Currently Obsessed With Hockey But Who Isn’t

Most of the corpses you could haul into the fire by yourself, but still often needed help with the larger corpses. Joel was here, but since you and Joel were hardly ever on the same service, you had never partnered together before. It was usually you and a woman named Mary. You knew literally nothing about her except for her name and that she had a dead husband and son. You didn’t know how they died, you never asked, and honestly the two of you had had maybe 10 real conversations, but you still considered her a friend.

You grabbed what looked to be the body of a teenage girl out of the back of the truck bed–the last one for this truck. She had a bag over her head but a large braid still stuck through the bottom of it and from the looks of it she’d been bitten. You chucked her body into the fire and was met with the overwhelming stench that was burning flesh, hair, rubber from shoes, and clothes combined with the sickeningly sweet smell of cooking meat. It made you want to gag thinking about how it reminded you of a Kentucky cookout back home.

As you walked over to the next truck you noticed Mary staring at the bodies with Joel walking next to her.

“I can’t,” Mary said. Wordlessly Joel reached into the truck and turned with a small child in his arms. It had been months since a child that small had been in one of these trucks. While you made your way over to the truck you watched him carry the poor kid over to the pit and toss them into the fire. When he turned away from the pit he made eye contact with you and you paused for a second trying to push back the thoughts of how that kid was no bigger than…

“THERE A PROBLEM?” an officer shouted. Of course you stop for less than ten seconds and ta da Officer Matthews over here has a problem with it.

“Nope,” you said to Matthews who had come around to the side of the truck you were at.

“Then get back to work,” he snarled. You grabbed another body and threw it over your shoulder, this one a woman who looked to be only skin and bones, and began your march over to the pit. Joel passed you, locking eyes with you as he went by, silently asking if you were fine. To which you nodded shortly. 

After you’d thrown in all the bodies you had maybe 20 minutes to sift through the ashes and keep the burning pile active and so that you could begin to shovel them away. Eventually the buzzer sounded at 4:00 to end the day and you and Joel met up at the line to receive your cards for the day’s work. 

“You got anything else?” Joel asked.

“Not today. Tomorrow, we got street sweeping, or sewer maintenance” the soldier responded.

“Which one pays more?”

“That would be the one with the shit,” the soldier responded sarcastically. Joel nodded. “Late crew, 4pm start,” he stamped Joel’s paper and Joel moved aside so that you could get your cards.

“I’ll do a double on the street cleaning tomorrow,” you said.

“Ah the pretty lady doesn’t like the shit huh?”

“No, I just know I can get more at other places.” It was true, some men liked to tip you a card or two or more while you “worked the streets” and if you could get a double shift in, it would be even better.

“Early and midday crew, 6am start.” You took the stamped paper from him and left with Joel to the QZ’s town square where an execution was taking place.

“... violation of EMC 342.3, unauthorized exit from a Quarantine Zone, Maria Elisiano, violation of EMC 342.7, unauthorized entry into a Quarantine Zone. Each of you have been tried in a military court of justice and each of you having been found guilty by the court martial panel and with a sentence of death by execution…" You felt Joel’s eye’s leave Boston’s gallows and you followed his gaze to the side wall where Lee, a FEDRA soldier, stood and nodded at him before slipping away.

“I’ll be right back, wait here,” Joel said.

“Yes sir,” you said, saluting unenthusiastically. He shot you a glare before following Lee into the back alleyway. You turned back just as the ground beneath the death rowers disappeared and the collective sound of three snapping necks filled your ears and you grimaced. You couldn’t be more grateful you’d convinced Tommy and Joel to just walk through the front door those 7 years ago or those three may have ended up being you. 

Tommy hadn’t radioed in two weeks. Joel mentioned it casually that he hadn’t responded in a few days last week but now it was really beginning to worry him. You started going with him to the radio station, if you could even call it that, as moral support for your friend or maybe just because you, too, were worried. It wasn’t like Tommy to not respond for so long. 

You looked around the crowd of people and spotted Jake, who you still hadn’t managed to completely cut ties with. You’d been making up excuses for months now of why you couldn’t have sex with him. Headache, you’re on your period, smuggling run, stomach ache, late shift, whatever you could come up with. And besides, you’d noticed him flirting with some chick named Rebecca last week so he’s got a new pretty doll anyway. 

*snap*

Another woman’s neck wringed, who you looked up to see was actually Rebecca, so Jake wasn’t completely off your hands now. You eavesdropped on the whispers of the people beside you and heard that she was a Firefly and was hanged for treason not just violation of whatever law like the officer said. This was FEDRA’s new tactic. Whenever they captured a Firefly they would come up with some violation other than treason to try to show that they weren’t scared of them and that they had no value. So they were being hanged with only their fellow Fireflies knowing. Another senseless FEDRA plan. 

Is this what happened to Tommy in another QZ? You wondered. He was smarter than that, you hoped anyway.

Tess was supposed to be securing your battery today. You were finally taking steps to get out of here and find Tommy. Joel is a lot of things, but when it comes to his family, patient is not one of them. You heard children’s laughter behind you and noticed two boys and a girl chasing each other around, completely oblivious to the fact people are being killed 30 feet in front of them. It was sad the way the world had ended up. You had so much life ahead of you back then, but now, you were a 34 year old with no family, hardly any friends, and honestly, the apocalypse was lonely. 

Now, you were a young, headstrong woman and you’d had your fair share of female teenage fans who looked up to you, but they only met a cold shoulder. You didn’t want them to end up like you, and if that meant FEDRA academy so be it. It was better than what you had. Never having to worry about food or a place to sleep, getting an education. A shitty one you’re sure, but still an education.  It hurt to push them away–you had always loved kids, but it was for their own good.

You couldn’t say that you completely regret going into the QZ. It gave you a sense of security, Tess–despite her obvious love for Joel–had become a mentor for you. You thought back to a night not long after Tommy left you had rolled over to see in the moonlight that Joel was still wide awake, staring at the ceiling with his hands linked across his chest. Maybe it was your sleepy state that made you do it, but you reached out and slipped your hand into his and squeezed. He looked at you quizzically but all you did was give him a soft smile and closed your eyes to go back to sleep. In the morning, your fingers were still interlaced.

 You were startled out of your thoughts and back to reality by Joel. 

“Hey,” he said, grumpy as always.

“Hey, is everything set?”

“Yeah, he said stay off the streets the next couple nights, guys are jumpy.”

“Makes sense, we done?” you asked.

“No,” Joel said gruffly, “one more stop.” He then turned in the direction of the radio station and started walking.

“Joel,” you said slowly and he turned around, “you’ve been there everyday. You can’t keep trading cards and whatnot to get stuff for this guy. He didn’t answer yesterday, or the day before that. It’s almost 5:15, we need to get back.”

“He could answer today,” Joel said and turned to start walking again. You kicked a rock on the ground in his direction and begrudgingly followed after him. 

—

You hated the radio station. Hallways filled with people writing notes to family members, some of them crying softly, some giving looks of panic, all of them just quietly depressed. It was things like this that made you glad you didn’t have family out there to call, but now there was Tommy.

Joel, as usual, walks past everyone in the line to the front. There’s a man in there talking to the Radio man, Greg–something about a new baby. Sometimes you forget people still get pregnant in the apocalypse. You’d been lucky, Jake knew how to pull out and you weren’t dumb and tracked your cycle.

Joel sat down across from Greg and tossed him a few cigarettes. Greg took one and lit it before shaking his head at Joel.

“Nothing?” Joel asks, “Is there any chance it's coming in at night? You're asleep and you miss it?”

“When I'm sleeping, Gabriela listens or my son, the smart one, not the other one, God bless him. If Tommy responded we'd know.” You watched as Joel tried to sort through options in his head.

“And you're talking to the tower?”

“Every day. They gave him your message. They haven't seen or heard from him since and that's it. It hasn't been that long.” Greg was right, as things go at the station it really hadn’t been that long. It wasn’t like before where you could just leave a voicemail and get back to them later when you or they weren’t busy. And if Tommy had to move again then maybe he hadn’t found a station there yet.

“It's been three weeks. It's never taken him more than a day to respond.”

“I'm sure he's okay.” Wrong move Greg, wrong move.

Joel pulls out a map you hadn’t realized he brought to work with him today. “Show me where the tower is,” he said firmly.

“Joel…” you piped in.

“You can't be serious.” Oh he is very fucking serious., “Joel it's in Wyoming. All this open country? You guys are capable people, but there are worse things than infected out there. I hear everything on this. There are raiders, there are slavers…” Wrong move again, Greg.

“But you're 'sure' Tommy is okay?” Joel says sarcastically. And you look at him again and you see a broken man, who just wants to know if after all this his brother is still alive.

“It's... it's the Cody Tower,” he circles a spot on the map, defeated. “Q-Bar 4, but I don't know exactly where…” Joel gets up to leave, and you follow him with your eyes out the door before turning back to Greg. 

“Thanks,” you say quickly.

Greg nods at you with a flick of his cigarette and goes back to his smoking while shouting, “NEXT!”

—

It was a wordless walk back to the apartment. As soon as you entered, Joel made his way to the floorboards where you kept your supplies and then made his way to the table to spread out all his maps to go over routes with his pencil. You grabbed an old bottle of whiskey and two glasses, filling them and giving one to Joel and sitting at the table with him. 

He starts to sip his whiskey and you sit in silence for a bit before speaking up, “So we’re really doing this?” You asked cautiously.

Joel grunted in reply before responding, “We were always doing this.”

“We were always going west, this is fucking Wyoming.”

Joel paused his cartography session to look at you in confusion, “Yeah? Wyoming is west, what the hell did you think it was going to be?” Joel countered defensively.

“We live in fucking Boston, everything is fucking west of here. I was imaging something more like Iowa or Illinois or some shit. Everyone knows how stingy the Chicago QZ is,” you shot back at him. Did he actually think the three of you would be able to make it across the country?

Joel scoffs and pops a few pills and downs the rest of his whiskey, slamming it onto the table. “I’m taking a nap,” he grumbles, “you should too. You didn’t sleep well,” he adds walking away from the table.

As he walks you turn in the chair to look at him, “what makes you think I didn’t sleep well?”

Flopping onto the bed he says, “you were yawning a lot today on shift and I heard you toss and turn all night.”

“I wasn’t yawning,” you argue but he just grunts from the bed. You roll your eyes and start looking at the maps. On paper it doesn’t look that far, but you know how deceiving that is. You finish off the last of your whiskey and get up from the chair to stretch and pop your body. Joel was right, the body of your twenties wasn’t around anymore. You were still a fit and muscular woman, but nothing stops age. Sitting on the couch you grab an old beaten up book from the shelf and try to read it, but succumb to sleep by the second page. At some point in the night Tess comes in and gets in bed with Joel but you don’t look up. It’s dark outside now and sleep is calling you in again.

