Gay panic... only quantifiably worse.

Read Another Part: [One]    [Two]    [Three]    [Four]    [Five]

_________________

It isn’t quite a surprise that Rica acts first, flying out of the room at the scream with Sae close behind her. Sae is so overwhelmed at this point that she can’t handle being the first one into action. Not again.

They move nearly as one though, the raven-haired woman just a few steps in front of Sae as they take the staircase, the handrail practically being used as a vault to jump around the last few steps as they touch down on the landing and step into chaos.

Sae isn’t sure what she expected least. 

The zombie; an older man, dragging the bottom half of his body along the ground towards Cari, his hand wrapped tightly around the little girl’s ankle as she screams and frantically tries to kick him off of her. 

Or... Rica freezing in place the moment she sees who it is, unable to move any further, Sae running into her as she becomes the barrier between Sae and Cari.

With the adrenaline of the days events, Sae propels herself forward, passing the stunned Rica as the blonde flings herself towards Cari, grabbing a hold of her arms and trying to haul her backwards away from the monster who’s using her leg to pull forward.

It doesn’t work.

The man has too solid of a grip on her, and as Sae hauls Cari backwards, he comes with them, his mouth opening to try and take a bite out of Cari.

Cari screams once more, Sae panics and her own foot comes out to swing at him, kicking him in the jaw as hard as she can before he can take his intended bite.

“Help!” Sae shrieks at Rica, her plea falling on deaf ears as the woman seems like she’s in shock. “Cari, keep kicking!” She turns instead to the child who despite being in a frenzy, is able to follow directions.

The little girl uses her foot to keep trying to kick the man off of her, but he’s relentless and won’t let go. Even with the force of Sae’s own kick having knocked a few of his teeth out, his grip stands tight on her.

Sae goes to kick him again, aiming for the arm that’s holding onto Cari, but as she hits him, Cari lets out a scream of pain as he rips her leg closer to him, the impact of the kick making him recoil but not let go.

“Hold on!” Sae yells again, getting back to her feet and running for the kitchen. She can hear Cari scream for her not to leave, but she knows she’s got to do something, and fast if Cari is going to stand a chance.

She spots a knife block, the first knife she goes for happens to be a large chef’s knife. It’s perfect. 

Wielding it like the weapon it absolutely is, she rushes back into the hall, where Cari is still kicking the man off of her, he’s closer to her than before, and Sae knows she has to act quickly or risk it all.

With a primal and animalistic scream of rage, Sae races at the man, knife outstretched at the ready.

It’s over so quickly that Sae’s heart is racing ten miles an hour, blood pumping so hard she can hear it.

She reaches the man, grabbing him by the back of the neck and lifting his head up and away from Cari. 

With her other hand she plunges the chef knife into the top of his head, straight down the middle. He gurgles, then goes limp. The upper half of his body hits the floor and his hand drops it’s hold on Cari’s leg.

It isn’t quite over yet, Sae immediately turns to Cari and barks at her, voice unintentionally loud and harsh. “Are you hurt? Did you get bit?!” She demands, pushing away from the man and immediately checking Cari’s legs for bites or scratches as the child shakes her head wildly. “Are you bit?!” She yells.

“N-no!” The little girl cries out, bursting into tears.

Sae takes a shaky breath of relief, before she turns from Cari and violently upends the contents of her stomach, horror overtaking her as she takes in the reality of what just happened to them.

She heaves, choking on her own spit and shudders in the realization. “I just... killed someone.” She shakes.

Sae curls up into a ball, scooting backwards away from the body and her own bile until she’s in the living room, and then she breaks down.

The events of the day finally hit her, and Sae begins to sob. Only pausing as Cari piles into her arms, and she wraps herself around the little girl, and starts sobbing again. The adrenaline leaves her and exhaust takes over, as the events swarm her mind.

Kate. Luka. Curtis. Martin... Taking a life.

It’s all real. This new horrifying life isn’t a nightmare. It’s all real, and Sae... Sae wants out of it now.

She stills, body wrapped tightly around the little girl. Sae holds the trembling child close to her, trying to reassure both herself and Cari that the latter is fine, she’s okay, she’s not been hurt. She won’t change.

Glancing at the body on the floor, blood pooling from his wound, Sae looks at Rica still frozen. “Was that...?” She asks, but she already knows the answer.

“Harold.” Rica confirms softly, breaking her stupor. 

As the older woman looks to the girls and finally seems to recognize what has happened, she rushes into the living room, snatching a blanket off of the couch and turns back to drape it over the dead man.

“I don’t understand.” Rica’s words fall on deaf ears, Sae instead focused at the pictures adorning the walls. 

Harold and his wife on a vacation.

Harold and his wife in their backyard.

Harold holding what looks to be a grandchild.

Sae killed a man; a father, a husband, a grandfather... She killed someone. Instead of just running away like before, finding other ways around. Sae killed a man.

Sure he was a zombie... But, he wasn’t always.

“I should have looked harder for him, I shouldn’t have left... He had to have been still alive, otherwise how would he have found his way home...” Rica is rambling, but Sae honestly only catches parts of it, instead her mind wanders to the what if’s.

What if she had been too late?

What if she hadn’t been able to kill him?

What if Cari had been bitten?

“I’ll check the storm cellar, that has to be where he got in.” That’s the part Sae picks up on and she nods her head silently as Rica rushes down the basement steps that the man had emerged from.

She continues to hold Cari, to comfort the both of them that the worst didn’t just happen, that the little girl is okay and safe. It’s weird to Sae that in just a few short hours, her priorities have changed so wildly.

_________________

Rica secures the storm cellar, locking the doors to the outside and throwing some furniture in front of them just to be extra cautious of their situation.

She locks the door between the basement and the main level as well, locking away the storm cellar on the off chance that anything can break through. It provides little comfort considering what they’ve already gone through in just a few hours.

The three girls decide to hunker down for the night. 

By the time all the dramatics are over with, it isn’t late into the day, maybe two or three in the afternoon. Though it has felt so much longer than that... They could leave, there is still hours of daylight left, but at the risk of not finding somewhere else safe before night fall, it’s just easier, and safer, to stay put.

Sae and Rica go around securing the doors and windows. Being snuck up on is not a mistake they are willing to make twice, especially not with how disastrous the last time could have been. With that in mind, they barricade the weak spots and choose emergency exits where they keep the bulk of their supplies should they leave at a moments notice.

(They add a fanny pack of first aid supplies to their stockpile, beside Cari’s small backpack of snacks, and even manage to find a dusty set of golf clubs as Rica secured the basement. It’s not much, but it’s a weapon a lot heavier than a chair leg and more versatile than a kitchen knife.)

The two older women work as a team, trading off jobs until the house is as secure as it could possibly be. Cari doesn’t leave their side often, straying only a few feet to grab something should they ask, or to move out of the way as they’re lifting the heavier pieces of furniture to place in front of doors and first-floor windows that can be reached from the ground.

It’s silent for the longest time. The three girls are so focused on their task to even think let alone speak.

Eventually though, the oldest of the three breaks the silence. “I’m sorry that I froze back there.” She whispers, just loud enough for Sae to hear as they’re sliding an oak cabinet in front of the back door.

“It’s okay.” Sae lies to the both of them, like she didn’t only just stop trembling barely half an hour ago.

“No, it’s not.” Rica corrects her, knowing a little too much. “You both could have died back there... I just, I never expected I would see Harold like that... I’ve been his PSW for the past four years and... and-”

“I get it.” Sae interrupts, looking at Rica, this time not lying. “When I saw Kate like that? I froze too.”

The girls go silent again, reality settling in for both of them and keeping them alarmingly quiet until a soft grumble breaks through the quiet.

“You guys haven’t eaten today, have you?” It’s more of a statement than a question, but still Sae feels the need to answer it regardless.

“We had some snacks on the road...” She realizes how ridiculous that sounds and clarifies. “While we were walking here from the resort, we had some kids school snacks out of Cari’s bag.”

“Well, we should probably eat.” Rica shrugs.

And so they do, Rica making something out of the food in the cupboards of Harold and Margaret’s kitchen. It’s only a basic meal, but it fills Sae and Cari, and loosens their tongue a little after the incident.

_________________

It isn’t until much later though, that Sae feels comfortable enough to speak freely once more.

