

DEAD CHAOS

Book 1 of the Dead Chaos series

Ryan & April Brookshire

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2013 by Ryan & April Brookshire

**ISBN-13:** 978-1301238798

All right reserved

www.aprilbrookshire.net

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**CHAPTER ONE**

"Do you think only the white trash zombies congregate at K-Mart?" Alexi asked quietly while peering through his binoculars at the scene across the street.

I held back a smile as not to encourage him, but couldn't resist teasing him. "Oh yeah, the high class ones prefer Target."

"Shut up you two," Viktor ordered the both of us, clearly annoyed.

True to character, Alexi always bended the rules and simply lowered his voice to a whisper. "I'm telling you guys, we should hit up Walmart. The pickings are better."

"There are too many of them there. We'd be the pickings," Viktor responded while pulling out his billhook machete.

"I can put out that many," I informed my older brother. Although, this was something he well knew.

Viktor shook his head, frowning in thought. "Not worth the risk, Anya. Better to hit this place first."

Our dad and Viktor had already decided on the K-Mart in this town, so that was the way it'd be. They lead and the rest of us minions followed. Five years older than me, Viktor's opinion mattered more to our dad than mine and Alexi's.

Even if I was considered the _talent_ in the family.

I couldn't blame my dad when it came to my brother Alexi, though. Alexi was seventeen going on seven. The only reason Alexi sat on this roof with us instead of a few blocks over where Kyle, Justin and my dad were about to start the fireworks was because Viktor was on a recent mission to toughen our younger brother up. Alexi had guts in spades. It was his lack of brains that was worrisome.

Viktor stared intently at his watch. "Three, two, one." The explosion from the west lit the sky brighter than the rising sun in the opposite direction. My dad, Kyle and Justin would be circling around to meet us here, having now provided the distraction.

Our gazes drifted back to the K-Mart parking lot. It worked as expected. Like a flock of birds, the dead headed toward the smoky sky. From our rooftop perch my brothers and I patiently, and not so patiently in Alexi's case, waited for the zombie herd to clear out. It was slow moving, comparable to watching a group of toddlers waddle in a race. Partially brain dead or not, zombies were competitive when it came to dinner time. The first-come, first-served saying came to mind. The early bird gets the intestine. I'd even seen one zombie unintentionally maim another to feast first. If only they'd start eating _each other_ , life would be much easier.

The biters who'd been least damaged before death were at the front of the pack. _Alpha zombies_ were what we'd nicknamed them, the ones you had to most watch out for. Then there were the stragglers, the ones who'd been gnawed on before they'd died and turned undead cannibal. Missing limbs or massive amounts of flesh and muscle resulted in the cripples. Looking through my binoculars, I saw an infected male down in the middle of the parking lot trying to stand up. Hard to do when you're armless. Another zombie with the opposite problem was desperately trying to catch up to the herd, dragging her legless body along on two arms.

I could almost imagine her saying, _Wait up, guys!_

"Like the freaking Special Olympics down there," Alexi commented with a chuckle.

I bit back my own laugh. "You're just _wrong_ , Alexi." Then to Viktor, I said, "Told you dropping him on his head would have lifelong effects."

Like usual, Viktor took the high road.

"And . . . we're good to go," Viktor announced confidently as legless rounded the corner of a building.

I followed Viktor and Alexi down the service ladder, leaping past the last few rungs onto the pavement. Before we set out to conquer K-Mart, we each readied with a weapon in hand. Along with handguns strapped at his ribs and thighs, Viktor carried a billhook machete in his right hand.

"Search and destroy, bitches," Alexi boasted. His shotgun was strapped to his back along with a modified Louisville slugger. Modified, as in he'd driven large nails through it and sheathed it in an aluminum pipe when not in use. Gripped in both hands, he carried a katana sword. He always did love Leonardo from the Ninja Turtles as a kid. I wouldn't be surprised if he started wearing a blue bandana.

Along with handguns strapped onto both thighs, I always had with me my trusty tactical tomahawk. Removing the nylon sheath, I admired the black axe head on one side and spike on the other. _A lady never leaves home without it._

It took almost five minutes to get to the broken out K-Mart entrance. Viktor tended to be overly cautious when it came to raids, secret weapon or not. Now that the zombies were cleared out, what remained was a parking lot with faded yellow paint dividing the spaces, littered with stray debris. The lone tumbleweed near the store entrance added just the right touch of desolation.

As we passed by armless, he began making a guttural sound and attempted rolling our way. The going was slow, to say the least. Alexi couldn't help himself. He stopped five feet away from the zombie, crouching down and enticing it with his living flesh. "Here, boy, come and get it."

Viktor grabbed Alexi by the scruff of his neck and dragged him to his feet.

It made me sad that human beings were reduced to this state. If you died, you become mindless and obsessed with eating live flesh. If you didn't die, you fought every day not to become one of the mindless. We were luckier than most, though, because we had _me_.

The moaning coming from inside the store warned us of the remaining stragglers. They'd be spread throughout the large store, but all within my radius. I'd also be taking out the undead in nearby buildings.

"Okay, secret weapon," Alexi murmured. "Time to drop 'em."

I began to chant.

"Stop fooling around, Anya, and get on with it," Viktor demanded in that superior tone big brothers tended to master.

"Fine," I gritted out. If you asked me, the chanting added a certain mystique to my abilities, gibberish or not. Really, only a few moments of concentration and visualization did the trick. I didn't know why I was able to do it or where it came from.

Connecting with the undead I felt around me, I let the feelings of despair and emptiness gather. The very essence of death. Using their aura, I turned it back on the infected, releasing a wave of energy which incapacitated them.

"Done."

"You sure?" Viktor asked.

I gave him a condescending look. "Do you hear any moaning or crashing about?" Yeah, being a necromancer tended to come in handy during a zombie apocalypse. Viktor was already giving me his back and entering the store. "You're welcome!" I called out to him.

"You know what the moaning reminds me of?" Alexi asked me with a twinkle in his green eyes.

"Um, ravenous zombies?"

"Nope." From the way Alexi was having trouble holding back his laughter, I knew the immaturity level of his next words would rate highly. "The sounds Viktor makes from his and Melanie's room at night when they think everyone is asleep."

Busting up laughing, I held a hand over my mouth to muffle it. As Viktor glared at us over his shoulder, I told Alexi, "That's so gross!"

Alexi's smile was sly in response. "Not when it's Melanie that's-"

A kick to his shin ended that conversation. I didn't know what was worse, my little brother talking about sex or my little sister mooning over cute boys. Maturity couldn't come fast enough for those two. Unfortunately, in Alexi's case it may never come.

We had only the sunlight filtering in through the front of the store to light our way. The three of us each grabbed a shopping cart. I grabbed a different one when my first choice was squeaky and went about the serious business of shoplifting.

I encountered an out of commission corpse on aisle three. Its small size made me avoid closer inspection. You never get used to seeing children like that. Pushing my cart around it, I cleared out all the honey, white rice, powdered milk and other items that thankfully lasted forever. Oh, how I wish cereal never expired, especially the sweet kind. A year after the world ended, I learned a hard lesson from eating expired food. Alexi was right there with me, sick all night. Thank god that when we got our hands on the right ingredients we could still make pizza.

After finishing up in grocery, I went to the health and beauty section for the item number one on my little sister's list. Tampons. She'd just gotten her first period and was acting like the biggest diva over it. While there, I also loaded up on toothbrushes, toothpaste and an abundance of hygiene items I'd be tossing everyone's way. The mostly empty condom section let me know Viktor had already been through here. Or maybe in wishful thinking, Alexi stocked up. Either way . . . disgusting.

Along with a couple more corpses, I ran into Kyle on aisle nineteen. My boyfriend had been with my dad and Justin when the explosion went off, but grabbed a cart and joined us in our shopping spree. His cart was loaded with flashlights, lanterns and apparently the store's entire stock of batteries.

After a quick peck on my cheek, Kyle pointed to the corpses on the linoleum floor. "Good job, babe."

I shrugged as if it were no big deal, which was kind of true at this point. "The guys should be finishing up. Ready to meet them up front?"

"Sure, but can we stop and grab me a new pair of shoes?" Kyle's current pair of hiking boots was looking a little worn out.

"Okay, but don't you want to wait until we go to a good store? K-Mart shoes will probably give you blisters."

"It'll be good to have a backup pair, just in case we don't make it to any better stores for awhile."

Thinking this was maybe a good idea, I grabbed an assortment of shoes for the rest of our small group. My little sister's feet were still growing, so I grabbed a half-size up from last time.

By now, our dad and Justin should be on the same rooftop perch we'd occupied before, waiting for us to signal them to come pick us up. When we got to the front of the store, Viktor and Alexi were already bagging their loot. Kyle helped me bag mine first, then we did his, double bagging the heavier items. I got two more kisses in the process and annoyed looks from my two brothers.

Viktor was the one to step out into the parking lot and wave for pickup. My dad and Justin would drive the truck and Suburban over for us to load up. After six years and lots of experience, both good and bad, we had the routine down to perfection.

At the sound of approaching vehicles, Viktor's head whipped to the side and he backed into the store. His vehement, " _Shit_ ," alarmed the rest of us.

"What is it?" Kyle grabbed Viktor's arm to get his attention.

"Strangers," he told us with a grim look. "Two fast approaching trucks entering the east entrance to the parking lot."

We saw what he was talking about when a newer and an older truck with rusted Texas plates screeched to a halt in the handicapped parking area. I only got a good view of one of the drivers, a scuzzy-looking, bearded white guy. However, I could just make out a passenger sitting next to him. It looked like the other truck also held two men. Hopefully, they wouldn't cause us any trouble, but history told a different story.

"Maybe they don't know we're here," Alexi whispered.

"Doubtful," Viktor answered. "They were probably scoping us out while we were scoping out the store. Or they heard the explosion and that's how they found us."

From our position, one truck was parked diagonally alongside the other. The men filed out of the pickups so they were between the two vehicles, using them as shields. Which put us at a disadvantage. My dad and Justin wouldn't have a clear shot of them with their sniper rifles and we were in the same predicament.

"Throw down your weapons and come out with your hands up!" a gruff, accented voice yelled out to us. Of course they knew we had weapons. Who didn't nowadays?

Kyle made a scoffing sound. "How original, he even sounds like a cowboy."

We'd all pulled out guns by this point, hoping not to have to use them since the gunfire would attract the dead. Hell, we should've finished off the corpses playing dead in the store. Usually we didn't bother wasting time if we were merely planning on getting in and out of some place quickly. Plus, we didn't like to unnecessarily get our weapons dirty. It wasn't the most fun of chores to wipe the gore from a blade. Pretty soon they'd start reanimating and it'd take awhile for my powers to juice up again. I was like a battery without a charge right now.

Kyle fingered the one of the grenades on his belt.

"Not yet," Viktor told him. "We'd have to leave behind the supplies. Let me call Levi first."

Levi was my dad. Viktor's too, since my dad adopted him as a little boy when he'd married our mother. Viktor just never got the hang of calling him anything other than Levi.

Viktor pulled out his walkie-talkie and set the volume low. "Levi, what do you think?" he curtly whispered.

"I think we shoot only if they're aggressive first, son," my dad replied, ever the pacifist.

"At least try to move into a better position," Viktor suggested.

Justin and my dad's figures could be seen scrambling atop the bank building a few hundred yards away in an effort to find a better vantage point. Without their help this might end up a real shootout. Just our luck, to get into a gunfight with what are probably former NRA members.

The Texans moved closer, and we could clearly see their weapons now. A tall one wearing a black cowboy hat was holding a sawn-off shotgun. The pocket-sized Mexican-looking one had a chrome-finished handgun with an ivory handle. _Real fancy gun you got there, partner_. I had a feeling the raised truck belonged to him. _Overcompensating, much?_ The other two were short and stocky white boys and, despite different facial hair, my guess would be twins. Their hunting rifles were identical too. How precious.

"Leave! We want no trouble!" Viktor bellowed.

"This ain't gonna be no trouble!" the little Mexican yelled back. His voice was the one from before, with its surprisingly strong Texan accent. He peeked at us over the truck, his tan cowboy hat almost appearing to float in midair. So he was their leader. Not what I would've guessed, considering the man wasn't tall enough to ride most roller coasters.

"If you come any closer we'll shoot you!" Viktor shouted, a bit of panic in his voice I hoped the cowboys couldn't detect.

"Give us the supplies n' the little gal and we'll let you be on your way," said their tiny brown leader. Irrationally, I wondered what was worth more to them, the _little gal_ or the big pile of goodies. Tough decision, I hadn't showered since yesterday and our loot was a modern-day goldmine.

I could feel Kyle tensing up and, out of the corner of my eye, saw him palming the grenade thoughtfully. Yeah, I was with him on that one. Aim for the huevos.

"Not happening! How about you leave and no one dies today?" Kyle bellowed this time.

"Yeah!" Alexi yelled in agreement. "Wouldn't want to blow any holes in those pretty cowboy hats, you fucking hillbillies!" I punched him in the arm to emphasize our need _not_ to antagonize said hillbillies. Alexi gave me an unrepentant scowl.

The cowboys could see they'd struck a nerve with us and started snickering and catcalling at me. Kyle had his thumb in the pin and was about to pull it when I saw something register in his eyes. He looked at me and nodded at the older truck behind the Texans.

I saw him now. The little eyes of a filthy, likely malnourished, boy were peering at the scene in trepidation from the beat up truck bed. A child of maybe eight years old, I didn't want to think of him in the hands of these animals. There would be no grenade after all.

At the same time, we could hear distant shuffling and stirring in the store behind us. The dead were awaking. There was no time for a pissing contest, with the degenerates to our front and the dead at our backs. Alexi, who'd been quiet since his earlier insult, stated the obvious, "We've got maybe a minute here."

The Mexican raised his gun and joked, "Boys, don't kill the señorita. I'm plannin' on making real nice. Always did like me a blonde." A moment later the ivory handled gun was lying on the pavement with Tex-Mex sprawled out beside it. My dad took his shot as soon as the little guy raised his gun. Paternal instincts outweighed pacifism every time. Good thing, because if someone hadn't shut Tex-Mex up, I would've thrown up my breakfast.

Obviously, it was then that all hell broke loose. The remaining cowboys panicked and began shooting immediately, one of the bullets hitting Kyle in the thigh. He let out a pained curse as he fell back onto the linoleum floor. All four of us took cover behind the customer service desk. Alexi and I pulled Kyle behind it and grabbed a t-shirt to bind his wound.

Viktor was shooting blindly to keep their concentration on us instead of the amateur snipers behind them. Like the zombie herd earlier, misdirection worked well with the hillbillies. My dad and Justin had already taken out another cowboy from their perch. The two cowboy brothers frantically tried to take cover in their truck, but Viktor hit the one in the driver's seat square between the shoulder blades.

Suddenly a hand was gripping my ankle. I turned and there was an amputee zombie staring up at me. Wearing a grungy white shirt and tacky tie, his name tag read _Jeffery_ and declared him the store manager. The place had really gone to hell under his management and I was amazed he was still hanging out here all these years later. Talk about dedication. He looked Indian, the dot kind, not the feather kind.

"Sorry, Jeff," I apologized, swinging my battle hatchet into his skull with a _thunk_ and wiping it off on his shirt. It'd get a more thorough cleaning later. I scanned the store and could see dead eyes approaching in the gloom of the aisles. The zombies were completely coherent now, well as much as a zombie could be, and once again on the prowl for flesh. A lot like Alexi would be in a strip club on the rare occasions we visited the Colorado Springs settlement. Not that my father allowed him to go to that skin factory. _Not until you're eighteen, son_.

The last cowboy started screaming at us from his truck, "Goddammit you killed Jimmy, you sons of bitches killed Jimmy!"

Not heartbroken in the least over Jimmy, Viktor yelled back, "Do you surrender?"

"The hell else am I gonna do?" the cowboy replied in a choked voice.

He cautiously climbed out of his Ford, hands raised and tears in his eyes. Alexi walked out, gun fixed on him, as Viktor and I helped Kyle out of the store. We'd have to go back in for the supplies after Kyle was situated.

"Viktor, there's a kid hiding in that truck bed," Kyle wheezily panted out.

Leaving Kyle to lean on me, Viktor walked over to the Ford and pulled out, by the back of his t-shirt, the most disgusting, ragged child I'd ever seen. And I'd seen Alexi in the first weeks after our mother died, when he was refusing to bathe. Cursing, kicking and screaming all the way to the ground, the little boy would give a trucker a run for his money. The threats didn't stop once he reached the ground and he seemed to be bilingual in swear words. Much to his grandmother's displeasure, Justin had taught Alexi and me all the good words to cuss in Spanish. Not that we dared when Paulina was around.

"I swear to God, I'll beat seven shades of shit outta ya!" screeched the little vagrant. Whatever the hell that meant.

"What do we do with him?" I asked Viktor, perfectly okay with putting the responsibility on his shoulders. _Daddy Victor_ , I thought humorously, but was wise enough not to say out loud.

"Beats me, we can't leave him here with this sociopath," he said, pointing to the cowboy still weeping on his knees about his dead brother as Alexi held a gun trained on him.

My dad and Justin pulled up in our vehicles and opened the tailgates to start loading supplies. Now that the drama was over, it was time to get back to our first order of business. My dad looked us over, starting with me as usual and giving Kyle a sympathetic look as he took in blood soaked cloth around his leg. "Not a bite?" he asked cautiously, taking Kyle's weight from me and guiding him toward the Suburban.

"No," I answered immediately. "Just the bite of a bullet."

The first of our zombie friends started creeping out of the entrance. In the distance we could see the throng returning, greater in numbers, no longer preoccupied by the earlier fireworks display. The gunshots surely got their attention and the attention of every undead around.

Alexi and I went to the entrance to take up the chore of clearing a path back to our supplies. Louisville Slugger and tomahawk were put to good use as my brother thrashed an infected mechanic in the forehead and I spiked a muumuu wearing housewife. My dad and Justin wheeled the shopping carts and loaded the supplies. Viktor, still trying to wrestle the kid into submission without hurting him, finally resorted to binding and gagging him before stuffing him into the backseat of the Suburban.

This did not go unnoticed by his ever-helpful siblings.

"Damn, it looks like Viktor finally met his match. Better water-board him when we get home. The way that kid's looking at you, he'll probably slit your throat in your sleep," Alexi smugly chimed.

Justin and my dad, snickering, closed up the back of the vehicles. As annoying as Alexi could be, it was hard not to encourage him when he was saying stuff to crack us up. Well, hard for everyone but Viktor. An angry and embarrassed Viktor looked even more austere than usual and Alexi was smart enough to stay out of his reach as he taunted him.

Kyle's makeshift tourniquet was completely saturated now. We had to get him to Melanie, and fast. Melanie was my brother Viktor's girlfriend and a former nursing student. She was a town over with my little sister, Riley, and Justin's grandma, Paulina, foraging for the peaches it was famous for.

We sped off at the safest speed possible, Viktor driving the truck and my dad driving the Suburban, leaving the grisly encounter behind. The last we saw of that cowboy was him running into the Grand Junction, Colorado K-Mart to escape the horde. At least his grieving period would be short.
CHAPTER TWO

"Can't leave them alone for a few hours without them getting themselves into a mess," my dad muttered as we looked down onto the scene below.

"I'm sure Riley did it," I responded and got a scolding look in return. Well, it was true. Knowing her, she probably saw a snake while they were picking fruit and let out a scream that brought the undead down upon them.

"Think they were after the wine or the grapes?" Viktor asked as he leaned against the highway railing. The small town that Interstate 70 ran above had a winery and inn that at one point in time must have been quaint. Now, with peeling yellow paint and overgrown vines, it was a sad sight. It hadn't been hard to find Paulina, Melanie and Riley. The sight of a couple dozen or so zombies in a furor surrounding the tasting room clued us in real fast.

Alexi and Justin got out of the truck and joined us. Alexi laughed at the sight. "I'm thinking Paulina looks too tasty up there for a distraction to work. Serve her up with some chips and salsa and they're good to go."

"Dude, that's my grandma. Serve _you_ up with some chips and salsa." Justin grimaced at his own lack of wit, while pushing up his slipping glasses. Not that he didn't have extra scavenged pairs in the leather fanny pack he always wore. At the end of the world everyone had that one item that was most precious to them. For Justin, with his bad eyesight, that was lenses that fit his prescription.

I still didn't know what my most precious thing was.

"Let's just start picking them off from here," Alexi suggested.

"And risk hitting the girls, dumbass?" Viktor shoved Alexi in the shoulder.

As we watched a zombie crawl out of the second story window in pursuit of Riley, Melanie kicked it in the head until it fell to the ground below. Several more were already trying to squeeze through the same broken out window.

Viktor let out a disgusted grunt. "Whatever we're going to do, let's speed it up."

"Load up and let's head down there to lend a hand. We'll drive back and forth in front of the building taking them out. Alexi and Justin will drive the vehicles while the rest of us shoot." My dad's plan was as good as any.