—

You wake up to Tess making coffee in the kitchen, and apparently so did Joel because you walk into the kitchen at the same time. Joel sits at the table and Tess sits next to him. Since Tess only has two hands, you don’t have a mug of morning drug and you move to the counter to grab one. 

You take your cup to the table when you notice Tess’s face was swollen and bruised with a black eye.

“What the fuck happened to your face?!” you rush towards her and Joel looks up, with a slimmer of worry in his stoic features, reaching for her face to get a closer look.

“I got jumped by a couple guys,” she says indifferently.

“What guys?” you and Joel demand in unison. 

“Just a couple teenagers. Said some shit I probably shouldn’t have.”

Joel stands up quickly, ready to fight, and you begin to grab a fresh towel to clean her up.

Tess grabs his hand and pulls him back to sit down, “no no, I’m fine,” she says, “come on. You know these guys were born after the outbreak. Never learned how to argue. They just start swinging. Fucking 19-year-old pieces of shit.” You ignore her and begin dabbing at her wounds with what was left of the whiskey from the night before. 

“It’s a miracle you’re alive,” Joel huffs.

“It’s a miracle any of us are alive,” she retorts. 

“These aren’t new…” Joel says, annoyed, examining her face.

“No. I was in FEDRA lockup all day,” you and Joel look at each other but before you could say anything, she adds, “Anyway it doesn't matter. I need you both to take a breath.”

“What?” Joel questions.

“Joel…” Tess says slowly.

“What?” you say back to her, this time leaning against the back of Joel’s chair and crossing your arms.

“The guys who jumped me were with Robert. He sold our battery to someone else. Nothing's lost. Shit like this is gonna happen. Now we just shake it off, and we go get our cards back or the battery.”

“That little piece of small dick shit!” you shout.

“I need that battery Tess,” Joel gets up aggressively, almost knocking his chair over.“The truck's no good without one and if I don't get to Tommy soon, he's gonna die out there!”

“Well fuck it, we get our battery and the money back,” Tess suggests, “Joel, listen. Robert is terrified of you. So, you march out of here all Clint Eastwood, especially with Miss Hot Stuff with you, he's going to get wind of it and skip. I need you to take a breath,” Tess stands up in front of him.

“Who’d he sell it to?” Joel asks.

“Don’t know,” Tess says.

“Well where is he?” you ask now.

“Don't know...yet. But we're gonna find out quietly. Understand?” Joel nods curtly, “Now I promised Robert that you wouldn't hurt him. But I would very much like for you to hurt him.”

You laugh from the table and take a swig of the whiskey, “you and me both sister.”

“So let's go hunt that motherfucker down and get our battery and our truck. And then we'll go find Tommy. Alright?” 

You and Joel both nod and grab the supplies out of the floorboards. Your timeline may have been set back, but that wasn’t going to stop you. Guess you won't be making it to your street crew shifts today.

—

Joel stood behind where you and Tess were talking with Dave, one of Robert’s “men.” Dave may be on Robert’s “payroll”, but it isn’t enough to buy his loyalty. Especially when it involved you in a low cut black tank top. 

The conversation didn’t last long. As you and Tess get up from the table and walk towards Joel as another man scurries away from him. You raise your eyebrow at him and he rolls his eyes shortly, nodding towards the white Fireflies symbol being painted over on a wall not too far down.

“Well, I mean, it cost us a couple of cards, but we got him. He’s supposedly taking the battery to a red-tagged building. But get this, the corner of Stillman and Cross,” Tess said.

“The one Miguel used to use?” Joel says confusingly.

“Yeah, I’m thinking so,” Tess agrees.

“I mean, couldn’t we take the subway tunnel under Haymarket and get into the building from below?” you ask.

“Take Robert by surprise…” Tess wonders aloud.

“Pay this fucker back,” Joel agrees.

“Then let's do this.”

—

Joel uses a set of large bolt cutters and snaps the rusting chain keeping the building closed off. You and Tess each have your guns and flashlights out already, wrists crossed.

“Ready?” Tess asks. You and Joel nod. You walk until you come across a door with a U and a dot painted above it. “This is it.”

You walk into an old office looking type room. This must have been some type of office building before the outbreak. Suddenly Tess lets out a yelp,  causing you and Joel to whirl around, guns up. Tess shines her flashlight on the wall revealing a dead infected, glued to the wall by cordyceps, frozen by its own flesh. 

“Shit,” you say under your breath.

“This one’s done,” Joel says, lowering his gun.

“Yeah, I know,” Tess huffs, “just wasn’t expecting it.”

“You never do,” you say slowly, taking in the magnitude of the horrendously beautiful display of nature on the wall. The poor victim forever trapped in a scream. You’d learned over the years how deadly cordyceps was, but you couldn’t help but have a horrified admiration for what it creates. The fungal flowers that sprout from the infected heads are a display of nature’s beauty surrounded by danger and death. 

“Let's keep moving,” Joel says to you, bringing you out of your daze and directing you forward. He, like you, took a last look at the infected and then followed behind you to a ladder Tess had begun climbing.

“It’s like they reframed the whole structure,” Joel starts and you’re already smiling and rolling your eyes, the infectious wall art quickly leaving your mind, “Probably in the ‘80s.. Everyone was cutting down on apartment sizes to sell more condos.”

“Oh,” you laugh, “and this has been…”

“Construction Corner with Joel Miller,” Tess finishes for you. “Construction Corner” had become a running joke between the two of you that Joel just absolutely adored and showed so by completely ignoring you and Tess’s comments.

“How far up are we going,” he says begrudgingly. 

“Uh, this far,” Tess says hopping off the ladder, “this door opens into the hallway and… the fuck? They put a piano in front of this thing?” Tess frustratingly tries to pry the door open.

“You smell that?” Joel asks.

“Gunpowder,” you say looking around until your eyes find something trickling out from the cracks in the door, “guys…”

“Blood,” Tess breathes and brings up her gun. You and Tess push the door open together and a body falls, it’s Robert, along with several other bodies around him. Tess spots the battery and bends down to inspect it.

“Well, the battery’s no good. And he still tried to sell it,” Tess shines her light on Robert’s face, “Twice.”

“That greedy fuck,” you say. You hear groaning around a corner in the hallway and Joel goes around the corner gun in position. He creeps fully around the corner and after a few steps you hear a door fly open and SLAM. 

“Joel?” you hear from a faintly recognizable voice.

“Marlene?” you hear Joel say. Here we fucking go. There’s some more conversation going on between two parties as you and Tess round the corner as well.

“So this is who Robert screwed us over with? The Che Guevara of Boston? I mean, war must be going pretty shitty for you to be buying from scumbags like him.” You could almost kiss Tess. You hated Marlene. For multiple reasons. The obvious one being that she convinced Tommy to leave, and the second being that she and her little rebel gang made everything harder. For smuggling, for working, for fucking existing. Her people were everywhere, bombing, attacking, causing disruptions. It was ridiculous and they could hardly be considered rebels at this point–just nuisances.

“Yeah. It kind of has been. The merch was bad and he obviously didn’t take “fuck off” for an answer,” Marlene responds.

“Give me my knife,” your attention is brought to some kid on the ground. She looks 12. 

“What do you need a car battery for?” Joel says. The girl is wearing a white shirt with burgundy sleeves and worn jeans, with her brown hair pulled back into a ponytail, and looking with big, brown eyes from her knife to Joel and back and forth. She makes a move to grab the knife causing Joel to point his gun at her resulting in a reaction from Marlene and some other woman. Kat? Kit? Kim? Something with a K.

“Don’t,” the woman says, causing you to tear your eyes away from the girl and to the two beaten up women down the hall from you.

“Not at her. Point it at me,” Marlene says. Joel looks back at the kid and raises his eyebrows at her before moving his gun back to Marlene, you and Tess follow suit. It’d be a pretty unbalanced fight, 3 vs 2 injured.

“And to answer your question, I need it for a better reason than you do. No offense, but Tommy’s just one man,” Marlene says, “ It’s our business to know things.”

Joel laughs, “To know things? You’re the cause of it. You turned my own brother against me.”

Suddenly… the assistant? speaks up again, “That was a lot of gunfire. FEDRA’s gonna be on the way.”

“I know,” Marlene says quickly, “We were gonna move Ellie out of the zone tonight. But we won’t make it anywhere like this. Not for a while anyway. So now I’m thinking… you’re gonna do it.”

What the fuck?

tags: @orcasoul @who-has-my-green-banana

“I don’t hear a better idea,” you retort and continue over the hill. You were getting into this QZ. You heard their footsteps behind you as you all headed closer to the concrete walls that seemed to grow as you got closer. Just before you reached the door, two soldiers took notice of your trio.

“STOP! PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR AND ANY WEAPONS YOU HAVE ON THE GROUND,” one of the soldiers shouted. Well, he didn’t shoot you so you’re starting off better than the others. 

“Okay,” you said calmly, slowly lowering your gun to the ground with your hands in the air. “We’re not looking for any trouble.” You could tell this soldier was scared more than anything else. He was young, possibly younger than you so you decided to follow his orders quickly but stay calm. The less freaked out he was the more likely he was to listen to you. You nodded at Joel to set his gun down and Tommy as well. Joel hesitated and you shoved his shoulder a little. Raising your eyebrows as if to say come on man, I don’t wanna do it either but also want to get into this QZ. He glared at you and wordlessly set his gun down. The other soldier walked forward and confiscated your gun…s. 

“You have any other weapons on you?” the second soldier asked.

“No, sir,” you said quickly.

“You the only one here who talks?” He said, slightly raising his gun at Joel, who only increased his usual resting grumpy face, which wasn’t helping.

“We talk,” Tommy said, “just sounds better coming out of her.” You’d discussed this earlier– you would do the talking because your voice combined with your looks was your guy’s best shot at getting into the QZ compared to the Miller brother bitchiness. 

“We just wanna do whatever you need us to do to get us into the QZ and away from out here,” you said with a soft smile. This did something to the officer because from behind his helmet you watched his eyes drift downward slightly to where the tops of your breasts were exposed out of your black tank top and he backed up to whisper with his partner. After about two minutes of negotiating, one of the soldiers ordered you three forward over a wooden bridge of sorts where there were stop signs on either side while the other went over to a repurposed traffic light in the wall. When it turned green, the large doors opened slowly and you were pushed inside into what you assumed to be a quarantine zone inside the quarantine zone. The soldiers push you past some plastic tarps and through a makeshift plastic door and into a chair and tie you down. Your heart rate quickens and Joel and Tommy resist slightly before giving in. You were inside, you can’t fuck this up now. A new, third soldier enters the dim room you’re in with a large black box.