The rest of the night is awkward and uncomfortable, they can’t risk putting the television on (flashing lights are an indication someone is home), and the radio seems to be nothing but static. There are books, but nothing meant for a child, and so they spend their evening trying to tell Cari stories or jokes, anything to distract her from what’s going on.

When it’s just past nine they decide that tomorrow is a new day, and they can retire for the night to try and shake off some of the horror of the day’s events.

They lock themselves in an upstairs bedroom, not the master suite but instead they settle in the guest one (where Rica had slept the night prior). 

They have their bags packed at the window just to be on the safe side, their makeshift weapons leaning on the wall just beside. Cari has just been put down, the child passing out the moment her head hit the pillow.

Sae is sat on the bed as well, just beside Cari, stroking the young girl’s hair as she looks at Rica with a solemn look. They’ve decided to take the night in shifts, one person always up to ensure they won’t be snuck up on, even with plenty of noisy traps downstairs.

Sae isn’t tired though, not yet, and so she chooses instead to stare at Rica, and be stared back at.

“I don’t know if I can do this.” Sae breaks the silence first, looking down at the sleeping child and then back at Rica. “I didn’t think this could happen.”

Rica laughs bitterly. “None of us did.”

The blonde closes her eyes, blinking back tears for what seems like the millionth time that day. “I just wanted a nice vacation to come out to my sister... The worst thing I thought would happen is that she’d be upset.... But this? This is much worse.”

Rica shakes her head. “I don’t know.” She can’t hide the smallest smirk. “The way my Mother reacted when I told her *I* liked girls was pretty apocalyptic.”

Sae glances back at her, cracking an eye open and narrowing it at the older woman. “That isn’t funny.” 

A beat passes.

“Okay.” Sae can’t hold back her own small smirk. “You’ve got to tell me now, how did she react?”

Rica lets out a quiet laugh, not wanting to wake Cari up. “Fire and brimstone.” She explains, the memory nothing more than a footnote in her history as an adult. “You would have thought I was taking candy from orphans and kicking puppies.”

Sae smiles to herself at the ridiculousness that she’s picturing. “Just how long ago was this?”

“Ten years.”

“And she’s good with it now?”

Rica stills, then shakes her head. “Haven’t spoke to her since. She kicked me out of the house, and I had to live with my girlfriend at the time’s parents until I was done highschool.”

Sae goes quiet again, smile gone. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine, she made her choice and so did I. It’s done.”

“Maybe we deserved this? Maybe it’s god’s way of telling humanity that we’re really the monsters?” 

Sae wants to take the words back immediately. 

Kate was not a monster - she was good and kindhearted and sweet. Cari’s father didn’t appear to be a monster either, just a man full of love for his only child. Neither one of them deserved what had happened to them. She can’t imagine that Harold or his wife, who seemingly treated Rica like one of their own family, had deserved this either.

She can’t find the words to explain what she meant though, and Rica seems to understand that, so the dark-haired girl just gives her a look, shakes her head and says softly. “You should sleep for now, your shift is in only a couple of hours.”

And that’s what Sae does. Shifting a little so that she’s cradling Cari in her arms, the young blonde lays her head against the pillow and tries to fall into an uneasy sleep.

_________________

It’s ten to two when Sae jolts awake, the room is dark and she’s about to call out for Rica when a whisper in her ear stops her before she can open her mouth.

“Shhh, be quiet.” She wants to be scared, but she recognizes the voice, it is Rica.

“What’s going on?” She asks, before the sound reaches her ears. It’s a siren, shrill and blaring, just outside of the window of the room they are in.

It rings for about thirty seconds, then stops for another thirty, only to continue ringing in that on and off pattern. Sae immediately knows what woke her.

“Where is that coming from?” Sae hisses, looking down at Cari who’s stirring just slightly over the noise.

“One of the neighbours, come.” Rica helps Sae out of bed, making sure that they don’t disturb Cari and the two make their way to the window.

Sae sees it, a car from the house across the street, she knows its that car because of the way that the lights will flash as it blares, only to turn off in the thirty seconds that it stalls, and then it flashes again.

“How did that turn on?” Sae asks, concern filling her.

“I have no idea.” Rica looks around the dark street below, heart racing as she tries to make out what the situation is. “Something must have bumped it, that’s not important though...”

Sae looks at her quizzically.

“What’s important is that we get it to stop.”

This time the confusion turns into bewilderment at the older woman. “Just how are we going to do that?”

Rica weighs the options in her head for a moment, seemingly working something out before opening her mouth for a plan that Sae immediately gets a gut feeling is nowhere near a good one.

Read Another Part: [One]    [Two]    [Three] _________________

“Run.” The very word is on the tip of her tongue as Sae stares down at the small horde slowly shambling towards them. They aren’t very quick, and the first thought in her head is that they shouldn’t have stayed on the doorstep begging for help... They could have ran, they could have gotten away before the zombies even reached halfway across the street.

But it’s a person.

It’s the first alive person they’ve seen since last night, and the very thought of someone else being in this crazy messed up world is enough that Sae is almost desperate to meet them. She needs to know that her, Curtis, Martin and Cari weren’t the only ones left... 

That her and Cari aren’t the only ones now.

She needs to feel like the world didn’t suddenly just end, that there’s still hope- people out there alive.

So they knock on the door far longer than they should have, and the zombies get closer and closer until there’s very little chance that they can get away unscathed. Sae feels like an idiot. She’s broken every zombie horror movie rule imaginable it seems.

Don’t make noise.

Don’t get caught.

And just... Run!

They turn to face the horde. Sae’s hand is on Cari’s shoulder protectively, ready to steer the girl in whatever direction is the safest, when the door opens behind them. It hardly registers for Sae, the sound of the lock click-clicking open, or the wood groaning as it swings inward. What does register, is the feeling of a hand on her own shoulder before she’s violently yanked backwards through the door. 

“Argh!” She lets a small cry out, her hands tightening around Cari and pulling the girl with her. They fall to the floor, surprise knocking them off of their feet and onto their bottoms... They are inside though. Both girls look up quickly to see as one of the zombies lunges towards the door, and they involuntarily let out matching squeals of fear for a brief second.

The person, or rather, the woman that they saw through the window acts quickly though. Her hand outstretches and she knocks the zombie away, slamming the door closed as soon as it’s safe to and locking it. They can hear the sound of bodies beating against the wood, but the door doesn’t so much as rattle, much less budge inwards from the creatures.

As the woman turns from the door to face them, Sae and Cari get their first look at their rescuer.

Her hair is raven black, tied into a braid that goes mid-way down her back, she’s tall... Taller than Sae. Her eyes are so dark that you can hardly tell where iris ends and pupil begins, but more importantly, the fire in her eyes is red hot and looking for a target.

They narrow in on Sae, and the blonde gulps nervously. Maybe it was safer outside.

“Are you crazy or something?” She hisses, not wanting to yell and further attract more of the undead to her. “Ringing the doorbell, and screaming like that? Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

Sae shakes her head in stunned silence, but the woman isn’t quite finished berating her yet. “Or that poor little girl, are you trying to get her killed too?”

“N-no.” Sae finally finds her voice, her grip loosening on Cari but the child doesn’t leave her lap. “I’m sorry.”

The woman releases a breath, and her hand slips overtop of her face as she does so. “No, no I’m sorry. I shouldn’t yell at you.” Her hand slides through her hair as she sighs and moves away from the door towards the girls and offers her hand. “Let’s get you two up.”

Cari accepts her hand first, though hesitantly after the two of them were yelled at, she’s on her feet before Sae but the moment the blonde is up, she clings to her, Cari clings to Sae like she is the only thing the girl has ever known despite them having known each other for less than a full twenty-four hours.

The woman sees it, her mouth going thin and tight-lipped as she looks at the terrified little girl. “Hey,” She whispers, taking a knee in front of the kid. “I’m sorry that I yelled at your...” She pauses for a second, glancing between the two curiously. “Babysitter?”

“Oh no, I’m not her-” Sae stops when the words sink in. “Wait. That’s kind of the right word for it, I guess?”

“You guess?”

“It’s a long story.”

“Well, it’s not like we’re going anywhere.”

Sae can’t argue that, so she follows the dark haired woman further into the house. She follows her into the living room, still hugging Cari close to her body. Sae doesn’t take a seat until the woman does, parking herself in a large leather armchair, as the two girls sit squished into one corner of a matching loveseat.