When I climbed back into the Suburban, Kyle immediately asked what the plan was. Once I'd explained it, he looked disgruntled at not being able to help out. Kyle never liked being kept out of the action. He and Viktor often took the initiative in situations like this.

When Alexi climbed behind the wheel, I had a vision of us crashing into the side of the building and being massacred by the horde. Good thing hardass Viktor was riding shotgun. Justin would drive the truck while my dad sat in the truck bed, shooting at targets.

Suicidal plan intact, we made our way down the highway off ramp and sped into the winery parking lot. Alexi, swerving to hit the straggling zombies like an idiot, incurred the wrath of Viktor. My older brother was already halfway hanging out the window and barely managed to avoid soaring from the vehicle altogether. I wondered what bothered him more, nearly getting thrown, or the fact that the last zombie splattered chunks in his face.

"What the hell, Alexi? That almost got in my mouth!" roared Viktor.

"Sorry I didn't see that one," replied a bold Alexi. He sure didn't value his life. Most likely to become a zombie out of sheer stupidity: my little brother.

We were finally in range and the world's worst drive-by began. At first only a few of the crazed zombies noticed us as we neared, but now the entire swarm turned and began chasing. It seemed almost comical as the zombies pathetically pursued us, arms waving wildly, teeth bared. It felt like I was riding a horrific merry-go-round. Viktor laid out a few on the first lap, and from the looks of it my dad fared about the same. Soon there was a mini dust storm as we kicked up red gravelly dirt, only adding to the mayhem. It was our third lap when Justin hit a pothole that sent my father from the truck bed.

Immediately I started screaming, "Stop! Dad fell from the truck!" Alexi flipped a u-turn so fast Kyle slid across the seat, the dirty child we'd acquired screamed behind his gag and an obese zombie got butted by the back fender and flew across the parking lot. I watched the punted zombie roll to a stop and regain his feet, to join the melee again. My dad was already shooting his way back to the truck, blowing off the head of the nearest biter. Justin had reversed, but zombies were standing between my dad and safety. As we neared, Alexi slowed down and Viktor jumped out and helped my dad eliminate the last few zombies blocking his way.

Once my dad was back in the truck bed, Viktor climbed into the suburban and they finished off the remaining undead. The last one to get a bullet to the brain had a bone sticking out of his decayed arm and a half-detached jaw on one side. It must have made chewing difficult. The mental image of another zombie chewing his food for him and feeding him like a mama bird made my stomach roll. Or perhaps that was Alexi's stunt driving.

The bright May sun illuminated the Jackson Pollock scene of zombie blood and guts littering the ground. Justin and my dad pulled up alongside the building so the girls could jump into the truck bed. I watched as Melanie vaulted down without hesitation. Paulina, who was pushing sixty, sat down at the edge and then kind of flailed off the roof.

I rolled my eyes in disgust as Riley crossed her arms and refused to make the jump. It was so typical of my little sister to make a big deal out of everything, thus gaining attention. I could see my father trying to negotiate with her in his usual patient way. This went on for what seemed like an eternity.

When I could take it no longer, I jumped out of the car and yelled, "Riley, I swear to God, we'll leave your princess ass here if you don't jump down right now!" My dad gave me a reproachful look as Riley daintily made a show of leaping. Of course Viktor was there to catch her a mere four feet away, but she made it seem as though she'd leapt from a plane at twenty thousand feet in the air.

I hugged Paulina, who was a head shorter than me, and then Melanie, almost a head taller.

"Melanie, Kyle's in the car, he's hurt and he needs you," I said breathily, trying to avoid Paulina's earshot.

"Bitten?" she asked quietly.

"No, he was shot," I whispered back.

Not softly enough.

"Hay dios mio!" exclaimed Paulina nearby and immediately set off toward the Suburban's backseat as she muttered in Spanish. Melanie quickly followed suit, shaking her head at Paulina's antics. Justin ushered his grandma out of the way and led her to the truck, following her in.

I walked over to dad and Riley as she was explaining how they'd gotten a flat tire on their way back to the interstate. The Jeep was parked down by the vineyard, a couple hundred yards away. My dad looked engrossed as she detailed how scared she'd been. I wouldn't say Levi Donovan had a favorite child, however, he was definitely more lenient toward the youngest, and brattiest, of his children. This only became more pronounced as Riley aged and began to look increasingly like our mother.

My dad still missed her. We all did.

"Where's Nacho?" Alexi called out, scanning the area.

"Nacho!" I yelled at the top of my lungs. It was convenient in a zombie-infested world to have a dog trained not to bark, but the little punk was hard to find sometimes.

"And here he comes, not a care in the world," Viktor muttered as Nacho, our black Labrador, came into view, tearing out of the orchard. With a dead rabbit gripped in his teeth and his tail wagging furiously, Nacho strutted proudly up to Alexi, showing off his kill.

From the sound of the moaning and groaning undead in the orchard, Nacho had also picked up a few friends along the way. With my powers still flat-lined, we needed to get on the road, and somewhere safe to tend to Kyle's wound. Melanie was standing in the open door of the Suburban when I came up behind her.

"Is it bad?" I asked her back.

"Hmn," she answered noncommittally, her attention on my boyfriend lying in the backseat.

"Well," my dad asked as he came up beside me.

"The bullet is deep. I'm not sure I'm skilled enough to dig out all the pieces if it shattered," she explained. Melanie was in nursing school when the world ended, but her expertise was limited.

My dad turned to Viktor. "What do you think? Take him to Eden?"

I spoke up before Viktor could. "I say we take him there. They have that weirdo doctor who'll dig it out if we trade him some supplies." Smirking, I called over my shoulder, "Hey Alexi, do you think we could borrow some of those condoms you'll never use to trade for medical services?"

Viktor snorted and shook his head. It was easy to guess who the condom culprit was since Viktor stocked up when we busted into a Costco a couple years ago. Alexi's response to my teasing was to flip me off, but with a settlement like Eden, condoms were a type of currency. If they would buy Kyle a doctor, they'd be put to real use.

Riley screamed, but it didn't immediately alert me to the danger since it wasn't uncommon. My dad hollering _Watch out!_ did. Spinning around, I saw two small figures lumbering toward Riley, who was climbing into the large empty fountain to avoid them. Chubby cheeks and happy smiles on the little boy and girl had been replaced with sunken-in faces and grotesque movements. I turned away and heard the shots go off. The zombies that'd been following Nacho were just beginning to show up at the edge of the orchard.

Riley rushed past me and got into the front passenger seat. "Who's he?" I'd almost forgotten about our little prisoner.

My dad peered in at the glaring little boy. "We don't know his name yet, but the company he was keeping was questionable, so we brought him with us."

My little sister scrunched up her nose. "He smells bad."

"Well, you can help get him cleaned up," I offered. "But can we get out of here before my boyfriend bleeds to death and we have to play shoot 'em up zombie again?"

My attitude finally lit a fire under everyone and my dad took over driving the truck while Viktor got behind the wheel of the Suburban. Driving to where the Jeep was parked, they changed the tire and Alexi drove it with Nacho sitting passenger.

Eden was a quirky settlement about an hour away, in what used to be Glenwood Springs. Renamed Eden after the fall of civilization, we avoided it when possible. They were friendly people, but not the type to raise children around. Unfortunately, none of the settlements in Colorado suited us for long, which was why we had our mountain getaway where we could make our own rules and hide my strange ability.

Since Melanie was now in the backseat using the first aid kit on Kyle's wound, I sat next to _stinky_ in the middle row. When Paulina got her hands on him she'd straighten out his hygiene situation. As for the bindings, I was thinking we'd maybe have to resort to chaining him like we sometimes did with Nacho.

I turned around in my seat to look at Kyle. "You okay, honey?"

He made an effort to smile. "I'll be fine once we trade for some real painkillers."

Melanie reached into the first aid kit and pulled out a flask. "This will help some."

Kyle's sly smile was more genuine as he uncapped it and took a long drag. As a group, we rarely drank except for the occasional wine with dinner. This instance called for the hard stuff. Some of the pain left his expression and I was glad for it.

"Love you," I told him softly.

"Love you more," he replied.

Being headbutted was a surprise. Hurt like a bitch, too. "Ow!" I yelped and moved away from the little demon. He was lucky to be a kid. If one of my brothers or Riley had done that, I'd punch them in the stomach. Rubbing my forehead, I eyed the kid warily, wondering how hard it'd be to convince the others to drop him off on the side of the road. We'd untie him first, of course. I wasn't a monster.

Viciously, I pictured Paulina putting soap in his mouth when he cursed. She'd done it to Justin a time or two growing up, even chased Alexi around a year or so ago when she'd heard him swear. That was hilarious.

The brat watched in satisfaction as I rubbed my forehead. Catching my glare, his expression turned to fear and I started to feel sorry for him. I imagined life with those ruffians couldn't have been easy. He probably expected me to retaliate.

"I'm not going to hurt you," I reassured him, feeling bad for my earlier unkind thoughts. "Just don't do it again." When he turned his head away to stubbornly look out the window, I took that as a sign that I was safe from his violence for now. That tiny head was a lethal weapon.

Once the pain dulled down, the pang in my stomach made its presence known. I reached under the seat to pull out the lunchbox full of sandwiches and homemade corn chips that Paulina had packed for us last night. I missed the processed food of my childhood, but Paulina was able to recreate some things from the ingredients in our large garden and foodstuffs we traded for.

Passing out lunch to the others, I contemplated the skinny urchin next to me. He was eyeing the food in my lap like a zombie would a fat lady. Would he bite if I removed the makeshift gag? I couldn't very well scarf down this food in front of him. From the looks of the kid, he didn't eat enough.

I held up a wrapped sandwich. "If I take the gag out and feed you, will you behave?"

He nodded eagerly.

Untying the cloth at the back of his head, I let it drop to the seat and peeled the saran wrap from the thick sandwich. Giving him chips in between bites of the sandwich, I finally asked him the obvious. "So what's your name?"

His untrusting look was followed by him saying, "Ezekiel."

I held back my laugh. Riley did not. When I kicked the back of her seat, she whined, "Hey!"

Ignoring her and giving _Ezekiel_ another bite, I told him, "Huh, you look more like a Timmy."

This got me his meanest glower yet. "Do I look like a damn queer, you dumb blonde?"

Shocked at the derogatory term, I pointed a finger at his face. "You stop that potty mouth right now or Paulina is going to stuff soap in it."

The kid shot me a repulsed look. "Figures you'd be a damn liberal." He nodded his head towards Melanie. "Especially with the company y'all be keepin'." Eyeing Melanie in a different and very grown up way, he added, "Even if she is hot as hell."

"Oh my, aren't you the cutest little klan member ever?" Melanie sarcastically countered.

"Listen here," I told Ezekiel to get his attention. "You stop with the swearing and the racism or the gag goes back in." I stuffed some chips in his mouth before he could offend further. Those losers created a monster in this child. Kid probably couldn't even read.

After swallowing, his mouth was running off again. "Actually, 'cept for the old lady and the assholes, y'all are a hot group of gals. I'm thinking I mighta just hit the jackpot, surrounded by you three beauties and getting fed like a king and all." Jesus, the kid puffed up his puny chest. The others were going to have their hands full with this one, because I'd given up on this brat developing manners.

Riley snickered and I kicked the back of her seat even harder.

To distract him, I changed the subject. "I'm not calling you Ezekiel. How about a nickname? Zeke sounds less. . . ."

"Redneck," Riley supplied.

Ezekiel shrugged his small shoulders. "Sounds all right to me, kinda badass."

"Zeke it is," I declared.

After I ate my own food, I turned in my seat to check on Kyle. His eyes were droopy and he'd eaten only half his food. "Is it okay for him to fall asleep, Melanie?"

"Yeah, I've got the bleeding to stop, so he should be fine. The doc in Eden will have something to prevent infection."

Shoving our trash into the lunchbox with the leftovers, I tucked it back under the seat. Zeke had fallen asleep with his head against the window and his mouth hanging open. It'd almost be cute if he wasn't covered in filth. Our best and easiest option would be to throw him in the hot springs at Eden before attempting a real bath.

"How much further, Viktor?"

"About fifteen minutes," he replied, keeping his eyes on the road and my dad driving the truck in front of us. Alexi followed in the Jeep and was probably itching to go faster than the speed limit we were coasting below. My dad was a big stickler for acting civilized despite anarchy. Until someone messed with us first, of course.

The rest of the ride was quiet, with Kyle either passed out or asleep and neither Zeke nor Riley mouthing off. When we neared Eden, more cars congested the highway, some showing fire damage. The zombies we passed reached out as if they could catch our vehicles through will alone. My dad hit one or two along the way, which is why the guys had installed grille guards on all our vehicles.

Such is apocalyptic life.
CHAPTER THREE

The Eden residents had either fenced, or barricaded in the area surrounding the hot springs and lodge directly across the street. It made a nice setting for the hedonistic community. Not that a majority of them weren't nice people, but sometimes they got a little too friendly. When I was seventeen I'd visited with dad and Viktor to trade supplies and had never felt more uncomfortable in my life.

The guards at the front gate had worn tie-dyed shirts, beads and moccasins. It seemed they were unarmed except for a single hunting bow between them. They'd made us relinquish our weapons at the gate and I remembered thinking that if I were a bandit, this would be the place I'd attack. One of the guards had led us through a barbed wire overpass that crossed Intersate 70. We'd passed dozens of naked residents wading in the warm sulfur pools, some of them participating in less than wholesome acts. It was at that point they'd made me close my eyes for much of the duration of the stay.

We were on our way out, and I'd finally felt safe from moral corruption, when a fifty-something couple caught up to us. Her name was Sunshine and his was Coyote. She'd gotten a little handsy with Viktor and my dad, which had been oddly both creepy and amusing.

Meanwhile, Coyote had smiled at me in an assessing manner and told my dad, "Gee, this little plum is almost ripe!"

This was one of the few times I'd seen my dad so quick to violence. He'd decked the audacious hippie and kicked him twice before his gentler self prevailed. I hadn't been allowed back since. No loss there.

Kyle shifting brought me back to the current situation just as we entered the mountain valley in early afternoon. We parked our cars right at the front gate. The entrance to Eden seemed better barricaded than before and there were signs that read _GO AWAY_ and _IF YOU CAN READ THIS, YOU'RE IN RANGE._ It seemed Eden wasn't so pure any more. This time the guards actually looked menacing. They wore assault rifles and carried themselves like trained soldiers.

One of them called down at us from his post, "What's your business here?"

Apparently they weren't all that smart, however, considering Justin and Alexi were on either side of Kyle, clearly helping to support him. I thought maybe the blood soaked bandages might've been another giveaway.

"We need your doctor's services. One of us has been shot!" I yelled back, running short on patience.

"Nothing is free. Do you have supplies to trade?" barked the soldier.

"We do!" answered my father before I could retort.

The gates swung open and four guards descended on us, weapons raised as if they were expecting us to jump them. I found myself wanting the tie-dyed archers back. We were told to give up our guns and patted down. The guard doing so must have seen me as less of a threat because he missed the pocket pistol in my boot. I wasn't giving up the gun unless I had to.

From the restaurant to our right came a little hippie with a wheelbarrow. I thought I recognized him as being on gate duty four years ago, but perhaps he'd been demoted from guard to gopher. "Hi there, folks, the name's Catfish, you can set the wounded in here," he cheerily stated.

The boys gingerly set Kyle down in the homemade gurney and we followed as he was wheeled across the street toward the hot springs. A silent guard escorted us, walking a few paces behind our group. Marijuana smoke and sulfur increasingly filled my nostrils as we neared the lodge. Clearly the residents of Eden hadn't lost all their principles. We entered the pool area and a familiar sight met us. Viktor pounced and was blocking Riley's view before she could see any scandalous behavior.

"Cover your eyes, mijitos!" screamed a very offended Paulina.

"Hey, you're not _my_ grandma," argued Alexi, who was enthralled by what he saw. After all, not every resident of Eden was old and wrinkly.

I refused to look at my dad, afraid to see him also eyeing the voluptuous brunette who bounced around as if she were on a porn set. I was suddenly and guiltily happy that my boyfriend was too hurt to pay her any attention. Always surrounded by our friends and family, I knew our relationship wasn't what it would've been had the world not ended. We were happy, though, and I never doubted his love.

Paulina smacked Alexi with all the force of her stout little frame. He laughed at first, but when she raised her hand again, he sure flinched. I hid my smile, not wanting to be scolded also. Justin was deliberate in his attempt not to watch the peepshow, but from the stiffness of his frame, the effort was murder on his teenage boy sensibilities. As if those two didn't have dirty magazines stashed somewhere.

We walked into the lodge and found a very convincing military hospital ward; several people in wheelchairs and some patients in beds, looking too injured to move. Women I assumed were nurses from their attire, buzzed around in every direction. My eyes strayed to a closed door with the word _Quarantine_ painted on it.

One of the nurses stopped long enough to bark orders. "Fish, put him in an empty bed, the doctor will make rounds in a minute."

On the opposite side of the room was a man wearing a turquoise necklace, colorful billowing robes and a stethoscope. I wondered if he purposely grew out his hair and beard to look like Jesus. The brown leather sandals added just the right touch to his elegant messiah style. Someone needed to let him know that the apocalypse already happened and, with hell on earth, we were no longer in need of a prophet.

The doctor held a metal clipboard in his hand and it seemed a nurse was filling him in on the status of the wounded. He wore a pensive expression, nodding his head every few moments. The man didn't exactly inspire confidence in me, looking like a rainbow Jesus. It was times like this I missed our former family pediatrician. I'd like to think that Dr. Amin had survived, possibly overseeing the healthcare in a settlement such as this one. Well, maybe not _exactly_ like this one.

I asked myself why we brought my boyfriend to the shaman at the military-run swingers club, but it wasn't like we had many options. Gathered around Kyle's bed, we waited as the doctor moved from patient to patient.

Kyle looked up at me and smiled, trying to reassure me. He was pale and sweating profusely, so the smile didn't work very well. I brushed his brown hair off his forehead, attempting to return his optimism with a smile of my own. My dad walked over a couple beds and started chatting with a bedridden man wearing an eye patch and gauze wrapped around his head. I squeezed Kyle's hand and followed him, listening in on the conversation.

"What happened here?" asked my father, indicating the abundance of patients.

"We were attacked by raiders six days ago at dawn," said the man wearily. "They rode into town and started firing without warning. We're not violent people. They could've taken whatever they wanted without hurting anyone."

"I'm so sorry. Where'd the new guards come from? They seem well-trained," offered my father tactfully. I'd been wondering the same thing.

"The council voted and we sent an emissary to Colorado Springs. We needed protection and they came through for us. They get a percentage of our goods and we get peace of mind," he explained with evident relief.

"Peace of mind, that's the rarest of commodities nowadays," my father mused.

"Do you remember me?" he asked both of us quietly. I did, a person didn't meet many new faces anymore. We were talking to Coyote, the man who'd incurred my father's anger the last time we were here.

I spoke up first, wanting to alleviate any awkwardness. "I remember you. Where's Sunshine?"

"They . . . they killed her," he replied faintly, tears growing in the one eye we could see.

"Oh god, that's terrible," whispered my father with genuine compassion. I was hoping this scene wouldn't later put my father into one of his funks. Those episodes usually occurred only on days that had been special to my parents. Their anniversary, my mother's birthday and the birthdays of their children sometimes made my dad incredibly sad and he'd go off to be by himself or shut himself in a room. I wouldn't want anyone to see my grief either if I'd lost my soulmate.

A nurse took notice of Coyote's tears and ushered us away from him. The poor man was broken inside and out. We returned to Kyle and saw the doctor was only a few people away now. Everyone agreed it would be best to explore the settlement as a way to get their minds off today's excitement, while I stayed with Kyle. Plus, our large group was crowding their already teeming hospital. For some reason, an adamant Alexi insisted on staying with me for moral support. It seemed like Alexi had grown up a little bit today, or so I hoped.

The group left and we waited together in silence, with me holding Kyle's clammy hand. I stared at our laced fingers, so grateful that he wasn't hurt worse and that my family was safe. Bandits were a way of life now, along with the undead. It seemed as if one or the other were always coming at us, wanting to take our supplies or our lives.

Kyle closed his eyes and I felt myself doing the same. I was exhausted in more ways than one. Dropping the nearby zombie population always wore me out. The sandwich and chips helped, but I needed more food fuel and sleep to totally recharge.

Finding out I could control the dead in such a way had been both frightening and exhilarating. It was just months after the outbreak began and we'd already lost my mother, along with others from our initial group. The little bit of organization and relief that the government was trying to give was failing. We first found shelter at an army facility in Yuma, Arizona, but that fell when a massive amount of undead crossed over from Mexico. When the fences fell, we knew better than to flee west to the more densely populated California. The forts there were overrun in the first weeks of the outbreak.

Some of the Yuma survivors headed north to a military proving ground in Utah, but we settled along the way in a religious community in Southern Utah. All was good there until a horde came through and overwhelmed the residents. I remember standing in the middle of a hopeless situation. Something came over me and, on a panic-fueled scream, I emitted a burst of energy that caused the fighting stopped. I just _knew_ I'd done it, made a hundred or so zombies drop to the ground mid-frenzy. At only fourteen, my first thought was _freak_.

