If I Die Before I wake Chapter 6
Chapter word count: 2,133
Total word count: 12,528
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Chicago, IL. Superstore Warehouse
The reactions were what you would expect from a group like the one that was clustered around the pile of PB&J sandwiches, most of which were gone or had been dropped in the shock of my revealing the destination of the possibly epic journey to save the country.
Melodramatic, much?
Giselle let out a quaint squeak, her eyes growing huge as she ignored the jelly that had splattered close to her mud covered designer jeans. She didn’t even blink and just openly stared and I could almost see the cogs working in that blond head of her as she made the connection. New York. Zombie capital of the country at the moment and ground zero for whatever contamination the government or some terrorist had leaked into the water system.
Hell. Essentially.
Seth was choking on the soda he had been swallowing at the time of my revelation and Miles had to reach over to thwack the kid on the back to dislodge whatever was going on in his pale throat. The kid coughed, turning viciously red in the process as air found his lungs once more and he stupidly blinked at me through those coke bottle glasses of his. I was half expecting him to pull out an inhaler and start sucking on it instead of just wiping the coke from his chin as it dripped down in small, brown rivers. The only reaction that actually surprised me?
Miles.
He gave a whoop of some sort of joy, punching his fist into the air and I thought for a moment that he was going to grab his shotgun and fire a few celebratory shots into the air towards the exposed rafters. But for some reason it seemed I had already gotten one ally on my side to go to New York, although his reasons were probably quite different than if the other two went with me.
“I’m assuming that means you would want to go with, Miles?” I questioned, attempting to keep the smirk off of my face. But it was difficult with such a… rambunctious reply. So much enthusiasm in the time of our lives where things seemed the most bleak. Although I had a feeling that Miles wasn’t going to go just for the idea of visiting a doctor who could create a vaccine that would save the country and possibly the world if this stupid infection grew anymore.
“Road trip to kill zombies? Hell yeah!”
And that made a hell of a lot more sense. The excited, five-year-old-on-Christmas-Day-grin on his face was enough to distract me for a moment before my eyes turned to the other two and I promptly was reminded of the anxiety I had felt only moments before. Both Giselle and Seth looked scared out of their minds at the idea of running headfirst into a city filled with zombies. From what I had heard through the grapevine of crappy radio pirates and word of mouth… they were coming for food. And despite the cities like Chicago that had managed to get a good number of citizens out before they had been affected… that wave of millions, excluding the same amount that was probably going to stay in New York, were coming our way.
It was inevitable that we were going to fight them sooner or later. Fight or flight and might as well take them head on and be prepared for it, right? Instead of sitting in the basement of some warehouse, flinching and jumping at each and every sound and feasting on the preserved foods that would last for weeks… but how long would the Zombies wait until they got hungry enough or vicious enough to crawl over the fence, leaving bits of flesh and rotting clothing behind on the barbed wire? Glass and table tops weren’t going to keep them out forever.
And I doubted there was unlimited ammo in this warehouse, even if there was any at all.
“You are crazy. You can’t be thinking about going there willingly!” Giselle cried, breaking the silence that had settled around us after Miles’s whoop of excitement and joy of shooting more dead heads. She shook her head, gold locks bouncing around her shoulders as she let her fingers wrap around her arms. Seth shifted uncomfortably in his seat and he seemed to be having the same thoughts I was about their well being if the two tough guys in the group (the ones that could obviously shoot a gun or at least put on the appearances that he could) were going straight into the belly of the beast… what would happen to the kid with his laptop and thick glasses? Would he be left to fend for himself once more, right after finding a group that he could possibly find better sanctuary with?
“Listen… Seth… you don’t have to come with… it gets safer the further you go west. At least that’s-”
“I know what the news reports are saying, Alexander.” Seth replied, his face still red from the coughing fit. But his voice was strong and that threw me off for a moment as I had expected more of that stuttering and nervous tone from the kid like in the earlier hours of our companionship. But his words didn’t surprise me… he seemed like an intelligent kid. Scared out of his fucking mind, but intelligent enough to follow what was going on in the world, even if he wasn’t experiencing it from other places besides behind his computer screen in his room. But before I could open my mouth and remind him that I didn’t expect him to follow, the teenager had burst out of his chair, sending it clattering across the concrete floor with enough force and sound to make Giselle cry out in surprise. His sneakers squeaked on the ground as he turned away and headed towards the computer he had set up for me only hours previously.
Wonderful.
A sigh escaped from Miles, who surprisingly moved to apparently follow the kid, even with an eye roll that screamed “Can you believe kids these days?” and I held up my hand, stopping him from rising to his feet before I rose to my own to follow Seth. Guilt flooded my veins for waiting even an hour or so before telling the kid who had already managed to connect me to the outside world, something I hadn’t been able to do by myself for a week and a half.