“Miss- I’m sorry I never got your name.” Sae stares at the raven-haired woman expectantly, waiting.

“I didn’t give it.” She states.

Sae pauses once more, staring at her a little harder, her eyes narrowing for a moment. “If you’re going to act like that-” She starts up, her voice trying to stay firm and in control. The last thing they need is to be teased and taunted. “We can just leave now.”

It’s a bluff. Cari’s eyes widen in fear at the idea of going back outside, but Sae maintains the lie.

It’s a show of dominance. It’s something to say that Sae isn’t going to take this, she’s already been yelled at once by this woman, she won’t be disrespected.

“And where will you go?” The woman calls her bluff.

Sae thinks for a second, Cari growing more and more afraid of the idea of coming back face to face with those zombies. “There’s other houses around here.” Sae decides. “We can find an empty one, we don’t need to stay here and be yelled at, or teased, or whatever you want to do to have some fun.”

The woman raises her eyebrow playfully. “Oh, I can think of some fun.” She smirks, and the hairs on the back of Sae’s neck stand up, electricity hitting her.

“Come on Cari!” Sae sounds pretty confident despite being faced with insecurity at the idea. 

The little girl reluctantly stands up, practically skidding to her feet as Sae tries to leave the living room with her. They get to the front door when the woman calls out to them. “You two are going to leave out the door that has a barricade of zombies in front of it?” And tuts her disapproval.

“Do you have a back door?” Sae asks, her annoyance seeping through her words as her heart races.

It’s a game of chicken, who will give in first, and Sae is about to give in to maintain her and Cari’s safety when the woman throws up her hands and relents.

“Okay, okay! Hold on... Don’t do anything stupid.”

“I’m not stupid!”

“Never said that you were, just that leaving would be.” The woman waves them back, standing up to show her surrender. “I’m just teasing, I’m sorry, I get that it’s a bad time to be sarcastic.”

Sae’s eyes steele over. “A really bad time.”

“My names Rica. Abiko.” She finally offers, waiting until the girls make their way back into the living room before asking. “I apologize for earlier. Again.”

Sae moves back into the living room but doesn’t sit down again, not yet. “That’s a unique name.”

“It’s Japanese.” Rica explains, shrugging. “Or at least, Abiko is, I think my Mom made up the name Rica.”

Sae lets out a smile, albeit a small one. “It’s pretty.”

“Thank you.” Rica returns her smile. “And you are?”

Sae looks down at Cari before back at the other woman. “I’m Sae, and this is Cari.” The girl nods.

“Those are unique names too.”

Sae laughs. An honest to god laugh, for the first time in what seems like forever, but has really only been a few hours. “It’s short for Sarah, and Cari’s name is short for Caroline.” She explains.

“Ah, Caroline and Sarah.” Rica repeats.

“Cari, and Sae.” Sae is firm on telling her. “We prefer those names instead, if you please, Rica Abiko.”

Rica nods her head in agreement. “Alright, Sae, then you guys call me Rica. Do we have a deal?”

The girls are quick to agree, and in their newfound agreement, Cari finds her way back onto the sofa. She curls up once more on the spot that she and Sae were just in, and instead watches the women.

“Why didn’t you think I was her Mom, or sister, or something?” Sae asks, continuing her thought from far earlier. “You said babysitter, you just went straight to that conclusion.”

“Honestly?” Rica asks, glancing from Cari to Sae. “You look far too young to have a seven year old, I mean, I could be wrong... Maybe you just have amazing skin?”

Sae blushes, immediately hating herself a little for doing it. “Well, you’d be wrong.” She says softly, glancing over at Cari protectively. “On both counts.”

Rica raises an eyebrow wordlessly, waiting for the blonde to continue.

“Cari’s eight.” Sae says with a teasing smirk. One that almost immediately disappears as she finishes her though. “I’m not even really her babysitter.”

“Ah yes,” Rica’s eyes sparkle as she recalls their earlier conversation. “The really long story.”

“That’s the one.” 

“Well Sae, as I said, we’re not exactly going anywhere.”

_________________

And so, Sae spills her guts to the virtual stranger that they just met. If she thinks about it, she’d have to say that they’re all strangers... Even Cari and her are strangers. They’ve only known each other for a day.

That day has given a lifetime of trauma, though.

She tells Rica all of it, every little part, even the ones that seem actually ridiculous to tell someone that you know absolutely nothing about. 

Sae supposes that it’s different times though. Who knows if therapists have survived the apocalypse? Who knows if they will even survive the apocalypse? It gives Sae a chance to dissect everything that’s happened today though, to go through her own emotions about it. The pain she couldn’t show Cari.

They start off slowly, Sae and Cari both explaining the resort, how they both came to be there at the same time. And then they talk of the attack. 

Sae tells Rica about the scream in the hallway that she had heard, and ignored. She details the woman who attacked Kate. Through teary eyes she tells of watching Kate bleed out on the floor, before turning into one of them and going after her.

Cari tells Rica things that not even Sae had heard; about how her Daddy had to fight off a man trying to push them into the zombies, how he had cried that night after Sae had passed out about not being able to save anyone else, and how he had sung her her favourite song on repeat to try and drown out the sounds of violence outside their resort room door.

Sae wipes Cari’s tears away and rocks her in her arms lovingly as the two detail to Rica how they got here; what they had seen and who they had lost.

“Jesus,” Rica breathes out in response. “You’ve gone through a nightmare, I am so sorry for how I acted.”

“This is new territory for everyone.” Sae explains, accepting her apology without a second word.

They talk for so long that Cari begins to doze off, back on the couch curled up and staring at the two women. Her grief brings her to a point of exhaustion, and it isn’t long before she’s asleep, taking a much needed nap after hours of walking. And stress.

As she notices that Cari is no longer listening, Sae is able to talk much more freely, the questions flooding her mind as she reflects on what she saw. “What have you seen? Do you think we’ll be rescued, or have you just stayed in your house this whole time?”

“We left once... Early this morning.” Rica’s mouth hides a frown line as she glances out the window. She can see that the front door for the most part has been abandoned now, something else must have drawn the zombies away from them. That’s good. They won’t have to worry about being barricaded.

“We?” Sae questions.

Rica turns back to Sae with an incredulous look. “I don’t know if you’ve seen the pictures plastered all over the house of an elderly Norwegian couple, but if you look closely, you’ll see I’m not in any of them.” 

Sae raises an eyebrow.

“It’s not my house.” Rica fills in the last puzzle piece for her, waiting for it to click in before she continues.

“So you just, broke in?” Sae’s less than impressed if that’s the case. She knows desperate times call for desperate measures, but what about the owners?

She laughs, Rica actually laughs, and Sae is ready to lay into her when she sees the pain hidden behind the laugh and stops before she makes a mistake. 

“No, no. I’m a PSW... Personal Support Worker.” She takes a pause. “The couple that live here- lived here, Harold and Margaret, I was their PSW.”

Sae grows quiet. Rica didn’t interrupt once during her and Cari’s story, and so she’s willing to do the same.

“Really, I was only Harold’s PSW. He was in a wheelchair.” She nods over to the stairs, which Sae has noticed for the first time, have a chair-lift attached. “I’d come in the morning to get him up and dressed, then I’d return at night to shower him and get him back into bed. That was all they needed help with, Margaret just wasn’t strong enough to lift him.”

“What happened?” Sae whispers, her stomach turning in the same direction that she knows this story is about to go. “Where are they?”

“I don’t know.” Rica answers in monotone. “I, uh, I was here last night. I came a bit early to help Margaret cut up some vegetables. She still was able to, but it hurt her wrist when she tried, so I usually helped out.”

The raven haired woman squeezes her eyes shut and Sae has to hold back from taking her hand. She knows how it felts, both her and Cari do, but this wasn’t comforting a child who was seeking out the affection. She doesn’t know this woman, doesn’t know how she’ll react. Sae stays still and listens.

The two girls sit in silence for a moment, before Rica begins to explain the bang on the door for help from her client’s next door neighbour. How it had ended with Margaret being bit by the elderly woman, Rica bandaging her and putting her to bed for the night.

Sae is confused. Kate and Martin turned so suddenly, but from the way Rica tells it, Margaret was fine through-out the night and even continuing to next morning.