“This is gonna pinch,” she says coldly. She stabs a needle from the box into your neck and you hiss quietly from the pain. Yeah what a fucking pinch that was. Joel tensed in his chair slightly. The screen on the box lit up green and the soldier moved on to Tommy, who also grimaced when the needle stuck him. The screen lit up green again. Joel, being Joel,  didn’t even flinch when getting tested, his face remaining as stoic as always.

“They’re all clean,” the soldier says.

“We removed anything possibly harmful from their bags, but we’ll still pat them down before we get their paperwork done and let them in,” responded another new soldier. A wave of relief washed over you. 

It wouldn’t take a genius to put together that this had to be FEDRA. Two soldiers undid Tommy and Joel’s restraints and began patting them down. Another soldier took off your restraints and really took his sweet time feeling you up. This in no way shape or form could be considered patting you down. Joel scowled slightly, but it didn’t look all that different from his usual facial expressions. You just rolled your eyes, a creepy man feeling you up in exchange for being in a QZ was one of the better hands life had given you.

“You could at least buy me dinner first,” you muttered after a particularly lengthy pass over your ass.

“What did you say?” the soldier said, who you recognized as the second soldier from outside. The one who stared at your tits. 

“Nothing,” you said quickly and before he could say anything else the soldiers were called away, leaving you and the Miller brothers to be ushered into the processing room. Inside was a table with a stack of papers and one singular woman. She was well into her 60s, but still looked like she’d kick your ass with her purse or some shit. Tommy went up first. She asked him some basic questions and some more particular ones. Every word she said was monotone–zero emotion whatsoever. Then she gave him a paper for the job he had to do tomorrow and a few ration cards to start. She explained his papers would be how he was identified.

“There is a mandatory curfew from 6pm to 6am. If you are caught out on the streets without a specific job or FEDRA approval you will be arrested and placed in lockup until your crime is deemed punishable by law or if you are simply let go. Remember to always report signs of cordyceps infection, coughing, slurred speech, muscle spasms, and mood changes. Safety begins with you… NEXT.” Joel walked forward and went through the same thing.

“Full name?”

“Joel Joseph Miller” he said gruffly.

“Location pre-outbreak?”

“Austin, Texas.”

“Birthday?” 

“September 26th, 1967,” the woman hesitated and looked up at him. Her emotionless gaze on him cracked into one of pity.

“Outbreak day? Jesus.” Joel’s birthday is outbreak day? Jesus is right. She finished her questions, handed Joel his papers and repeated her speech from before.

“There is a mandatory curfew from 6pm to 6am. If you are caught out on the streets without a specific job or FEDRA approval you will be arrested and placed in lockup until your crime is deemed punishable by law or if you are simply let go. Remember to always report signs of cordyceps infection, coughing, slurred speech, muscle spasms, and mood changes. Safety begins with you… NEXT.” 

You walked forward. She asked your name and where you were located pre-outbreak. You hesitated only slightly before you said Hazel, Kentucky. You and your father had an unspoken rule to never talk about them, which he broke before he died, but you hadn't said her name out loud in months, maybe over a year.

“Birthday?”

“May 19th, 1989,” you said and the woman looked up again.

“Happy birthday”

Jesus

—

Life in the QZ was not all Ryan and the posters made it out to be. Here in Boston you weren’t fighting for your life from infected, nature, raiders, and slavers–you were fighting FEDRA, the fireflies, and just some batshit crazy people. There were some good ones, and you’d made a few connections so far in the two months you’d been there, your favorite being a woman named Tess. She came here from Detroit and had staked her claim in smuggling operations in and out of the QZ and after your arrival she saw an opportunity to gain muscle in her operations. Mostly from Joel. You could tell she also thought he was hot. Joel was either oblivious or didn’t care, you couldn’t quite tell.

The apartment three of you were given already only had one bed propped up on cinder blocks that Tommy and Joel shared and you slept on the couch. Not the most comfortable, but better than the floor or sleeping with Joel or Tommy. Your smuggling with Tess took up most of your free time. You’re not sure how you all became a quartet of terror so fast, but Tess fit in nicely to your group. And smuggling got you more ration cards, which got you more supplies. Tess had gotten you all guns within the first 2 weeks you all agreed to work together. Tommy, however, despite how much better off you were than before was still restless. Smuggling and what you had done in the QZ definitely did not right your wrongs with God– there was a reason people were afraid of you. You could tell Tommy wanted out as soon as he got in, and when business had slowed down, he was nowhere to be fucking found.

You were out later than you should have been one night but Jake, the guy you’d starting fucking semi regularly, had dragged you away for what was supposed to be a quickie. Unsurprisingly, it went a little long. You knew he liked you, but you just saw him as a stress relief. That clearly wasn’t going to plan, though, as you had never finished with him. 

As you were walking back to the apartment rushing to meet curfew, you were suddenly pulled out of the street into an alley. You started to fight back when a hand went over your mouth but then you heard a voice you recognized. 

“Shh shh shh, it’s me, Tommy,” Tommy whispered. You wriggled out of his grasp and turned to look at him.

“Tommy?! What the fuck are you doing? Why aren’t you back at the apartment by now? It’s almost six? You’re late again and Joel will fucking kill you and then me because I was with you!” you whisper shouted at him. He and Joel got in a pretty heated argument the other night about Tommy not being back in the apartment by curfew. Something about how he always used to have to bail Tommy out of jail and blah blah blah brotherly quarrels. But you still didn’t want to be on the receiving end of Joel’s anger.

“Look I wanna take you to meet someone, just trust me,” Tommy said, you immediately started to turn back onto the street.

“Absolutely not.”

“Please?” He grabbed your arm. “Trust me.” 

You cursed God for coming up with Miller brother puppy dog eyes and sighed. “Fine.”

After a bit of walking Tommy took you to an abandoned corner building in the QZ. Tommy went up to the door and gave the guards standing there a code.

“I swear if you took me to a fucking brothel,” you trailed off when you noticed a large, red symbol on the wall, a firefly. You took in a sharp breath, “Tommy” you said slowly, “what the hell is going on?”

“He didn’t tell you on the way here?” a woman said coming out of a room in the hallway. She had tanned skin and calculating brown eyes that matched her brown curly hair that was tied back in a low, loose ponytail. She was wearing a simple gray tank top and army green cargo pants with a gun holstered at the hip. You’d heard of her, but now that you were actually looking at her, it all made sense.

“Clearly not, but I’m guessing you’re Marlene?” you said coldly. You didn’t like being the only one out of the loop. 

“That would be me,” she smiled, “and Tommy here is going to join us.”

“What?” you questioned angrily.

“Yeah and I was thinking you should come with us,” Tommy said.

“What?” you questioned again. You were so confused. Tommy? Joining the Fireflies? Where is he going with them?

“Look, you know the things we’ve done, the things we’re still doing. I can’t stand it anymore, Joel’s too far gone and he’s getting older and Tess would never, but you? Come on sugar, this is a chance at redemption, to help people instead of hurt them.” 

You looked at him in bewilderment. What the hell was he talking about? Sure, you still had to do some not-great things while smuggling but it was nowhere near the level of dark with Ryan and the group. You only did what was necessary. It was different. Right?

“There’s a squadron of us going out west. Tommy has agreed to be one of them. We have a base out there that’s doing some real good work to benefit the world, not just in the QZs, and from what Tommy’s told me we could use a woman with your mind and skill set,” Marlene says.

“What, you mean like a cure?” she nods, and you laugh, “Tommy, you’re gonna leave us hell you’re gonna leave Joel for what? A chance? Some ‘good work?’ You know how long it took us to get here, and-” you sharply inhale, “fuck I know it isn’t the most glamorous thing but it’s still fucking better than having to live out there. Plus, you’d have to make it through the open city and then past that”

“Good thing I won’t be alone,” Tommy interrupts, frustrated, “and everytime we leave we’re at risk of hanging. Come on sugar, do you really want to stay here for the rest of your life shoveling shit, dumping bodies, and taking orders? And not just from FEDRA. Tess? Joel? They’re making you do what Ryan made us do just under a new name. It still makes us bad people, it still makes you a bad person. Do you really think your family would want that for you?”

That made you pause. Would they? Your dad’s fucking dying wish was that you find a better life and keep thinking of others, but you couldn’t help but feel you’d only half accomplished one of those. Were they looking down on you from heaven, or up from hell, with disappointment? Would it be better if you left with the Fireflies? With Tommy?

“You’re my closest friend, sugar. I just want what’s best for you. We can be heroes instead of villains.”

Villains? You weren’t fucking villains. And then it all made sense. After about a minute of organizing your thoughts you grinned at Tommy and you watched his eyes flash with a glimpse of hope before you said, “On today’s episode of Tommy Miller’s Hero Complex, he’s joining a new and cool rebel group to ease his conscience about the things we did to survive, not because we wanted to,” you watched his face fall at your biting remarks. 

“There’s no moral code in this world anymore Tommy because if there was you’d see that Marlene over there is no less guilty than either of us” you spat.

“I beg to differ,” Marlene interjected.

“Well you’re gonna keep begging because I didn’t fucking ask you,” you snarled. “Tommy, listen, let’s just go back to the apartment and talk about this.”

He sighed, “I’ll go back to the apartment to say my goodbyes, we leave at dawn tomorrow,” he said, refusing to meet your eyes. You blinked back tears of betrayal, frustration, and sadness. But if this was the road he wanted to take, fine.

It was about a 20 minute walk back to the apartment, but it took even longer because you and Tommy had to silently dodge FEDRA soldiers every few minutes. Luckily Tommy had it down to science and you assumed all those nights he’d been late he had been doing this.

When you reached the apartment it was 7:15. You unlocked the door and walked in to find Tess sitting on the couch and Joel pacing the floor. As soon as he turned and made eye contact with you both the fight began.

“WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU TWO BEEN?”

“Ask Tommy,” you said glumly as you walked over to the kitchen table and slung your bag onto it and flopped into a chair, putting your hands on your face. This was gonna be a long night. 

The three of them argued all night, while you listened from the kitchen table, like you always did. They’d ask you for your two cents occasionally, but would start arguing again before you could answer until Tommy tried to pin some of the blame on you.

“Look, she almost decided to go with me! Why aren’t you mad at her?”

You stood from the table and walked towards him swinging your finger up in his face, “Yeah I thought about it for a split second until you called yourself a hero and us villains and then I realized you don’t actually think this will help, it’s just to ease that little hero complex you have. Sometimes heroes do bad things to save the people they care about, but clearly you don’t care about us enough to get over it.”

“I never said that I didn’t care about you guys,” Tommy shot back.