When the zombies started to reanimate an hour or more later, the residents were able to take them out, but questions were being asked. Most people were confused, never seeing such a thing in their past experience with the undead. Unfortunately, there'd been a few residents who realized the phenomenon had coincided with my scream. Paranoia and plans of exploitation ensued, so two nights later we left under the cover of darkness.

My eyes popped open and I came out of my reverie when I heard the doctor's voice. "Hello, I'm Dr. Rivers. I hear you've been shot. Can you show me the wound?" he asked in a deep tone which surprisingly made me feel everything would be alright.

Kyle weakly nodded and gestured for the doctor to go ahead with the examination. I surveyed the room and saw Alexi sneaking back toward the hot springs. The little pervert had conned us all. If Paulina caught him, he'd be in for it. Sometimes I wish he'd find a girlfriend the way Viktor found Melanie just so some of his eagerness would wane. Not that I could imagine any female putting up with him.

"We pulled as much of the bullet out as we could, but there are still pieces in there," I told the doctor.

"We need to remove what we can and clean the area," responded Dr. Rivers. "A little shrapnel never hurt anyone and antibiotics should prevent infection." He nodded to a nurse, talking in a low voice gave her orders and turned back to me. "Why don't you go for a walk or enjoy a swim? I'll have someone come find you when we're done."

I kissed Kyle on the forehead, walking out of the hospital and into the equally surreal confines of the hot springs. On the other side of the pool Alexi was flirting with a topless woman in her late thirties. I could just imagine how the conversation was going.

Hey, nice boobs.

Thanks, nice peach fuzz.

She didn't seem to mind his advances and before I knew it he was taking his shoes off in a hurry.

"Alexi Donovan! Put your freaking shoes back on!" I screamed at the top of my lungs.

He looked up at me in shock, blood rushing to his face. The woman glanced back at me with an expression somewhere between amusement and resentment. My brother reluctantly put his shoes back on and booked it toward Main Street. The walk to the town store was particularly enjoyable for me after thwarting my idiot brother's plan to hook up with a cougar.

My family was sitting around a table in the restaurant now being used as a dining hall by the town. Melanie and Viktor seemed to be getting along and she sat on his lap. Justin and Alexi were quietly whispering to each other at one end of the table, no doubt trying to think of some new dimwitted plan to each lose their virginity. Paulina was lecturing my dad about how Riley needed a firmer hand in her upbringing and discipline. Zeke was eyeing a girl close to my age who was sitting with her family a few tables over. Just what the family needed, another deviant set on repulsing me at every turn.

I hastily ate some slop substance that resembled a potato casserole, but at that point anything would have tasted good. Maybe if this settlement was less focused on feeding their sexual appetites, they could serve something edible. The small pot farm I'd spied in a lot down the street proved they had the skills to do better.

Paulina was a whiz in the kitchen and we'd made an effort throughout the years to become knowledgeable enough amateur farmers and ranchers to grow and raise the ingredients needed for good eating. Our isolated cabin was our haven and, in my opinion, more of an Eden than this place could ever be.

A man built like a linebacker with the face of a bulldog walked up to our table and addressed my father. "Levi Donovan. Come with me," ordered the behemoth.

My dad nodded to Viktor to come along, eyeing the man suspiciously. He got up and I could almost see him walking on his tiptoes beside the huge guard. "You too, Anya," my dad threw over his shoulder after a few steps. So I was being included in the decision making now, like a real adult. This was a welcome and long-overdue development.

We were led past the kitchen into an alleyway, through a nearby doorway and found ourselves in a perfect replica of army barracks. Set against the back wall was a small metal desk. Sitting behind it was a medium-sized blonde man cleaning a sniper rifle.

Without looking up from his task he said, "Welcome to Eden, hopefully our doctor was able to patch up the injured young man. My name is Sergeant Davies. I have to ask, how exactly did he suffer a gunshot wound?" He looked up at us with a face that was simultaneously friendly and terrifying.

"We were ambushed by another group that demanded our supplies," replied my father, much to Viktor's and my chagrin. He could've made something up, but his trusting nature prevented this. Even after years of dealing with assholes, his creep-radar didn't detect as well as the rest of us. He still wanted to believe in the goodness of humanity. He thought we would one day band together, cure the virus and rebuild civilization into a utopia. Not likely. I often wondered if the best of humanity was now stumbling around craving living flesh.

"That's just bad luck, isn't it?" remarked the sergeant. He was clearly trolling for some piece of information. "You must have been out in the open to invite such attention." He was working toward the point now. Just what that was, I wasn't sure.

"We were trying to gather supplies at a store," my father replied unsuspectingly.

"That's incredibly brave. Oftentimes those places are the most infested with zombies. Did you have to fight your way in?" It was at that moment my father realized what the questioning may be leading to.

"Yeah, we had to unload several clips to make the place safe enough," my dad answered shrewdly.

"You've got a tough group there, Mr. Donovan. Most of them are just kids, too. At any rate, one hears things, legends of sorts. There's a tale some travelers from Utah told me a few months back about a girl who could blackout the dead. Incapacitate them, if you will. Not sure I believe it, but they were so certain, so absolute. Supposed to have been witnessed around the time this all started. To ignore such a tale entirely would be foolish. A weapon like that would be priceless in this new world." He ended his speech leaning back in his chair, with a cheerful expression that was intended to indicate camaraderie.

Negative there, sergeant.

"Indeed, that'd be quite an asset in these times," agreed my father stoically. _Nice to know my value_. I wondered if he mentioned this zombie-girl legend to all new acquaintances, hoping one day someone could corroborate the story, lead him to the treasure. Rumors of my prowess with the undead could lead to problems for me and my family.

"Sure would," Davies intoned slowly. "Now to the real business, how will you be paying for this visit?" the sergeant inquired with a hard edge. The image flashed through my mind of us having to do manual labor to pay off Kyle's medical bill. Picking weeds in the weed farm or working in the kitchens scrubbing pots.

My father reluctantly opened his backpack and took out a bottle of Viagra, a couple packs of condoms and the ivory handgun we'd only acquired earlier that day. Thank god for the allure of "keeping it up" for hours and not making babies in the process. Oh, and a Texan's exotic taste in weaponry. It was the Beretta that caught the sergeant's attention. His eyes gleamed greedily as it was set on his desk. Davies restrained his excitement and I could almost see his mind churning out a plan.

"That'll do nicely. Now, you guys enjoy your stay here. Be wary of bandits on the way home." Sergeant Davies opened a drawer to place the items inside and an awkward silence filled the room. With the shakedown he was giving us, I was wary of him. Not that we hadn't been through worse.

We stood there unsure of what came next, but thinking he was done with us.

Just to clarify, Viktor asked, "Are we dismissed?"

The sergeant nodded arrogantly, hands already set to work cleaning his new firearm. Grateful the negotiation was over, we followed the ogre back to our waiting group. When we returned, Catfish was chatting with Paulina and Melanie. He smiled as we neared and told us the doctor had fixed Kyle up good as new. I needed to see him to determine that for myself.

But first, there was a more pressing matter. "Restroom?" I asked Catfish, trying not to fidget in my urgency.

He started to point when Melanie interrupted. "I'll show you."

Getting off Viktor's lap, she led me to the back of the restaurant and through the "employees only" area. The public bathrooms must've been out of service. An elderly lady was stirring a pot of something and with a sour glance dismissed us. No wonder the food was tasteless if those kinds of vibes were going into it.

The employee bathroom was single use, but spacious enough for us to both squeeze in. Most settlements maintained a septic system unless they wanted to do their business in nature. And no one wanted to risk getting bit on the behind by a zombie. Far past being uncomfortable around each other in these situations, Melanie used the mirror to fix the scarf over her curls.

Seven years older than me and two years older than Viktor, we'd met Melanie a few months after we'd first gotten to Colorado. She'd fled Denver and was surviving with the group at Colorado State University in Fort Collins. They weren't as organized as they were now and when she and Viktor hit it off, she left with us. Six years later, they were still together and she'd become family.

She wouldn't talk much about her own family, but Viktor had told me once that she couldn't find them after the virus invaded the city. She'd been sharing an apartment with two other nursing students downtown and when she finally made it to the suburbs and her childhood home, they were gone. She could sometimes be serious like my brother, but she also had a playful side. Four inches taller than me, at five foot ten, she had light brown skin and eyes. She often wore her curly black hair in a scarf of bun, not wanting it in her face, but not willing to cut it either. She was beautiful and I'd often teased Viktor that the two of them would make some adorable giant children, with him being a few inches over six foot.

Melanie moved to let me wash up and I studied my appearance in the mirror. A few strands of my blonde hair were starting to come out of my ponytail, so I pulled out the hair tie and ran my damp hands through it. My ponytail redone, I wiped under my eyes to clean my smudged eyeliner. Thankfully, unopened eyeliners from the luxury cosmetic companies were still okay to use. Along with unopened powder, lipstick, lip liner and eye shadow. Something about staying sealed from oxygen. A few years ago, mascara and foundation were kicked out of the usable category. When I wanted to make the effort, fake eyelashes were an option, though. I rarely made the effort.

The whole group set off to check on Kyle when we got back to them. My father ordered us to all stay together for the rest of our time in Eden, not trusting the sergeant and his questions about the mythical blonde zombie puppet master. For now they were just rumors, but if they turned into suspicions about me, we'd probably be forced to leave the area. Leaving our ideal setup in the mountains would mean starting over somewhere else.

Sunset was hitting the peaks around us and the temperature was dropping with a cool breeze. We'd have to set home soon if we wanted to avoid spending the night here. The setting was almost beautiful if you could ignore the military police and free love mentality. For the third time that day I had to pass the hot springs, noticing this time that Alexi's long lost love found someone else to occupy her time. Upon entering the medical center we were met by a dim glow of candles illuminating the dreary room.

Kyle was in a great mood at our arrival, as if he'd not been shot and operated on all in one day. The doctor walked up and told us everything had gone well and they'd given Kyle THC Jello to help numb the pain. That explained his carefree, smiley attitude. The doctor continued by telling us Kyle should stay for several days in order to heal up.

The thought of being subjected to the whims of Sergeant Davies made me anxious. I mean, if we had to trade all the condoms to pay for our stay, that would leave Alexi without, making teen fatherhood a possibility. _If_ , he ever got laid. I heard a commotion behind me and turned to see Viktor struggling with an unruly Zeke while Riley looking bored with the whole situation. Alexi and Justin were standing in the doorway, gazes on the hot springs. Paulina had found a chair to sit in, eyes on the teenage boys.

As my dad was telling the doc that we'd need that wheelbarrow again, since we were definitely leaving now, I took a seat by Kyle's bed. "Hey, honey."

He turned his head to give me a droopy-eyed smile. "How's it going, babe?"

I laughed at his cheerfulness. "Not as well as it's going for you, obviously. We're going to bust you out of this joint."

"You're so beautiful," he whispered, reaching up to touch my cheek. God, my boyfriend was cute. Maybe he wasn't the most handsome of the last men on earth, but since the day he'd moved down the street when we were in the third grade and we'd bonded over all things sci-fi, he'd been my other half. Plus, his dimples always made me want to kiss him.

Through loss and survival, we'd only gotten stronger. If early bloomer Stacey Larken chasing after him in the eighth grade couldn't tear us apart, the end of the world hadn't stood a chance.

"Love you, honey," I whispered back.

"Beautiful," he repeated.

"High as a kite," I responded.

"Fuck yeah," he drawled lazily.

Running a hand through his thick brown hair, I was about to tell him it better not become a habit when rapid fire sounded from nearby. Our guard went into immediate action and whipped his weapon up at us. We all froze, not wanting to provoke him into a massacre. At first the noise coming from his walkie-talkie was garble, but when it cleared the word "raiders" was coherent enough.

It seemed Eden was once again under attack.
CHAPTER FOUR

When our guard was ordered to take position along the barricade, we were ushered to get moving. A nurse brought a wheelchair and my dad and Viktor lifted Kyle out of the bed, settling him in carefully. If I wasn't worried about our situation, I'd laugh at the state of his pants. One pant leg had been cut off at his upper thigh and a bandage over the wound was the only thing covering his bareness.

With a gun still at our backs, we made the journey back down Main Street, me wheeling my invalid boyfriend along. Panicked shouts were heard as a flurry of fire rained down from the freshly christened night sky. Eden was a warzone. The commune's security force positioned themselves around the formidable edges of the wall. I watched as two of the soldiers put on night vision goggles and climbed the watchtowers at a speed monkeys would envy. Calculated shots rang loudly and an eerie quiet momentarily overtook the picturesque valley once again.

My family rushed into the nearest building as Sergeant Davies passed us carrying the same rifle he'd been tending to when we first met. I expected to see a troubled face, but he was brimming with eager excitement. We were directed to hole up in a former bank until the battle was over.

Kyle smirked and feigned shooting Davies with an imaginary handgun as we walked away, adding a chipper "pew pew" for good measure. I rolled my eyes at his marijuana-induced antics and parked him next to the half-naked elderly couple ducking behind a bank counter. Peeking out the window, I saw the raiders had driven an SUV through the main gate in an attempt to breach. The guards smartly positioned a minivan behind it to prevent that from happening. The men in the watchtowers ruthlessly plugged the attacking car full of shells.

"Anya, get the hell away from the window!" screamed my father, going into papa bear mode.

"I'm just trying to see what's happening! We're sitting ducks in here without our weapons!" I yelled back angrily. The pocket pistol in my boot would do little against more than a few men, but I retrieved it nonetheless and deposited it into my hoodie pocket. It made me feel marginally better.

Viktor was of the same mind as me and began scouring the bank for any sign of a weapon. He found a ski pole on a desk and hurried next to me. My dad hovered near the doorway, insisting on maintaining the front lines. Melanie stood behind Viktor, a gun in hand. Obviously, we girls knew how to be sneaky.

"In case they break in, you go first ok?" I couldn't help taunting my big brother. He missed my sarcasm and gave me his trademark dismissive grunt. Alexi soon joined us with a cheap K-Mart pocket knife in his shaking hand. Looking at his pinched face, I was tempted to tell him to grow a pair.

One of the soldiers dropped from his perch and fell lifelessly to the ground below. Little fires lit our view as we watched the militia shooting at headlights a couple hundred feet away. There was no telling yet how big the group of raiders was. In the past we'd encountered small gangs like the ones at K-Mart and large ones we were lucky to escape notice from.

The giant of a man we encountered earlier was loading an RPG with obvious intent to maim the men who'd been foolish enough to raid the same settlement twice in a week's span. Assuming this was the same group. He shouted something at Davies who apparently gave him the go ahead to take the shot. People talk about things slowing down, life suddenly moving in slow motion. I never believed them until the moment that missile was shot. To watch the imminent death of so many people, even the lowest of the low, was an unforgettable reminder of how very far civilization had fallen.

The initial explosion and the following blasts it triggered sent chills down my body. No doubt the bandits had been defeated, but whether any survived remained to be seen. This group of apocalyptic soldiers seemed like the take-no-prisoners kind. I glanced around at my family and friends, hunched in a place of the past, and couldn't help but appreciate how fortunate we'd been so far.

"I think it's pretty much over," I informed those standing in the back of the room. They slowly made their way to us and we all watched as the soldiers shot another RPG in the direction of the flames to the south. A small formation of men walked toward the burning cars, weapons raised. The firing squad extinguished any flickering signs of life, including a boy around Riley's age who was badly disfigured from the conflagration. I could just make out his futile attempts to beg for mercy before he was filled with several rounds.

These men were really no different than the bandits in their disregard for human life. They'd simply been trained to commit atrocities and given uniforms to justify them. Whatever they wanted to pretend, their authority meant nothing. There was no government anymore, much as the pseudo-military down in Colorado Springs liked to pretend. We rarely went to that settlement for a reason.

"It's time to get out of here," my father muttered to himself. "These men relish the opportunity to kill and can't be trusted," he said this time to all of us.

With great trepidation, but mustered confidence, we exited the bank in one large flock. Strength in numbers. Once we exited Eden, hopefully by some miracle our cars would be undamaged from all the fire and bullets near the gate. Our group needed the supplies in them to trade for biofuels. We passed celebrating soldiers and frightened citizens desperately attempting to put out small fires all around town. Catfish was already gathering the fallen fighters into a rusty wheelbarrow near the Eastern watchtower. We feared the worst leaving the settlement, but from what we could tell our cars had been undamaged in the battle.

"At least none of us got shot this time," Kyle quipped optimistically.

"And our getaway vehicles are still intact," I added.

Riley walked alongside us, acting put out by the whole affair. "Next time I think I'll just wait at the cabin."

"Good idea!" I exclaimed with false cheer. "You can stay behind and help Paulina with the laundry!"

"Bitch," she gritted under her breath.

Stopping, I grabbed her arm. "What was that?"

"Nothing," she replied, shooting daggers at me.

Letting it drop because now wasn't the time to have a blow out with my mouthy little sister, I resumed pushing the wheelchair. If it was the last thing I did, I'd turn my sister into a survivor. If she were ever separated from the group, she wouldn't have much hope of making it a week. My dad coddling her hadn't helped. Paulina was just starting to get out of the habit of babying her.

Sergeant Davies walked up to us triumphantly, still toting a rifle. He probably slept with the thing. "I'll need another word with you," he directed at my dad then shot a look at me and my sister.

I grabbed Riley's hand and put it on the wheelchair. "Stay with Kyle." My dad and Viktor were already trailing behind Davies, but I was determined to hear what was said.

I sensed a trap, the man oozed deceit, but there was no choice but to follow. The gun in my pocket weighed heavily all the way there. Inside the barracks a man was bound to a chair and it appeared his face had been used as a punching bag. So they took a prisoner of war after all.

"Marshall here was kind enough to get caught this morning in the hills north of the hot springs. He told us all about the plan to attack tonight. Not that it didn't take a little convincing," Davies remarked happily. The way Davis preened in satisfaction I wondered if he was waiting for applause or a pat on the back. This man was probably going to suffer a fate much worse than his comrades if the sergeant got in on the torture.

"Ah, but back to business my new friends," Davies continued. "It would seem you owe me a debt once again. My protection doesn't come free."

Hatred filled me. This extortionist had known about the upcoming conflict and not warned anyone but his men. I imagined Davis often set up situations where he was the one collecting debts. Hustlers like him made survival harder for everyone else.

"This is unfair, Sergeant Davies. We've already paid our debt and would never have stayed here had we known what was to come," my father countered righteously and I _now_ felt like applauding. Then he let out that sigh, the one I knew meant resignation. "However, for the sake of us parting as friends just tell us what you want," dad finished plainly.

"Very direct, Mr. Donovan, that's an admirable quality and I will repay it in kind," answered Davies smugly. "I require one of your daughters." His tone became conciliatory as he said, "You see, it gets very lonely in these times and my mother always wanted me to settle down, god rest her soul. I could provide food, protection and anything else she needed. I'm not picky. Both of them are pretty girls. I'll even allow you to choose."

The appraising look he scanned me with made me feel like jumping in the hot springs for a harsh scrub down. Viktor was vibrating with rage and I knew my expression reflected the same feeling. The image of me whipping out my little gun and shooting him in the face didn't settle my anger.

"We would've never needed your protection, as you call it, had you not taken our weapons," my father scathingly spat out.

"This is non-negotiable, Donovan, I was merely letting you choose which one as a nicety. Come to think of it I rather like the younger one, more malleable," Davies retorted perversely. Little did he know, Riley was convinced her prince charming was still coming to rescue her from the horrors of the apocalypse. Prince Charming, Sergeant Davis was not.

Before the disgust could consume me, a worried man appeared and blurted out, "There's a huge swarm of zombies on the highway headed for us! Hundreds!" This day just keeps getting better and better.

With a scowl, Davies grabbed an assault rifle from his weapon-littered desk and burst from the room, only glancing back once at us. We'd just been knocked down the to-do list.

We sat there a moment before I said, "Like hell I'll be some sort of bartering chip, let's get out of here while he's occupied." Viktor untied the half-broken prisoner as my father rummaged through the sergeant's desk. Smiling, my dad pulled out two bottles of scotch and the Ivory handgun the officer and been salivating over. After the prisoner slumped out of the room, Viktor came over to grab a shotgun off the desk.

Meeting the others on Main Street, we went unnoticed as the soldiers were once again gearing up for battle. A large group of men rushed out the gate and into the darkness. My dad led the way to the cars with Viktor bringing up the rear and we quickly loaded Kyle into the Suburban. In a couple minutes we would be making tracks, disappearing into the night.

We were almost all inside when Riley screamed. Sergeant Davies and a few of his men were trying to force her back to Eden. Viktor was holding his shotgun on them, but unable to fire without risking Riley also.

