Resolve

After everything that happened at the school, the teens ran until their legs burned not stopping until the world went quiet again.

Luckily for them, it isn't overrun with zombies.

Yet.

They found a seemingly ran down house on dark and abandoned, its windows dusted with ash and silence.

They kept low, moving in the shadows, checking every corner. No movement. No sound. Just the distant echo of screams that didn't belong to anyone they knew.

The front door was locked.

Without a word, Riley nodded to Blake, and he wrapped his hoodie sleeve around his fist and with one sharp crack glass shattered. They froze. Listened.

No growls. No footsteps.

Only then did they slip inside, one by one, careful not to let the broken glass drag beneath their shoes.

They could finally breathe.

Riley dropped to the floor first, back against the wall, legs sprawled. Blake followed, sitting hard, chest heaving. Maya sat with her knees to her chest, trembling. Oliver paced a few steps before stopping, hands on his head like he could squeeze the panic out.

It was the kind of silence that made your ears ring. Like the world had just been punched in the chest and hadn't exhaled yet.

Maya stared at the concrete floor. "Why….w-why is this happening here TO US," she says frantically and fumbling over her words

Oliver mumbled, "Does it matter?" fearing his own answer.

Blake hadn't said a word.

He was still trying to wrap his head around it all of it. Tyson's face melting. The voice, repeating those broken words. That thing pretending to be Mr. Kelter. The blood on his hands wasn't his, but it might as well have been.

He swallowed hard. Thought about Nathan.

Two days ago they were side-by-side at practice, Nathan talking shit like always, throwing half-assed punches at his ribs during water breaks. Calling him "Captain Serious."

Saying dumb stuff like, "If the world ended tomorrow, I'd still beat your ass at 2K."

Now the world was ending.

And Nathan was nowhere.

Maya looked over at Blake. "He wouldn't just leave us."

Blake nodded, jaw tight. "He didn't."

Riley stood up, quietly rummaged through a pile of old gear in the corner and saw tarp, busted folding chairs, a broken broomstick, and a half-empty toolbox. She grabbed the hammer.

"Grab what you can use," she said. "We're not waiting for help. No one's coming."

Blake didn't move at first. Then he stood. Grabbed the broken broom handle and started taping the rusted screwdriver to one end using old electrical tape and a strip of shirt. Not because it was smart. Because he needed something in his hands. Something sharp.

Oliver stared. "You actually think that's gonna do anything?"

"I don't care," Blake said. "I'm not dying empty-handed."

They went quiet again.

No one wanted to say what they were all thinking: Nathan should be here.

He should've been the one cracking jokes. The one pulling Maya out of her spiral. The one Blake could look at and just know what to do.

Instead, there was just that ache, the kind that makes you check your phone even though you know there's no service.

Blake did it anyway. Opened the screen. His messages to Nathan still sat there.

"u good?"

"text me back, dumbass."

"Nate. Seriously."

Unread.

"Fuck." he said his voice cracking slightly and tears would threaten to leave his eyes

He turned away so no one would see his eyes get wet.

Maya's voice broke the silence. "We're going to his house."

Oliver spun. "What? Why? We don't even know if he's"

"He's our friend," Maya snapped. Her voice cracked on the word. "And he disappeared before all this started. That's not nothing."

"We don't know what we'll find," Riley said carefully.

"Exactly," Blake said, voice low." "We don't know. And if it was any one of us, he'd already be on his way."

Maya nodded. "I can't just sit here wondering if he's out there. Or if he's… worse."

Riley looked away. "And what if we find him, but he's one of them?"

No one answered right away.

"I'll know," Blake said finally. "I'll know if it's him."

They let the weight of that hang in the air.

Then an old janked up radio crackled from inside the house.

Blake turned it up. and it spoke:

"…all sectors breached… symptoms: aggression, vacant stare, loss of identity, vocal repetition of familiar phrases…"

"…subjects may display partial cognitive functions, may retain language, enhanced physical abilites , recognition… do not interpret this as recovery…"

"…treat all exposures as fatal… there is no cure… repeat, no cure…"

Then static.

Then screaming.

Then silence again.

Maya stared at the floor. "They're not sick."

"No," Riley said. "They're fucking zombies."

Blake gripped the handle of his makeshift weapon tighter. "So we don't hesitate. If we have to put someone down…"

His voice cracked.

"If we have to put him down… we do it clean."

They all stood. Not because they wanted to. Because there was nothing else left.

They packed quickly.

Hammers, taped-up blades, duct-taped flashlight handles. Riley handed Maya a rusted box cutter she found wedged behind a crate.

"Don't flinch," she said.

"I won't," Maya whispered.

Blake went forward and then he froze

He'd cracked the front door open just a sliver. Just enough to peek.

What he saw made the blood drain from his face.

A zombie stood directly in front of the door.

No eyes.

Skin bubbled and split around its sockets like they'd been clawed out.

It swayed. Listening. Sniffing the air.

Blake stepped back too fast, accidentally dropping his weapon and his foot scraped against the tile.

The zombie twitched toward the sound.

He moved to the right turning himself against the wall fast, hand over his mouth.

The creature dashed straight at the doorframe, slamming into it so hard it cracked the wood. Its arms reached in, swiping through the gap, clawing blindly with inhuman speed.

It felt like time had stopped as the creature sniffed and looked around.

As she backed up, Riley would end up bumping into a table alerting it.

The zombie launched at her, claws flashing. she barely dodged with a piece of hair being cut. Slicing the wall with its sharp nails.

Riley would look up at the drooling monster as saliva would fall on top of her hair.

She would hold her mouth to be the quietest she could as sweat would trickle down her face.

Everyone was frozen. Until Oliver made his choice.

He looked at Blake, then at the others and said:

"HEY! I'M RIGHT HERE, MOTHERFUCKER!" he roared.

The creature reacted instantly, charging through the gap with inhuman speed, slashing forward.

Oliver ducked just in time. The zombie's claws shredded his glasses. A literal millimeter more and he'd be blind.

"HAMMER!" Riley shouted, tossing it.

Blake caught it mid-run, already closing the distance. He slammed it into the back of the thing's skull — hard enough to knock it sideways, but not kill it.

It shrieked. Saliva sprayed.

It spun, raking its claws across Blake's arm, tearing fabric and flesh.

"FUCK!" Blake stumbled back, blood slicking his sleeve.

The zombie lunged again but Oliver was already there. He stabbed the zombie with a swing of the weapon blake had dropped and kicked it back as it stumbled and fell,

Straight toward Maya.

She hesitated. Just for a breath.

Then her face hardened.

She grabbed the hammer from the floor and drove it down once but it wasn't enough. The thing thrashed.

She screamed and hit it again. And again. Until bone cracked and blood sprayed her hoodie.

"Maya-!" Riley yanked her off.

The zombie lay still. Head split open. Jaw twitching, then finally still.

They all stood there.

Panting. Bleeding. Staring.

Maya was shaking. "I almost froze. If I had… if I didn't…"

Blake stepped toward her and put a hand on her shoulder. "You didn't freeze."

No one spoke for a while.

They exited out of the back deciding to duck behind the houses and traverse that way instead of going out on the streets.

"We're going to his house," Blake muttered.

The others didn't argue as they were already moving

To Nathan Sloan's house.