“No, but you’ve been complaining for weeks that what we’re doing is bad and that it makes us bad people, hell you tried to win me over by using my dead family as a bargaining chip. I killed my father and you don’t see me moping about how horrible of a person I am. No, I took it and use it as fuel for my fucking fire and to keep my promise to him. Your little Star Wars Rebels group isn’t going to change anything.” 

“She’s right,” Tess said. “What? Do you really think joining them is going to change anything about you?”

“I’m gonna fucking help people instead of blackmailing them for information, supplies, or ration cards. I’m gonna stop FEDRA’s abuses instead of supplying their officer’s addictions. I’m gonna negotiate and listen instead of killing.” Tommy shouted and then looked at Joel. Something about Tommy’s last sentence softened both of them. Like it reminded the brothers of a memory they shared. 

Joel fiddled with the broken watch on his wrist, “I can’t protect you out there,” he said softly.

“I know, but I won’t be alone,” Tommy put his hand on Joel’s shoulder, “I’ll be okay, I’m a man now, I’m not just your little brother anymore.”

“You know the radio communication codes here?” Joel asked.

“Yes,” Tommy said.

“You’ll check in?” Joel said firmly, it was more of a demand than a question.

“Promise.”

“Okay,” Joel breathed. “Dawn you said?”

“Dawn.” You all looked out the window, there was still a few hours before then.

“You need to get some rest, you have a long journey ahead of you,” Joel said walking over to the bed. “Just stay here Tess, it’s late,” he said without turning around. You could tell this hurt Tess, but she didn’t say anything. She never did. So you took your flat pillow and blanket to one end of the couch and curled up there, Tess headed to the other end and sat down, but to your surprise Tommy kneeled next to you.

“I’m sorry for trying to force you into that, I shouldn’t have used your family like that, it wasn’t fair. You’re like a little sister to me, I didn’t mean to hurt you,” he confessed.

“It’s okay, I know why you did it,” you said softly and he hugged you from the side of the couch. “Just be safe out there, okay?” you said into his shoulder, to which he responded with a squeeze.

“I will.”

And at dawn, he was gone.

—

The second leg of your life in the QZ started after that. On a smuggling run not long after Tommy left, Tess, Joel, and you came across Bill and Frank on the radio, two men living in a gated, safe haven, private neighborhood resort of sorts. It took a little convincing but eventually Bill agreed with Frank that they should partner up with you guys. Trips there were rare, but cherished. You and Frank especially got along. You were young and he loved to doll you up just for a day and make you feel like a girl again instead of just a woman in a broken world. You protested at first, but when you saw how delighted it made Frank it reminded you of how much Hazel loved to get dolled up, so you always let him. You’d receive a compliment from Tess, showers of praise from Frank, a comment or two from Bill– less for you and mostly for Frank’s handiwork, and stares from Joel. It was easy to forget about the end of the world there.

Tess moved into the apartment about a year after Tommy left, but you hadn’t minded the brief time it was just you and Joel. You’d grown fond of your little conversations with him as he slowly would open up to you about his life as a contractor and as he learned bits about your short life in Hazel. 

You two decided to just share the bed and it was way more comfortable than the couch so you were grateful the awkward tension there had broken, but when Tess moved in to make smuggling operations easier, you were moved back to the couch not so subtly by her. 

The first night Joel came over to the couch, but before he could open his mouth you reassured him it was fine and that the elderly needed the bed more than you did. 

It went on like this for years. You’d hear from Tommy here and there, go on a smuggling run, trade around the QZ, see a hanging, watch the fireflies fucking destroy everything, and work. It wasn’t great by any means, and it honestly really sucked most of the time, but you had food every night, protection, and a couch to sleep on, so if this was what the rest of your life was gonna be, you hoped your dad would take this as a better life. 

You were gonna have to keep working on that thinking of others thing.

tags: @orcasoul @who-has-my-green-banana

“Because your dad’s getting older and if you’re not careful Ryan will try to take advantage of you. We’ve seen what he can do with no remorse. Some of the things that he’s made us or tried to make us do… It’s not all like he made it out to be, but you’ve already agreed to join, so if you don’t come now he’ll kill you, and if you hadn’t agreed to join he’d have killed you,” Tommy said while Joel still stood, brooding slightly, behind him. You looked from Tommy to Joel, you weren’t dumb, your dad was in his fifties now, and the extra wear and tear on his body these past few years had already started to take its toll. You knew you needed someone who could protect you and watch your back as well as your fathers. You could hold your own, but 4 sets of eyes was always better than 2. And you knew deep down you could find that in Joel. Tommy too. Out of the 8 people, these two seemed the most genuine. You may have just met them, but you are very good at reading people.

“Okay. I still need to talk to my dad, but okay,” you said. They seemed satisfied with that answer and you expected them to leave, but they grabbed the dishes, took them to the basin of water you had in the kitchen, pulled out some chairs from the table, and began washing them, solidifying in your mind that, yeah, they were good people. 

The next day was hard as you prepared to leave the only home you’d ever known. You packed your bag with the obvious things you’d need and then you grabbed some sentimental necessities. Your mother’s necklace (a gold chain with a locket that had dried white wildflowers in the center and a picture of your family inside), her wedding ring, and the Barbie pink bracelet you made out of the fabric from Hazel’s dress. Her room was a wreck after, but the dress had been untouched in the garment bag.

The rest of the group packed up some extra bags with your canned goods and also added some to their packs, as did you and your father. He also went and let out the animals so that they could roam free and let some of the people know you were leaving and gave them some supplies that you guys couldn’t carry. By the middle of the day, you were set to leave. 

You went out to visit their graves one last time to say goodbye. You both decided to say goodbye separately so that the group couldn’t sneak off with the truck without you, but also just so that you both could have some privacy. Your father went first and was only there for about 5 minutes, but it felt like ages just sitting around with the strangers you were about to travel the country with. You trudged your way over to the wildflower field where they laid, and you did as you always had done. Remove the few wilting flowers, since you only put them there yesterday, but this time you didn’t replace them with new ones. You wouldn’t be here to replace them anymore. No one would, and you didn’t want them stuck with dead flowers for eternity.

“Hey guys,” you said sheepishly. It didn’t matter that it had been 6 years since they died, talking to a rock never got easier. “I know Dad probably already told you, but we’re leaving town finally.” Your eyes started to well up a bit and you didn’t know why. “I know you loved this house, mom, and you never wanted us to leave it, but we can’t stay here anymore by ourselves, it’s just too risky and Dad and I are too weak on our own. So we’re joining a group of travelers. Specifically these two brothers.” Your Dad had agreed earlier in the day, which surprised you. It didn’t even take any attempts to convince him. You wondered if he knew something you didn’t. You turned towards the other of the identical stones. “Hazel Elizabeth,” you swallowed thickly, “I hope you’re winning pageants up there and enjoying life… unlike me,” you added. 

Before you could cry anymore, you and your fistfull of wilted wildflowers went back to the front of your house where everyone was waiting in the driveway. You chucked the flowers onto the front porch with a huff. The wilted petals on the porch made the house a visual representation of rejection. You turned and wordlessly climbed into the passenger’s seat of your dad’s pickup and the rest of the group followed. Ryan naturally climbed in the backseat but to your surprise the other seat became occupied by Joel. He and Tommy must have wanted to make sure one of them was listening to both halves of the group’s conversations. But regardless, you were headed off to Boston and leaving Hazel behind. The place, and the person.

—

Life in the group wasn’t bad… at first. Ryan did try to make a few moves on you, but thanks to Tommy and Joel he never made it far. Never far enough to scar you, at least. You were also right to join the Tommy and Joel side of the group.  They weren’t kidding when they said the boys were narcissistic, selfish, assholes and the other three genuinely were fucking each other… frequently. Joel didn’t talk much, if at all, but when he did talk it was mostly to you or Tommy, nowadays mostly you. Tommy had started to get distant lately too, the things you all had done starting to get to him. You assumed life out here would be rough, but this was a new level. Infected, FEDRA, and people were worse than you’d imagined. You’d met your first set of clickers not too long ago. You lost Blake. No one talked about it. Ryan killed him before he turned. Ryan had some kind of obsession with killing—in another world he would probably be a serial killer. His obsession forced you all to do what you were told or he would kill you, like Tommy said, and he’d like it. Doing what Ryan told you involved killing a lot of innocent people for their supplies. You only argued with him about trying to negotiate once before he showed you what happens when you question him. That demonstration was now turning into a scar across your thigh. Joel was pissed and so was your dad, but they knew better than to do anything

You’d lost the truck a couple months back, something happening to it during an attack from other raiders. Joel and Tommy tried their best to fix it, but unfortunately it just wasn’t something they could patch up. So you’d been walking since then. The toll that took on your father was heavier than you’d feared, but he was hanging in there, either for his sake or yours. 

“Hey! Welcome to Pennsylvania!” Luke announced.

“Well we’re at least in the state of one of the QZs we’re headed to,” Sash said. The decision had been made a while back that the likelihood of all 9 of you  making it into the Boston QZ was unlikely, so closer to the Philadelphia QZ - Ryan, Luke, Vicki, Phillip, and Sash would head there - Joel, Tommy, you, and your dad would keep going on to Boston. 

“This state is also hopefully flatter than the last few, I refuse to climb a mountain ever again,” Luke said breathlessly. He was certainly the group’s clown.

“I see a gas station up ahead, we can stop there for the night, see if there’s anything,” Ryan said. He and Luke went in and cleared the building first. Naturally, there wasn’t much left but some jerky. You ate a bit of that and packed some more for later before laying out your sleeping bag between your father and Joel. Phillip offered to take the first watch and after the sun went down you were all tired so there wasn’t much small talk before you all slowly drifted to sleep. 

—

You heard it at the same time as Joel. Your eyes snapped open and you made eye contact with him in the moonlight. You couldn’t have been asleep for long, an hour maybe less with the way Joel still looked very much awake. He was never one to sleep well, you’d noticed, but he always at least acted like he was trying. He looked past your head behind you and slowly brought his finger to his lips. A clicker. Where the hell was Phillip? Didn’t Ryan and Luke clear the building? Joel slowly grabbed his gun, squinted one eye and killed it in one shot which startled everyone else awake.

“What the fuck?” Phillip shouted gun clattering to the ground in surprise from where he’d been slumped against the cash register’s counter, asleep. His and everyone else’s dismay, however, turned out to be the least of your worries when you heard more of them barreling up from a basement you didn’t know this place had. At least three, maybe four. While you all started shooting in the dark corner where there were no windows to see Tommy asked what everyone had to have been thinking.

“I THOUGHT YOU CLEARED IT?”