Zombies were closing in and the soldiers, along with a few Eden natives, were trying to keep them at bay. Despite their efforts, it was clear there were too many. Had they made nice, we'd have assisted them. Fat chance now. I hoped the zombies enjoyed their meals. Closing my eyes for a moment, I checked my strength just in case, not sure I had it in me to use my power again so soon.

A short, bulky man was blindsided by several dead and I watched him get torn to shreds in seconds. Blood and stray flesh lay where there was once a man and the infected around my sister inched ever closer. The giant soldier was overtaken by some biters and frantically fought to maintain life. It was too late though, he'd been bitten in the leg by a child zombie missing half the skin on its face. Dropping to his knees, he took the pistol from a holster around his waist and fired into his own mouth. The undead were indifferent to the blast, proceeding to rip him apart and divvy him up.

The situation was getting more dangerous for us. Running toward the scene, I did the only thing I could. I closed my eyes and concentrated my efforts onto the zombies closest to us. The weak surge of power did the trick. Instantaneously, the dead fell to the ground, leaving only my sister and Sergeant Davies cowering amidst the sea of incapacitated subhumans. Joining Viktor, I hurried to regain my captive sister. Riley made a break for it and ran past us to our father's waiting arms. _You're welcome, Riley_.

Viktor held the shotgun on a stunned Davies, who was aiming a weapon right back at him. Neither man looked ready to back off. My pocket pistol may not have the oomph of their weapons, but it'd get the job done. If he didn't back down, I'd be joining the game.

"I change my mind! I want the older one!" yelled Davies from a mere ten feet away.

"You're a coward and a pig!" I replied ferociously. "You'd have to sleep with _both_ eyes open."

"Your ideals are outdated, sweetheart! There's really no choice at this point. I know who you are and what you can do. You'll be my ticket to take over in the new world order," he boasted confidently. If I were capable of that kind of takeover, what would I need him for?

"Like what? I'd be your queen or something?" I scoffed irreverently at him. It wasn't surprising when he bristled at that.

By this point his gun was pointed firmly at me and he motioned me to start walking into Eden. I took a few steps in his direction and pulled the gun from my pocket. Before the sergeant could react, I'd already fired at him. At first I thought the shot had missed, but with a wheezing breath, blood trickled from his mouth and he fell limply to the pavement.

Viktor gave me an approving look. "Nice job." Toting the shotgun over his shoulder, he added, "Now let's get the fuck out of here."

Catfish came from the shadows with a shocked look on his face. "Little girl, you better get going before more soldiers come."

Enough said. We got the hell out of there. As I looked back at the scene from the backseat of the Suburban I saw Catfish dragging the body into an alley. There would be tough times in Eden when the soldiers returned. Hopefully the man who took over would be a more just leader. The surviving Eden residents would know to clear out until the zombies moved on. What they thought of the napping zombies, I didn't know. Davies was the only one who'd made the connection between me and the rumored zombie puppeteer. Everyone else had been too busy trying not to die.

Inevitably, there'd be more rumors. _Damn_.

I fell asleep for what seemed only a moment, with Kyle's head in my lap, but when I awoke we were back at our cabin refuge outside the ruins of Breckenridge. We unloaded the supplies, lit a fire in the hearth and Paulina set to cooking some soup. Kyle had already been settled in the room he shared with Justin and Alexi. Sleep was the best thing for him at this point. It was late and the rest of us would be hitting the sack after we'd eaten dinner.

I could sense the eyes of my family watching me. I'd never killed a living person before, that job was usually Viktor and my dad's. In all honesty, I felt no remorse. It was him or me, and I chose me. I'd always choose me in a situation like that. There was more plaguing the world than just the undead. The living caused their fair share of destruction.
CHAPTER FIVE

I awoke before the sun the next day, worried about Kyle. Riley was sleeping in the twin bed across the room. Pulling a robe over my pajamas, I wandered out of the room. Peeking in the boys' room, I saw Kyle's bed empty and Alexi and Justin still asleep in the bunk beds. The three bedrooms upstairs were occupied by my dad, Paulina and Viktor and Melanie. The house was quiet. Stopping in the bathroom, I brushed my teeth then continued my search.

Kyle was lying on the couch in the family room and, by the expression on his face, happy to see me. "Hey, babe. Sleep good?"

Before answering him, I crouched down and touched my lips to his. When I was done, he looked even happier. "Would've liked to sleep longer, but I'm glad my guy is back to normal."

"Sit with me on the deck?" he asked. I gave him a deeper kiss in answer.

As he hobbled his way out the door, I wanted to assist him, but without the effects of drugs I knew he was back to his old self and wanted to do it on his own. He was a boy when it all began and turned into a man in the harshest of circumstances. Kyle's parents died in the first days, trying to scavenge for supplies while we were all still deluded enough to think we could hide in our suburban homes. Being an only child, he had only us when they were gone.

We settled in matching Adirondack chairs on our deck overlooking the dark mountain. A waning moon offered little light, but I saw him wincing while trying to get comfortable. We sat here often, enjoying the serenity of our secluded cabin and the woods surrounding it.

Several mountain roads led to our cabin and we habitually blocked off the long driveway leading up here, making it look like nature had caused the blockage. Still, if anyone dead or alive made it through the trees, they'd find the immediate area barricaded. We'd used anything we could, including an old school bus, barbed wire and chain link fence to make a perimeter around the cabin, stables and outbuildings. A zombie would have to be pretty wily to get through without making a sound. The bells we'd attached to string and hung around the barricade would give it away.

Whoever built this place hadn't meant it to be a yuppie retreat. The stables were perfect because we were able to keep animals. A couples horses, cows, chickens and pigs resided there. In our garden we grew anything that could thrive in the Colorado climate. That was Paulina's domain, along with the kitchen, but we all chipped in to help. We did alright here and never disclosing the location of our home to people we encountered at the settlements or on the road.

"Tomorrow night is the party," Kyle reminded me.

"Yeah, the brat is going to be fifteen. Maybe she'll finally start to grow up," I grumbled half-heartedly. Things were so much easier when Riley idolized me. That stopped years ago and compliance disappeared right with it.

"You love her," Kyle commented, squeezing my hand.

"Yeah," I reluctantly agreed. "It's my curse." Laughing, I added, "Well, my _other_ curse."

"It's saved us enough times to be considered a blessing."

"I suppose."

We sat there in companionable silence, watching the rising sun illuminate the world with color again. I was lost in thought when Kyle reached over and took my left hand. He slid the ring on my finger in a smooth move. "I wanted to get down on one knee for this, but I'm afraid I won't be able to get back up," he said wryly.

"Kyle?" I asked, unsure.

"Marry me, Anya?" he asked softly.

I looked from the ring to him, warmth spreading in my chest and tears pooling in my eyes. In a choked whisper, I gave him my answer, "Okay." Then, bringing his face down to mine, I reinforced that answer with a kiss.

As I sighed, Kyle let out a deep chuckle. " _Finally_."

I knew exactly what he meant. We were twenty years old, been together for years, but always surrounded by people. There was no way my dad would object to us sharing a room if we were married. There was a pastor at the Fort Collins settlement who could seal the deal. Next time we were there, the deed would be done and Kyle and I could _finally_ be free to be together in any way we chose without the disapproval of our loved ones. Not that anyone ever said a word against Viktor and Melanie sharing a room. I wasn't stupid enough to think I'd ever get away with the same thing, though.

"I love you, honey," I told him with everything I felt.

"Babe, I've always loved you, since you came over with your Dr. Who action figures."

"I could've sworn it was for my comic book collection," I teased him.

"Nope," he said succinctly. "It was the action figures."

I beamed at my ring. "It's beautiful. How'd you afford something so big?" The diamond solitaire wasn't gaudy, but it was a good chunk of rock. One great thing about the world ending, the jewelry stores had poor security. As in, no security anymore.

With a groan he pulled me over and onto his lap. "Got it on credit," he said playfully. "Now give me a preview of your wifely duties."

"Breakfast?" I asked in mock confusion.

"This first," he whispered. His lips were hot on mine and within seconds I was hot in other places.

"Gross, get a room!" said a disgruntled voice from inside the house.

We separated with mutual reluctance. "What are you doing up so early, Alexi?"

"Hungry," he grunted out. "Where's Paulina?"

"Asleep," I said in a _duh_ voice. "She's not your personal chef, Alexi, have some respect!"

Standing in the doorway now, he rubbed his bare stomach. "I'm a growing boy, I need sustenance."

"There should be some tortillas left from the other day, eat one of those."

"Justin ate the last one yesterday."

Exasperated, I lashed out at him. "Go away Alexi, Kyle and I are having a moment."

" _Gross_ ," he repeated, his face scrunched up to emphasize his opinion.

Kyle was laughing underneath me. Holding up my left hand, he told Alexi, "I'll be moving out of our room soon."

"Shit, does that mean Riley is moving in? No way, man."

"Chill out, Alexi," Kyle ordered. "I've already thought this out. We use the sixth bedroom as a storage room. We can clear that out and move it all down to the basement."

Alexi didn't like Kyle's idea. "That's were Justin and I hang out."

"Hang out somewhere else or hang out in our new storage area."

Looking unhappy still, Alexi said, "Whatever. I'm making myself eggs."

The sound of crunching leaves woke me from my daydreaming of the pretty, but simple, wedding dress I was going to scavenge for. Stretching my arms behind my back, I sucked in a huge breath of balmy mountain air.

When I was growing up in the old world we constantly heard environmentalist propaganda about global warming and how important it was to "save the world" and now we were just struggling to save ourselves. It seemed Mother Nature was once again safe from man's destructive tendencies. Everywhere we went she'd already begun to reclaim the land.

Well, those environmentalists would be happy. That was, if they were _alive_.

Trampling footsteps grew louder and I could hear the labored breathing of Justin approaching. His turn was next at our little watchtower. Viktor and Melanie had stumbled upon the elevated hunting blind three summers ago and kept it as a secret love nest for awhile. I tried not to think about what these four walls had seen. The perch was conveniently located about halfway down the mountain and provided a solid vantage point of Breckenridge and the roads around it. We'd camouflaged it in such a way that it was almost invisible to the casual passerby.

Justin appeared from the trees toting a small backpack and wearily climbed his way up.

"Hey, Anya," he said glumly upon reaching the summit.

"Good morning, Justin. What's up?" I asked with a smile. Justin was prone to fits of melancholy when he got stuck inside his own head. He and Alexi couldn't have been more different. Alexi was the Tigger to Justin's Eeyore, but they'd been best friends since the first day of Little League. I cringed at the thought of how much _more_ trouble Alexi would get into without the cautious, sometimes cowardly, influence Justin had on him.

"Nothing," he replied hesitantly. Sometimes it was best to just let people feel their feelings without interfering. If Justin was in his sourpuss mood, I'd leave him to it. The phrase _It's not the end of the world_ had unfortunately become meaningless. A more apt phrase may be _Life sucks, then you turn cannibal_. However, Justin throwing himself from our watchtower in a fit of hopelessness would suck more, so I kept my silence.

It was almost six years ago when my family had packed into our minivan and headed to the baseball fields for Alexi's game. He and Justin were on the same team for the fourth year in a row and our families were good friends. Mom had been there handing out juice boxes and snacks to all of us in the bleachers. Justin's parents were out of town for a wedding so Paulina had been charged with watching him over the weekend. The Arizona sun was setting, the field's lights were flickering on and the kids were set to take the field. I remember mom and dad taking turns paying attention to Riley's incessant chattering about the boy band of the moment. Not that I didn't think back then that the bad boy of the group was _so hot_. I was fourteen, after all.

It was so hot that night. In the third inning Justin hit a ball into the outfield and, as we watched the ball roll to the fence, something strange happened. A man had jumped over the fence and tackled the boy running after the ball. The boy's angry coach, along with a dad helping out on the field, ran out and tried to subdue the man. We watched in horror as the lunatic bit him in the neck.

That's when things turned into mayhem. More people were jumping over the fence and attacking the kids. One woman in a nurse's uniform jumped onto the shortstop only a few feet from Justin and bit the poor boy's ear off.

Parents from all directions rushed to save their children and my mom ushered us to the parking lot as dad grabbed Alexi in the dugout. Alexi was screaming that we couldn't leave Justin and Paulina. Dad yelled at mom to start the car as he ran back toward the carnage, little aluminum bat in hand. We waited in that parking lot for what seemed like forever before dad returned with both Justin and a wheezing Paulina. That's the day they became more than friends. From then on out they were family.

We never found out what happened to Justin's parents.

"You hungry?" Justin asked while handing me a plastic container full of beans, rice and eggs.

"Yes, thank you," I greedily replied, wasting no time digging into my lunch. We sat there in relaxed silence for a while, me thinking about my satisfied belly and Justin thinking about whatever angsty teenage boys thought about.

After eating, I joined Justin at the lookout window. He was staring thoughtfully at the ashy remnants of the town of Breckenridge in the distance. "Do you ever feel bad about what we did there?" he questioned, nodding at the ruins.

When we moved here my father decided the best way to avoid other people settling near us would be to leave them nowhere to live. We set to work burning as much of the town down as possible while keeping the fire contained. Yeah, that'd been especially fun when the smoke and the flames had attracted the dead. Once my power had been used up each day we'd resorted to manual methods.

There were still buildings intact, but not many, and definitely not enough to make the place enticing to settlers. It was because of our pyromaniac tendencies that we first met Mac, our only neighbor for miles. "I don't feel great about it," I mused. "But our safety is more important than a few empty buildings."

"Suppose you're right," Justin answered pensively, pushing up his glasses.

"Don't think about it so much. Just be glad-"

"Do you hear that?" he interjected quietly.

I immediately tested my ears and strained my eyes in all directions and after a moment could hear the deep grunts of a large animal heading toward us. Instinctually, both of us ducked down and peeked over the bottom of the window cautiously. Carefully unholstering my pistol, I flicked off the safety. The animal was getting closer and the grunts drowned out the songbirds.

Peering over the edge, we saw the bear enter the small clearing in front of us. From its massive size and deep brown color my guess would be a grizzly bear, but they weren't supposed to live this far south. We saw smaller black bears from time to time and stayed out of their way. Perhaps without human interference grizzlies were starting to migrate down from Wyoming.

That was a scary possibility, like we didn't have enough trouble keeping the zombies out of our neighborhood. Now we'd have giant predators moving in? Another scary thought? Wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone years ago. If they also migrated down to Colorado, life would get even harder.

Behind the honey-colored grizzly down below, struggling to keep up, were two small, darker brown cubs. The mother bear stopped midway through the clearing, testing the air, sniffing for the faint scent it detected. She bared her teeth for a moment and looked right in our direction. The pierce of those incisors wouldn't feel good. I briefly contemplated carrying two tomahawks from now on, just to even out the odds.

It was as though she knew we were there but just couldn't see us. The cubs wrestled with each other playfully, oblivious to their mother's suspicions. Mama bear grunted and the babies filed into position behind her. The bears set off again, but after a few steps the mother once again stopped and sniffed the air. That's when we heard the deliberate steps of several people below us and I felt them. If I hadn't been distracted by the wildlife I would've noticed sooner.

The bear growled menacingly at whoever was beneath our vantage point. The cubs nervously hid behind their mother as the steps continued into the clearing. Five zombies on the hunt entered our line of sight and they too appeared to sniff the air around them. The Grizzly again growled at the zombies closing in, who at this time increased their pace and charged the bears. The baby bears scurried to the trees, trying to hide. The zombies, indifferent to the bear's crunching bites, flailed and frantically snapped their overmatched jaws. Two more flesh-eaters came from the woods to the north and clumsily rushed the outnumbered bear who was desperately trying to keep her tenacious attackers at bay.

The most aggressive of the zombies broke through and clamped down on the grizzly's exposed back, wrenching flesh and fur with his jaws. The bear retreated and angrily bit the infected man in the upper thigh. _Aim for the head, bear!_ The bear's claws were probably as sharp as the spike of my tomahawk. The zombie was only momentarily dazed and limped pathetically toward the retreating bear. The other zombies formed almost a tactical formation and charged at the grizzly.

I'd never heard of the undead hunting with a pack mentality, but they were showing similar traits here. Usually they tended to be more competitive than cooperative with each other. Both baby bears rushed to their mother protectively, and in the instant her attention was drawn away from the aggressors she was bitten again in the neck. With a swipe of claws, a zombie was partially decapitated. Another swipe and a zombie's guts were sliding out. Not that it fazed him at all. Unfortunately, there were too many and things weren't looking good for the bear.

"This isn't right," muttered Justin as he unstrapped his hunting rifle and aimed down the sights.

Before I could urge him not to fire he had already plugged one of the zombies in the temple. The fighting ceased for a moment as the fallen zombie, a woman with a dangling eye and a chunk missing from her leg, fell to the ground.

The baby bears once again tried to retreat, but one of them was caught by a male. Wearing army greens, he appeared to have recently joined the ranks of pointless death machines from his fresh, barely decomposed look. If not for the black ooze dripping from his nostrils, he might have looked normal. He enthusiastically bit into the bear cub like a fat kid devouring a cheeseburger.

Blood flew in all directions, sending my heart and stomach into knots. Justin again fired and, before I knew it, I too was aiming to kill the biters. Two more fell and the bear took this chance to make an escape. The grizzly stopped to nudge its fallen cub, making what sounded to me like a grieving roar. We watched as she cleared the trees and the baby who survived once again joined her side.

Justin and I dispatched of the remaining few zombies as they gluttonously filled themselves with the beautiful bear cub. I hadn't felt this sad about anything in a long time and, from the corner of my eye, I saw a few tears forming in Justin's eyes. He looked away and made an obvious effort to fidget with his gun while they faded away.

My walkie-talkie squawked. " _Everything all right down there?_ "

After hitting the push-to-talk button, I replied to my dad. "Justin and I are fine."

" _Need_ _me to come down?_ "

"We've got it covered. I'm going to stick around for awhile. I'll let you know when I'm on my way back," I told him and ended communication.

I examined the scene below us and, after determining it was safe, descended the ladder into the clearing. Slowly walking toward the bodies littering the ground with weapon raised, I stopped to execute a twitching zombie. I could hear Justin behind me trying to stifle his heavy, anxious breathing. We reached the epicenter of the attack and found the bear cub still faintly clinging to life. Painful as it was, one of us would have to end the baby's suffering. Seeing how emotionally broken Justin was at this very moment, it would have to be me. I fired once.

"Why didn't you stop them, Anya?" Justin croaked harshly.

Turning to face him, I let him see my own sadness. "I may end up regretting it, but I'd regret it more if I saved the bears and couldn't save _us_ later." Justin knew as well as I did to expect the unexpected. This wasn't the first animal we'd seen taken down by the dead. If I tried to save every one, I could be too tapped out to save our group.

"Is the mother bear going to die?" asked Justin dejectedly.

"I don't know, haven't seen what happens to an infected bear before, but we can go find out," I answered more confidently than I felt.

"You mean we follow them?" he questioned cautiously.

"That's exactly what I meant," I replied with false bravado.

We found the opening where the bears made their escape and surveyed the grass and bushes. Neither of us had ever done any tracking, but that wouldn't matter now. There was a morbid trail of bread crumbs. The birds resumed their singing and their cheery song provided little happiness as we followed the bloody trail. A stream ran along our path when we ascended deeper into the woods.

Carrying our guns locked and loaded, we anticipated any confrontation, be it animal or man. Normally, few zombies trekked this high into the mountains, which was part of its appeal, thus why we'd settled here. The blood grew denser as we neared the mountain lake.

We were so focused on looking ahead, so as not to aggravate the injured bear, that we nearly ran right into it. To our left, just behind a cluster of aspen trees, the bear lay on the ground, struggling to breathe. The cub was hopelessly burrowing into its side, crying out weakly.

At the sight before us, I came to the likely conclusion that being bit by the infected would end the same for a bear as I'd seen it end for dogs, cats, deer and a multitude of other animals. The popular theory was that the infected were attracted to anything warm-blooded with a beating heart. Among other scenarios, I'd imagined cheetahs, lions and giraffes being chased around the African plains by the famished dead.

We approached slowly, the bear smelling us before actually seeing us. The baby bravely stood between us and its dying mother. The grizzly stood up anemically and faced us in a final act of defiance before flopping back to the ground.

I'd seen the effect of the virus on other animals and knew they weren't capable of reanimating after dying. If they were infected, they died an agonizing death and stayed dead. At least, I'd never encountered a zombie cat or zombie squirrel. Either one flying towards Justin would make him piss his pants. I found myself picturing a zombie panda and how cute and deadly it could be. What was wrong with me?

"Anya, we need to end her suffering," Justin declared while holding his gun on baby bear in case of attack. I could tell he was trying his best to act macho despite the crazy situation. This was quite a feat for him considering how he'd cried and locked himself in his room when our other family dog, Peaches, had died two years earlier.

Justin walked a few steps forward and, hands shaking, shot the bear in the head with his Ruger bolt action rifle. The cub clawed and nipped at his booted feet, squealing something terrible. Yeah, not the same as when a puppy does it. Those boots were ruined. Justin let out a little squeal himself and jumped back when the cub would've swiped at his shins. I'm pretty sure those claws could cut through denim.