Rica isn’t finished though.

The next morning, noting that Margaret wasn’t well, the three of them tried to get help. They piled into the car and got only two streets away. 

She stops there, looking from Cari to Sae. “Come with me for a second.” She nods to the staircase, not waiting to see if Sae is following before she’s leading the blonde woman to the second floor.

Sae takes a second glance at Cari, just long enough to ensure that she’s still sleeping, but then she’s following Rica without another thought to it.

It’s weird to think that she’s known the woman for only an hour or two, but she trusts her... She files that in the same train of thought for how she’s only known Cari for the day, but she’s already become fiercely protective of her.

Emergencies just tend to change a person.

She follows Rica upstairs and into a nicely decorated room. “It was Harold’s office.” Rica explains without prompting. “His pride and joy. He used to tell everyone that the only reason he bought this house was because of the view in this office... and the storm cellar.”

“Storm cellar?”

“In his 20′s he lived in Kansas, he used to tell me not to buy a house without a storm cellar because even if I’d never need it, it could still help in an emergency.”

“An emergency like this?” Sae says softly, biting her lip as she says it, to her credit, Rica can only laugh. 

“I don’t think this is what he thought.”

_________________

The girls are quiet again, both staring out the window until Sae finally thinks of something to say. “Uh, Rica, why is it so foggy? If this was his dream view, I’d have thought it’d be less... awful.”

With that Rica snaps back to attention.

“That’s why I brought you up here. It’s not fog, it’s smoke.” Sae doesn’t understand. “The city of Niagara is on fire right now.” She gasps as she understands.

“We noticed it this morning, but we still needed to find Margaret help, so we got in the car.” Rica points through the window, Sae taking a step closer to look out of it, her heart thudding painfully as she can see all the way to Clifton Hill.

Or rather, what’s left of it.

“We got stopped here, too many bodies in the way. We tried to turn back but that’s when Margaret turned... She bit Harold, and I sent the car crashing into a tree.” It’s only now that Sae sees the signs of trauma on the other woman.

Dried blood. Bruises. Sae knocks herself for not seeing it sooner, for getting so caught up in there being another living human standing in front of her that she didn’t think to check for danger.

“Are you okay? Have you taken care of your-”

“That’s not my point.” Rica cuts her off.

“When I woke, I couldn’t see Harold or Margaret, so I ran back here... Sae, the point I’m trying to make is...” She sighs. “You asked me if I think we’ll be saved, and I can’t say that I think we will. There’s already too much wrong out there...”

She rubs her temples for a minute, trying to say it without being too harsh. “The whole damn city is on fire... I think we’re on our own. Help’s not coming.”

The worlds settle in for the twenty-two year old and she has to hold herself back from crying. This wasn’t the plan. The plan was to find police... firemen... military! Someone who could take charge and get them out of here, get her and Cari to safety.

“So what?!” Sae can’t keep the hysteria out of her voice. “We just stay here? Until when?!” She’s trying not to scream, or cry, or fuss. It isn’t Rica’s fault but damn does it feel good to have a target for her frustration. Even if she doesn’t really mean it.

“As long as it’s safe.” Rica shrugs, that being the only answer that she really has for the other girl.

There’s a beat. A pause where Sae wants to accept Rica’s word as gospel. She’s about to, when a shrill scream pierces her thoughts and jerks her to reality.

A shrill scream from downstairs.

Read Another Part: [One]    [Two]    [Three]    [Four] _________________ 

There’s a ringing in her ears and Sae has to blink her eyes a few times to free herself of the haze clouding her vision. As a sharp pain twinges in her back, the young woman exhales and it all comes flooding back.

“Sae!” The voice is frantic as small hands try to shake her back into the present situation at hand.

With luck, during their backwards descent down the stairs, Sae had managed to pull Cari ontop of her and so the child is relatively unscathed from the fall. Though, clearly more than a little frightened by it.

“You okay?” She huffs out, still refusing to move.

Cari nods her head, before something hits her and her eyes open wide in fear. “Sae, you’re bleeding!”

If the pain of falling backwards down a flight of stairs and landing on her back somewhere between the second and third step with a fifty pound child landing on top of you has rendered Sae immobile... Hearing that she’s bleeding springs her back into action.

She scrambles to her knees on the stairs, pain shooting at her from all directions. Sae ignores them though, her hands quickly and desperately moving over her body until she can find the blood.

A scrape on her right arm, likely from the staircase railing. It’s big and bleeding quite a bit for a scrape, but it’s only a flesh wound... It isn’t a bite.

Sae breathes a sigh of relief.

She doesn’t know much about what’s going on, but she used to be a pretty avid horror movie fan and judging by what she’s seen, these ‘creatures’ are zombies. What she knows about zombies is simple... 

If you get bitten, you die.

Kate and Martin have proved that, so while a scrape can be inconvenient - It’s better than the alternative.

A growl from the staircase above them snaps Sae’s eyes to the fire exit door that she just slammed. She can see Kate’s face in the window, which hurts more than the fall down the stairs did, but it appears that the woman can’t figure out how to open the door in order to shamble after them.

It’s a relief, but not much of one as another growl can be heard. She clues in that it’s probably coming from the third floor, the door might be open up there and their fall down the staircase was less than graceful.

“I’m okay.” She says finally, turning to look at Cari who is still staring at her in terror. “Look,” Sae shows her arm to the eight year old. “It’s just a scrape.”

The child still trembles wordlessly, tears pooling in her eyes as she continues to stare where Sae is hurt.

It’s like she’s frozen in time. Sae can see as the shock sets in for the little girl, and so she takes her hands gently. “I promise you, I’m okay, it’s not a bite.”

Sae doesn’t make a move to get off the ground, she instead keeps looking at Cari, the girl uninjured but obviously very shaken up. Her eyes dart over the little girl, just to make sure that she is indeed not injured, but then the growl turns into a dragging sound and Sae can tell that whatever’s up there, is trying to come down the stairs after them.

“We need to leave now, okay?” Sae tries to tell her as softly as possible, despite the fact that her heart is racing in her chest. “We’re going to go try and look for your car, maybe Curtis hasn’t found it yet?”

At this, Cari finally moves, shaking her head. “Daddy.” She whispers. “We can’t leave without my Daddy.”

Sae’s heart hurts. “He can’t come with us.”

“I’m not leaving without my Daddy.” Cari repeats, firm on her stance. The demand is only just a whisper, but it still shakes Sae to the core. She doesn’t need this.

For a second, her mind wanders.

It would be so much easier on her own. Sae wouldn’t have to worry about taking care of anyone, she can really go much faster without a child slowing her down. She could even find Curtis, maybe, he’s the only family she has left and he’s strong, he’s smart, he’ll take care of her as long as she listens to him.

The only question is can she live with this on her conscience? Leaving an innocent child to die, or worse. Can she handle being THAT person, who only worries about themselves and sacrifices others?

The answer is no.

“Sweetheart, I understand that you want your Daddy, but he just can’t come with us...” She tries to explain it as gently (and quickly) as she can. “Same with my sister, I want my big sister to come with us more than anything, but she just... they just can’t, okay?”

The tears in Cari’s eyes roll down her cheeks leaving streaks. “We won’t ever see them again, will we?”

“No...” Sae confirms. “But I’m going to take care of you until we find somewhere safe though, I promise.”

The dragging turns into a thudding as the zombie above them begins his shuffled descent downwards.

“We need to get out of here.” Sae repeats, and this time Cari nods, her fists wiping her tears away before she holds out a hand to help the older woman up.

Sae struggles to her feet, even with help from the eight year old, her body screaming at her in pain.

She eventually makes it though, dusting both her and Cari off in the process and collecting the backpack that flung off of Cari as the girls had fallen.

“I think our snacks might be a bit squished...” Cari says softly, pulling the bag back on as Sae hands it to her.

“That’s okay.” Sae offers her a hand. “Still edible.”

The girls hold hands as they move down the rest of the stairs quickly, and quickly make their way outside of the building and into the morning sun.

If inside is bad, then outside is worse.

Bodies litter the pavement, maroon seeping into the smooth gray stone, evidence that some people had tried to escape earlier. Tried and didn’t make it.

Cars have been beaten down; bumpers dented and windshields cracked as desperation clearly had settled in and survivors attempted to break into vehicles in order to escape from the resort.

