Chapter 11: Thank You

I woke up to find that Christian was not here and I was in a dark room all alone. The door was still locked and there was a bar still blocking the doorway. Where did he go? The room wasn't that big and you could see the full room from the light that was shining at the bottom of the door.

I was a bit scared to walk out of the door because I could hear something on the edge of the gas station that sounded like the dead walking around. I wondered if Christian was okay, clearly he had gotten out himself because the door was jammed shut, and locked and he was nowhere to be seen in the room.

I looked around one more time and then just stayed quite. I hoped that he was okay, maybe I needed to stop getting so worried about everything like he had told me.

But I couldn't forget about last night. Maybe someone had been watching us yesterday and they saw us go into the gas station. Maybe they took him in the night, I was a very deep sleeper.

The more I thought about it to more scared I became, and the closer and closer the dead was to walking up to my door.

Maybe he could hear me shivering from the other room because of how scared I was. It was by no means cold at all. I knew that the dead had amazing hearing. There was no way it could open the door but at the same time I was still thinking about it in my head. I also didn't know if it got in if I would be able to kill it. I pulled my machete out from the other side of the table and began to start pulling down the log that was in the door.

Suddenly I heard it get even closer, I knew that it had heard me at this point. I had too kill it, I had to get out of the room. If Christian was dead I would have to find my way back to the community. Shannon probably would blame it on me and I would lose my job and maybe even be cast out. I knew if I was Angela would come with me. That's exactly what Shannon would want.

"Kid, unlock the door, you gotta be up at this point... I went all the way to cook the squirrel and back." I heard Christians voice from the other side of the door. I was thankful because I wasn't too sure I could kill it if was actually one of the dead. I quickly broke the rest of the log and then unlocked the door for him.

He opened the door and then tossed me a squirrel, I was a bit hungry, all we had to eat last night were some beans, he had told me we couldn't go to burn the other 2 squirrels, the dead would see that. It made sense, but now I was so hungry I didn't care what I was eating.

At this point now that we were going to eat the final cans of beans we would have to go back no matter what. Unless Christian had other spots where he had squirrels. But I didn't want to eat all squirrels, they were really nasty I would just have to get over eating this one because I was so hungry.

"Alright kid, so you made the promise to take out my family. We are going to head in that direction and see if I can't get you to kill one of them. If not then we have neighbors, I never really was a fan of them." He said to me. I was a bit confused because we had to get back to the community and warn them. If there was really another group and they were coming after us we had to notify them as soon as possible.

"Don't we have to get back to the community? We have to warn everyone." I said to him. He shook his head and then finished eating the last of his squirrel. Then he began opening up the can of beans.

"Kid its like I said, it would probably take them months to get here." He responded to me. I guess it made sense but the sooner the better right? And we didn't know how long ago they had killed the wanderer and warrior.

I then realized I was a bit stupid, at the same time of thinking that. Clearly the lady had only been dead for a few days. But also at the same time what if the group was nearby. Another stupid thought I realized, the community searched a 20 mile radius pretty often and the other group had died at a while ago. Shannon had already sent everyone to search around in case all of the conspiracies were true.

I finished the rest of my squirrel and then got up to look around the gas station. I didn't see or hear anything nearby thankfully. But at the same time I kind of wanted to, that way I could show Christian that I actually could do what he had asked me to do.

I heard Christian get up from behind me. He then walked over to me and put his hand on my shoulder. He was looking around the area like me but I knew that his mind, much like mine was in a different spot right now. He finally began to speak.

"You don't wanna eat some beans before we head off kid?" He asked me. I shook my head, we needed to be careful with our rations, he had to realize that too. He took his hand off of my shoulder. I turned around. "Why not kid? Surely you are hungry from last night right?"

"Well we might not get anything on the way back. Unless you have another bunch of squirrels nearby." I said looking at him. But he just shook my head and then moved out of the room. I followed him.

"Alright so we have to first, head off towards my old neighborhood. Then hopefully we find one, I don't want to have to kill my neighbors even though I didn't like them, if we have to I suppose so though." He said to me. I looked around once again hoping that we could get this done as soon as possible. "Alright kid, odds are we wont find one, so just follow me."

"Alright, I am ready, I can do this." I said out loud. I meant it basically to myself though. I had tried but I had failed everytime, Christian had shown me the areas, I could do it for sure this time though. I cleared all my bad thoughts from my head. That would make it to where I would not be able to kill one of them for sure.

We then began to head off as Christian nodded at me to make sure I was ready. I nodded back at him and then we left the gas station and began heading towards a different road that we had come from in the first place.