"What are we supposed to do with the cub?" Justin asked from a yard or so behind me.

"We can't leave it here alone. It'll die, probably eaten by a mountain lion," I replied with determination.

"There's no way Levi will let us keep it," Justin responded, coming to stand beside me. "And my grandma will freak out."

She may freak out, or she may wonder what bear meat fajitas would taste like. Paulina's crazy could go either way. "We can decide all that once we get back to the house. For now, you'll have to carry him home, Justin," I announced smugly, then added as an afterthought, "Maybe Mac will want him."

Justin glared at me then strapped his rifle to his back. He circled behind the animal and gingerly bent down to hoist up the distraught bear cub, teeth and claws facing away from him. Despite the grave circumstances, it was hilarious watching Justin gripping the cub around the middle of its torso from behind.

Justin faced me squarely. "So, is it a boy or girl, Anya?"

I glanced down on reflex and quickly back up again. Laughing, I answered him, "Not that I'm an expert, Justin, but I'd say you're now the proud papa of a baby boy."

"What's up with that?" he muttered. "First that little brat, Zeke, and now this bear cub. We're picking up orphans left and right."

With me leading the way, we walked down the mountain, following the bloody trail all the way back to the grisly clearing. I felt it before I saw it. The more there are, the better I could sense them. One or two, and I have to be closer to them to know they're there.

When we entered the dell there was a zombie, a girl in her late teens, eating the remains of our new pet's sibling. The zombie looked up and bared its teeth to reveal a set of braces rife with fresh flesh. It was so disgusting I almost threw up the meal Justin had brought me.

Normally I would've shot the bracefaced bitch in the head, but we were trying to go all incognito mode. I unsheathed my beloved battle axe and swung at the approaching zombie. She fell to the ground, tomahawk fully implanted in her forehead, eyes dripping black smut. I grabbed the handle, planted my foot against her decaying chest and pulled. Wiping the smut on the grass, I sheathed the blade and made a mental note to clean it later.

We approached the tree stand and Justin hustled up to grab the few belongings we'd left there. That left me in charge of the pissed off bear cub. I held him and bounced him gently, hoping he'd fall asleep. Not that I'd ever had any experience with babies, human or otherwise. I was still too young when Riley was a baby to have been of any help.

Justin once again appeared and looked at me jealously now. "You know, I can carry him again if you want," he offered transparently. It seemed his new paternal instincts were firing on all cylinders. Not to mention, he usually loved animals when he wasn't scared of them eating him.

"Nah, that's okay. I got him," I teased him just to be a pain.

We made the trek back home, stopping once when my arms got tired to transfer custody of the baby. It had been a long, strange day and I was ready for an afternoon siesta. Paulina usually took one around this time.

Kyle was waiting for me outside our barricade. Arms crossed, leaning against the back of the bus to keep weight off his leg. Hobbling to me, his eyes bugged out at the sight of baby bear in Justin's arms. "Who's your friend?"

Leaning against him and tilting my face up for a kiss, I waited until his lips brushed against mine before answering. "We're thinking of calling him Cocoa. What do you think?"

"I think . . ." he started slowly, "Paulina is going to freak out."

I nodded my head in Justin's direction. "That's what he said."

"And your dad will tell you to set it free in the wild."

"Mac might want him," I suggested. "Then we could visit him whenever we want!" This plan was sounding better and better. We push responsibility off onto our grumpy neighbor and drop in just to play with Cocoa when it suited us.

Studying the cub, Kyle asked Justin, "What kind of bear is that?"

Justin shrugged one shoulder. "His mom was huge. She couldn't have been a black bear, had to be a grizzly bear."

Kyle whistled. " _Damn_. What happened?"

"We'll tell you along with everyone else," I told him as I opened the rear emergency exit to the bus and hopped inside.

As Justin struggled to get in behind me, I wondered if we could scavenge one of those front baby carrier things so the cub could be strapped in. I imagined Mac wearing one of those while toting the baby bear around and started laughing.

"What?" Justin snapped out with a scowl.

"Nothing," I assured him innocently.

Our secret entrance into what I liked to refer to as the compound wasn't complicated. We enter through the back emergency exit of the school bus then walked down the aisle to the front entry door and we were in. We had other ways in, some not so sneaky.

Walking up to the house, Riley came out to meet us, hopping down the porch steps. "Justin, where'd you find it? It's so adorable. Can I have it?" Just as she reached for the bear its arms moved and she screamed, running back up the steps. "Holy shit! Is that thing real?" She breathed out another, "Holy shit," then slammed back into the house.

I beamed at Kyle. "That just made it totally worth it."

"You have a black heart, babe."

Holding a hand to my chest, I gave him a puppy dog look. "But this black heart belongs to you."

"Damn straight it does," he practically growled, giving me that look, the one he usually saves for when we manage to find some private time. God, I couldn't wait until we were sharing a room.
CHAPTER SIX

Nacho came racing around the corner, with my dad a few steps behind. "Anya, you didn't let me know you were on your way back." He stopped in his tracks at the sight of Cocoa. Nacho forgot everything his trainer taught him and went into crazy-bark mode. "Nacho!" my dad called sternly and crazy-bark mode came to a halt, to be replaced with a long, vibrating growl.

Riley's head peeked out of the screen door. "Daddy, Anya brought a wild animal home!"

It's like she _wants_ me to slap her.

When my dad's disapproval turned on me, I did the only thing a girl could do in a situation like that. Pointing at my accomplice, I blurted out, "Justin did it!"

Justin's grip on the baby bear tightened. "He's an orphan, Levi, and his name is Cocoa."

My dad shook his head and gestured for us to follow him to a shed on the side of the house. There, he dug around for what he was looking for. The leash was an electric blue and he had to adjust the collar to fit Cocoa's fat neck.

Alexi ran from around the back of the house and came to a halt at the sight before him. "Riley said you guys brought home a bear!" Grabbing the leash from my dad's hand, he kept jabbering, "I'm going to teach him tricks. We'll call him Fang and train him to rip off zombie heads."

"His name is Cocoa," I protested.

"Cocoa?" Alexi shouted. "That's a sissy name! Do you want all the other bears to kick his ass?"

"Alexi!" my dad scolded.

"Well, it's true. Anya's trying to make Fang soft," he defended, already pulling Cocoa away as if trying to protect him from becoming soft.

"We're not keeping him," my dad stated.

And that's where my great idea came in. "We could give him to Mac."

Alexi's face went defiant and Justin swiped the leash away from him. My dad thought it over for a moment. "We'll take him to Mac's and see if he wants him."

"Of course Mac will want him," Alexi grumbled moodily. "He's a kickass predator."

"I'll go with you, dad. Just give me a few minutes," I told him, rushing into the house.

Riley was pouting on the couch in her signature arms-crossed, chin-down pose. Anything for attention. She was probably just worried that with the bear around, she wouldn't be the baby anymore. How she'd survived the apocalypse this long I'd never understood. Oh wait, I think maybe I had something to do with that.

"Where are you guys keeping that thing?" she asked snidely.

Tapping my index finger against my chin, I told her, "I'm thinking he can bunk with us in our room."

"No way! I already have to put up with you and your freaky voodoo powers. I'm not putting up with that animal tearing up my stuff."

"Chill out, Riley, we're taking him to Mac. Where's Paulina?" Already walking down the hallway, I heard her confirm Paulina was asleep upstairs. She usually worked in the garden in the morning with whoever was scheduled to help her that day. We each had a day of the week but most of us would pitch in an extra here and there.

In my room, I grabbed the bags with the boots and clothing I'd picked up for Mac on our last supply run. Getting to my knees, I dug around under my bed until I found the bottle of Macallan scotch I'd hid under there. This would hopefully sweeten the old man into taking in Cocoa until he was old enough to find his own way.

On my way out the door I heard the little witch mutter _freak_ under her breath. Now, I could either be the better person by ignoring her _or_ I could throw something at her. The soccer ball one of the boys had left by the front door hit her smack on the forehead. Her indignant screech was music to this freak's ears.

On my way to meet my dad outside the barricade, a street urchin ran up me. Oh wait, that was our newly acquired orphan, Zeke. How he'd gotten so dirty again so soon after the scrub down he'd had before Paulina would allow him to sleep in the house, I didn't know. He and Nacho had become fast friends and I figured suggesting to Paulina they bathed together from now on would be a brilliant idea.

Narrowing my eyes at him, I asked, "What have you been up to?"

"What's it to you, blondie? Do you see me askin' what you do with your time when you ain't makin' out with numbnuts?" The kid was impossible.

"You know," I began, "there's an orphanage of sorts at the Fort Collins settlement. The kids there do chores all morning long. How good are you at milking cows?"

Zeke gave me a disgusted look. "Is that the best you can do, blondie? Your dad done and woke me up this mornin' to work in the stables."

"Oh yeah?" I asked while I exited the barricade. "How'd that go?"

"It didn't _go_ at all. I didn't get my freedom from those jackasses y'all killed just to play slave to a new bunch of jackasses. I told your dad he could eat the shit he was tryin' to make me shovel and hightailed it outta there."

Picturing that scene in my head, I had to stifle my laughter. "Did he catch you yet?"

The boy's chest puffed out a bit. "Naw, but that mean-ass brother of yours, the one with the colored girlfriend, well I've been dodging that big oaf all day since."

"Do you like the taste of soap?"

"What kind of ignorant question is that?"

"Then watch your mouth before someone puts it in there. And I suggest you quit referring to Melanie in such derogatory terms before Viktor takes a belt to you."

"He'd have to catch me first," Zeke boasted fearlessly. We were just coming up on some of our vehicles where my dad had Cocoa on a leash. Zeke stopped dead in his tracks before yelling, "Is that thing real?"

"Yep!" I heard called out from above us. Looking up, I saw Alexi standing atop the barricade.

"Are we keepin' it?" Zeke asked in awe.

"We're taking it to a friend of ours who lives nearby," I explained as I met my dad at the back of the vintage military Jeep we'd commandeered from this place that restored them in Fort Collins. There was a goldmine of old military vehicles with the keys hanging up in the office.

"Can I come along?" Zeke pleaded, sounding more his age and less like a foulmouthed trucker.

"Sure, why not?" I agreed wryly. It'd be interesting to see what Mac made of the kid.

Tying Cocoa up in the back of the Jeep, my dad then joined Zeke and me in the front. I had my tomahawk and a handgun just in case. My dad was carrying a machete along with his favorite shotgun. Zeke had a survival knife strapped to his thin waist and I wondered how skilled he was with it.

As we drove away with my dad behind the wheel, I looked back to see Alexi messing around with his slingshot, probably trying to shoot birds out of trees. Out of all creatures, I think birds had it easiest. Beyond reach in the trees, they were rarely devoured. Justin must have returned to the watchtower and Viktor and Melanie must be off somewhere, probably getting things ready for the party tonight.

Since my hair was braided down my back today, the breeze from riding in the topless Jeep only pulled a few shorter strands loose. Out of habit, I scanned the area, using my sixth sense to check for the undead. I felt a small vibration, indicating that something was barely within range, likely just a couple of them that would pass by the area.

The drive to Mac's was about four miles when taking the roads. The distance was shorter if you were cutting through the wilderness on an ATV. Approaching Mac's humble abode, I saw smoke rising from the chimney and huffed at his recklessness. It was fine for our family to take risks like that because we had safety in numbers, in addition to my ability. Our neighbor, Willard Mackie, or Mac for short, lived in an old two-bedroom cabin he'd decorated on the outside with both the American and Colorado flags hanging from posts on either side of his front door and decorated on the inside with antlers and old photos from his army days.

Hearing our car approach, Mac was waiting on his front porch, cigar in one hand and rifle in the other. At sixty-five, he was still in good health. With salt and pepper hair, mostly salt, and a mostly pepper beard and mustache, in his plaid flannel shirt and suspenders he looked the stereotypical mountain man. Mac was born and raised in the Rockies and, apocalypse be damned, he'd die here too. Unlike us, he'd occupied this same cabin before civilization came to an end.

Sauntering toward where we'd parked outside his tripwire perimeter, his stocky figure moved to the back of the Jeep where he looked Cocoa over. "Found yourselves a grizzly cub?" His cool blue eyes then moved to Zeke. "And a man cub also?"

When I saw Zeke was about to mouth off again, I cut him off. "They're presents for you, Mac."

Two bushy eyebrows rose. "Look more like unwanted castoffs, missy."

My father moved to the back of the Jeep to shake Mac's hand. "She's just trying to ruffle your feathers, old man. We're keeping the kid, but we were hoping you'd take in the bear."

Joining them, I added, "His name is Cocoa."

"Now, what kind of girly name is that?" he asked, clearly offended.

I gave up. No one liked my name for the baby grizzly. "Fine, whatever, Mac. Name him what you like."

"Don't remember agreeing to keep him, missy" Mac responded grumpily.

Knowing that he was more bark than bite, I tried to rile him up. "Well, if you don't think you can handle him. . ." I taunted.

Mac gave me a dirty look. "Didn't I tell you the last time I kicked you off my property to never return?"

I laughed out loud. The last time I'd visited, a couple weeks ago, I'd joked that Mac was sweet on Paulina. She'd sent with me some cookies she'd made, along with all the fixings for fajitas. Mac had had a twinkle in his eye that I'd mistaken for love. I joked with him he was either smitten with the food or the woman who'd made it. He'd promptly ejected me from the premises.

"But Mac," I pouted in a whiney voice, "Look what I brought you!" Grabbing the bottle of premium scotch from the back of the Jeep and the bags of boots and clothing, I held them out to him. "Who's your best buddy?"

My dad ushered Zeke forward, who'd been watching the interaction between me and Mac. "This is Zeke. We found him in Grand Junction when we were raiding. The bear, Anya and Justin found after its mother was taken down by a group of zombies." Zeke's expression was defiant, as if expecting a putdown.

With an aggravated grunt, Mac turned back to his house. "Well, come on then. Bring the bear with you."

Stepping carefully over tripwire, I led the way with Zeke and my dad following. The smell of some stew or soup cooking filled the main room. There was freshly prepared jerky in jars on the small kitchen table. Mac propped his rifle against the fireplace and stirred whatever concoction was simmering over the flame.

"The boy looks malnourished. If you want, you can stay for supper." His crotchety attitude contradicted his generous words. I secretly thought Mac liked the company. Even cranky old men got lonely sometimes. We'd offered for him to move in with us before, or at least closer, but he was adamant we'd only get on his nerves.

"Did you eat lunch, Zeke?" my dad asked the boy, who was eating the jerky with his eyes.

The kid shrugged. "Ate breakfast, but don't remember anyone offerin' lunch."

Maybe if he hadn't been so busy hiding from anyone who would give him chores. . . .

I opened a jar and handed him a few pieces of jerky, then belatedly informed Mac, "I'm giving Zeke some of your jerky. I'll pass on the stew, Mac, but if Zeke can have some?"

"I'll pass, too, old man," my dad said.

Mac brought a bowl for Zeke and himself and they both dug in. Zeke was still gobbling it down when Mac finished. "I suppose I'll take in the bear until it can fend for itself, as long as it doesn't try to eat Oscar." Oscar was Mac's evil cat. The thing tried to claw anyone who came near it, except Mac, of course. I was more worried about Cocoa's safety.

"Cocoa doesn't want to eat your demon cat, Mac. Where is the spawn of Satan, anyways?" I teased him.

Zeke washed down his meal with a glass of water and promptly belched. Mac gave him an irritated glance then turned his attention back to the bear. "Bud."

"What's that?" my father asked.

"I'll call him Bud," Mac decided. "After my bunkmate in boot camp." Not as creative as Cocoa, but I wouldn't be the one cleaning up after the animal. Mac scratched his beard while looking thoughtfully at Bud. "I'll have to get a kennel to keep him in at night and when I can't watch him."

"I could go into town with you and see if there's anything there," my dad offered.

"I suppose I might need help getting it into the back of the truck," Mac said.

"Do you want me to go with you?" I asked, not too keen on them going around without me.

My dad shook his head. "No, Anya, you take Zeke back home and I'll be home in an hour or so."

"That reminds me. How'd you like to come to a party, Mac?"

"What for?" he was hesitant to ask.

"It's Riley's fifteenth birthday," I clarified, already predicting his response.

Mac stood up, taking both his and Zeke's bowls to the sink. "Last time I went to one of those, I ended up with pink confetti in my hair. I'll pass."

" _Paulina_ will be there," I reminded him in a singsong voice.

When Mac's face started turning red with what I hoped was a blush, but was probably anger, I decided to get out of there. Grabbing Zeke's hand, I tugged him out of his chair and bounded towards the door. "Well, the offer stands. I'll get the orphan home and see you later, dad."

My dad chuckled from behind me. "See you at home, Anya."

It was an improvement not to be kicked out of his house again. Given a few more minutes, though, and who knows.

Paulina was icing the cake in the kitchen when we got home. Alexi was off somewhere, probably with Justin. Riley was upstairs getting ready for her party, probably caking on the makeup. Viktor and Melanie were out back hanging up decorations. Nacho was sleeping behind an armchair.

Paulina took one look at Zeke and told him that if he didn't clean himself up, he wouldn't be getting any cake. The poor kid's eyes bulged at the sight of all that sugary goodness and he shot up the stairs like a rocket. We'd put him in Paulina's room for now, but would probably move him in with Justin and Alexi when Kyle and I started rooming together.

Thinking of my cute fiancé, I went looking for him. He was lying face down on his bed, sleeping. I knew Paulina had asked him to butcher some chickens today for dinner. Riley loved fried chicken and mashed potatoes. Paulina usually made buttered yams along with it. We were eating good tonight.

I lie down on top of him, my front to his back, and nibbled on his ear. "Wake up and entertain me."

Kyle murmured in his sleep and turned his head. This didn't deter me. I simply started kissing his neck. My sleeping man liked that, if the humming noise he made was any indication. "That better be you, Anya," he muttered, not opening his eyes.

"And if it were Nacho?" I whispered.

His back rumbled and I knew he was silently laughing. "What time is it?"

"Time for you to get up and party!"

Kyle rolled over, bringing me on top of him. "How'd it go at Mac's?"

"He took in the orphaned bear but turned away the orphaned boy."

"You didn't seriously try to get rid of the kid?"

Melting into his warmth, I snuggled against his chest. "You know I wouldn't. Besides, who'd teach us new ways of cursing if Zeke left?"

"You have a point," Kyle conceded. "So, what are you giving Riley for her birthday?"

"Some dresses I scavenged when we were in that department store a few months back."

"Speaking of dresses, am I going to be seeing those legs at our wedding?" He ran a hand over my jean-clad thigh, making me shiver.

"You're only marrying me for my hot body," I teased him.

"And you're only marrying me to get at my big-" he got out before I punched him in the stomach.

"Shush, Kyle! That's supposed to be our secret."

"Love you, babe," he said with a kiss.

The door slammed open and Riley barged in. "I have nothing to wear!"

Could she _be_ any more of a cliché?

With a groan, I hauled myself up. "Quit being a drama queen and follow me." Kyle smacked my bottom as I walked away and I gave him a smile over my shoulder.

"Dorks," Riley said, making me rethink what I was about to do.

"Shut it, or I won't give you one of your birthday presents early," I warned her.

She squealed, "Gimme!"

Going into the sixth bedroom that we used for storage, I took one of the presents out of its hiding place. I'd taken my time wrapping it and tied a thick silver ribbon over the shiny wrapping paper. Riley ripped off the silver bow first.

"Oh. My. God. I love it!" she exclaimed, holding the royal blue dress up against herself. It, along with the other dresses I'd picked, was stylish and feminine but not too short that my dad would have a heart attack. Riley darted out of the room without so much as a thank you. Not that I was surprised.

She was trying the dress on when I got to our room. Her makeup was already done and you'd think she was about to act on stage with how much of it there was. Going into the closet, I pulled from the hanger a black and white floral sundress. Getting dressed, I added some black flats and a necklace.

This was sort of my party too, celebrating me and Kyle getting engaged. As if there were ever a question of whom I'd marry. Apocalypse or not, we were destined to spend our lives together, whether it be working ordinary jobs and raising a family in suburbia or killing zombies and scavenging for supplies.

Adding eye makeup and lipstick, I sat at my vanity and closed my eyes, reaching out to test the activity in the area. It was all clear. Let's party!

Entering the kitchen, I gave Paulina a skeptical look when I saw Zeke. He was sitting at the dining room table, cleaned up, hair brushed and wearing an old outfit of Justin's. A little too big for him, he must've scrounged it from the basement. The red polo shirt was slightly wrinkled, but I think it may be the nicest thing he'd worn in a long time.

"Don't you look debonair, Mr. Ezekiel?" I complimented.

"Deba-what?" His little freckled nose scrunched up.

"It means you look good, kid." I giggled at his blush and gave him a pat on the back. "Make sure you ask Riley to dance."

Out back, Melanie was setting out silverware on the table and Viktor was lighting tiki torches. The sun was low in the sky and those would come in handy before long. Riley had requested a tropical themed party, so the place was made up like a luau.