Sae sees a car stopped in the middle of the parking lot only about fifteen feet from them, the windows are all broken and blood stains the glass. If it wasn’t obvious that something - or someone - was pulled out of the car by the rips of fabric snagged on the glass... The half a torso underneath is a clear indicator.

Sae lets out a gasp and pulls Cari against her once more. She tries to shield the little girls eyes but a cry means that it’s too late. “It’s okay, don’t look Caroline.”

“Cari.” She whimpers. “Everyone calls me Cari.”

“Okay Cari,” Sae breathes out. “I respect that, my name is Sarah but everyone calls me-”

“Sae.” Cari interrupts.

“Yeah. It’s a nickname that my Dad gave me.” Sae keeps the girl talking as they move away from the wreck, looking for the SUV, and possibly Curtis.

“Cari, do you know where your Dad’s van is? Do you remember where you parked when you got here?”

“I think so, I think we parked...” Cari trails off.

Sae finds herself staring at the stone wall that surrounds the resort, the pretty cobblestone she had admired on the way in is now full of scratch marks from people (she hopes) trying and failing to get out.

As she stares, she doesn’t notice that something else has peaked Cari’s interest, not until a sharp cry of “Sae! It’s Daddy’s van!” breaks her concentration.

She turns her head and her heart stills in her chest.

It’s crashed... Into part of the resort fence gate, bending the wire frame backwards and popping open whatever lock was on it so that the other side swings free. First thought that pops into her head is -

“Curtis!”

She breaks into a sprint, running at the smoking vehicle as fast as she can until she’s at the front and ripping the driver’s side door open to find him.

It’s empty.

The driver side door is empty and undisturbed other than the airbag that was deployed. There’s no blood, no carnage, no hint that he was dragged out of the vehicle or that anything bad had happened to him other than crashing the vehicle.

As she stares at the way the car has wrecked, Sae starts to think that maybe it was on purpose. That he smashed the car into the gates to break them open, to make it so that he had a way out of the resort.

It’s brilliant, other than the fact that he left the car.

Why would he crash into the gate knowing that it would total the car and make it so that he had to walk from that point on? That seems exactly like what happened, judging by how big the gap is where the other gate has swung open. It’s big enough that another car could fit through, much less a huma-

Son of a bitch. Son of a bitch!

It hits Sae even before she can see the chips of blue paint along the broken spires of the busted gate.

“Curtis you didn’t...” She murmurs as she turns quickly, eyes peeled to see if she can spot her Honda. They parked close to the entrance so it should be right here... It should be right here, but it’s not.

Cari catches up to Sae, trying to peer around the older woman to see into the car as well, concerned for what or who she might find in the wreckage.

It’s what Sae and Cari don’t find that happens to be the much bigger issue for the two girls.

“My car...” The blonde whispers to herself in disbelief. “How the fuck did he take my car?”

Her eyes trail down to her wrist, still red from where Curtis had grabbed her and tried to get her to follow him. Her wrist, bare, when before her key had been looped around it with a hairtie for easy access.

“Goddammit!” She screams, unintentionally loud.

Cari just blinks at her, confused for a moment as Sae paces back and forth beside the van and mutters obscenities to herself. She’s mildly aware that screaming that loud, especially now is probably not a good idea to keep them from attracting everything in hearing range to their immediate location.

“Aren’t we getting out of here?” Cari’s voice wavers, watching as the body on the ground from the earlier wreck, the torso with only one arm and a head, looks up at the sound and begins crawling towards them.

Sae just shakes her head in defeat. “We can’t.” She murmurs. “Curtis wrecked your Dad’s van to get the gate open, then stole my car and used it to get out of here. That was probably his idea from the start.”

The sound of shuffling and groans from inside of the resort reaches Cari’s ears and she steps closer to Sae. “Couldn’t we walk? It’s better than being here.”

Sae catches on to the fact that they aren’t quite alone and so she nods. “Yeah, that’s a good idea, we’ll just follow this road into town and to a police station.”

Closing the van door, Sae pulls the gate towards them, allowing her and Cari to graze through before trying to shut the zombies out enough for the two of them to get a head start on whatever might be following them from the resort.

“It shouldn’t take too long, right?” Cari asks, cocking her head to the side as she stares down the abandoned road that connects the resort to a few of the more residential neighbourhoods. It’s a far way off, most of the trail is clear green grass and wooden advertisements to “Come again!” and “Remember Riverrock Resort for your Window to Niagara!”

Sae just grimaces. “It was about ten kilometres if I recall, so maybe a few hours, not too long at all.”

_________________

And so they walk. And they talk.

Cari talks about her Daddy. It makes her kind of sad, and they have to stop a few times so that Sae can give her a hug and brush away her tears, but the little girl talks about the kind of man he was.

She talks about the fact that it’s just been the two of them since Cari was four, that her Mother got sick and then one day just went away. Cari tells Sae he was a social worker, and that he threw himself into his work heart and soul. His determination to save others.

Sae can tell, the way that he put himself and his child at risk the night before, just to help Sae and Curtis.

Cari tells Sae her favourite colour, favourite animal and what kind of food she likes best. Sae encourages her to share all of the little information, anything she can think of, just to distract the child from the growing pit of worry in Sae’s stomach.

The worry that even after walking for over an hour, the road is disturbingly empty, void of any sign of life.

Sae shares with Cari too; how she was going to school to become a teacher, how her own Father passed away when she was younger than Cari, and all of the shenanigans that her and her sister used to get into.

Cari takes the same pauses that Sae does, moments where she stops walking and instead hugs the older woman, telling her that it’ll all be alright.

They leave the talk of zombies back at the resort, along with the shambling monsters that have long since forgotten about Sae and Cari - especially after the two girls had disappeared from their sight.

They talk about school, about movies, about music and even a bit about places they’ve been to.

About an hour and fifty-six minutes into their walk (but hey, who’s counting) that they start to run into houses. The narrow resort road opens up to a neighbourhood and at first it’s just a few houses, some of them rather run-down looking, but it isn’t long before they get into suburbs.

Most of the homes look like they’ve been evacuated, or something; front doors are left swung open, lights turned off and cars are gone, deep tire tracks left in the dirt of front yards as if the people driving only cared about leaving as quickly as possible.

A chill runs down Sae’s spine. What if a rescue team did make their way through here, and the girls had missed it through the night... or even worse, if they had missed it during their walk from the resort.

Sae is halfway through trying to reassure both Cari and herself that they are going to just have to keep walking until they find someone when she spots someone moving through the front window of a house just down the street from them. “Look.”

Cari follows Sae’s pointer finger to the window, and the two girls can hardly contain their excitement as they practically run up to the house and begin to ring the doorbell beside the large wooden door that they’ve found.

The doorbell blares out louder than expected, and Sae winces like she’s been hit by how abrupt and intrusive the ‘playful’ musical tune is as it choruses down the porch and into the street.

The person in the window stops moving and freezes, their head turning to the window. Sae can’t see their face, but suspects that through the white lace curtains, the person might be able to see her, and so she stops to wave, her words spilling out of her mouth. “Hello? Hello, please, can you let us in... There’s something really bad happening out here, and we need help!” She can’t help as the words drop out of her, desperate yet awkward.

She feels a tugging on her arm and turns to look down at Cari, the girl looking up at her with wide eyes as she points across the street. Sae glances briefly, paling as she sees a zombie shambling out of the open door directly opposite of them.

They should have never rang the bell.

“Sae... Sae, there’s more!” Cari whimpers, looking around at the once thought to be abandoned street, now bustling with zombies that had been hidden in the dark only to get brought into the light by the hollow chiming of the bell.

“Oh shit.” Sae whispers as she turns instead to knocking, her fist rapping on the door quickly. “Please, please let us in! They heard us, and their coming!”

Slowly, one by one, the zombies take a step forward towards Cari and Sae. There has to be a half a dozen or more of the monsters, and as they shuffle closer and closer to the porch where Sae and Cari stand, her knocking becomes desperate and panicked. “Oh god, please, please help us! Please!” Sae cries out in fear.

The person in the window peers out from behind the curtain, the sheen of raven hair showing through the gaps in the curtain. Sae gestures at the window with a plea. “Please help us!” She screams out again, the zombies now varying states of halfway across the street and some even take their first steps onto the grass in the front yard of the house.