I at least owed him an explanation of some sort. Even if it wasn’t going to be the full truth. If I was going to supposedly inspire some sort of reaction, whether it be courage or fear, from the kid… he couldn’t be afraid that I was going to drop dead at any moment or something from a past illness. That wouldn’t be fucking acceptable and the mere thought made me clench my fists as I picked up to a jogging pace to catch up with him.
“Seth, wait up.” My voice wavered slightly as I managed to finally stop jogging, slowly turning into the aisle that Seth had found solstice in, his pale fingers flashing across the keyboard I had been using earlier. He had already managed to connect to some sort of network again and was quickly flipping through screens faster than I could even read them. This kid knew some things, which was impressive. And I knew that if he wanted to come with… me and Miles would have to teach him a few things, like how to shoot a fucking gun.
“Seth, listen… I--” But before I could even begin, I was silenced by a pale hand that was brought up to stop my apology or whatever the hell was going to come out of my fucking mouth. I didn’t even have a clue of what I was going to say to the kid. Sorry? Give him some sort of explanation to why I had waited until the four of us were sitting around a relatively peaceful meal, probably the first one any of us had consumed in days? But whatever was in my head had instantly vanished as Seth turned the computer screen my way.
Rescue squads to leave Chicago tomorrow.
Get out while you can.
They aren’t coming back.
Fuck.
Now it was my turn for my eyes to go wide as they flicked from the blogging headlines… and even a real newspaper headline that Seth had pulled up, not allowing me to read the rest of the rants or articles or whatever they were at this point.
“They’re leaving us, Alexander. We can’t rely on them anymore. It’s going to happen tomorrow. The last rescue teams are leaving at noon, when the risk for those fucking zombies is the least.” The curse seemed foreign on Seth’s lips and my ears rang despite my constant use of the not so eloquent word. But this kid’s voice was serious and deadly… and it took all of my energy to keep my stomach from clenching and roiling at the thought of him growing up to be someone like me… or Miles… But before I could think about that idea fully, his voice shattered the nightmare once more. “I’m not staying here to let them get me…” The statement was as final as anything else in this world and I realized how much I had underestimated the kid with my assumptions about how much he could handle. He had managed to survive thus far, right?
Of course, so had Giselle with her pocket knife.
Another flash of websites and frantic click of keys underneath his uncallused fingers and suddenly I was staring at an all too real picture of something absolutely grotesque. Dripping flesh, vacant eyes and I could nearly hear the moans as it approached whatever unlucky soul was holding the camera at that point. It looked nothing like the zombies I had encountered thus far though, which made chills go down my spine as my brain instantly cried foul and I wanted to claim it to be photoshop.
“It’s a digger. At least that’s what this guy on his blog says.” The serious voice was there again and the zombie on the screen became all too real to me. Large arms with the circumference of truck tires. Scoop-like hands that hung down at its side. “They dig holes to trap people. This guy’s blog is all about what he’s seeing holed up in some house out east. They’re evolving, Alexander. Chicago is just the baby stages.”
I felt like I was going to fucking vomit and had to put a hand on the counter next to me in order to keep myself upright at that moment. Had I thought that things were going to get worse when I went east? Of course. The number of zombies would increase, as would the risk of getting turned, unless the Doc was right with his theory and my blood. But the idea of them fucking changing like that into grotesque things that could only appear in the movies?
It blew my fucking mind.
“I’ve been reading this guy’s blog since it first started. He’s somewhere east of here… Ohio, I think. Cleveland. And I doubt any of you guys are going to be able to brush up on these things in time.” Such strong words, although after he finished, he flushed immediately, looking from the screen to me and back again. “No offense.” There we go… that sounded like the Seth I sort of knew. Which really didn’t count for anything considering most of what I knew about him was assumptions, and it seemed I was wrong about a lot of things.
Like his backbone.
“So what are you telling me this for, Seth? To warn me and convince me to go west?” I questioned, not quite knowing what he was doing with this information. Had it just been his intention to tell me about all of this so he could convince me not to go out to New York with Miles? That it was going to more than likely get us killed instead of turning us into heroes?
Would his argument work?
Of course, this conflict didn’t seem to matter as Seth shook his head. And that mere gesture made my heart speed up as he leaned up against the counter, eyes flicking at the mutated human form on the screen before looking back into my eyes.
“No. I’m telling you that you need me.” A deep breath expanded his chest and seemed to steady him a bit more as his eyes flashed with a sudden confidence I had a feeling would quite possibly be rare during this trip. “And that I’m going with you."