“WE DID! THERE WAS A SHELF OVER THERE THAT WE MOVED AND FOUND A TRAP DOOR BUT NOTHING WAS UNDER THERE I SWEAR. THEY MUST HAVE BEEN HIDING UNDER THERE,” Luke yelled. Dumbasses. You heard Vicki scream as one had managed to lurch toward her and your father moved over to help her. After a short minute or two, thanks to 9 guns and Joel’s ridiculously good aim, you finally managed to get everything under control. You all packed up quickly and went outside just as the sun was rising.

“What the hell were you thinking?” Joel asked sternly.

“How were we supposed to know what was under there after we cleared it?” Luke said defensively. 

“Why didn’t you recover it with the shelf?” Vicki asked while being held by Sash, she looked quite shaken, the clicker had gotten super close to her, she’s really lucky she didn’t get bit.

“Cause we cleared it! Didn’t you Ryan?” Luke desperately asked? Ah, Ryan was the one who “cleared” the crawlspace. You looked at Tommy and Joel who both looked at you and then each other as understanding crossed everyone’s faces. Ryan was more of a, take a look and call it a day kind of checker— not a thorough kind of guy. 

“Hang on you can’t blame this all on us, fucking Phillip fell asleep on watch!” Ryan argued in a sad attempt to continue trying to save his reliability. 

“What did you expect me to do? We’d been walking for miles all day, I was exhausted!” Phillip said.

“Well still, that ain’t how keepin’ watch works,” Tommy piped in putting his two cents in the growing argument money pile.

“GUYS! Guys, we got different things we need to be worried about right now. What’s done is done,” your dad said. You recognized that tone. It was the same tone he used 6 years ago when he told you to go to your room.

“Dad?” you said slowly, taking a step toward him, and he took a step back, “Dad, what the hell are you talking about?” He lifted his arm out and showed you all the bite there. It didn’t look deep, the damn clicker barely had enough of his arm to let all of its teeth break the flesh, but enough of them had. It’d only been maybe 15 minutes since he’d been bit and the bite already looked worse.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart,” your dad said softly. Tears threatened to fall from your eyes as you looked at him, the bite, and then him again. No, this wasn’t happening. 

“Shit Mike,” Tommy said.

“Wha- what are we gonna do?” you stuttered. What are you gonna do? You couldn’t let him turn into one of those monsters, not like your family did, but you couldn’t kill your own father. And yet at the same time you didn’t want someone else to kill him either.

“Kill him,” Ryan said, “I don’t think he wants to turn into an infected, do you Mike?”

“He’s right sweetheart, you have to let him kill me, it’ll be easier, you’ll know I didn’t suffer.” You didn’t try to keep the tears at bay now. Your breaths hitched and you were finding it harder and harder to breathe but you shook your head. 

“No, no, I’ll do it,” you said shakily, “I’ll… prevent you from turning.”

“Sweetheart, I can’t ask you to do that,” your dad argued and was immediately followed by protests from the rest of the group as well.

“I don’t think that's a good idea, sunshine,” Joel said. Sunshine, that was new, but you didn’t have the capacity to think about that. You turned to him and tried to plead with your eyes. You weren’t about to let your father’s death be a way for Ryan to get off. Your father had killed your sister and your mother and lived everyday with that burden, surely you will make it with this burden. Somehow, he understood, and you watched him take a breath, look you in the eyes in a way you couldn’t describe, and open his mouth, but before he could offer, you interrupted him.

“I’m doing it,” you turned back to your father, who was crying softly now. Vicki walked up to your father and hugged him.

“Thank you for saving me, you still barely know me, but I’m so sorry,” she said through sobs. You went back into the gas station, your father followed behind  and then moved to stand in front of you. Joel and Tommy went in after but waited at the door. You looked your father in the eyes, trying to memorize every detail, and you realized his hand was slowly twitching as he brought it up to your face, like Hazel’s did, and you held his hand.

“I’m so sorry sweetheart, but I need you to promise me something. Keep going, don’t let this hold you back from finding a better life. Keep thinking of others even in times like these, you know it's what your mother would have wanted. Promise me,” he said through sobs.

“I promise,” you choked out. You were trying so hard to be strong for him. You didn’t want his last memory of you to be one of weakness, no matter how heartbreaking this whole situation is.

“Your mother, Hazel, and I will be waiting for you when you’re ready, so take your time, but sweetheart, nothing you’ve done has ever wavered my belief that you are a kind, smart, beautiful woman just trying to find her way in this broken world. I love you my sweet girl,” he pulled you into a hug and you squeezed him, trying to memorize the feeling of his heart beating against you.

“I love you too,” you finally sobbed out.

“Look out for her and please take care of her,” your father asked Joel and Tommy over your shoulder. There wasn’t a single second of hesitation before Joel said.

“We will.”

“Of course,” Tommy said. The Millers, despite it all, were good people and deep down you trusted them to keep their promise. 

Your father pulled away first and you held his still twitching hand. “We’re running low on time, sweetheart. I don’t want you to see me any worse,” your father said softly and he kept your hand in his until he turned around and kneeled to the ground. You attempted to control your breathing, blinking back your tears. The worst thing you could do right now is miss and have to shoot your father twice. You knew he was exaggerating the time frame. He probably still had hours before things would become unsafe, at least that’s what you could put together from your encounters with people before they got infected, but you didn’t want to see him get any worse.

“It’s okay, sweet girl, it’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay sweet girl,” your father repeated over and over. You summoned whatever power your dad had that night so many years ago. You looked at the back of his head and raised your gun, you inhaled, looked away, exhaled, and bang.

You dropped to the ground as did your fathers body, your knees already soaked in your father’s blood. Your father, who you had just murdered. You saw your gun get kicked away by a black boot and large arms were wrapped around you as you looked up to see… Joel, comforting you, holding you, and talking to you. You could see his mouth moving but you couldn’t hear him quite yet. You could still barely breathe. All you could do was scream.

“It’s okay, it’s okay, sunshine, just breathe. Just breathe, breathe with me.” You somehow managed to focus enough to hear what he was saying over your gut wrenching cries and eventually slow your breathing enough to go from screams to quiet cries in his arms. You felt another hand on your back and you assumed it to be Tommy’s. He blocked your view of your father with his body and your knuckles were white from the grip you had on Joel’s jacket.

You stayed there for a few minutes before suddenly standing up from where you were on the ground with Joel and Tommy and composed yourself. You’d shown enough emotion, but you all had places to be. This wasn’t a world where you had time to mourn or the safety to be vulnerable. You could only move on and use your grief to fuel your need for survival.

“We should get going soon, don’t want to waste anymore time,” you said.

“Okay. I think I might look around for a second. Help me, will ya Joel?” Tommy said softly, but you already headed outside where the rest of the group was. They all were just looking at you, they no doubt heard your screams so they must have been surprised when you emerged first with Joel and Tommy following a few minutes after. Joel handed you your gun back and you put it in the waistband of your jeans. There was still something different in his eyes when he looked at you but you had no idea what it was. Everyone looked at you with a sort of pity, even Ryan, but Joel’s was something else.

“Lets go,” you said and started walking East to Philadelphia, with Joel following right behind you, followed by Tommy, then Vicki, and then the rest of the group. You made a promise to your father, and you intended to keep it.

—

You couldn’t imagine how much further you all walked that day. It was the most you all had ever walked, probably due to the determination after your father’s death combined with the fact you now didn’t have your father’s age wearing you all down. A morbid, but true, fact. You tried to find the good things about your newfound no parent situation. You were 23 years old and had never been a day without one of your parents except for your occasional summer camp stay. You might even be the last of your goddamn bloodline alive since your father had never been able to reach any of his or your mother’s families when the government was still trying to make mail work. Yeah, dumb. You were now officially alone, and that thought almost relieved you. Now you really only have to worry about the safety of yourself. And maybe Joel and Tommy, but they haven’t proved to need your protection so far. 

Your attention was brought back to the present with the burning of your thighs and calves, but feeling that physical pain was helping you deal with your emotional pain, so you decided to just really keep feeling the burn. Joel, Tommy, and you made up the back of the group, Sash, Vick, and Phillip in the middle, and Ryan and Luke in the front as always. This irked you a little bit, the way Ryan’s attitude and temper stopped anyone from arguing with him about whether or not he was trustworthy enough to be leading you all. A deep voice next to you saying something brings you out of your trance.

“What?” you say to Joel.

“Tunnels,” he repeats, “in the weird crawl space basement thing. Some not infected people must have been trying to stay safe down there and dig tunnels to wherever.  Probably came up to use the gas station supplies when one of them must have gotten infected and then…”

“Gotten at least some of ‘em sick and the others climbed out and put the shelf over it. We couldn’t tell ya how far the tunnels went but ya got a lotta time on your hands in 10 years,” Tommy continued. That’s right, 10 years. If you could guess anything about the time of year it must have been March, maybe April based on the weather warming up. Either way, that meant your birthday was coming up soon in May. Not that you’d do anything for it or tell anyone. It was just confirmation of your aging and unavoidable acknowledgement that you were passing milestones Hazel would never get to. Gosh, she’d have turned 18 this year. An official adult. You couldn’t even imagine the chaos.

“So with Ryan’s habit of not being thorough,” Joel growled. 

“I don’t wanna hear either of you say it could have been avoided,” you huffed. In what world did they see telling you this as helping?

“No, we’re not saying that. What we’re trying to get at is that this may be the thing to convince the others Ryan is in no position to lead this. The things he’s done, the things he’s made us do, and the things he doesn’t do that put us in danger can’t be ignored anymore,” Tommy pleads.

“Correction—he’s saying that. I think we should keep our fuckin’ mouths shut until we drop their asses in Philedelphia. I was gonna say his habit of not being thorough and sharing things with the group got your father infected and endangered the rest of us,” Joel whisper shouted at his brother. You three were far enough back that your conversations would at least be muffled to everyone else, but you never know how sound can carry. Plus, the Miller boys could yell.

“Which is exactly my point! Listen, sugar, I just think that if you…” 

“You wanna use my father getting infected as a push point to, what, put you in charge?” you question him. He didn’t have an answer for that. “That’s ridiculous. Joel’s right, just keep your mouth shut for a couple more days and then we’ll be on our own and you can be in charge.” Tommy grabbed your arm, stopping you and forcing you to look at him.

“This isn’t about me being in charge, sugar, this is about the possibility of not letting more innocent people die,” Tommy started calling you sugar when he noticed whenever you ransacked a store for supplies you always looked for gummy candies or something sweet in an attempt to feed your never ending sweet tooth. You used to think the nickname was sweet, made you feel like part of the team, but now it just enraged you.