Cari ducks her head against Sae’s side and begins to whimper, her entire body trembling in fear as the chorus of groaning gets louder while the zombies begin to close in on them.

“Oh shit, oh shit.” Sae begins to cry as the zombies begin to ascend the front step of the porch.

She’s got her eyes wide as she sweeps the front porch, trying to figure out what the best way to escape is... At this point it’s clear that whomever is inside isn’t coming to their rescue anytime soon. 

Sae is seconds away from shoving Cari towards the back of the porch and hoping they can climb over the side. She figures that they can drop down onto the ground and run like hell before anything is able to catch up with them. 

I know that this is extremely late, but damn 2020 packed one hell of an end of year, so I’m just trying to catch up on all my works now. I hope everyone’s been enjoying this story as I’ve even thought of a few sequels as well.

TW: Brief Mentions of Child Death.

[Read me on AO3] [Support Me on Patreon]

_________________

When one of Henry’s knights finds the bones of a child at the site of Alice’s fallen tower, the breath of every last individual in Storybrooke, Hyperion Heights and his kingdom is held with a shudder until the remains are thoroughly examined by Dr. Whale.

Not Sophie. He claims. The child was too old, too big and was a male. This offers everyone the chance to breathe again, to rest assured that Sophie... 

Sophie might still be out there.

The fallen tower provides more pieces to the puzzle. It’s strange, Henry’s Knights have combed every inch of the forest, including the very spot the tower lays in and they hadn’t seen hide nor hair of it in the entire five years that Sophie has been missing.

“It looks like a spell.” Regina fills them in, her and Zelena going through the rubble of the tower together as Alice and Robin watch in distress.

“Some sort of charm.” Zelena agrees.

“It seems like as long as you were looking for her, this place remained hidden...” Regina can’t hold back her amazement at the source of power something like this would take. “Then the moment she was no longer here, the charm broke and the tower collapsed, no longer needing to be hidden.”

“Who could have done something like that?” Emma is there too, deeming herself vital to the investigation... She is Sheriff after all, and Robin is family to her.

This time, the reply is soft and whispered. “Gothel.” Alice whimpers, turning her head into Robin’s neck to stifle her sobs as what remains of crudely colored drawings are pulled from the wreckage by Regina.

“Gothel stole my baby.”

_________________

Sophie’s troll runs far; far from the tower that’s imprisoned Sophie for most of her life, far from the other trolls (the violent ones, that eat children), and far from where Gothel (or anyone else) can find her.

For the first few hours of her escape, the seven year old lays still in the outstretched palm of her rescuer. With each step, the hand holding her rattles and Sophie is terrified that if she stands, she’ll rattle right out of the troll’s hand. And so she lays still and quiet.

Fingers furling and unfurling around her, Sophie stares in amazement at what the sky actually looks like, branches and foliage dangling above her on occasion and the sound of birds in the distance.

Her tower never really had birds, or blue skies.

The troll speaks, but only rarely, taking the time to ask “Sophie okay?” once in a while to the quiet child. Sophie doesn’t mind the silence, she’s used to it. The deep, loud booming voice of the beast that saved her life and gave her freedom is what she’s not used to.

“I’m fine!” She squeaks out, eyes wide in disbelief at the fact that she’s done it, she’s actually done it, she got out of the tower and she’s free. She’s finally free.

After the shock wears off, Sophie finally stirs. Although it’s only slowly, she is able to get to her knees and then her feet, standing upright in his palm so that she can see more than just the sky over her.

She moves to the edge of his palm, wrapping her arms around one of the troll’s fingers to keep her balance, and then she’s able to peek out at the world.

And it is magnificent.

They’re in some sort of forest, trees stretch far as her eyes can see and woodland creatures scamper about. Sophie spots a deer, a real life deer, and she’s overcome with emotion. “Hi there!” She shouts out from where she’s perched. “Hi friend! How are you?!”

That becomes her new game as the troll slows to a leisurely walk, is to say hello to everything that they pass; birds, bunnies, deer and what not. 

As the day turns to dusk and Sophie’s successfully greeted half of the forest that they’re wandering in, a yawn escapes her and she finally asks the troll.

“Mister Troll, where are we going?”

“We go home.” He grumbles deeply, the word reverberating off of the trees that enclose them.

For probably the ninth time that day, Sophie becomes emotional. It’s all she’s wanted in her life, it’s what she’s fought every day to do, it’s... it’s-

Not her home.

He brings her to a clearing. It’s big and well-kept, large trees hide them from on-lookers. It might not be her home, but it’s better than her tower ever was.

As the two of them settle into the clearing for the night, the troll brings Sophie oranges, dozens of them, from a nearby patch of orange trees. 

He’s almost giddy to show off to her, laying the oranges down in a gigantic pile, before swiping them closer to Sophie and nodding to them. “Eat. Good.”

She grabs one, begins to peel it and he huffs out an annoyed sigh. “No. Not eat. This eat.” And he puts an entire orange into his mouth, chewing it up peel and rind entirely. He eats another one like that and pats his belly before pointing to her orange. “Good.”

Sophie’s eyes widen. “Of course, marmalade.”

The troll stops chewing long enough to stare at her in confusion. “Mama?” He asks, raising an eyebrow.

“No, marma...” She explains. “Marmalade.”

He continues to stare at her in confusion, though he resumes chewing his oranges as Sophie finishes peeling one and eats the wedges selectively. 

“It’s like an orange jam.” She smiles as she eats another wedge of her orange, the juicy fruit tasting surprisingly sweeter than any fruit Gothel has brought her over the past five years. “Mama and I used to bring you sandwiches that were made with it.”

“Mama!” He exclaims, his voice rumbling across the forest and shaking some of the trees. “Alice Mama!”

Surprisingly Sophie doesn’t flinch this time from the loud roar, she’s gotten used to it, and him. Instead, the realization dawns on her quickly. “Oh! You’re asking about my Mama, you aren’t asking about the jam.”

He nods his head, orange juice flying everywhere with every move he makes and repeats. “Alice Mama.”

Sophie gets a lump in her throat that she can’t quite get rid of, so she chews another piece of orange before continuing. “I don’t really remember much...”

For a moment she chews on her bottom lip. “Mama was really beautiful, same with Mommy... I think.”

Tears begin to pool in Sophie’s eyes, and she tries to rub them away with her fist but they’re falling faster than she can keep up with them. “I want to go home, but I don’t know where that is, Mister Troll.”

He is confused once more. “This home.” He says, the demand on his voice, he points at the orange trees that they ate from. “That food.” He turns to gesture to the ground. “This bed.” He finishes up by pointing at himself and smiling a gummy grin. “Me friend.”

Sniffling back her tears, Sophie shook her head slowly. “No, I want to go back to my home...” Her voice wavered as she tried to keep together, the exhaustion of the day hitting her like a ton of bricks. 

“I want to see my Mommy, and have her chase me around the house to tickle me.” That was one of the few things she remembered about being home.

Biting her lip, she continued, her fists coming up to wipe away the tears streaking her cheeks. “I want Mama to tuck me into bed with a kiss on my nose.”

Her tears are wiped free, but they still eat at the back of her mind, even as she tries to stay strong. 

Sophie finishes a few oranges and then moves to sit beside the troll, nuzzling her tiny body into the crook of his elbow as he begins to lay back against a tree, the large overgrown pine groaning and cracking under the pressure of his body leaned against it.

He pulls her in closer, using one finger to gently tap on her head (maybe a little more jarring than he meant but Sophie understands the sentiment) as his other hand stills and he whispers. “Bed now.”

With the entire day weighing on her, all Sophie can do is nod her tiny head and curl in tighter against the troll, the large beast becoming a source of comfort and security as she finally relaxes.

“Mister Troll...” She whispers as her breath starts to even out. “You think my Mommy’s remember me?”

_________________

Over at the Mills-Jones household, Robin and Alice are in the middle of their night time routine.

Alice no longer checks windows or doors, she’s given up on it. Robin asked once why she no longer went around the house checking like she had before... A sullen cry of “There’s nothing left for us to lose now.” made Robin decide to never ask that question again.

Their routine consists now of checking the news, even with Alice searching all day for any information she still insists it be one of the last thing she does at night. It continues into Alice staring blankly into Sophie’s room as Robin does all of the cleaning, and gets herself ready to go to sleep.