Melanie, stunning in a strapless, coral dress and a white lei, placed a blue lei around my neck. "Aloha, bride-to-be."

"Oh, Melanie, are you okay with me and Kyle getting engaged? Viktor. . . ." I trailed off.

"Girlie, don't even worry about it," Melanie waved off my concern. "What Viktor and I have is good, we both know it. We don't need to go about saying we're married to be secure."

"Lucky you," I told her. "If Kyle and I aren't official, we're never going to get any action."

Melanie grimaced. "Your dad and Viktor do have a double standard when it comes to you."

"At least Paulina spreads the prudishness evenly. She'll never quit harping about you and Viktor sharing a room until you tie the knot."

"Too true, girlie."

Kyle came out the sliding door, covered dish in hands. Wearing a black dress shirt and jeans, my guy looked good. I picked up a yellow and orange lei from the table and slipped it over his head. "You look debonair, honey."

"Didn't I just overhear you telling Zeke the same thing?" he questioned in pretend hurt.

"As if I would recycle my compliments!" I pretended my own hurt.

Smirk on those lips I loved so much, he came down for a kiss. Running my fingers through his brown wavy hair, I ignored Viktor's pointed cough. I'd have to cut it again for him soon. It was starting to grow below his ears. Eventually we came up for air and I gave him an unused compliment. "You look sexy as hell wearing flowers."

He rolled his eyes. "Much better, I think."

"I'm here!" Riley announced, twirling around in her new dress. She saw the leis and rushed over to put on a turquoise one. Her eyes sparkled when she saw the pile of wrapped gifts.

Paulina, followed by Justin and Alexi, came out with the rest of the food. I went into the house to get the pitchers of tea and water. As I was bringing them out, I heard the front door slam and let out a sigh of relief. My dad walked in a moment later and I handed one to him. "You're just in time. We're just getting ready to eat."

My dad rubbed his belly with his free hand. "I'm starved."

"Did you guys find what he needed for Bud?"

"We did. Mac and I put the cage in his second bedroom."

"Isn't that his gun room?" I asked, stepping out onto the deck.

"Gun room slash Bud's room now," my dad remarked.

I shrugged one shoulder. "Whatever works."

Kyle was just putting a CD in the boombox when we set the pitchers down. An old R&B track started playing. Once seated, we all started digging in. Paulina made plenty for everyone and enough for leftovers tomorrow. After lighting the candles and Riley making a big show of blowing them out, probably wishing for a boyfriend, the cake was eaten with just as much gusto. Zeke had two pieces. I wondered when he'd last celebrated a birthday.

"Hey Zeke," I called from the down the table.

Mouth full of cake, he answered, "Yeah?"

"When's your birthday?"

"How the fu-" he started to say before correcting himself. "How the heck should I know?"

"We'll give you a birthday. When do you want it?" Melanie suggested.

"How about the fourth of July?" Alexi asked.

"Works for me," Zeke agreed. "Just don't give me a lame party like this one."

Riley threw her napkin at him and an unconcerned Zeke brushed it away. "I'm ready for my presents," she announced.

With much fanfare, each present was opened and admired. Riley made out good, receiving more clothing, makeup, accessories and even CDs. For once, Riley didn't have anything to complain about. I have to say, going to stores and getting whatever you wanted for free did have its perks.

My dad surprised everyone with a colorful butterfly piñata. Alexi ran to fetch his modified baseball bat, planning to do some real damage, not that he was getting a go at the piñata with that thing. My dad looped the rope over a tree and handed Zeke a stick while Paulina blindfolded him with a bandana. Zeke was practically vibrating with excitement. He managed to hit it with the tip of the stick, but the piñata was otherwise unharmed.

"Riley's next," my dad announced. And so on it went, going by gender, then age until Viktor waved off his turn. Ridiculous, no one was too cool to smack a piñata with a stick.

Zeke was the one to break it open, and I thought my dad had been making it extra hard for the rest of us so this would be the outcome. He was the only little kid, and I doubt he'd had very much childish fun in his nine years. Even Riley didn't complain.

"Yay, Zeke!" I shouted, clapping along with Melanie and Riley.

Zeke beamed at us. "I just pretended it was a zombie head I was bashin' in!" Well, childhood pursuits were a little _different_ nowadays.

The candy that poured out onto the ground was a mixture and although candy never really spoiled because of all the sugar in it, flavors and colors would fade. It didn't stop Zeke from trying a few pieces and spitting out most of them.
CHAPTER SEVEN

It was after dark and Paulina had already gone off to bed, taking an unhappy Zeke with her. The kid didn't like being told when to go to bed. He especially didn't like sharing a room with an "old lady." Zeke had been having the time of his life, eating more and dancing. Though, I'm not sure if it can really be called that. Zeke had a seizure-like dance method. With many threats, Viktor and Paulina got him upstairs and in bed.

My dad lasted longer, sitting with Viktor and drinking wine. Eventually, he too went in for the night. This may have had something to do with the more uptempo music we were now listening to. After his departure, Kyle and I started going around to the side of the house to take tequila shots. I suspected Alexi and Justin were up to something similar when they kept disappearing and showing up stupider than they were before. Viktor sat and slowly drank wine while Riley chatted up Melanie about her gifts and her aspirations for life. It was amazing how delusional she still was, thinking somehow everything would change back to the way it used to be. Not in our lifetime it wouldn't.

After my fourth shot and Kyle's fifth or sixth, he changed the CD to hip hop and we started dancing. My guy was still feeling some pain from the wound to his leg, but the alcohol had dulled it. At first it was just me and Kyle, with Melanie and Riley nearby doing their own thing. They looked funny dancing together because Riley had so little experience with dancing pre-apocalypse and she basically sucked post-apocalypse. After years of dance classes and being on my freshman dance team, I had moves. The tequila only made me feel freer.

I loved this. His strong arms encircled me and his brown eyes gazed down at me with a warmth that was solely mine. There were a lot of sad stories out there of love lost. My dad still suffered from it, only driven by the need to protect his children. Riley could call me a freak all she wanted, I didn't care. Whether I was a freak or gifted, I would always thank whatever gave me this ability to protect the ones I loved. Because of it, our story, Kyle's and mine would have a happy ending. I didn't fear trying to have a normal life, a home and a family someday.

The song changed to one of my old favorites. I had to wonder how many of the rich and famous survived. With helicopters, private planes and yachts, wouldn't many of them have a chance? Perhaps the artist currently playing on our little boombox was on an island somewhere in the Caribbean. "Keep it clean, honey, or Viktor is going to complain again," I told him over the music, grinning.

Kyle's tipsy self was almost to the point of beyond caring. "Like he isn't going to be grinding against Melanie once he stops brooding over his wine." True, Viktor was the brooding type. Alcohol just made him more introspective. Even though Levi was his dad in every way that mattered, I sometimes wondered if Viktor got the trait from his biological father. He definitely got his dark looks and height from him. Alexi would always be the little brother in every way, unless he managed to shoot past my dad's six foot frame. Kyle was a little under six feet and I thought he was perfect size for my five foot six height.

"Let's go take another shot," I suggested, taking his hand and dragging him off our improvised dance floor. When he stumbled a little behind me, I slowed down. The alcohol may numb the pain in his leg, but it didn't make him any more coordinated.

Retrieving our bottle of tequila and shot glasses from where it was stashed in a paper bag, Kyle poured us each a shot. Going down, it still burned but at least it no longer tasted so toxic. My dad and Paulina would be pissed to know we were drinking. We'd both had a glass of wine before in their presence, but no hard liquor. For Alexi and Justin even wine was prohibited and I bet they'd be struggling to hide hangovers tomorrow morning from whatever it was they were drinking.

Kyle quickly downed his shot, waiting for me to do the same. "That's it for me. I'm done."

"Me too, babe," Kyle agreed. "We have a busy day tomorrow."

The next few minutes were spent making out against the side of the house. I couldn't wait until our wedding night. I was thinking we'd clean up a cabin nearby and have ourselves a little honeymoon. With no one to invade our privacy or annoy us, it would just me and my new husband. Everyone would have to do without us for a few days.

Walking around the side of the house, I thought I felt something, but couldn't be sure. My senses were out of whack due to the tequila consumption, so I brushed it off. "Let's sit down for awhile."

Kyle sat down first and lowered me onto his uninjured thigh. "It's nice out tonight."

"It is." I pillowed my head on his shoulder. "Nights like this, you can almost forget what's out there in the world."

"Zeke is hilarious," Kyle commented, running a hand up and down my back.

Laughing at his antics tonight, I played with my engagement ring. It was so pretty. "I wasn't so sure at first it'd work out, but I'm glad we found him."

I felt it stronger now and was certain what it was. Jumping up out of my chair, I called out, "A horde!"

Viktor was beside me in seconds, gripping my arm. "How far and how many?" Justin rushed to turn off the music. Alexi was already fumbling for his baseball bat.

"Damn," I mumbled closing my eyes. "I'm having trouble telling. I just know I feel them."

Someone flicked their fingers against my forehead and I popped my eyes open to glare at the culprit. "Anya, maybe it's not such a good idea to get drunk if it's going to impair you."

"I'm not your performing monkey, _Viktor_! Sometimes I need time to relax like the rest of you!" Okay, that was the guilt talking, and maybe the booze.

"I'm going to wake up dad," he said, disappearing into the house.

I felt a hand at the nape of my neck. "Relax, Anya. Concentrate and you'll figure it out."

Doing what Kyle said, I tried to ignore the panic of Justin and Alexi. My dad came running out of the house a minute later, Viktor right behind. Melanie had sent Riley inside and was now gathering weapons. Focusing helped, I was able to better detect them. "About a dozen or so, not far and getting closer. I'd guess about a quarter mile." I stopped to be sure. "In that direction." Pointing up the mountain, I felt relief the booze hadn't totally put my power on the fritz.

"Good job, babe," Kyle encouraged, "You can drop 'em and we'll take care of them before they wake."

"I'm still drunk," I whispered mischievously and he coughed to cover his laugh.

Melanie handed me my tomahawk and a gun. I checked the clip. Everyone was ready to go, including Alexi and Justin. Viktor was having a quiet pow-wow with my dad as they studied the teenage boys. Clearly pissed, my dad told the boys, "You two get inside and we'll have a talk about your behavior tomorrow. Wake up Paulina and let her know what's going on. I'll be expecting you to sit with Riley, nice and quiet, until we return." Red-faced, Justin and Alexi filed past him into the house. My dad turned back to Viktor. "You should've been watching them."

Viktor shrugged noncommittally. "It's nothing I didn't do at their age, before this shit happened."

I strived to not look as drunk as the boys. Kyle had an excuse to look clumsy, luckily. The five of us loaded into the Suburban and drove in the direction I'd pointed, well as close to that way we could go by following the back roads. The ride was bumpy; no more road crews to patch up potholes anymore. Worse than the road conditions were the pitch black areas our headlights didn't illuminate.

As a family we'd decided a long time ago not to let the constant threat of attack stop us from living as normal as possible lives. Within reason, of course. We weren't going to move in downtown Denver, expecting to live peacefully, but we also weren't going to wallow in misery and paranoia. Living in such a secluded area, we didn't often have major problems. Usually the stray zombie or two, sometimes a horde travelled through. When given the choice between ascending steep terrain and walking over flat ground, the dead generally chose the easier route. This is where living in the mountains helped. Given provocation, however, even a legless zombie crawled uphill. Our shindig could be considered reckless to settlements that didn't have a necromancer amongst them. We'd had our fun, unfortunately attracted a passing horde and now we had to pay the price. Then again, maybe they hadn't heard our ruckus at all and it was a coincidence that they were headed our way.

The drive was short. "Pull over right here," I informed my dad, "they're in the trees over there, coming closer." They'd definitely heard our vehicles or seen our lights, likely both, altering their course to target us instead of the direction they'd heard our music coming from.

"Okay, Anya, drop 'em," Kyle said, hand on my knee.

"Wait," I told him, feeling out the area. "There's something else." From the glow of the dashlights, I saw four pairs of eyes on me. " _Shit_ ," I cursed.

"What is it?" Melanie questioned from the other side of me.

"I think," I started, waving a hand, "there's another group coming from that way." Dead energy hit me from the south. "A larger group, for sure, and over a mile away." The larger the group, the farther away I could sense them.

"Can you hit them with your zombie juice?" Viktor asked, peering through the windshield at the first infected to stumble out of the trees in front of our headlights. My dad slowly reversed the car about fifty yards to buy us more time.

"It'd be better if they were closer," I told him. "They may not be within range, plus, if I took them out from here, we'd have to search for them." One zombie headed our way turned into a handful as they trickled onto the road. Within a minute, the complete group was desperate to reach us. My dad backed up around a curve.

"This is what we'll do," my dad said, getting our full attention, "You direct me, Anya, and we'll lead them to the other group and take care of all of them at once."

"That could take awhile," Kyle observed.

"But it'd be more efficient," Melanie countered. Viktor nodded in agreement.

Already maneuvering the large SUV into a u-turn, trying to avoid hitting any trees in the narrow space, my dad drove the vehicle at a crawl down the mountain, zombie conga line behind us. Zigzagging over switchback roads didn't help our progress. Bored, Viktor put in a hard rock CD.

My buzz was starting to wear off a bit and I yawned, laying my head against Kyle. "Let's open the windows, it's a nice night," I told Melanie and Kyle. They complied and I enjoyed the cool breeze it created. Turning my head to look out the back, the red of the taillights gave me a view of our nearest pursuer. The desperate grimace on his face almost made me feel sorry for him. _Almost_. Meeting this guy in an alley even before he turned undead would've scared me. He was dressed in dirty leathers, a black jacket and pants, but for whatever reason was barefoot.

Turning up the music, Viktor ensured the larger horde down the mountain would hear us coming and hopefully save us some time by stumbling our way. As we lessened the distance between us, I blocked out the zombie train to our rear and focused on the oncoming group. _Definitely double in size to the one at our back_. My guess was, they'd strayed from the highway or perhaps the stronger ones at the front were leading the weaker through the Rockies. My affinity with the dead didn't extend to telepathy and I was sure that was a good thing. No one wanted to be in the head of a zombie.

The journey took almost an hour according to the clock on the dash. I'd guided us within yards of the bigger horde and they were eager to meet up. Before a zombie mixer could commence around us, I let my necromancy stretch out and encompass the area. Dread and nothingness were my companions on this ethereal journey. Besides these two groups, I didn't feel any other activity. I blasted them with dead energy. They fell like dominoes, mostly forward, some backwards and the odd one sideways.

Viktor turned the music off. "All done?"

"Yep, now the real work begins," I replied reluctantly.

No one was in the mood to take care of business, but what other option did we have? These infected would be reanimating eventually and we couldn't risk waking up tomorrow morning with them surrounding our barricade. Here, at least, the rotted bodies were far away from our home. Near our house, the stench of decay wouldn't go well with the bacon and eggs Paulina would be making in the morning. Besides, we chose not to bury bodies by the house. We'd finish them off here and dispose of them tomorrow during daylight hours.

"Let's do this," my dad declared and we dragged ourselves out of the car. Kyle groaned when he put weight on his injured leg. With the tequila wearing off he was feeling the effects of dancing with his wound not yet healed.

"Do you need to sit this out?" I asked.

Stubbornly, he hissed, "I can manage."

My dad pulled several lanterns from the back to light the macabre scene. I took my tomahawk to the nearest corpse and, with a heave, brought the spike down into its skull. Viktor had a sword we'd found in a mansion above Aspen and was sticking it to them in a similar fashion. As Kyle bashed a head in with sledgehammer, I took out biker zombie. The cross he wore around his neck made me involuntarily shudder. My mother had been religious and brought us up Orthodox. However, since it began six years ago, we'd all questioned those beliefs. If God really did exist, man was no longer in favor. Not that I could blame Him, we'd sort of taken for granted the gifts He'd given us.

My dad split skulls with a cane knife and Melanie made a face as her pickaxe slid through brain. Yanking it out, she muttered, "I'll never get used to this."

It may be hard to get used to, but after years of practice our skills were honed. We were zombie-killing machines. I couldn't tell in the dim lighting, but I thought I'd managed not to dirty my dress. My dad killed the last one and we practically let out a collective sigh of relief. We must have finished off about three dozen total.

"So, we'll come back tomorrow, bring Alexi and Justin, and gather them up," Viktor proposed. "Load them in the back of the trailer and take them to a house in Silverthorne and burn it down." The house he referred to was located away from other houses and trees, so the blaze would be easily contained. We had several such places lined up for disposal. I guessed Viktor wasn't meaning to have Kyle come along. He'd expended enough energy in the activities of tonight.

It was unavoidable with the sheer number of dead strewed across the ground around the Suburban and my dad ran over bodies as we drove out of there. So saying, the ride was bumpier than before. Moving at a higher speed now, we arrived home in minutes. Along the way, I saw the glowing eyes of a deer peering out from the bushes and imagined a large buck impaling an attacking biter with his massive antlers. Stranger things had happened. What if the deer got stuck that way?

"You awake?" Kyle murmured, leaning his head against mine.

Raising my own from his shoulder, I gave him an exhausted smile. "Yeah, but I hopefully won't be in ten minutes."

We parked vehicles in random spots around our barricade, keeping our options open in case of attack. In addition, hidden down the mountain we had more getaway vehicles loaded with emergency supplies and weapons. As tired as any of us, my dad parked the Suburban right in front of a barricade entrance. Exiting, I let Kyle help me out and made sure to avoid the barbed wire on the outside of the barricade.

Paulina was waiting on the front deck when we got there, shotgun in hand. When I'd teased her once about battling zombies with a rolling pin she'd withheld corn tortillas from me for a whole day. There were few delights left to me and fresh, warm tortillas were one of them. Nacho greeted us, wagging his tail. If I'd had a nap like him today, I might be just as energized. Paulina had a fluffy robe wrapped over her nightgown but was wearing tennis shoes instead of her favorite slippers. She was obviously ready to gather her chicks and run.

Pinched face, her worry showed. "Is it safe now?"

"Safe as it can be," my dad answered vaguely.

She let out an exasperated huff. "Young people, wake the dead playing their music too loud."

_Or something like that_ , I agreed to myself. Not that we'd change tonight. One or both of those packs could've shown up at our doorstep anyway. I doubted the larger pack had been close enough to hear our music, they were likely passing by. The smaller pack probably heard us on their walkabout and followed the noise. We weren't going to live like scared rabbits. Not even rabbits had avoided casualties in this zombie war, I'd seen that too. Not a pretty sight.

"Up to bed all of you," she ordered in her motherly, if impatient, fashion.

"Yes, ma'am," Viktor joked as he followed Melanie inside.

Kyle and I left my dad and Paulina out there, presumably to discuss the night's events. Passing the living room, Alexi and Justin were zoned out on the couch. Melanie and Viktor had already gone upstairs. Kyle escorted me to the closed door of my room. Unconcerned and still high off all the attention today, I assumed Riley was warm in her bed. Ritually, I waited for my goodnight kiss.

"Crazy day," he said, leaning against the wall.

"Not the first and definitely won't be the last," I noted.

"The one good thing about winter is snow slowing life, and the dead, down," he observed.

"But it's damn cold," I got out before he reached to pull me into his chest. Resting there for a long time, I pulled back when I heard my dad stomping into the house. "See you tomorrow."

"Kiss me first," he demanded. Our lips met and I savored the familiarity of his soft mouth. Reluctantly on both our parts, it inevitably ended.

That night, I slept like the dead.
CHAPTER EIGHT

I'd spent a majority of the day before helping in the garden. It was important for us to have successful crops if we were going to have enough produce for the following winter. We'd stockpiled rice and other products, but if we wanted some things we'd have to grow it ourselves. Thankfully, we had plenty of animals to butcher for meat. In the autumn we'd be busy canning whatever we could.

The guys had worked all day hauling the corpses from the night before and burning them and a house down to the ground. My dad had given a long lecture the previous morning to Alexi and Justin on the hazards of getting wasted when there was the possibility of danger. Neither Melanie nor Viktor tattled on me and Kyle, which we were grateful for.

In the evening, I'd helped Paulina prepare dinner while Melanie patiently watched Riley parade in and out of the living room, showing off her new clothes. Riley practiced strutting around the house in heels the past few months so she was a pro. I'd still be interested in watching her run from a gang of zombies in them. Well, if by some miracle civilization did return, she'd be prepared for prom.

Until then, I'd be sticking closer to the ground in boots and flats. Except for my wedding, I may don a pair of pretty heels for that. I still needed to find a dress, something simple and feminine. I was thinking the outlet mall in Silverthorne may have something. I'd have to get Melanie to check it out with me.

Alexi and Justin were tired from their work, and still a bit hung-over, so they'd gone to bed right after bathing and eating dinner. My dad had set about the task of figuring out what Zeke did and did not know academically. Mostly, it was the "did not know" category that filled up. He had his work cut out for him. The boy couldn't read and the alphabet was meaningless symbols.