“Well, sugar,” you say back to him, your voice laced with venom, “We’ve been doing this for almost 4 years together now, and I don’t even know how long you were doing it before then, so I’m not sure what the hell is making you get cold feet all the sudden about the things we’ve done because it’s not gonna change anything. It doesn’t matter who told us to do it, we did it. So I’m sorry that you’re having trouble sleeping at night, but if we’re going to make it to Boston we have to leave things as they are.” Both Miller boys looked at you with their jaws slightly dropped. Losing your father had already started to change things. That was the most words you’d said to anybody at once, even your father, in the 4 years they’ve known you. There was no one there to do the talking while you observed anymore, so you were gonna talk. 

“And my father wasn’t one of the innocent people you need to feel guilty about losing. Did you know I listened to him kill my sister and my mother on outbreak day when they got sick? Did you know that whenever our hospitality started being taken for granted he threatened people with bullets to their legs and shoulders? Or did you know he used to tell me that I couldn’t kill anything, not a farm animal or infected, because a woman shouldn’t have blood on her hands? And all that was before I met you and you know what he did after, so don’t try to make my father out to be some innocent old man who died protecting a stranger.” Your father was a brave man, you loved him more than anything, and maybe it’s just the grief talking, but after the world fell apart, he became a different kind of man. Of course, as always, this was the same old story for most people after the outbreak and the things your father was guilty of, you were guilty of too, but he was not an innocent man. The Miller boys didn’t know this but there were things he did that Ryan didn’t ask him to. Things that were too dark, even for you. He’d have done anything to protect you, he just didn’t know when it was too far.

“Is there a problem here?” Ryan asked. You hadn’t realized in your rage that you’d called attention from the rest of the group.

“No,” you said, “just talking to Tommy about how I killed my father today. What’s on your agenda for the rest of the day?” You finished your response with a smile. Mentioning killing someone distracted Ryan and made everyone else uncomfortable, given the situation. Then, asking what Ryan wanted the plan to be reminded him that he was in charge and stroked his ego so he’d forget what started the conversation and wouldn’t get suspicious about your argument with Tommy. Therefore, if anyone else was still suspicious, they wouldn’t mention it now. 

If you had to name your top three strengths it would be observant, tactical, and seductive. You had an allure that pulled people in like no one in your group had ever seen. And sometimes you didn’t even have to try, they’d just look at you and do what you suggested. This especially worked on men because most of them think with their dicks and boy did you have the looks to make their pants twitch. It hadn’t worked out in your favor a couple times, but Joel would always barge in and rescue you. He had an effect on people that ignited fear, but you knew who he really was. He’d only been too late once, and he swore never again.

“Well, looking at the sun we got roughlyyy 2 hours to sunset, so I say we use the rest of our time to find a spot to spend the night. We should make it to Philadelphia within the fortnight,” Ryan said. You all made your way into a neighborhood that had been bombed after outbreak day and found a house that had managed to stay mostly intact. 

“Joel and I will do the sweep,” Tommy said and you smiled at him softly. You may have had an argument earlier, but you knew where he was coming from deep down and you couldn’t blame him.

After the sweep and looking to see if there was anything useful left in the house, everyone ate food from their packs and by dusk everyone was getting ready to settle in for the night. Today you laid your sleeping bag in between Tommy and Joel.

“I’ll take the first watch,” Joel said quickly. He made eye contact with you but neither of you said anything. You shimmied down into your sleeping bag, watching as Joel positioned himself in front of the window, you glanced down and when you looked back up, Joel was looking at you. Eventually, sleep lulled you away and you felt safer than you had in months knowing Joel was the one watching over you.

—

It had been roughly two weeks since your father died, well since you killed him, and they were really tough. Not just for you and your grief, but for Tommy and Joel too. Their relationship had become a bit strained since you had a run in with another group of raiders and Tommy had held back. Which caused you and Joel to step up to cover his lack of  “results” as Ryan would say. You did things you didn’t even know you were capable of because your father had never let you, and Joel delivered as always. He had this ability to just zone out into a blind rage and finish his “tasks.” This was starting to frustrate Tommy more and more every time Joel had to do something. Thankfully you should only be a few hours out from Philadelphia, and under the cover of night, over half your group would split and it would just be you and the Millers. Then hopefully when your decisions were in your own hands Tommy would calm down a bit and realize you have to do what you have to to survive out here.

“There it is,” Phillip said, “the Philadelphia QZ.” The QZ was surrounded by a large concrete wall, making it look more intimidating than safe. 

“Alright, we’ll get a little closer, wait till dark, then part ways,” Ryan said.

By nightfall, the group had dished out what supplies they had left to you and the Millers and started making their advance into the QZ. The plan was to go around to the side, cut a hole in the chain link fence, and sneak in through the tunnels. 

They never made it. The FEDRA guards must have noticed movement because before you knew it they were firing their weapons and your group members were being blown to bits. Safely hidden, you weren’t worried about getting hit yourself, just what might happen if they came out to assess the bodies and found you. So you ran off quickly, trying to process what just happened. They’re supposed to let people into the QZs, that’s the purpose of them. Would that happen to us?

“I don’t think we can sneak in,” you said after the running/walking in the dark you had been partaking in.

“The fuck you mean?” Joel said to you.

“You watched them get blown to bits because they probably saw the movement and thought they were infected. We’re not infected, so why shouldn’t we be able to walk in the front doors?” you questioned them. If Tommy doesn’t want to do things Ryan’s way anymore, here’s a start. “Look either way, we either get into the QZ or die.”

“We’re getting into that QZ,” Tommy said.

“Yes we will,” Joel confirmed, “but first we sleep, we’re far enough out now, I’ll watch.”

“Are you sure? You watched last night,” Tommy pried.

“Yeah I can do it Joel,” you pleaded him. If anything, you wanted time to process through watching your “friends” get blown up right before you. 

“Fine, but wake me up when you get tired,” Joel said.

“Or me,” Tommy added, annoyed.

Both brothers got into their sleeping bags, still on either side of you, and they went to sleep. You clutched your gun in your hand a little tighter, you rarely kept watch when your dad was around, someone else just always ended up taking it or he did, but you didn’t mind it. It gave you a real chance to think. And tonight you had quite a bit to think about. You didn’t let yourself get super close to anyone other than Joel and Tommy, it was too much of a risk to get close with everyone because of all the uncertainty out there. It wasn’t anything personal, it was more of a protection method.

But that didn’t mean there weren’t things you’d miss and times you’d think about. Naturally, since you, Sash, and Vick were together all the time your cycles ended up linking up. When that happened and you hadn’t found any pads or tampons in a while, you would use old ripped up clothes instead. Whenever you were near a body of water, the three of you would get up early and rinse them out and just talk as if you weren’t in the middle of an apocalypse. You couldn’t even remember what you’d even talk about but you just remember laughing with them until one of the guys would uncomfortably call you back. They were always so on edge when you all were on your periods.

There was also the time during one of Vick, Sash, and Phil’s night time exercise sessions that woke everyone up. At the beginning, it always woke you up but eventually you could sleep through it. This one night in particular, however, the three of them were so lost in the moment when Vick was supposed to be keeping watch that they didn’t realize the shelf they were fucking against wasn’t that stable and they knocked it over onto Blake, Luke, and Ryan with a huge crash. Thankfully, the shelves in the gas station were mostly empty and the boys didn’t have anything more severe than some deep cuts, bad bruises, and sore bodies but none of them kept watch for a while after that.

Blake also had a thing for you for a while. He’d always try to walk by you, talk to you, and offer you things, much to the annoyance of both Joel and Tommy because then they couldn’t talk to you or your father about anything that he would run off to tell Ryan about. He was a sweet guy and everything, he even picked some wildflowers for you one time which did genuinely touch you. Plus he was a better guy than Ryan but he was bitten by an infected, you didn’t cry about it.

Then there was what plagued your mind the most, your father. Who he was before and the man you ignored he was becoming. You wanted to keep your childhood innocent version of him in your mind but then you’d think about things he willingly did, and your image of him in your mind started blurring into someone you didn’t want to acknowledge, which is what hurt the most. You knew you’d started to push him away when you started traveling 4 years ago, so you can’t help but blame yourself for what he became. Which you know isn’t fair, but you can’t help that’s the way it makes you feel. You sighed to yourself in frustration and blinked back a few tears and looked up at the stars. That was one thing you appreciate about the lack of electricity, less light pollution, more stars. Through the trees you found the little and big dippers and some other constellations.

Madison smugly raised her hand and you visibly cringed before the smart ass remark you knew she was about to make made its way to the surface. She’s your “neighbor” because her family is the only people who live within 6 miles from your house. “If you give us a pop quiz every Friday, is it even a pop quiz anymore?” She said and the Junior boys giggled. Gross.

“And yet some of you are still surprised,” Mrs. Charleson replied, smiling just as smartly. That made you and many other students laugh, proving why she was without a doubt your favorite teacher.

—

You aced your quiz. When the final bell rang you couldn’t wait to get out of there. Something was just off with everyone today but you couldn’t quite decide what it was. You headed to your locker to grab your snack of raisins and peanuts and then started walking in the direction of the local dress shop where your sister would be getting the final alterations done to her dress for the Hazel Day pageant.

“Hey Hazie!” you shout as you walk in and see your adorable baby sister. Her blonde curls somehow so effortlessly laid across her shoulders.

Hazie shrieks your name in excitement, “Come look at my dress!!” You walk further into the dress shop to see your sister in her Barbie pink pageant gown that you’d guess weighed more than she did soaking wet. It had everything a girl like Hazie could ever dream of, pink ribbons, ruffles, and even lace.

“Well aren’t you just the prettiest princess!” You said giving her a twirl.

“Oh don’t move so much I haven’t taken out the last pin!” Mrs. Vivian said. She was the owner of the dress shop and also the old woman from the market who took your mom to have a baby in her bathtub. She gave your mom a discounted rate for alterations for your sister’s endless pageant dress collection which helped your parents be able to support her pageant dreams. It was still a fucking expensive hobby and your parents definitely had more financial strain because of it, but whatever to make your little Hazie happy. 

Once alterations were done, Mrs. Vivian promised to have it done by October 1st which was 3 days before Hazel Day. “And don’t worry about this round of alterations Lillian, this one’s on me,” Mrs. Vivian said.

“Oh Vivian I couldn’t possibly allow you to do that,” your mother frantically replied. She absolutely hated accepting help from anyone.

“No, no, I insist! It’s a birthday present for our future junior pageant Queen.”

“Well, thank you, could I still at least give you a tip?” Your mother began bargaining. Mrs. Vivian along with everyone else was obsessed with your sister. Disney Princesses may not be real but they came to life in sweet Hazel Elizabeth. She deadass would have squirrels and birds and whatever else following her around, it was bizarre. But you couldn’t deny the fact that the effect of the sweet beacon of innocence and joy your sister had on people affected you too. Hazie was your everything, there’s not a single thing you wouldn’t do to protect her, not that she needed it. She may be pretty and cute, but she had quite the stubborn head on her shoulders.