After she’s done and ready for bed, she goes through the process of getting Alice ready as well. 

Even after five years, Alice is like a zombie.

Robin has to pull her away from Sophie’s room and into the shower. Thankfully, her wife is able to do that on her own. Robin pulls out pajamas for Alice and then tucks her into bed before slipping in beside her.

The loss hit both of them hard, the only difference is that Robin has been able to keep moving where Alice has remained stuck. It’s not that she doesn’t miss their daughter, but Alice? Alice took Sophie’s disappearance harder than anyone could imagine.

Robin asked Hook once, about a year after Sophie disappeared, in a moment of desperation on how she could help Alice get back to the woman she married.

It was in not so kind words that he explained that she might never; that the memories Alice has of her own childhood, of her own imprisonment, has given her a pretty good insight into what their daughter is probably going through, and the outlook? Well the outlook of that kind of life for a child is quite grim.

He explained to Robin that the only help she can provide Alice, is support, and if she’s not ready to do that... then she might as well leave too.

Robin decided to stay.

And so for five years Robin has comforted Alice, cared for her, held her while she cried, and stayed strong even when she wanted to fall apart as well.

Tonight? Tonight Robin can’t keep up the facade.

As she curls into bed next to her shell-shocked wife, Robin begins to cry. It’s loud, it’s ugly and it’s jarring as she hiccups between her sobs. “She was right there, she was right there in that goddamn tower for all these years and we never found her!”

Alice turns to her, lays a few fingers against her chin and wraps herself around Robin. She lets her wife cry and she whispers back five years worth of comfort.

Read Another Part: [One]    [Two]    [Three]    [Four]

_________________

By the time Sae opens her eyes again, the sun has finally gone down and the hotel room she lays in is dark aside from the faint glow of a light on behind the closed bathroom door. The room is silent.

For a second, it all feels like a dream- no, it feels like it’s all been a nightmare. Zombies... Lukas... Kate.

The best part of a nightmare is that you can wake up from them. Maybe a little anxious, a little on edge, a little worse for wear for a moment... But when the sleep shrugs off and your mind clears, the nightmare is over. It’s over and done with and you can move on.

Sae waits for the nightmare to fade, but it doesn’t.

A brief glance around the room confirms to the twenty-two year old that she didn’t hallucinate the horrors she saw what felt like only moments ago.

Kate isn’t there, all that remains is the blood stained over the cocktail dress Sae was supposed to wear out to Copa Cabana. Lukas is missing too, the face of fear and concern he had as he tackled Kate away from Sae flashes painfully in the young woman’s mind.

She stifles a sob, only stopping herself upon seeing the young girl curled up in the bed across from hers.

The child sleeps. The man that rescued Sae, her Father, curls up around the girl protectively. Their brows are furrowed in identical worry, but the evenness of their breath denotes just the slightest moment of peace between the two.

Sae isn’t willing to ruin that for them, even in her grief.

Her grief is quiet, the agony swallows her up and for a moment Sae wonders if her sister is still in the hall, if she can go find her... They promised their whole childhood to never leave each other, maybe Sae can-

“You’re awake.” A voice breaks through her planning.

“What time is it...” Sae whispers, not turning to face him, not able to turn and look Curtis in the eye.

She knows its him, if it wasn’t obvious from the fact that there is only four people in the room, she can tell his voice from anywhere. She’s grown up hearing that voice; her sister’s boyfriend for almost six years and fiancee for two... He’s been like a brother to her, or he was her brother, at least, until a few hours ago.

“Four, I think, I turned off my cell to save battery.”

“It’s quiet.”

“You missed all of the screaming.” His voice is flat and emotionless. “You could hear the entire resort go to hell until about one, then it all went silent.”

Sae doesn’t speak, the air between the two is tense and thick. A shiver runs down her spine as she realizes the reason for the silence. “Everyone’s dead.”

“Not everyone, not us.”

“Not yet.” She spits out the words like poison.

Her name comes out like a trickling of wind. “Sarah...” Curtis breathes, his head dropping to his hands. “I’m so sorry, okay, I never should have said what I said.”

“You never should have left him out there, Curtis-”

“Sarah...”

“No, I know that Kate is dead or something, but Lukas? Lukas wasn’t. You left him out there to die.”

There is silence again, before a small sniffle is heard and Sae turns to face Curtis finally... His face is red, and his eyes are puffy, and she knows he’s crying but she just can’t feel sorry for him. Not after what he did.

“I had to keep you safe.” Curtis finally whispers.

Mouth dropping open just slightly, eyes squeezing tight to stop the tears that threaten to fall, a single word escapes Sae’s mouth. “Why?”

“You’re like my little sister... No, you pretty much are my little sister. I couldn’t save Katie, but at least I could save you, so that was more important.”

“He was your friend, you should have saved us both.”

The sound of a snore quiets the two again. A minute goes by. Two. It’s almost five minutes before Curtis starts to speak again, his voice strained with emotion.

“Look, when you decide you are going to propose to someone, a lot of thoughts go through your head...” He starts with a wistful sigh. “If you’re good enough, if you can provide for them, if this is really the person you want to love for the rest of your life.”

Sae turns to stare at Curtis.

“You don’t really expect that the rest of your life, is going to suddenly just end in the blink of an eye.”

His words hit Sae in the chest. “I’m sorry.” She admits, hanging her head. “I’m not the only one that lost her.”

“I’m sorry too, I know you really liked Lukas, but in that moment, the only thing I could think is how Kate would want me to save you, no matter what.”

An admission escapes her. “I actually didn’t.”

“What?”

“I didn’t like him... not like that. I mean he was nice and all, but I don’t...” She struggles to find the words.

“I like girls.” Her heart thuds in her chest painfully with the realization that this is the closest she’ll ever get to telling her family the truth. Her sister’s gone, before she could know what Sae wanted so badly to tell her.

“Oh.” Curtis goes quiet.

“Did you know, that I thought the worst thing that could happen this weekend... was that I’d tell Kate and she’d be angry with me.”  A bitter laugh escapes Sae. 

“I never imagined that all of this would happen.”

Curtis nods in recognition. “None of us did.”

He’s quiet again for another few moments, Sae can almost see the wheels turning in his head as he processes the information she’s just dumped on him.

“She wouldn’t, you know.” He settles on.

All Sae can do is make a soft ‘hm’ in response.

“Be angry? She loved you. She just wanted you to fall in love and be happy, whoever that was with.”

“I know, Curtis.”

“I’m not angry either.” Curtis looks her in the eye when he says this. “When we get out of here, I want you to know that I’ll support you, no matter what.”

In the first show of solidarity since everything fell apart, Sae reaches over to take Curtis’ hand, squeezing it to show her appreciation. “I know.”

“Now let’s figure out a plan to get out of here.”

_________________

The older man wakes not long after Sae, he’s careful to not disturb his daughter as he slips out of the bed and over to the two young adults near the door.

Together, the three of them brainstorm how to get out of the resort. Curtis is convinced that as long as they can get to their cars, they can go find help.

Sae isn’t too sure of that, but it’s the man, Martin Hess, as they find out (here on a special week-long vacation with his eight year old daughter Caroline), who happens to be the deciding vote between them.

“If we stay we’re sitting ducks.” He explains, offering a water bottle to Sae, and a chocolate protein bar to Curtis. “This place is locked up tightly, which fortunately means nothing from the outside is getting in... But, unfortunately, it also means that those monsters aren’t able to get out on their own, either.”

“So?” Sae asks, grimacing at the thought that her sister is lumped in as part of the ‘monsters’ roaming.

“He means that they’re all still out in the halls, and the lobby, and they aren’t just going to go away.” Curtis interrupts, glancing at the door. “We can either run for the cars, or we stay in this room until they find us.”

“Couldn’t help find us too? Police or something, they’re probably out looking for survivors.”

Martin shakes his head. “In a city this big... I don’t think anyone will be going room to room in each resort searching for uninfected folks for quite a while.”

“We could wait right? It’s safer in here isn’t it?”

“No.” Martin voices, adamant against that idea. “We’d run out of food. I packed a few snacks for the trip; cheese strings, water bottles, bear paws... Snacks so Cari wouldn’t ask me to stop every five minutes for a Beavertail or Dipping Dots, but it won’t be enough to feed all of us properly for more than a day or so.”