Which made sense, we weren't going straight to her place, hence the reason why we slept at the gas station. I felt bad for even saying yes. I don't even think I could do it in the first place, I didn't want to get his hopes up and let him down.

We had been walking for about an hour and Christian stopped me, we had been through a few neighborhoods so I wasn't too sure that we were at the place or whether he say one for me to kill. I then noticed the reason why he stopped me.

"We are here... They are everywhere though, I don't think I can do this all by myself... We are going to have to sneak in and somehow kill one at the same time." He told me. I stayed quiet, I really didn't know what to say... If we took one down wouldn't the others hear us? And wouldn't they hear us? I had so many questions and I didn't want to look weak by asking all of them to Christian.

"Won't they hear us?" I asked him. He just shook is shoulders up like he didn't know. I wasn't too sure I wanted to find out either. "I think we should do this another time, I just want to catch one, there's nearly 100 here."

"Kid if we don't to this now, the next places I take you wont be anywhere near here. Im supposed to train you to multiple areas, you are supposed to have multiple skill sets. I don't think we will have another chance any time soon. So tell me now or we are leaving, it is a bit crazy here so I wouldn't blame you.

"Okay... We can try." I said to him. He nodded and we left the house that was presumably his. We were walking around to find a small pack of just one. We were walking slowly and as quite as possible that way none would hear us. We were lucky so far that none if them saw us, maybe they thought that we were dead too.

He stopped me and nodded to one, there were no others nearby thankfully. Maybe I could kill it and none of them would hear me. We then began heading towards the small pile that the dead was stuck in. This would be fairly easy, it wouldn't be like any of the others, there was no way this one could fight back at me.

Once we were close I opened my machete from out of my belt. I then looked at it, a bit scared, this wasn't like the other ones, if they heard this then we were screwed. Christian nudged me and then nodded for me to continue. I picked up my machete and then looked at the direction the Christian had told me to chop it with the sword.

I then chopped on it. It was a clean swipe exactly where it needed to go and the dead fell back and didn't respond. I easily stuck the machete from out of the head. I looked at the blood all over it and then a turned to Christian. He had a smile on his face and nodded at me.

"I got it!" I said sort of loud. Christian then pulled out his sword. I had realized my mistake, and how dumb I was, there were so many around us.

"Kid, shut up!" Christian whispered to me. I wasn't sure if maybe they had actually heard me but then I saw a few pulling out from the other side of a few houses. They were heading right towards us. My worst fears had now become a reality. "Come on kid, we have to get out of here, lets go to my place, once we are there we will find out after that."

I nodded and then we began running towards his house. It was about a block away and there were so many of them in the way. We began running even faster, there were so of them there was no way we could get through them. Even more were turning around, even if we made it in, the way out was going to be impossible.

Christian pushed through a few and I kept on running through the path that he was making for me. They were so close to me and if I wasn't fast enough one could stop me. If one stopped me then I was screwed, they all would push through to me.

We were so close there were only a few more and Christian was already through all of them and he was right near the front porch. I was about to pass through the last one when it all of the sudden put its hand on my foot. I stopped in my path, it was surprisingly strong, and I yelled at Christian for help.

All of the sudden I heard a loud noise and the dead stopped pulling me towards it. I realized that it was Christians gun and I pulled up from the ground and ran towards him.

He opened the front door for me and we both ran in. I fell to the ground, that had tired me out so much and I felt like I was about to die I was so exhausted. Christian looked at me fairly upset at me.

"Kid, I told you they had amazing hearing. You let one hear you, the rest follow their path. You almost got us both killed." He told me. I felt bad, I had almost just ended my short time that I had spent out here. It actually happened a lot to people who were trained to be warriors. A lot of warriors just died trying to save someone else. That's the reason they were there in the first place.

"I'm sorry, I was just so excited that I had finally gotten my first kill I didn't even think about any of them hearing me." I said to him. He shook his head and then laid on a chair nearby. I followed him and then hopped on the couch.

"Well at least you got your first kill... But it might also be your last one. We are screwed... You hear all of those pulling into the walls?" He said to me. I realized I had heard all of the dead just pushing against the walls. There had to be at least 50 if not even more. I just close my eyes, hoping that they would just leave but I knew they wouldn't at least for a few days.

Suddenly I heard some scratching on the wall right beside me. It scared me, it was inside the house which meant that one of them was in here with us. I then realized how dumb I was, of course it was Christians wife, not his kid because he said his kid was just a few months old.

