“We can’t use the elevators.” She said, her tone apologetic. The two girls didn’t mind. They could handle the stairs.
“I can’t take you all the way to the basement, but I can take you to the front desk and tell them you need to be placed down there.” The nurse seemed to understand why they were doing this. Or maybe she didn’t, but she just wasn’t asking any questions. Kimber wondered if she had lost someone. Maybe that was why she was risking her neck for them. Or maybe she had a person down there or knew someone who had been infected. Whatever the reason, this nurse was risking a lot to move the two girls somewhere they didn’t belong just so they could be with their people. Kimber appreciated that.
They walked briskly down the stairs, Kimber’s fingers still intertwined with Drew’s. It felt good to hold her hand again. In all honestly, Kimber hadn’t thought she would ever feel that way about Drew again. The night Kimber saw Drew kissing that boy seemed like a million years ago. After everything they had been through together, risking their lives trying to survive, she couldn’t continue to be angry with her. What was a simple kiss when the world was ending? At the time it had been such a big deal, but now everything was different and there was no one else’s hand Kimber would rather be holding.
They came to the end of the stairs and the nurse stopped them. There was a lot of commotion going on the other side of the door. Something was happening. Screams and yelling, feet pounded across the floor, all could be heard through the door. There was no window, no way to know what was going on without opening the door.
“You’re sure?” The nurse asked, looking from Kimber to Drew and then back again. Kimber looked at Drew. Time slowed down around them. Her eyes went from Drew’s beautiful irises to her lips. Kimber leaned in and placed her own chapped pink lips against them. The kiss was quick, barely more than a peck, but it sent a shock through Kimber’s entire body. It was just like their very first kiss, quick but meaningful, filled with feeling, passion, and love.
“We’re sure.” She said, not turning to look at the nurse, still unable to pull her eyes away from Drew.
When the redheaded nurse, pushed open the door, they were greeted with panic and turmoil. People were running in every direction. The crowd moved in chaos. Uniformed guards stood unsure of what to do, yelling to each other but unable to hear above the commotion. Nurses and doctors designated only by their scrubs were trying to calm down anyone they could.
“What is going on?” Drew asked, but the nurse shook her head. She had no more of an idea of what had happened then they did.
“Stay here.” She said before moving towards the information desk to try and make sense of what was happening there.
Kimber looked at Drew. They both had no intention of staying put. Their heads turned in every which way, trying to locate the door they had seen Eli and Rion and the rest go through. There were so many doors and they all looked alike. There wasn’t time to try them all. Think, Kimber urged herself. Where had they been standing? Which way had the soldiers lead them when they said goodbye? She could make out Eli’s face in her mind when she was reassuring them she would be fine, but where had they gone from there, she couldn’t remember. She closed her eyes, blocking out the scene around her. They had been standing by the desk, to the left and they turned….
“There!” She pointed to the door next to where they came out of. It was another set of stairs, this time going downward. “They went in there.”
Drew moved quickly toward the door and pulled the handle. On the other side was Eli, Rion, Nolan, and Emmy. Behind them, moving rapidly was a pack of infected. Its was the most infected people Drew had ever seen in once place.
“Come on!” She shouted as she pulled her friends through the door and shut it quickly behind them. “I hope they don’t know how to use doorknobs.” She said with a laugh.
“They don’t,” Eli said, remembering back to the trailer when Rion’s mom had clawed her way through the bedroom door rather than just turn the handle.
Eli took Kimber into his arms, thankful that they didn’t have to go looking for the two girls. He would have never left without them, but it was better that they had had the intuition to come looking for the other half of their group.
“We have to get out of here. It isn’t a safe place anymore.”
“We know,” Kimber said.
Eli let Drew take Kimber’s hand and he helped Rion. They moved with the rest of the crowd out into the cold. The air felt crisp to the teenagers. It was like coming up for air after staring death in the face while drowning in the deepest ocean.
“Anyone remember where we parked?” Nolan asked, bringing a much needed moment of comic relief.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The group, minus Mr. Sales, climbed back into Drew’s SUV. No one spoke. It was the second time they had looked the infected in the face and made it out alive. Coming that close to death twice in one day was draining. No one was sure they could keeping doing this. The hospital had been their one lead to safety, now, no one said a word. No one knew what to do or where to go.
“Should we head back to Dyersville?” Drew suggested.
Silence was all that was heard in the SUV. Eli couldn’t think of any other idea. He wasn’t exactly sure where his mother was or if heading to that neighborhood would be safe. Plus when Kimber had talked to their mom, she said they had room for Kimber and himself. After facing what they had together, Eli didn’t feel like they could separate now. He didn’t want to leave the others with no where to go, especially Rion and Emmy. They didn’t have a mom or even a home to go back to right now. There was no way to know if the trailer park would be safe. Eli didn’t think it would be very difficult for a zombie to get into the trailer. Everything looked different at night and he wasn’t very familiar with the neighborhood. It didn’t seem like a good idea to try and find a place in Dubuque. There was nowhere left for them in the city, but his mother was here, somewhere, hopefully alive. He felt like he was turning his back on her if he left, but he needed to protect Kimber and he felt a responsibility to the rest of the group. They were a band of misfits whether they wanted to be or not.