“Momma can I have one more cookie before we go?” Hazel asked with the biggest doe eyes you ever did see, in what world would your mother ever be able to say no to her?

“You’ve already had two… how about half if you split it with your sister?” Your mother replied. 

“Okay!” Hazel grabbed the chocolate chip raisin cookies Mrs. Vivian had made and split it mostly in half and handed you the other piece. You were still a little hungry, but you’d just had your snack of raisins and decided that your daily tolerance of their texture was up, so you slipped Hazel the half she gave you on your walk back to the car.

“Shh,” you smiled at her, winking and watching her sweet blue eyes brighten at the sight of what would complete her third cookie. You tossed your backpack in the trunk next to Hazel’s homeschool books and popped in the front seat next to your mom. Your parents decided to homeschool your sister when the pageants and travel started affecting her ability to attend school. Plus it was one less thing your parents would have to pay for, so most of Hazel’s school supplies were just your old school supplies. It seemed like your mom kept everything you or Hazel ever touched. 

“Mommy? I feel a little funny.” Hazel piped up from the backseat, interrupting your looking-out-the-window-music-video-vibe you had going on while listening to Beyonce’s newest hit “Crazy in Love.”

“Honestly me too Hazie. Now yours may have to do with the three- yes, three- cookies you ate today. I saw you trying to be sneaky,” your mother glanced at you for a second, “but I think the weather’s changing so it may have something to do with that too.”

“Yeah it’s probably just a bug going around. People were weird today at school too,” you added, trying to ease Hazel’s worries.

“A BUG?? I don’t wanna be sick for my birthday Mommy,” Hazel pouted.

“Oh you won’t, love. It’ll pass, I promise. Do you have any homework today?” 

“No, just a test I need to study for in science.” You saw an opportunity and decided to take it. “So I’m not sure I can go to the pre-banquet tonight.”

“WHAT?” Hazel shouted from the backseat.

“Your sister’s right, the banquet won’t be a good use of her time if she needs to study. She’ll be at the pageant though, don’t worry.” Your mom’s obsession with your studies increased once your parents pulled Hazel from school, so you couldn’t be happier to study for your science test. Sitting in a stuffy room all dressed up eating stale food and surrounded by a bunch of snobby girls and their mothers was not how you wanted to spend your evening. You liked dressing up for church on Sundays and special occasions and you wore a little makeup every day, but you certainly were no pageant girl.

“Gosh it’s already 5:00. Help Hazel get ready will you? We need to leave in 45 minutes if we wanna make it there by 6:20…” your mom got out of the car rambling. If your dad was a chronic worrier your mother was an incessant worrier.

“Come on Hazie, let's get you all dressed up,” you said. You were no makeup artist, but for only being 14 and hardly wearing any makeup, you considered yourself pretty good. It was probably due to having done your sister’s makeup for so long. You may not like doing it very much, but you loved making Hazel happy and this definitely made her happy. 

“Stop jittering so much. I can barely get this eyeliner on straight and you know I’m no good at eyeliner anyway,” you said.

“I’m sorry, I think I’m just cold," your sister said softly. You immediately felt terrible and grabbed a light pink blanket off her bed and draped it over her shoulders.

“Maybe you are getting sick?” You took your hands to her forehead, but she was cold. “Huh no fever, though.” You more or less got her eyeliner on and started to touch up where her natural curls had flattened. Then you pulled the front bits back into a half up half down look and applied just a touch of tinted lip gloss. She may be required to wear makeup for these pageants but you still wanted her to look more like herself. 

“Thank you sissy,” Hazel said and gave you a big hug.

“Of course. And always remember you’re my favorite princess and you’re so so beautiful no matter what anyone says about you,” you said. You’d always been worried about what the effect of pageant life would have on her. You’d seen how deathly skinny some of the older pageant girls are, but you’re just glad Hazel still wants a third cookie.

“HAZEL ELIZABETH WE NEED TO LEAVE!”

“You better go. You know what mom’s like when she thinks she's gonna be late,” you warn your sister.

“I don’t know why she thinks we’re gonna be late, right now we’re still getting there 25 minutes early.”

“Ah, but,” you start.

“Early is on time, on time is late, and late is just unacceptable,” you and Hazel quote your mother perfectly. 

“HAZEL!” Your sister's eyes widen as she gives you a kiss on the cheek and then runs out of her room. You hear your mother shout love and goodbye, but leaves you no time to respond before the door slams and you’re met with silence. 

Just how you like it.

—

When your dad came in from the fields to find you at home, he wasn’t at all surprised, but that did mean you had to help him out with a few final things he wanted to get finished up today. When you tried to fix up something for dinner you realized your mom has been so preoccupied with Hazel and the pageant next weekend that going to the market must have slipped her mind, so you both settled on popcorn for dinner. 

“Now if we’re having popcorn for dinner, we have to watch a movie,” your dad said, shrugging.

“I think you’re right.” You could study for the test later. “What do you wanna watch?”

“Hmmm, how about Harry Potter?”

“Sorcerer's Stone or Chamber of Secrets?”

“Chamber of Secrets for sure. I wanna watch the scene of Hermione as that nightmarish cat” your dad replied. You started searching the DVD cabinet for the movie. “By the way, when’s the third one supposed to come out?”

“Uhhh sometime next summer I think? Ya know, you could just read the books to find out what happens.”

“And spoil the movie?! I would never,” your dad dramatically puts his hand out in front of you, reminding you where Hazel gets all her sass from. You, on the other hand, were more like your mother- empathetic to all, but protective of those you care about. Always a silent watcher and observer, thinking and planning what the correct response or move should be in a situation. It’s why your dad refuses to play board games anymore because either you or your mom would destroy him and Hazel and then it was just a battle between the two of you to see who could outsmart the other. You’d only beaten your mother once. She always seemed to be one step ahead of you. She claims it’s what happens when you become a parent, you’re too mentally prepared for any option to be surprised when something happens. Your dad would always say that’s bullshit because it’s never helped him out, which then turns into your mother scolding him for cursing around Hazel. You work with him in the barn so you’ve heard all the profanities, thanks to his frustrations, so she's not worried about you. She’s under the impression you just filter it out and have the vocabulary of a saint, but in reality you just don’t do it around her and your dad graciously hasn’t told her. 

About thirty minutes into the movie, your dad is passed out on the couch so you head upstairs to study for your test on Monday. Whatever made your teacher decide a test after the weekend was a good idea needs to be reevaluated. You plopped down at your desk, opened your textbook and notes, and began to go through them. You had stayed up late the night before studying the reading for the “pop quiz” you took today so your eyes started drooping a lot faster than you thought they would and before you knew it you had passed out on your desk reading your notes.

—

It was 11:30 when you heard it. A strange, croaking noise coming from down the hall that awoke you from your impromptu nap. You were a little disoriented from falling asleep at your desk. Your desk lamp was off, so you assumed one of your parents had shut it off before they went to bed. You turned the lamp back on and realized you had drooled on your notes. Shit. You had only smudged the ink a little bit and decided they were legible enough before you heard it again. Is there a fucking frog in the house? You tried to reason with your very sleep clouded brain when the croaking got closer and you heard a door creak. You got up from your desk chair to peek out your door and saw a small shadow had appeared in the darkness of the hallway. Assuming she also heard the freaky croaking noises and got scared, you called out to her in a whisper.

“Hazie? Are you okay?”

She tilted her head at you and you heard more croaking.

“Hazie…?” 

She jumped at you, and an inhuman sound came out of her–a shriek or scream or something you couldn’t even begin to describe. Before you knew it she was on you, clawing, snapping her teeth, and scratching. You were quite a bit bigger than her, and Hazel has always been quite small for her age so you could overtake her physically, but the mental hurdle of trying to understand what she was doing was a battle.

“Hazel? Hazie? Hazel? What the hell is going on, stop it!” You were wrestling with her at the top of the stairs and were starting to get scared she was gonna take you both down them. She kept croaking and screeching and suddenly the light was turned on. Your father stood at the bottom of the stairs, not croaking thankfully, but looking confused. When your mom and sister came home they must have left your dad on the couch and shut your lamp off.

“What the fuck are you two doing? Get off her!” You didn’t know who he was referring to but you didn't have time to ask before you heard more shrieks and inhumane croaks coming from your parents room. The door was shut but it was shaking like someone was pounding on it.

“Dad, something is wrong,” you said, starting to panic now at the possibility your mother would come barreling out of the room acting just like Hazel, or worse. Your dad started moving up the stairs, causing Hazel to suddenly stop attacking you and fly at your father, straight down the stairs. Hazel, or this creature that looked like Hazel, missed your dad completely and basically just flung herself down the stairs. That fall should have killed her or broken a bone at the very least, but she hit the bottom and just got straight back up, then turned to look at the two of you. The croaking and shrieking coming from your parents room was now partnered with sirens and helicopters outside. You didn’t know what was happening but you knew everything was changing much too fast for your liking. 

Hazel stood there, staring at you and your father, and started twitching. Similarly to how she had while you were doing her makeup, but more violent. She opened her mouth and in the light from the lamp in the living room and the one above the stairs you could see that there was a tendril-looking plant coming out of your sister's mouth that was moving on its own. You almost thought you were hallucinating. Something compelled your father to move. He barreled down the few stairs he’d come up and grabbed your sister by the neck like he was about to choke her, moving her head up to immobilize it. He studied her for a second before throwing her in the kitchen pantry and shutting the door. She started croaking again. But now she was also screaming. Not the shrieks from before, it sounded like the Hazel you knew. Screams she’d make when she saw a bug or got dirt on her hands. Screams she made when she fell off her bike. Screams like how she should have screamed when she flung herself down the stairs. 

Your dad calling your name brought you out of your daze. “I need you to grab something heavy that I can put in front of the door,” he shouted over Hazel and your mother’s screams. You’d never heard so much noise. So much unpleasant noise and it was loud. Loud. So, so loud. You couldn’t think. You could barely will yourself to move from the top of the stairs. Your arms stung and were sticky with blood pouring from where Hazel had scratched you. Could you even say that was Hazel? A more concerning bang from your parents door made you run down the stairs much faster. You could take Hazel in a fight like that, but definitely not your mother. Thankfully, the door held through. You don’t know where you found the strength to push the DVD cabinet in front of the pantry door. Just a few hours ago you were searching through it to find Harry Potter, and now you’re using it to trap your “sister” in the pantry. 

“What is happening?” You frantically asked your father. More like yelling at your father over the noise. You just needed it to stop being so loud so you could think. 