Kyle and I found alone time by sitting out on the deck, cuddling on the same chair. Talks of the future had changed since before the apocalypse. When we were in middle school, we'd often contemplated which college we'd go to or which profession we'd like to go into. I'd wanted to be something ambitious like a lawyer or an FBI agent. Kyle's dreams were more easily attainable; he'd wanted to be a high school math teacher. Nowadays, our dreams were more down-to-earth. We talked about having a home of our own nearby and someday making a baby or two. I thought that someday was a day far away. Like when we were thirty. I was in no hurry to be responsible for keeping _another_ person alive. Kyle had the "whatever happens, happens," attitude. I'd stealthily be starting our own stockpile of condoms the next time we went on a supply run.

Having to get up early the next morning, we all went to bed at a decent time, Melanie and Viktor before everyone else. Paulina had simply shaken her head, complaining that there was a couple who needed to be getting married. _Live and let live_ was my motto. There was no longer a society to judge and I figured someday that little fact would catch up with Paulina.

Today, we'd be on the road again. We left early after finishing loading up the vehicles with goods to trade. Eating the breakfast Paulina made us all for our journey, I wondered if she ever got tired of constantly cooking. I got the impression she found pleasure in providing nourishment for the rest of us, so maybe not.

We'd all been looking forward to today, having had good experiences in the past at this settlement. There was only one downside to going there and I wasn't going to even acknowledge him. With any luck, he'd be on a supply run himself or otherwise occupied and out of my sight. I knew the guys were hoping to pick up new defensive techniques with regards to weapons or combat.

My dad and Paulina sought out the chance to socialize with their own age group. They didn't have much in common with each other and were sometimes bored being surrounded in isolation by a group of youths. My dad had Mac to visit, but poor Paulina had no older women to converse with. Melanie was arguably more mature than me, so I think she on occasion filled that void, but was usually off with Viktor.

That's the way it was when you were in love. I'd known for a long time Kyle was my partner for life. We'd shared much sadness and happiness over the years. Our bond was unbreakable. Viktor seemed to have found the same thing in Melanie. Girls at the settlements were never been able to entice him into straying. Like Melanie said, ring or no ring, they were solid.

People got bored at the settlements, rarely seeing new faces, and the single people living at them would sometimes come on to visitors. Viktor had had to brush off a persistent older woman at the Colorado Springs settlement more than once. We'd all had experiences like that. I thought our group was sometimes envied for our unity. We were small enough for loyalties to never conflict.

And we never told any outsiders where our permanent home was, friends or not.

Our small convoy of cars, three to be exact, descended from the mountain at around ten in the morning. The weather was overcast and, from the dreary shades of grey in the sky, I didn't need to be a weatherman to predict a good chance of rain. Good for our crops, bad for the roads. I was pretty sure it was Thursday. Maybe it was Friday; the days of the week lose their importance when your main objective in life is simply to survive. Still being alive and healthy on a Thursday didn't feel any different than any other day of the week.

My dad always kept track of these things, the time and date, making sure our clocks were always correct and making his own calendars. The one he always posted in the kitchen even had important dates written in. As if Memorial Day was important anymore. The greatest war of all time had been fought over the past six years, the war against our extinction, and there too many fallen in its many battles to keep track of them. Too little time to mourn them all. None of us liked to think of the people from Arizona we'd known at school and in our old neighborhood that we'd never see again.

We'd taken several cars in an effort to ease the congestion now that we had the new addition of little Zeke. Viktor had suggested a safer, but slower route that weaved through the mountains, avoiding any known settlements or major towns. As we passed the mountain scenery, I felt the occasional zombie vibe. Nothing alarming, like a swarm of them awaiting us on the road. The ones we'd herded together the other night were in all likelihood the last hordes we'd encounter so near to the house for awhile.

My dad, Justin, and Paulina led the way in the truck. Viktor, Melanie, Alexi and Riley were in the Suburban, pulling a trailer with the supplies we planned to trade. That left Kyle, Zeke, and me at the rear of the formation in the Jeep. To say we'd drawn the short straw would be a monumental understatement. Even Riley's whining didn't compare to the pestilence that was Zeke's views of the world.

Zeke blabbed the whole way to Fort Collins about nothing in particular and everything we didn't want to hear. His drawl had grown wearisome before we'd even left the friendly confines of our driveway. He spoke frankly of all facets of life, from the uselessness of women to the time he'd bested his former captors in a pissing contest. It was a truly riveting conversation which made the road trip so relaxing for Kyle and me.

"Hey blondie, you two is getting hitched right?" Zeke inquired after a rare and unfortunately all too short silence. I'd been hoping he'd fallen asleep back there. He'd scarfed down enough food to go into a coma.

"It's Anya, not blondie," I said monotonously for the zillionth time.

Ignoring me, he continued to run his dirty and uninhibited little mouth. "You know, you're pretty smart puttin' that shit on lockdown." he directed at Kyle, who couldn't help but scoff at his nerve. "And here I was, thinkin' you were dumber than a dog runnin' right into the middle of a horde."

"I'm flattered, really," Kyle acknowledged dryly.

Zeke was undeterred. "Though, maybe settling down with a woman ain't so smart after all. Lorenzo always used to say that only man was intelligent enough to come up with this plague, but only woman was stupid enough to unleash it on the world."

Kyle burst out laughing and quickly shot a glance at me. At my dirty look, he'd grown very intimate with the windshield in front of him in an attempt to avoid my fists of fury. Concentrating on his driving, he must have felt my glare. "What?" he asked innocently. "You can't deny the kid's hilarious."

"You don't have to encourage him," I hissed under my breath, "especially when he's acting racist or like a little misogynist."

"I know you're gonna ask me to be your best man and the answer is yes," continued Zeke confidently. "Course that's only if there's a bachelor party," he finished smartly. At the sound of Kyle's guffaw, he got my fist in his side, the one wearing his engagement ring.

"Zeke, what in God's name do you know about bachelor parties?" I asked the little demon, turning in my seat to stare pointedly at him. He had me genuinely interested how a nine-year-old living in the apocalyptic world would acquire knowledge of pre-marital festivities such as this.

"Well, _Miss Anya_ ," he emphasized sarcastically, "remember them cowboys I was with before ya'll kidnapped me? Well the Mexican one, Lorenzo, had a little TV thing that could play videos."

"Alright, that's enough," I interrupted him. "There's no need to finish that story."

There was no telling what kind of video had taught him about bachelor parties. Disgusted yet again, I told Zeke it was time to play the quiet game. Predictably, Zeke lost the quiet game after only a few minutes. This was the entire drive to Fort Collins. Zeke spout off about age inappropriate topics while I uselessly scolded him and Kyle laughed occasionally.

At least the scenery was beautiful. The mountain towns hadn't been quite as ravaged as the rest of the state, particularly Denver and its suburbs. Back when the outbreak first began most people had foolishly congregated in the cities, thinking the hastily called up National Guard and police officers could provide protection. Refugee camps outside the cities were inevitably overrun by massive hordes of the undead searching out victims.

We didn't see a living soul the entire drive, not a surprise. One of the soulless undead fell victim to the grille guard on the truck, leaving Viktor and then Kyle swerving to avoid running over the corpse. If I had a nickel for every zombie we'd killed . . . well, what the hell would I do with all those nickels anyways?

The former college town of Fort Collins was one of the few settlements we'd encountered which showed some remnants of civilization. The university's former students, along with some professors and families, had formed the only rival to the Colorado Springs settlement, both in size and security. Its survivors were educated, well organized and, most importantly in these harrowing times, they were _normal_. Unlike the pleasure seekers of Eden and the power hungry of Colorado Springs, the Fort Collins group strove for progress and community.

Several times a year, we made the long trip to Fort Collins to trade supplies and stock up on biofuel. Twelve foot walls, made with a mixture of materials, surrounded the borders of the settlement. Dorms, dining halls, classrooms and wide open spaces provided ample room for the people to prosper and plant crops. We'd even considered settling here at one point before Viktor and my dad had decided it was best to seclude ourselves from others. The security in the numbers here didn't outweigh the use of my gift. Plus, in our little mountain retreat we didn't have to answer to a larger community. We made our own decisions.

We arrived on campus being followed by a slew of stray zombies that were then trapped in the spiked moat around the gate. An engineering professor had devised an ingenious drawbridge system which added extra defense in the event of mob attack. I saw a guard wearing a silver fire proximity suit preparing a flamethrower to light the living dead on fire after they fell into the pit.

"Badass!" Zeke exclaimed in awe. "I gotta get me one of those!" Hopefully he meant the suit, not the flamethrower. I imagined Zeke having playtime with a flamethrower and setting the forest surrounding our home ablaze.

"Not till you're twelve, son," Kyle joked.

"Or ever," I added cheerfully.

The last time we visited, there'd been rumors Colorado Springs' leaders wanted to annex this place. So far these rumors had proven untrue, but after the events at Eden it didn't seem farfetched any longer. The prospect wasn't a good one. It would take away a lot of the enjoyment of visiting if this place became the military dictatorship that Colorado Springs was.

Kyle and I had our own special errand to run this trip. There was a pastor who could give us a formal wedding for only a meager fee at the chapel on campus. I'd been in there once before. Paulina had made us all visit the church a few summers ago because she'd found dirty magazines in Justin and Alexi's room while gathering their dirty laundry. It didn't really seem fair for us to be grouped with the little perverts, but there we were. For awhile now, she'd pretty much given up on keeping everyone's faith alive, leaving us to our own beliefs or non-beliefs. Maybe she'd finally seen enough and given up on God herself.

We crept through the gates and stopped in the visitor parking area to run through a quick security check. A guard would routinely step up to each vehicle and ask us to state our business and how long we'd be staying. The drill was the same each time we came.

Our guard was a cocky-looking guy in his mid-twenties. I was honestly hoping we'd get someone else because every time we were here this guy would stare at me. It's not that he was unattractive. A shade over six feet, his black hair was currently buzzed and he had hooded blue eyes surrounded by thick lashes. What always unnerved me was the mischievous look in those wicked eyes which implied he knew something you didn't.

He motioned us out of the vehicle and I noticed he was strapped with enough weapons and ammunition to take out a horde by himself. "Hi there," he greeted, his gaze zeroing in on me in my shorts and tank top. "Welcome to Fort Collins, I'm Conley, what's your business?" he asked Kyle while watching me come around the Jeep. I took the blue flannel tied around my waist and put it on, uncomfortable being scrutinized.

"We're here to fuck shit up," squeaked Zeke.

Kyle laughed before answering, "We're here to get biofuel and visit the pastor."

"Sounds good, you know the weapons restrictions?" asked Conley in his rumbling voice. Yet again, he was looking at me. Then he, almost distractedly, continued by saying, "No automatic weapons allowed. Each person is permitted one handgun with the safety on and one sheathed blade."

"Yeah, yeah, commando Conley. This counts as my blade, right?" quipped Zeke as he unsheathed the machete he told us "spoke to" him.

"Sure that works, even if it's bigger than you are, champ," responded the amused watchman. "Be safe guys . . . and you too, miss," he finished softly while staring at my mouth.

Ignoring him, I walked away, hoping he wasn't now checking out my bottom in my jean shorts. Guys were such pigs and the last thing I needed was some stupid self-absorbed jerk ogling me. One more thing to add to the long list of reasons _not_ to live in a settlement.

We weren't ten steps away when Kyle asked me, "Hey, so should I kick that guy's ass?" It was very noble of him and all, but I wasn't sure he'd healed enough yet for fighting.

"Of course you can, but after we get all our trading done," I teased him. Never having actually spoken to him, I hadn't known Conley's name before. The first time I'd noticed him, I was seventeen and we were trading supplies here as usual. His piercing stare had made me blush and I'd avoided him ever since. Pushing thoughts of him out of my head, where they had no business being, I headed to our first stop.

One of my favorite parts of visiting Fort Collins was seeing my friend, Suzanna, who ran a cluttered albeit charming general store on the far side of town. It didn't see much business because it mostly focused on women's clothing, makeup and knickknacks. Once I saw her, I could catch up on any gossip and see what she'd been up to.

With Kyle and Zeke in tow, I entered Suzanna's empty shop where she sat painting her nails some crazy design. By no means was I self-conscious about the way I looked, but Suzanna had that exotic beauty that made men crazy. I'd asked her once what her ethnicity was and she'd told me a little bit of everything. Another time we'd had some drinks together, the first time I'd ever gotten fully drunk, and she'd told me she was half-Filipino, half-Ecuadorian and half-French. Whatever that meant. She wasn't the brightest girl I'd known, but I was hoping it was the alcohol talking.

She lifted her eyes and smiled immediately. "Anya Donovan, my long lost sister!" She giggled excitedly while walking around the counter. Laying a big hug on me, she made sure to keep her hands stretched out so as not to ruin her intricately painted nails.

"Suzanna!" I laughed. Come to think of it, I never did catch her last name in all the time I'd known her. With so few people around, I guess it made sense to only go by one name. Madonna and Prince would be so proud.

She ushered me to the seat next to hers behind the counter and opened a special wooden box of nail polishes. She always treated the box like it was her treasure chest and the contents her treasure. She grabbed a few fluorescent hues and started jabbering about the comings and goings of the settlement. Things could get scandalous when people were forced to be in such close proximity for long periods of time. Not that I knew most of the people she was talking about, but the drama in the residence halls was entertaining even in an abstract way.

After telling me a story about a bed-hopping husband getting caught, she looked up and saw Zeke standing in the doorway, admiring her _. Real smooth, Casanova_. She smiled at him and the boy blushed a deep shade of red, sporting a toothy smile on his face. "Who's this little cutie, Anya?" asked Suzanna loudly.

I looked to Zeke so he could introduce himself, but in his mesmerized state he didn't seem capable. "This is Zeke, we found him on a supply run in Grand Junction," I explained. "He's part of the Donovan clan now, but we're thinking of trading him for a cow."

My taunt went unnoticed and the strangest thing happened then. Zeke actually walked up and politely as the day is long, said, "Nice to meet you, Miss Suzanna. I've heard good things about you, but no one mentioned you were the most beautiful woman in the world. That seems like a big oversight to me." It was the first time I'd heard him speak and not sound like he was raised by degenerate carnies.

"That's so sweet of you, Zeke. You're quite handsome yourself." Her compliment made him blush all over again and his eyes lit up. She crooked a finger to bring him closer. "Would you mind doing me a favor, Zeke?"

He nodded eagerly and I imagined the chores we could get out of him if Suzanna was the one to ask.

"Do you think you could take Kyle on a walk so Anya and I can have a little girl time? You know how we girls like to chat . . . about handsome boys."

Looking at my own handsome boy, Kyle was awkwardly eyeing the lingerie section of the store. Now, there was a thought, honeymoon supplies. He must have felt my gaze on him, because when he looked at me his eyes were hot. Now I was the one blushing and the grin he gave me let me know that he knew what I was thinking.

"Gladly, Miss Suzanna," Zeke replied, gawking at her ample chest. _Oh god, not another Alexi._ My little brother had given Suzanna a wide berth since she slapped him when he was fifteen.

Kyle came over to kiss me on the cheek, telling me to come find him when I was done with the girl talk. When the door shut behind them, Suzanna gestured for my hands and opened a bright pink nail polish which looked like something Princess Riley would pick.

"Actually, do you think you could go with a dark red?" I asked carefully, not wanting to hurt her feelings.

She pulled out a deep red shade of polish and shook the bottle. "Ooh, someone's feeling daring. Does this have anything to do with why your man was practically dressing you with his eyes in lingerie?"

I shrugged one shoulder noncommittally. "Perhaps."

Laying my hands gingerly out on the counter, I heard a deep gasp of surprise. " _Oh my God!_ Is that an engagement ring?" Suzanna chirped in that special high-pitched voice reserved for babies, puppies and weddings. Frankly, I was shocked it took her this long to notice the rock on my left hand.

"Yep, he proposed the other day. It was really cute and unexpected," I told her proudly. "We're going to the chapel later to talk to the pastor about setting a date for a ceremony."

"That's so great! Have you picked a maid of honor yet?" She threw the question out there indifferently, but it didn't hide her anxiousness. "I mean, I know Riley's your sister and all, but that girl is a pain in the ass."

"Well I was kinda hoping you'd do it," I offered. "You could help organize the preparations while I'm not here?"

"I was hoping you'd say that!" Suzanna beamed, clapping her hands together in excitement.

"Now, let's talk about you. How's the love life?" I asked, trying not to monopolize the conversation and talk only about me. Suzanna was several years older than me, at twenty-four, and last time I'd come she'd been single.

"Oh, you know, it's been worse," she said merrily with a smirk on her lips. Clearly she was downplaying it. "I've been seeing this guy off and on the past few months. I can't tell how serious he is, though." She finished her thought wistfully, obviously wanting things to be more serious than they were.

We talked about all sorts of things while she painted my nails, even giving them a second coat after the first dried. An emissary from Colorado Springs had come recently and discussed providing a military force. Fort Collins' leader, a man named Beckett, had outright refused and the emissary left on bad terms. Based on my previous experiences with the military-like settlement down south, it didn't bode well.

Other gossip was some former biology students trying to experiment on zombies to find any weaknesses. So far they hadn't had much luck. This wasn't surprising. I'd guess only the most brilliant scientific minds had a chance of curing this plague. The former students of Colorado State University, though intelligent, weren't in the class of genius. I imagined some secret underground military bunker in New Mexico where brilliant scientific minds were hard at work, trying to discover a cure. A girl could dream.

Suzanna informed me there was a new family originally from St. Louis who reported Missouri and everything east of the region was almost completely uninhabitable. We were all worried about hordes crossing the Midwest, coming from the highly populated East Coast and into Colorado. The newcomers came from a settlement that was overrun by thousands of zombies at once. If that were true, it'd be the largest pack we'd heard of in years.

I told her about the bear incident and how we'd rescued the baby bear. Rarely leaving the walls of the campus, Suzanna was amazed we'd had the courage to track an infected grizzly bear. I also told her the entire story of how we'd come across Zeke, leaving out my part with necromancy. Her eyes widened when I described the bandits and their demands. When I was telling her about us herding the two hordes of undead together, her hand slipped and she got polish on my knuckle.

Wiping it away, she said, "You guys are crazy. I don't know why you don't move here. There's plenty of room in the dorms."

"We like our privacy," was my practiced answer.

Friends were few and far between during Armageddon and it was nice to have constancy in Suzanna's friendship.

As we were saying goodbye that same jerk from the gate, Conley, came strolling in smiling like he was the answer to the infection. He walked up to the counter, leaned over it and, to my horror, kissed Suzanna in a way that should be behind closed doors. Oh god, he was why she was so happy and confused at the same time!

I put on a blank expression and tried to be nice as Suzanna introduced me to Conley Beckett, the head of security for the settlement. From the starry look in her eyes, she really liked this guy, so I refrained from blurting out that he probably wasn't serious about her at all. It wasn't my place to say such things.

"Anya," he said my first name slowly, as if savoring it. My eye was twitching in my effort to keep from glaring at him. "I've seen you around over the years."

Suzanna now wore a strange look on her face and grabbed onto his hand. "Baby, Anya is getting married!"

A dark glint entered his now cold blue eyes. "Is that so?"

My friend wasn't deterred. "Isn't that wonderful? She and Kyle have been together, like, forever. I just think it's so great that they're committing to each other in such a permanent way."

Subtle, Suzanna was not.

Conley ignored her enthusiasm, and her hints, and grunted irritably. "I've got things to do." With that, he made his exit in long, angry strides. I wasn't sure what had pissed him off so much. Maybe he didn't like his women pressuring him.

Suzanna's pretty face fell. "Sorry about that, he's not usually so moody."

I'm sure my smile was strained. "It's okay, guys get like that." Still trying to reassure her, I said, "Believe me, I know, I live with enough of them."

For the rest of our time together, she wasn't quite as upbeat, but when we said our goodbyes, she hugged me as tightly as she had when I'd arrived.

I wasn't ten feet from her shop when I encountered Conley again. He was leaning against the side of the building, one heel raised against the wall in an indolent position. He was now wearing sunglasses to reduce the glare of the hot midday sun. Having the disturbing idea that he'd been waiting for me, I'd planned on walking right by without acknowledging him.

He had other plans. "Where are you off to, now?"

I would've continued to ignore him, but he moved to walk alongside me. "Trying to find my fiancé."

" _Him_ ," Conley grated out. "He seems kind of. . . ."

I stopped, spinning around to face him. "Kind of what?"

"Not you're type," he answered mulishly.

Laughing without humor, I shook my head. "You don't even know me."

"I know a lot about you," he returned stubbornly.

My heart skipped a beat, and not in a good way. "What do you mean?"

He tilted his head. "I know you come from Phoenix. I know your mom died in the beginning. I know you have two brothers and a sister. I know from the stories I've heard that, like the rest of your family, you're fearless."

More like we had an advantage over everyone else, including the infected. When he first declared he knew a lot about me, I'd worried he'd somehow found out about my ability. Instead, he knew only general facts. "Who've you been compiling your information from? Suzanna?"