“I guess so.” He said.
The drive back was filled with more silence. A sense of defeat had settled into the group. The hospital was supposed to be a safe place, they trusted that. Now, they were just a bunch of kids, trying to find a place to hide. Could they even hide from the infected? It was like the world was at war and they were on the losing side. Drew drove on the same back roads they had used when they left Dyersville. They didn’t see another car on the road. She had to be more careful now, the road was covered in snow and it was still falling. Eli wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or not. Maybe it would be safer to just stay inside somewhere safe. But where was a safe place?
A few miles ahead of them there was an orange glow. It was the kind of glow you would see over a large city. But Dyersville was just a tiny town. Rion had never seen such a vibrant burnt orange haze hanging over the town like that before. As Drew drove them closer, Rion began to see smoke. It was thick and dark, billowing high into the sky, causing the orange glow to turn darker. The SUV came over the last hill of the gravel road just on the edge of town and everyone in the car saw it. Drew stopped the car immediately.
“It’s burning,” Rion said quietly, in an almost absentmindedly way. Her voice was quiet, but everyone in the car had heard it. No one needed to say it. Each person in Drew’s beat up Tahoe could see that the place they each called home, was amassed in flames. It looked like something you only saw on the news. Like the wildfires in California that tore through the state with a force that was hard to stop.
Only it wasn’t forest and national parks that were burning. It was their homes and school. It was the bustling main street where Rion had gotten ice cream on Saturdays with Emmy. It was their friends and family.
“Where is everyone, why aren’t they fighting the fire?” Kimber was confused. Somebody should be doing something. Wh
ere was the fire department or the police? This was their town, their home, why was no one doing anything.
“I don’t think anyone is left to fight,” Nolan said softly.
It struck Kimber like a knife to her chest. This wasn’t an accidental fire. This fire was on purpose. Suddenly Kimber realized that somebody had declared war on their town and was winning by burning it to the ground.
“Its ground zero,” Drew said.
“What does that mean?”
“We were the infected. All the students that had been in that lecture returned here, bringing the infection with them. They did what they thought they had to do to clear out as much of the infected as possible. They did it for the greater good. Kill one to save many.” Drew said, remembering what the nurse had told her.
“Who the fuck is ‘They’?” Nolan snarled, “What gives them any right?”
“They are the government and they don’t need your permission to burn a tiny town in the middle of nowhere to the ground if it's going to keep these things from attacking and infecting other people!” Eli said. His voice was steady but had an edge of anger to it. He was just as angry as Nolan was, but he was acting more rational. Eli was always more rational. Some thought that made him cold, but Eli thought it made him smart. Sometimes emotions were better left outside of a life or death situation.
“What are we going to do?” Rion asked everyone but her question was really directed at Eli.
“Maybe there are some survivors? They couldn’t have wiped out the entire town.” Eli sighed. The height of the fire made it look like the entire town was in fact burning. Black smoke billowed through the air, rising high enough to block the stars from view.
“They most certainly could have. It looks like…” His voice trailed off. He knew exactly what it looked like and so did Nolan but nobody wanted to say it or even think it.
How could they think about their own government bombing their town, their own people, and leaving the rest to die?
“I don’t think anyone in town could survive.”
“Some did,” Kimber said quietly. “We did.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“Do you think other people got out? Like we did?” Kimber asked. The question was for her brother, but Eli was still staring at what remained of their town in silence. The orange glow of the roaring flames lit up his face, exposing the raw emotion in his eyes. He looked stunned, at first, but now his brow furrowed and his jaw clenched. Kimber knew that look, she had seen it a hundred, thousand times before. It was a silent rage that he kept contained, but that tore him apart on the inside. He flexed his fists, opening and closing his hands, a movement she had seen him do a lot recently to control his anger. When he was younger she was afraid his pent up anger would cause him to strike out at her or their mother or anyone really.
Rion saw Kimber watching her brother. Her eyes traveled from his face, tense and etched with fury, to his hands that opened and closed as he looked at the remains of their hometown. Rion didn’t understand why Eli was doing what he was doing. All she knew was that he was hurt and when someone she cared about was hurt, her first instinct was to reach out to them. Rion stepped closer to Eli and took his hand. He turned to look at her, pulling his gaze from the fire for the first time since they arrived. With their fingers intertwined, the two gazed into each other’s eyes. The expression on Eli’s face softened and Rion even managed a weak smile. Kimber watched on in amazement. She was certain this was the event that would cause Eli to finally lose control over his issues with rage, but then suddenly, with Rion’s hand in his, his rage was gone.