“I don’t know.” Your father moved from the pantry door that was barely holding on due to your sister trying to break through it. She isn’t that strong. She can’t be that strong? Your dad turns the TV on to see news reports of towns and cities on fire, people killing what looks like other people before cameras could cut away. The signal was barely pulling through, but you could see enough. When the signal was fully cut out, your dad moved to the radio, where they were talking about people who were acting similar to your mom and sister, and how they’re not safe and people need to run or kill them. Then there were croaks and screams and the signal went out and all you heard from the radio was static. Static, screaming, shrieking, your father’s heavy breathing, you couldn’t comprehend what was happening.

“Go to your room, shut the door, lock it, and stay in there until I come get you,” your father moved over to his desk in his office and took his gun out of the drawer and loaded it.

“Dad…? What the fuck are you doing?” You followed him, but suddenly heard gunshots in the distance and more sirens and you both looked out the window. It was rare to hear sirens all the way out where you lived, so you both knew that if you could hear them, it didn't mean anything good.

“What everyone else is,” he said, turning from the window to look at you. He moved to where you were at the front of his office and you could see the conflict in his eyes when he looked at you. “I don’t want this on your conscience.” You couldn’t hold it in anymore. You started to cry. You cried, the shrieks blending in with your sobs. You so desperately wanted to wake up from this nightmare.

“I know sweetheart, I’m sorry.” You looked up and your father was crying too. In your 14 years of life you had never seen your dad cry. That scared you even more. 

“Go in your room,” he said sternly, trying to hide his emotions and tears. You wordlessly followed his orders, taking one last look at the pantry, the pounding on the door was going to be the last thing you saw your sister do alive. Your father was about to kill your sister, and your mother. And you were not only letting him, you almost felt thankful. They won’t have to suffer anymore. At the top of the stairs, right before the door to your room, you watched the pounding on the door to your parents room too before slipping into your room and closing the door, locking it, and staying there. Just as you were told. You’d always been a rule follower, but you just never thought it would be something like this.

A few minutes passed before you heard the DVD cabinet get moved and the pantry door finally break open. You assumed your dad had to talk himself into what he was about to. Then you heard it. Bang. A set of croaking stopped and you heard your dad’s sobs as he climbed up the stairs. You sobbed into the pillows of your bed. Then you heard the same thing as before, the door opened, and then the gun went off.

Bang.

And you’re met with silence, but this time you don’t like it.

—

6 years later, date unknown, year 2009

It was a beautiful day. Sunny with a soft breeze. You stood at the two matching headstones with the wildflowers you’d gathered, taking the dead ones out of the pot and adding the new ones. You and your father had stolen the headstones a few weeks after outbreak day. You couldn’t even really say stolen. The owner had gotten infected, and no one was really around to stop you. You and your father carved their names into them that night and wheelbarrowed them over to where you buried them the next morning. Lillian Rose and Hazel Elizabeth. You saw their bodies, for closure purposes. Both with a bullet in the head and cordyceps, you now knew, in their mouths. They didn’t look like them, which helped only a little bit because it didn’t help any with the fact they were dead. 

Your father and you drove into town the morning after and got a little bit of information. What law enforcement had told them to do in town, none of them apparently cared enough to go out to the countryside assuming we were all dead. Then what we knew so far about the people being dubbed “the infected,” it passed through bites so you were okay since you only got scratched but you and your dad were both on edge for a few days. And that the town leaders left were calling for a meeting to see who was alive and who wasn’t. 

Out of the 450 people in Hazel, 25 people remained. Two of which being you and your father, so 23 others. Most of them were the only ones of their families to survive. It seemed like if you didn’t get sick, a family member bit you before you could do anything or register what was happening. That seemed to be what happened to your neighbors. Your dad killed a lot of infected people that day, including Madison and her family. It seemed like her parents had gotten sick and attacked her because she had a bite mark and they didn’t.

 The general consensus of the meeting was that you can try to make it to what eventually became the Nashville QZ, at the time it was just a government support station, because it was closer than the Frankfort one or you can stay here and play survival. Most of the older people decided to try to make it to the QZ, but you and your dad decided to stay. You both felt safer in your own hands rather than someone else’s. After some cars were stocked with people, gas, and food you sent over half of who were left away.

You started playing adult that day. Your father asked for your opinion on every decision setting up this new version of your father-daughter relationship as partners and equals, knowing the two of you were really the only ones you could trust. You’d gone through everything the two of you did that day, why hadn’t you two gotten sick? You figured it out before the authorities did that it was probably flour. The only common thing you and your dad had done was not eat something with flour. Even six years later you think about what might have happened if you had eaten the cookie and gotten sick or if you and your dad had decided to order pizza instead of just eating popcorn and got sick. 

You raided the market for non-perishable goods first, then houses. You stepped over bodies, infected and not. You gathered a hell of a lot of gas and stuff for your farm animals. Living off of your land and what you could find was hard, but after you heard about what was going on in the local QZs you were glad you and your father decided to stay.

You were already pretty outdoorsy, but your father taught you even more. You had your own gun now, you practiced throwing knives in your spare time, and you helped with the butchering now and again. You tried to stay good, it’s what your mom would have wanted, so the occasional straggler was given a meal and a place to sleep for the night before “gently” being told to get on their way. You rarely ran into infected, but when you did, you killed them with ease. Your dad hated when you wouldn’t let him do it. He was still trying to preserve some kind of innocence he thought was left in you.

You can’t lie to yourself, the apocalypse and the world shutting down requiring you to work more combined with the fact you had just gotten older had given you the looks you wished you had at 14. You could tell by the way men looked at you when they stopped by your house, and because you weren’t blind. You were 20 now, your body was now fully developed, your hair was long, you’d gotten slightly taller, and your body was thinner and more toned. 

You and your dad decided to do one of your rare visits to town to find some cars to get gas out of and maybe check in with the people and make sure they’re doing okay. Out of everyone left in Hazel, you were significantly better off than most people because of the farm and just being more able bodied. There weren’t a lot of families in Hazel, most of them were in the next town over, so it was a lot of middle to late aged people just doing what they could and trading with you and your dad for food. You certainly weren’t living luxuriously or comfortably per say, but your worries were certainly less than others.

Your dad headed into one of the antique shops on main street to see if they still had anything of value. You both ignored the fact this was where your mom worked, and that you’d searched this one hundreds of times, rarely finding anything, and you were only here because it made you feel closer to her. Then you saw them, straight in front of you. A group of people you’d never seen before. They’d just walked out of what used to be the local bar and it looks like they found a stash the other people in town had either been saving or hadn’t found yet. The man at the front of the group noticed you first then said something to the others that made them look your way. It immediately made you worry, you’re used to taking one, maybe two people in for a night but not… 8.

“Dad?” You called softly trying not to give off that you were scared but with enough urgency that he came out immediately. He too noticed what you had seen and that they were headed right towards you.

“Fuck,” he said taking his gun out from behind his back and holding it down at his side, as did you.

“Well hellooo there,” the man who was in front said with a bit of a southern accent, “who might we have here to bless us?”

“Mike, how about you?” your father said and you smirked.

“Well I’m Ryan, and we’re just a group of people trying to get by, you think you could help us with that?” You scanned over the group of them, out of the 8 only 2 were female, but they all looked set to kill you and your father at any second. But there were two men in the back, however, who looked uncomfortable. They looked similar enough to be at least related, maybe brothers. One was taller and more well built than the other who was only slightly shorter but skinnier and with more defined muscles but you could tell they could both pick you up one handed and throw you down with ease. The taller one definitely caught your eye the longest, he looked like he’d seen some things.

“That depends, what exactly do you want from us?” Your father did the talking and like always you did the observing.

“Some food to start, our location, and maybe something fun for later,” Ryan said, eyeing you. Bold. Now you had to speak up.

“I don’t know what you had in mind but I can guarantee my idea of fun and yours may not be the same,” you said softly but not unstrong. You can sense that he doesn’t like hearing no so you’ll at least be gentle about it.

“Oh please enlighten me,” he said, taking a step toward you. You took a step toward him.

“I like to throw knives, and I can think of a target I could practice with, if it's not too small,” you say, giving him a sweet smile. The other members of the group giggle and this Ryan guy backs off.

“Aren’t you just a sweet peach,” he said sarcastically.

“Now, we can help with the food and location, but if you’re going to stay here you’re going to follow our rules. Got it?” You said.

“Now what makes you think we’re gonna wanna abide by that?” Ryan says.

“Because you wouldn’t be asking us for help if you didn’t need it, and looks to me like this girl over here is coming down with something so you need medication too. I can also tell that you all are longing for a good night's rest and haven’t eaten well in a few days, so if you want any of that, you're gonna listen to us.” Your observations seemed to sway them because soon enough they were in the bed of your dad’s pickup and you were headed back to your house.

— 

You all exchanged information and food. They snarfed their meals and you couldn’t blame them. You learned most of them were from Texas but a few were from Louisiana and Mississippi. They were traveling north, apparently the QZs in the bigger cities like Boston and Philadelphia were doing better than the Kentucky ones so they were trying to make it there because life in the open was getting harder and harder. You learned that the FEDRA people had finally developed a test for cordyceps that pinched you in the neck and the reader would light up green or red. But the most thought provoking thing you learned was about raiders and FEDRA raids. You and your dad had thought the FEDRA raids were over, but apparently they were still going out on random raids to try to collect people. Not things or supplies, people. And then killing them because dead people can’t get infected. But the sound of raiders just terrified you. You figured the people in front of you were raiders of a sort but they seemed to be on the better end of what’s out there.

“We only kill if they attack us first, raiders kill first,” a woman named Sasha said. You looked at your dad and you could see the thoughts crossing his mind. We won’t be safe from any of that. 

“If you think it would be best, you’re welcome to join us. Your food supplies should get us most of the way there and if we can ride in your truck it would help us get there faster. Try to find better lives for all of us,” another guy whose name you haven’t been told yet said.

“Yeah, that’s a good idea Blake, but we’ll have to let them think about it,” Ryan said in response. 

You looked at your dad shrugging your shoulders slightly, “It’s not a bad idea, we’ll eventually run out of things here and one dry season and that's it.” Your dad looks at you slowly and you try to communicate with your eyes what you’re really thinking. It’s an opportunity to get out of here with actual able bodied help to maybe find somewhere easier.

“Okay,” he says to you first, “okay,” he says again directed at Ryan.

You picked up some of the dishes and headed into the kitchen to start washing them. You quickly grabbed the extra soap from the pantry and a common thought of yours crossed your mind, that you didn’t have to open the door anymore. You heard footsteps behind you and who you expected to be your father was actually the two men you had guessed were brothers, carrying the other dishes. 

“Oh, well thanks…” you said, a little surprised.

“Yeah, no problem,” the younger one said with a real southern drawl you hadn’t heard in a long time, “I’m Tommy by the way. And this is my older brother…”