalie tries to soothe him.
We reach the trailer, and I’m out of truck before Ryan even has it in park. “What about you, Blondie?” Silas asks, still not looking directly at me as he double checks the straps holding down our stuff in the back of the truck.
“What?” I ask, not sure what he’s talking about and also feeling a little disgruntled that he kissed me when he thought he was going to die, and now he won’t even look at me!
“We aren’t that far from the cabin, but we’re all dirty and gross. Do you want to stay here for the night, or should I hook up the trailer?” I bite my lip, wanting to pick the cabin, of course, but not sure it’s right for me to make the decision for the rest of the group.
“Whatever you pick is fine by me,” Ryan says, and I give him a huge smile.
“I don’t care either,” Silas says, obviously figuring out that I’m hesitating because of him and the others.
I look to Natalie and Hank, and Natalie shakes her head. “We’re just grateful for the ride, we’ll go wherever you want,” she says.
“Thank you guys,” I tell them, starting to feel all kinds of emotions crash over me. This is it, the end of my journey, which has felt like it’s been months. I should be ecstatic, but I’m terrified. I didn’t realize it, but trying to get to the cabin has given me a purpose. I’ve tried really hard not to think about what would happen if I actually got to the cabin and Abby wasn’t there.
“It shouldn’t be more than an hour,” I murmur, knowing that it’s close to Watseka because that is where we always stopped for ice cream just before reaching Lake Manaruke each summer vacation. “I want to go,” I say, firming my resolve. I was tempted to put it off another day, but then realized that nothing would change tomorrow, and I will still be feeling the same way without any excuse to delay it.
Sunny surprises me by climbing into the truck next to me and snuggling against my side. “Why are you so sad?” she asks, reaching up and brushing away my tears. “Don’t you want to see your friend?” Her nose scrunches up in adorable confusion.
“I’m not really sad,” I tell her, having no idea how to explain this all to a six year old. “I’m just nervous, and excited,” I tell her, plastering a big smile on my face so she will stop asking questions.
“Why don’t I read you a book?” Ryan suggests to distract her, and I give him a grateful look as Sunny scrambles across the seats and plants herself in the small middle seat between the driver and passenger seats. Ryan digs a book about ponies out of his bag and starts to read.
Silas hops into the driver’s seat, having just hooked up the trailer, and rolls his eyes at Ryan, but he doesn’t say anything for Sunny’s sake, and then we are on our way.
The truck eats up the miles, and we start to see less and less zombies the further from civilization we get. I’m hopeful that will be a good sign for us. We reach the small grocery store at the base of the mountain, and Silas pulls into the deserted parking lot and digs out the map to examine it.
“The turn is just up there on your left,” I tell him, starting to vibrate, and I’m not sure if it’s from excitement or fear.
Silas folds the map up and puts it away. “I didn’t realize it was up on the mountain,” Ryan remarks.
“It will be a great defense against the zombies,” Silas agrees, looking out the window at the store. “Do we want to grab any more supplies while we’re down here?” he asks, and everyone in the truck shakes their head in unison.
“I just want to get there,” I tell him, no longer overly worried about what the others want. I need to know.
“We have enough to last us a while,” Ryan agrees. “I think we should see if we can set up a safe home base at the cabin and then come back without the people who don’t need to be down here risking their lives,” he says, and I frown.
“You’re not talking about me are you?” I ask, not wanting to be treated like I belong in a bubble, and Ryan shakes his head.
“Are you kidding?” he says with a small grin. “I wouldn’t dare–I was actually talking about Natalie, and Sunny…and I guess Hank, since he’s so weak right now,” he clarifies, and I relax.
“Half of our group is a handicap right now, you’re right,” Silas agrees bluntly, and I almost open my mouth to protest, but really, I don’t actually care. Natalie knows she shouldn’t be running through zombified grocery stores in her condition, Hank is half starved and weaker than a newborn calf, and Sunny is just a kid and has no idea we are even talking about her. I look at the little girl, obliviously playing with her doll, snuggled into Ryan’s side, and I feel good about not dragging her around anymore than we have to.
Silas puts the truck in gear and gets back on the road, carefully maneuvering the trailer so it can make it around the sharp turn that starts to immediately lead us straight up the mountain.
It isn’t your regular kind of road by any stretch of the imagination. The top of the trailer scratches against some of t
he lower hanging branches, making us all wince at the sound, but Silas doesn’t stop and I’m grateful. I think if we have to stop even one more time before actually reaching the cabin, now that we are so close, I will probably go crazy and run off into the woods, pulling my own hair out!
We wind around curves that are familiar to me and crest hills that make us feel a bit like we are on a roller coaster. Finally, we round the corner and get our first view of the lake as the terrain plateaus a little. We see a cabin up on the right, nestled away into the forest, but it looks abandoned.
“Is it that one?” Ryan asks, leaning forward to squint at it, looking for any sign of life. I shake my head.
“No,” I tell them, thankful that it isn’t because that house is definitely abandoned. For a few more miles, we wind along the road, which follows the lake around, and then another cabin comes into view. My heart stutters in my chest when I see people standing outside.
“Is that them?” Silas asks, starting to tap his brakes, but again I shake my head.
“That’s someone else’s cabin,” I tell them, my pulse hammering. We aren’t alone; there are other survivors up here.
The people openly stare as we drive by. They all hold a gun or weapon of some sort, but they don’t make any threatening motions towards us with them. It’s almost like they are just as afraid of us as we are of them.
Sunny sits up in her seat and waves to them through the window, and one of the younger women slowly waves back. We pass a few more cabins, most abandoned, but some have cars in the driveway or people standing out front. With each live human I see, I begin to feel like there might actually be hope for humanity.
“It’s the next one,” I say, and my voice comes out in a whisper as we round the bend. I hold my breath as the familiar brown cabin comes into view. It looks exactly the same as it always has, untouched by everything else going on in the world. Three vehicles come into view parked outside the cabin, and I let out a strangled sound in my throat.