“I hope some people did,” Eli said, answering Kimber’s question, but still looking at Rion.
“Well, what are we going to do now?” Kimber asked, kicking at a few rocks gathered close to her. Her head was down and she tried to focus hard on the gravel road beneath her feet. Something about the way Eli was looking at Rion made her stomach tighten. He didn’t even know this girl and now he was holding her hand, it didn’t make any sense. If Kimber was being rational about it, she would have realized that she was just feeling overprotective of her brother, but she couldn’t see it like that. Drew watched on as Kimber acted sullen about her brother holding someone’s hand. She knew how jealous Kimber could be when it came to the attention of her brother. Eli had really only ever looked after Kimber and their mom. In fact, for as long as Drew had known him, Eli had never dated. She wasn’t surprised this was causing Kimber to act like a spoiled child.
“I need to call Sada,” Nolan said, speaking up. Rion tore her eyes away from Eli and remembered that they were also missing someone from the group. ‘What happen to-“ She stopped and looked at Eli, “-Mr. Sales?” Eli noticed that she hadn’t called him Issac and took that as a good sign.
“Oh,” Kimber said. She stopped kicking the rocks and looked up at the others in the group who hadn’t been with her and Drew. “He got bit.”
“He’s infected? Did you just leave him there?”
“No,” said Kimber, getting defensive. “He was in another room and about to turn. The nurse told us. We had to pretend we weren’t with him, otherwise who knows what would have happened to us. They weren’t exactly being fair about choosing who got to go where. They put you down in the basement because they thought you guys were infected. Nobody even bothered to ask you or examine you. They just assumed and put you in a room with other people who were actually infected and waited for them to turn.”
“I’m sorry.” Rion said quickly, looking down at her swollen feet, “I was just surprised, that’s all.”
“Well, we all know he was your favorite teacher and all but we didn’t really need-“
“Shut up, Kimber.” Eli’s voice was colder than the snow falling around them. Kimber instantly stopped talking and closed her mouth. She looked at her brother, shocked that he would say something like that to her. Was he really defending this girl? She opened her mouth again like she was going to snap back at her brother, but Drew placed a hand on her shoulder, that stopped her.
“We need to think of a plan, not bicker with one another. There’s no time to fight. We’re exposed, out in the open, and we don’t know if any infected are out here”
“Rion,” Emmy said tugging at her sister’s free hand, “I’m getting cold.” Rion took her sister’s hand in her own free hand and noticed it was ice cold. Emmy’s nose was running and her cheeks were colored a bright pink as if someone had taken a rose colored marker to them. “I don’t want her to get sick, we need to find a place to go, the sooner the better.” She said, keeping her voice low and talking directly to Eli, hoping to keep the drama to a minimum.
“My dad has a fishing cabin a few miles east of here. It's not very big, but there is usually firewood and we can hold out there for a while until we figure out what to do.” Drew suggested. “There is even usually food because my dad is in the Army and a total survival nut.” She hadn’t thought about the cabin before, but in reality, it was the perfect place. Someday, if she saw him again, she was going to have to thank her dad for being paranoid.
Everyone seemed to nod in agreement and they headed back to the SUV. Nolan brought up the rear, ready to get somewhere he could sit down and rest and call his girlfriend. He limped towards the car, holding his left hand on the side of his left leg, trying not to make any noise because of the pain.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The cabin was nestled along a large pond, far back from the road. The driveway alone was a mile long of twists and curves. It was hidden away from the world, both infected and not. The moon was full and hung just above the roof of the cabin. The reflection of the moon shown brightly on the pond. As they pulled up to it in the dark, the view was almost romantic. Well, it would have been if they hadn’t spent their entire day running from zombies.
The door was locked and Drew couldn’t remember where the hideaway key was. Eli began to push his shoulder against the door, but he couldn’t move it. None of them could. Every single one
of them was beyond the point of exhaustion. Snow continued to fall, as it had the entire day. Emmy was shaking, her tiny body unable to keep her warm. Rion pulled her into her arms. She moved her hands up and down Emmy’s shoulders, trying to keep her baby sister warm. Soon Rion’s shoulders began to shake and she could barely move them, but she kept running her hands up and down her sister’s arms. Self-sacrifice was the only thing Rion knew and she would continue to put her sister and her child ahead of herself. But her body was very close to betraying her. It couldn’t keep going at the pace she was setting for it, even though that pace was the only thing keeping her alive.
“We have to find a way in.”
Nolan, who was shaking as well, walked along the porch that wrapped around the humble shack. If anyone could find a way to break into the cabin, Rion was betting it was him. Nolan had a reputation for being a bad boy and doing things that typical bad boys did, like joy riding and breaking into places he didn’t belong. She once heard a rumor that he had broken into the school and moved all of the trophies from the display case and set them up in the principal’s office as a prank. Rion had never doubted the authenticity of that story but now wondered if that was really something Nolan would do. Childish pranks against teachers and administrators seemed beneath him.
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