Curtis nods his agreement. “Look, Sarah, if we go, we go now... We need to get to the cars and get to the police, or a fire station. One of them will keep us safe.”

“It’s our safest bet, I agree.” 

Sae looks between Martin and Curtis, for a moment she can see how scared they both are, how utterly terrified they are of leaving the room and she also feels that same fear. They seem to know what they’re talking about, but the idea of leaving the safety of the room and willingly going out into the hall, it’s crazy.

Her heart pounds in her chest, but slowly she lets herself nod. “Okay, whose car are we going for?”

“Mine.” Martin insists. “It’s an SUV, it can take a hell of a beating and Cari’s carseat is in the back.”

“Okay.” Curtis nods. “Sarah, I want you to take your keys just in case we get separated or anything.”

Sae nods, the tiny breath of air she was holding expelling from her body as she glances from Curtis’ determined face, to Martin’s concerned one and finally to the girl still curled up on the bed sleeping.

“When do we do it?”

_________________ 

It isn’t quite seven in the morning when the four survivors decide that they’re all ready to go.

They’ve woken up Caroline, and made the official introductions between the eight year old and her two new friends. They have also gotten her to pack the rainbow unicorn backpack she brought on vacation with all of the snacks that they can fit in it.

The two men have broken apart the desk chair that sits in the hotel room, using the metal legs for bats, more reliable bats than the wooden chair leg that Curtis found and used the night before.

Sae, from some stroke of luck, has managed to change out of the cocktail dress stained with her sister’s blood and into a pair of jeans and plain tee-shirt that Martin had in his suitcase. The jeans are too wide and need to be held on with a tight belt, and the shirt swims on her, but anything is better than running around in a skin-tight dress with the memory of her sister being bitten seeped into the material.

The plan is simple; Curtis and Sae are going in front, with Martin and his daughter following close behind.

Curtis has Martin’s keys because he’s the fastest runner out of the four of them, his role is to get to the SUV as quickly as he can... If he can start it up, they may be able to make it before they get overrun.

Sae and Martin’s roles are to beat away any of the monsters that get too close using the metal chair legs, their only weapons against arms, legs and teeth.

Cari? Cari’s only job is to be brave.

It all seems so easy, until the door to the room opens and they’re met with the carnage in the hallway.

It’s like the scene of a horror movie; blood stains the floor in pools, people (or what remains of them) are crumpled into heaps, and the only sound you can hear comes from the piles of bodies littered along the hallway; moans, groans and the unmistakable noise of something gnawing through bone.

Sae has to cover her mouth to conceal the gasp that threatens to escape, Martin shields his daughter’s eyes before the whimper on her lips can make it’s debut, and Curtis motions the group to move on.

They’re able to walk down the hall a little, moving away from the lobby where it all began and instead following a little hall to a fire exit, it had been decided that going the path more secluded had less of a chance of running into the monsters they were trying to stay away from. It almost works... almost.

Curtis has his hand on the handle to the door, ready to open it, when a scream erupts into the near quiet air stopping him and Sae dead in their tracks.

As they turn their heads towards the scream, the sight meeting them has Sae’s heart still in her chest.

Cari has been knocked to the ground, her eyes trained in horror on the beast that advances on her father.

Sae lets out the gasp she held earlier.

The creature is easily six feet tall and over two hundred pounds, as a human he would have been intimidating with the muscles swelling around his arms, chest and legs... As a mindless and relentless zombie attacking them, he is absolutely terrifying.

In mere seconds he goes from advancing on Martin, to tackling him to the ground. All at once, the man, Sae and Cari scream.

“Curtis we have to do something now!” Sae begs, taking a hesitant step forward and brandishing the chair leg like it’s a bat, she’s set to take a hit on the zombie before she’s stopped by Curtis grabbing a hold of her arm and pulling her back.

“We can’t.” He quirks his head to the hall they’ve just come from, another creature stumbling it’s way over to them, foot dragging like it’s been broken.

“We need to go now, Sae, we can’t help him.”

Sae turns to stare at her almost brother-in-law in horror, Caroline’s screams pierce the background at the same time as Martin’s pleas for help start.

“Curtis, we need to.” She’s determined as she tries to break out of his hold, her eyes narrowing as he holds her almost painfully tightly.

“We have the keys, we can still get to their car and get out of here.” His eyes are wide in his frantic demands. “Come, there’s no way we can help him.”

Sae stares at him for another moment, her eyes filling with tears as she shakes her head. “No, I can’t, she’s just a little kid, we have to help them.”

For a moment, his eyes soften and Sae feels like she’s broken through to him... But then Curtis is holding her arm tighter and trying to drag her towards the fire door, his face red in an unrecognizable fury.

“It’s us or them, Sarah, and I sure as fuck choose us. Come on!” He growls in her ear as he struggles to pull her towards the door. “If the roles were reversed, they’d leave us behind in a heartbeat!”

Her eyes flicker between Curtis, anger and determination written across the features that once held nothing but humour and adoration... And then they flicker to Martin and Cari, the tiny girl screaming desperately as her father tries to fight back against the monster that has him pinned to the floor.

“No!” Sae finally screams, her mind returns to the night before, Martin putting not just himself but his daughter in danger to try to get Sae and her friends into his room, into safety. “No, they wouldn’t!”

She rips away from Curtis’ hold, and stands facing him, panting in desperation. “I’ve got to help them!” She demands, refusing to give in to him.

“Then I’ve got to leave you behind.”

Her heart breaks in ways Sae never imagined as her sister’s fiancee turns away from her and pulls open the door to the fire exit, rushing down the stairs and out of sight. For a second she’s frozen watching the spot where he used to be, until another desperate scream from Cari snaps her back to reality.

She turns back towards the chaos, swinging at the zombie with the metal chair leg and hitting him in the shoulder just as he ducks his head and sinks his teeth deep into the flesh of Martin’s throat.

“Noooooo!” A scream breaks out and it takes Sae a moment to realize that she’s the one screaming, as Cari joins her crying out in anguish.

She pounds the chair leg into the zombie’s shoulder again, trying to beat him off of Martin but the damage has already been done, blood spurting from the open wound in the older man’s throat.

Sae is screaming and crying and pounding on the six foot monster’s shoulder as Martin twitches and spasms on the floor, the only sound escaping him is a gurgled plea to “Take... Ca-ri... Run...”

It takes Sae a moment to react, dropping the metal chair leg as the beast she was attacking turns to face her, his mouth a crimson red and his eyes the same milky white as her sisters were only the night before.

The seconds that follow, all Sae can hear is the blood rushing through her veins as she jumps into action.

She runs for Caroline, scooping the child up with one arm and not stopping as she flees from the nightmare unfolding in front of them. She’s holding the girl against her side, just barely able to keep them both upright as she races down the hall in the opposite direction from the fire exit, the path to safety being blocked by six feet of pure horror and Cari’s own father who she’s sure is either dead or turning into one of them.

Sae races past other creatures, zombies she supposes, some of them are too preoccupied with their own catch to worry about a sprinting twenty-two year old and the eight year old arm luggage she’s picked up.

A few turn towards them and Sarah tries her best to run around, or shove them away as she races desperately towards the fire exit on the opposite side of the building, the one that’s just past her own room.

There’s a thought that occurs to her just moments before she can see the doors to the fire exit.

What if Kate is still around.

The thought is just barely in the back of her mind, her instincts to flight taking over until it’s almost too late.

She catches sight of Kate, skulking around what Sae can only assume is the body of Lukas... From the barely visible blonde hair and bright blue v-neck he had been wearing the night before, it confirms exactly who it is.

Sae freezes, Cari still pressed against her body, as she stares at the shambling, grotesque mess that her dearly loved older sister has horrifically become.

A hole where her shoulder once was now shows skin flaps barely clinging on to the meat underneath, blood drenches the front of Kate, from her mouth and shoulder all the way down her dress. Red bits adorn her neck and jaw, and it’s with a shudder that Sae realizes that the red bits are pieces of Lukas’ flesh.

Kate lets out a groan that runs down Sae’s spine, and the blonde stumbles backward into the fire exit. She’s shaking her head, tears collecting in her eyes when she steps in a puddle at the top of the staircase.