I could tell that Christian had heard it too because his head was hanging very low. This was the reason we were here. If we were going to die, I would at least have to do my mission.

"Kid, its time... I need you to do this, I may seem like I am strong... I am not strong enough to do this." He said to me. I nodded and then went over to him. It seemed a bit weird to be doing it to a guy like this but I just gave him a big hug.

He then got up from the chair and followed me to the room right beside us. The door was closed, the dead didn't know how to open doors so we would be fine in that aspect. He had his head lowered all the way over to the door. He was just looking down so sad.

"Alright, I will go in there... Do you want to go in there to see it, or in case i need help? I've only killed one of them." I said to him. He just sat there not responding and I wasn't even too sure if he had heard me in the first place. "Christian did you here me?"

"No, no, I cant, you've got this kid. I believe in you. My heart and my soul would just break if I saw my wife... Much less my 6 month year old kid." He said to me. I nodded and then held my breath for a few moments. I didn't even know if I was ready to do something like this myself.

I could hear it scratching at the door because it could clearly here us talking. I looked at Christian but he just had his eyes closed. I felt bad for him, it heart me for even saying yes or even doing this. I couldn't imagine the thoughts going through his head at this moment. I hope he didn't hate me or feel upset about me for doing this.

I finally decided I was ready, if I was going to open the door Id have to bust it down, that way it would hopefully fall to the ground or fall back a little. I couldn't just barely open the door because then I wouldn't even be able to get in at all.

I pushed myself against the door opening it at the same time. But it was actually super easy to open. And when I opened the door I looked around confused because there were no dead around. Each direction there wasn't one that came after me.

All of the sudden I heard a bit of a grunt from the left side of me. I turned around and then realized my mistake. It wasn't actually at the door it was just next too the door. It jumped on top of me and I fell over.

"Christian help me!" I yelled. I saw him look up but then he just cried when he saw his wife on me. I was trying to push her off of me but she was surprisingly actually really strong. She began biting against me and I pushed her back a little bit. She got on my legs and began biting.

I heard Christian just crying from the other room. I could really use his help in this situation but I didn't blame him. His wife then bit into my leg, i jumped and pushed her off of me, I didn't feel any pain but I was pretty sure she had bitten me. Usually when you got hurt you didn't feel pain for a short amount of time.

I knew it was going to pop in at some point soon. I picked up my machete from off of the ground and ran over to her. I was pissed, at Christian for not helping me, but also her because I might have just lost my life.

I shoved my sword into one of the right spots in the skull and then pulled it out, she laid down on the ground dead. Christian continued crying and I just went over and closed the door. Now I would have to look at my leg just to make sure and then I would to kill his baby son that was crawling in the crib beside me.

I looked down at my pants and saw I hole in them. I almost wanted to cry but then I noticed that there were no marks and no blood. Thankfully she had only bitten through the jeans. I would live to fight another day in this cruel cold world. I then got up and went to the crib that his young child was laying in.

I could here it groaning, and I felt terrible even thinking about it. I closed my eyes, if I had to do something like this to Liam I would be absolutely broken.

I knew that it wasn't a normal person anymore, its life form had gone long past that. At this point the kid would be 10, and the dead that was in that crib was no older than just a few months. I picked up my machete.

Thinking once again about Liam, I wasn't sure if I could do this. I had to do it for Christian though. I pushed my machete into the young childs skull closing my eyes doing it. I felt so awful and I felt so broken. I had just killed someone that could have had a life, but had died way too young.

I heard it crush into the young childs skull and I began crying, I then could here Christian cry even louder from the other room. He knew what I was doing right now and I felt so terrible for him.

I continued leaving my eyes close and I pulled my machete from out of the young kids skull. I then turned around and opened my eyes. I looked at the blood of the young child and Christians wife sitting there on my machete. I almost wanted to just through it threw the window but I knew that would just let the dead in.

I felt broken, but doing something like that would only make me stronger. I wasn't scared of the dead anymore, I knew they used to be just normal people but they weren't anymore. I put the machete back into my belt and then opened the door to the room.

Christian had left the hallway and I heard him crying from the room that we were in earlier. I felt so awful for having to do something like that and I hoped that he would not think bad things about me.

I had just done what he had asked me to do. I walked into the other room and he was just sitting in the chair and tears were all over his face. I pulled into him and gave him another hug.

I felt awful for it, but those things were not people anymore... I just had to keep that mindset. I wouldn't be killing them if they were. He looked up and then just looked straight at me. He just looked completely broken.

"I couldn't have done that myself Ben, I may be strong but not strong enough for that... Thank you."