"Her," he agreed. "And my dad."

"Derek Becket is your dad?" I asked, already figuring that out when Suzanna introduced Conley.

Conley nodded then abruptly changed the subject. "Are you hungry?"

"What?"

The sunglasses blocked me from seeing his eyes, but the way he turned his head to the side, I knew he wasn't looking at me. "I was just about to go get something to eat from the dining hall, wondered if you wanted to join me."

His head was turned back towards me when I answered. "Um, thanks, that's, uh, hospitable of you, but I really need to go find Kyle."

His jaw tensed and he walked away, calling over his shoulder, "Fine, see you around."
CHAPTER NINE

After asking around, I found Kyle and Zeke in a classroom watching the biology students experiment on a zombie chained to the wall. There was a glass case around the zombie, a man whose age was impossible to distinguish with so much decay. A patch of grey flesh was hanging from his forehead down to his cheek. He was missing several fingers spread over both hands and, from the sounds he was making, really pissed off. The zombie was mostly naked, revealing all sorts of bruises and discolorations. I wondered who had the lucky job of undressing him.

I could feel several more zombies behind a chained and padlocked metal door. An infected adolescent boy clawed at the bars of his cage from across the room, staring hungrily at us. His urgent groans made me want to put him out of his misery. Small and scrawny, the infected kid was stuck in a permanent state of agony.

I imagined myself using my power to drop the infected man behind the glass case, just to see what the scientists made of it. They'd no doubt take credit, thinking it was something they'd done to make a zombie pass out for an hour or so.

Creeping up behind Kyle, I poked him in the back. "What are they trying to accomplish?"

A nerdy woman in a white lab coat glanced at me with an irritated look and answered for him. "We're trying to figure out if snake venom has any effect on the dead."

Another "scientist" entered the room carrying a crate with tiny holes poked in it. This was turning out to be interesting. Lab coat number two unlatched the crate and climbed up a ladder to throw it into the zombie's playpen from up above. I watched intently as absolutely nothing happened for what seemed like minutes.

"So, you're testing the infected's resistance to empty boxes?" I joked lightheartedly, trying to alleviate the boredom of nothing happening. That jest got an unenthusiastic grunt from the male scientist and a disgusted look from the female. Glad they managed to maintain some levity. Or not, as the case was.

The crate finally began to wobble slightly and a snake peeked its head out slowly. The zombie seemed indifferent to the snake's presence, but it had definitely noticed it. Both lab coats were furiously taking notes as the snake crept closer to the zombie. I wondered what the heck they could be writing down. I imagined it was something like this:

The snake hissed

The zombie groaned

The snake slithered

The zombie stared blankly

Exciting stuff. Sign me up for Zombie 101.

Of course the zombie didn't care about the snake. Everyone knew the infected didn't eat coldblooded creatures. Throw a raccoon in there and we'd be seeing something.

"What kinda snake is that?" Zeke asked quietly, and I noticed there was fear in his eyes when he looked at the zombie.

"Crotalus Viridis," responded the male scientist.

"The hell is that?" questioned Zeke a little louder.

"Prairie rattlesnake," scoffed the scientist. _Yeah, because everyone knows the Latin name, dork_. Did the science geek really expect a little kid to study taxonomy? Science had never been my favorite subject in school, but if science fiction were taught, I'd have aced every test. Little did I know back then all this would happen, taking some of the fiction out of science fiction.

The snake sauntered over to the zombie and started shaking its rattle in warning. The infected male glanced down momentarily, distracted by the noise, and looked back at us with a famished expression. All snapping jaws and grunts with this one. The rattlesnake lunged at the zombie and bit his leg. It retreated back and swayed its rattle a little bit, judging its opponent. The zombie was unaffected by the bite and continued to fight the chains and snap at us. The snake bit him again and again, but the zombie showed no signs of feeling it.

"Now the waiting game," mused Kyle.

"The typical time it takes for a rattlesnake bite to take effect is generally twenty to thirty minutes, but considering the amount of bites, that should rapidly accelerate the process," the female scientist remarked while making notes.

I imagined her writing: _The Crotalus Viridis bit the Manus Zombis seven times_

These people needed a life outside the lab.

Again, I imagined dropping the zombie to see the exhilarated reactions of the geeks, thinking they'd done it with their snake venom experiment. I didn't actually do it, even I wasn't that messed up. Now, if it were Riley and Alexi I was playing a trick on, well. . . .

We stood there watching, waiting while the snake abandoned the fight and retreated back into its crate. After thirty minutes the zombie showed no signs of relenting. I wouldn't have guessed it would show effects of being poisoned. Zombies don't have blood coursing through their veins because they're dead. Without the heart pumping the venom through the body and running rampant through the nervous system, there was never going to be a reaction. What a complete waste of time.

"This is lame!" Zeke declared and I wholeheartedly agreed.

The three of us left the laboratory and made our way to the chapel to discuss the upcoming wedding. The pastor, a slight man with a receding dirty blonde hairline, was conversing with a middle-aged woman next to the altar. She was whispering and tears were rolling down her cheeks. The familiarity of that look made me shiver. That was the look of soul-wrenching grief. She spotted us and scurried out the back door. The pastor shot a concerned expression her way and gestured us toward him.

"Hello, children, how can I help you?" he queried. The man had a kind face, but his eyes couldn't hide a deep sadness.

"We were hoping to discuss marriage," answered Kyle hesitantly, uncomfortable with the scene we'd walked in on.

"We want to get married and were wondering what steps were needed to do that," I added more confidently.

"Ah, that's good, happy tidings for once. My name is Pastor Dan, please have a seat." He gestured to the nearest pew and we sat down. Kyle reached out to hold my hand and I squeezed his in return. "Well, firstly, you need to really examine this decision and make sure it's the right thing for you. There isn't any reason to rush into this, correct?" he asked while looking at my stomach. Some nerve this holy man had. Little did he know, getting alone time with my fiancé wasn't easy.

"No, I'm not pregnant, if that's what you're asking. We've been together a long time and this is a well thought out decision." God, when I put it that way it sounded more like a business transaction. I hastily added, "We love each other very much."

"Excellent! There are usually required meetings and counseling to make sure you're both prepared for the holy and beautiful act of matrimony. Seeing as you don't live here, and every day could be your last, I'd be happy to marry you right now," the pastor suggested.

"Um, that sounds good and all, but our family isn't with us and we have some friends who live up in the mountains to invite," I told him. "We were hoping to set a date next month to give our friends enough time to plan for the trip here."

"No need to set a date. I have lots of time to fill. You'd be surprised how many people have already forgotten about God," Pastor Dan confided sorrowfully. I hadn't forgotten God myself, just questioned what the hell he was thinking. Maybe he was on hiatus.

While we were talking with Pastor Dan, Zeke had sneaked onto the altar and was fidgeting with the cross. At that point, he began throwing it into the air and catching it. The Pastor saw, a scandalized look crossed his face, and he turned to run up the stairs in an attempt catch it.

"Do you have no respect, son?" he asked a confused Zeke, snatching the cross out of his little hands.

"Respect for what? I was just playing with that wooden thing." Zeke retorted angrily. I wasn't sure if he was serious or just messing with the pastor.

"That _wooden thing_ is a cross. It's a symbol of Jesus' love for you," lectured Pastor Dan indignantly. "Tell me you've been baptized, child."

"Not sure what the means, _Dan_ ," Zeke barked at the scolding adult.

"It means you've been cloaked in the loving embrace of God as one of his children," replied a flustered Pastor Dan. "It enables you to have a deep and personal relationship with the Lord."

"Well, me and God ain't on the best of terms, if you know what I mean," Zeke said proudly. "So, our relationship ain't so friendly."

Jumping up, I grabbed Zeke's shoulder and gave Pastor Dan an apologetic smile. "He's a work in progress, I'm afraid."

"I'm available for baptisms anytime, also. Talk with the little one and perhaps I could perform both ceremonies on the same day," he offered amiably, all signs of earlier antagonism gone.

Kyle and I took that as our cue to leave. "Thanks, Pastor Dan, we'll see you soon," Kyle said in parting as I dragged Zeke out the door.

We met the rest of the family at the town's main general store and tavern, where they were stocking up on biodiesel and eating lunch. Grabbing a few fries from Riley's plate, I slouched down next to Melanie. I reached for the last piece of pizza, but was thwarted by a ninja-like Zeke. A burly lady with a gimp brought us some sandwiches and my family resumed our noisy conversation about what else to trade for. After getting requests from everyone, my dad assured us he'd get what he could. I wasn't worried, if not from here, we'd get it somewhere.

One of the great things about our house was the fully stocked wine cellar that came with it. We found hundreds of vintages that soon became our most valuable bartering chips. The town's seemingly unlimited supply of biodiesel was more than a fair trade for the wine we'd probably never drink. For a long time we used fuel stabilizers in regular unleaded gas for our cars, but when the cars began to perform inconsistently we were forced to find another way to get around. After our first visit to Fort Collins we scoured the mountains for cars with diesel engines and eventually found enough to get by. A few months later, we commissioned the scientists and engineers at Fort Collins to build us a biodiesel generator for our home. Adding that to the existing solar panels created a nearly endless supply of power.

The great thing about Fort Collins was their reluctance to scavenge for supplies. They often relied on small groups like ours to bring in goods to trade. They produced much of what they needed themselves and got the rest through trading. We were perhaps their best trading partners, what with the large amount of items we were able to bring in. No one I knew of had my ability to drop the dead and I pitied the scavengers who had to do it the hard way.

While walking through the aisles of supplies, I found a new knife sharpener for my tomahawk and a healthy looking strawberry plant. I couldn't remember the last time I'd eaten a strawberry and had to have it. We'd have to try planting strawberries again. I turned the corner to find my father and discovered Riley making out with some boy. Her hands were in his back pockets and he was holding onto her hips with a death grip. _Such amateurs_. I thought to myself, _who am I to stop her_? That was, until he went for the boob. Big sister alert! Sure, mine wasn't as honed as it could be, but it wasn't totally busted.

"Hey now, that's enough of that! Who's your friend, Riley? You guys seem close." I commented suspiciously. I had the power here. There was no way she wanted me to tell dad about this.

"Oh hey, Anya, this is, uh, my friend, uh," she stammered with a serious blush, but in her sweetest sisterly voice.

"Nolan," he supplied for her. He put his hand out to shake, the one that went for boob, and I had no choice but to leave him hanging. I thought I remembered him from a visit awhile back. He looked taller now, though he was about the same age as my sister.

"Nice to meet you, Nolan," I choked out as politely as I could manage. "Hey, Riley, dad's looking for us."

Begrudgingly, my idiot sister followed me to where everyone was waiting and we tallied the rest of our merchandise. Dad handed over various items, including around twenty bottles of wine and several packs of batteries. Riley made a special effort to keep my dad from talking to me. I owned her for the time being. We loaded the supplies into our vehicles, taking extra care to protect my new plant.

My dad gathered us all together afterward at the back of the trailer. "Alright guys, I'm making a stop at Doug and Jill's. Who wants to come along?" Nobody really seemed that interested in going.

"I'll go," I told him, figuring I should be the one to invite them to my wedding.

Suddenly Riley seemed a helluva lot more interested in going herself. Smiling sugar sweet at our father, she said, "Me too, daddy." Anything to keep me from telling dad about her little make out session with some random boy.

Kyle, who was going to be riding with Justin and Alexi in the truck, came to kiss me goodbye. First he pulled me into his arms, squeezing me. "Be careful."

"You too." I murmured against his lips. "Take it easy on that leg."

He smiled in answer and walked over to the truck's passenger side. Justin was already behind the wheel, engine running. Viktor was driving the Suburban again, with Melanie up front and Paulina and Zeke in the back. The kid looked exhausted and would probably nap the whole way home, lucky for them.

The three of us were taking the Jeep. Riley made sure she grabbed the front seat, which was rightfully mine as the older sibling. Before we could leave, the sentries had to dispose of the zombies near the moat. It seemed some of the zombies were learning not to fall into the pit now. We were waiting in line behind the truck and Suburban. I wanted to see what was holding us up.

"Be right back!" Hopping out of the Jeep, I walked up the stairs of the watchtower to check it out. A stocky young man grabbed a huge deep-sea fishing pole and attached a porterhouse to its hook. He cast and began reeling the meat toward the spiked moat. When it was dangling over, he stopped and swung it back and forth in enticement. Another angler was preparing his line for the same procedure. The zombies faithfully leapt to their doom, except for one. An infected, a ratty-haired brunette wearing a mangy CSU sweatshirt, was lucky enough to take the steak, pole and all, with her into the ditch.

The fisherman fell victim to one of the classic blunders: Never go in against a zombie when fresh meat is on the line.

"Holy shit! I think that chick was in my Economics class!" the young man said in amazement.

Huh, small world.

I left the cursing sentry and returned to the Jeep. The impaled zombie was devouring the raw steak as we drove past. I thought it was a waste to lose the meat to the biter, but I suppose it wasn't intended he should actually get it. The people of Fort Collins were always trying new things in the name of progress.

We drove away from the college, taking the clearest route. Weaving around abandoned cars, we caught the attention of a few roving infected. We left town with a wake of zombies following us slowly, determined despite the impossibility of catching up.

Leaning forward in my seat, I pointed out to Riley and my dad a horde of about twenty who were approaching town across an open field. "Gross!" Riley blurted. "That one is naked!" She was right. There was a female at the front of the pack in her birthday suit. I wondered what the boys in the vehicles in front of us thought about that. Paulina was probably covering Zeke's eyes, wishing she could do the same to Justin and Alexi.

I had the urge to kill the female infected just to save her the shame. Her hair and body was covered in dirt and God knows what else. Wherever her soul was, she'd be cringing at the sight. As a family we'd discussed the theological and metaphysical quite often in the beginning. None of us wanted to believe the soul was trapped inside the infected body upon reanimation. Our mother had been bit and turned two days later. Before Viktor was forced to kill Svetlana Donovan, her infected body went after Alexi. No, my mother's kind soul left this world for another. It was a comfort to us, and others in our group, to think our loved ones passed on to a better place.

The infected horde changed course when they spotted our vehicles. Now moving with purpose, they veered away from town and headed in the direction we were going. That would be about twenty less victims for the spiked moat.

Eventually, we parted ways with the Suburban and truck. Dad had grabbed his Bob Dylan CD from the truck and insisted upon torturing us by singing along to every song. Even his off-key rendition of "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" couldn't detract from the wild beauty of the passing scenery. A little two-lane highway running along a stream led us through the mountains. This area seemed untouched by the plague and the picturesque backdrop could almost fool a person into hoping for an end to the threat.

Unable to wait until we got there, Riley made dad pull over so she could empty her bladder. Naturally, she screamed while she was off in the woods. I hadn't felt any of the dead, so I slowly got out of the Jeep but my Dad rushed to save her. The skunk she'd come across was already waddling away from the hysterical girl. Oh, how it would've made my day if she'd been sprayed. I stole the front seat and the rest of the drive was fairly uneventful.

We pulled into Walden in the early evening and strangely there was a zombie population in town, which was all but unheard of here. That was its appeal to the Evans family. They were the only other family unit we were close friends with and twice a year we'd visit them. Isolated, highly elevated and where Doug Evans grew up, Walden would be the perfect place to live indefinitely if we weren't already settled in our cabin. We'd first met them four years ago when we'd stopped at a forest ranger station and found them already emptying it of its supplies.

As we neared the firehouse where the Evans family made its home, we were shocked to see the firehouse door open with a couple zombies lingering inside. My dad sped up and pulled into the driveway, screeching to a halt.

"Anya, do it," he ordered.

I put out the zombies within moments. Given the size of Walden, no doubt these were the only biters in town. We walked guns in hand, even Riley, into the firehouse. First thing first, my dad used a machete to permanently put out the infected. We searched for signs of the Evans. There were things knocked over and dresser drawers left hanging. In the kitchen there was a pot of sludgy spoiled soup on the stove. A note on the fridge with a bold LEVI on top was dated two weeks ago.

_In case you stop by, don't worry. We were overrun by a horde. All safe and going into the mountains until the infected clear out. We'll check back in a few weeks._ _–Doug_

The zombies we just killed must've been stragglers who hadn't clear out with the rest of the horde when it moved on. "Well at least they're safe," I offered my upset father. The Evans had a backup holdout less than an hour away but we weren't sure of the exact location, never having been there.

"That's true, but let's do them a favor and get rid of these corpses so the girls don't have to see them when they get home." My dad meant the Evans' young daughters, Madison and Kayla, who were thirteen and eleven.

The removal and relocation took my dad half an hour and it gave me an opportunity to clean up the firehouse for them a bit. Everybody liked coming home to a clean house. My dad loaded the corpses onto a large blue tarp and connected it to the back of the Jeep, dragging the bodies down the street. When he disappeared from sight, I blackmailed Riley into helping me with the housework.

My dad returned, tarp-less and corpse-less awhile later. "All done! Let's go!" he called out the window after pulling up in front of the firehouse and honking his horn. I shut the firehouse door behind us, thinking the Evans must have been in quite the hurry to get out of there if they'd left this open.

"Finally!" whined Riley. "You know, I'm happy they weren't here. Madison and Kayla are so boring. They still collect dolls." Riley snickered as if that were the most pathetic thing she'd ever heard.

Fed up with her self-centered, snobbish attitude, I said while getting back into the front seat, "Hey, dad, guess what?"

"What?" he played along good-naturedly.

"I saw Riley making out with some boy back in Fort Collins," I tattled then added for good measure, "he was getting handsy."

"You bitch!" Riley screeched from the backseat.
CHAPTER TEN

The days passed peacefully and it was only a week until the date Kyle and I planned to get hitched. My dad and Viktor had returned to Walden to make sure everything was alright with the Evans. They'd found them two weeks ago back from their forced vacation and in residence at the firehouse. For fun, Melanie and I made elaborate wedding invitations for the Evans family and Mac. My dad delivered one to Jill Evans and reported that she and the girls had been delighted to have an excuse to dress up.

Kyle week with me to take Mac his invitation last week and all we got out of him was an, "I'll think about it." Paulina planned to drag him to the ceremony through pure bully tactics, so I wasn't worried. I was on my way to visit Mac again today to check on him and the bear cub. My dad was driving us in the Jeep and I held in my lap a covered plate of food that Paulina sent along.

"When Kyle and I were here, we saw knitting needles and yarn on the end table by Mac's beat up recliner. I think he's knitting Bud a sweater for winter," I told my dad.

He glanced at me sideways. "You're making that up."

"I swear I'm not!" I denied, ruining my fun by giggling. Okay, I was kidding, but I imagined Mac sitting in the recliner knitting a sweater and kept laughing.

"I'm telling him you said that," my dad teased me.

"Oh god, please don't do that. He'll kick me out of his house again."

"Okay," my dad pretended reluctance, "I won't tell him."

"Good. I'm trying to get him to come to the wedding and I don't want him to have any excuses."

We were leaving for Fort Collins in a few days, wanting to get there early and have time to prepare for the wedding. We'd stay in the dorms and bring our own supplies for the days we were there. For obvious reasons, things were going to be kept simple. I already had the dress, a white knee-length sundress which I planned to wear with cute sandals. Riley practiced doing my hair in different styles and would put a flower in it on the actual day. Kyle wasn't nervous at all, saying he was impatient to make me his wife. I wasn't nervous, exactly, but wondered how I'd feel afterwards. More grownup? The same?

Mac was sitting on his front porch, holding his cat, when we drove up. As soon as I got out of the Jeep, carrying the plate of food, he called out, "Trying to butter me up, missy?"

"As if that would work!" I called back, stepping over his tripwire. "Where's Cocoa?"

"His name is Bud," Mac corrected. I was totally trying to rile him up. I knew the bear's name. "And he's inside asleep, so don't go disturbing him."

Reaching him, I handed him the plate of food. "I brought this for you. Paulina made it, of course, but I carried it the whole way here."

He rolled his eyes at my silliness. "Well, tell Paulina I'm grateful."

"I'll just go inside and get you a fork and spoon." I was already edging toward his front door, eager to take a peek at Bud.

"Bring me something to drink, too," he replied moodily. "And don't wake the bear."

Bud was sleeping in the far corner of the living room. Mac had piled up old blankets like a nest and Bud looked cozy. I'd have to tell Kyle about this new development in Mac's nurturing instincts.

*****

VIKTOR

"Catch me if you can!" Melanie's voice echoed through the trees. Every morning we took a run and she always insisted on cheating to get a head start. My girl was competitive. She was also everything you'd want in a woman: beautiful, smart, funny and more than capable of taking care of herself. Her easygoing nature balanced my own solemn temperament. With Kyle and Anya getting engaged, the pressure to settle down with Melanie increased tenfold. She'd already begun to drop not-so-subtle hints despite telling Anya she was secure in the status of our relationship. The days were getting warmer and longer, but it was hard to gain any semblance of complacency. Part of being a realist was not believing in the surety of happy endings. Life was what you made of it, what you fought for.

"See you soon, cheater!" I yelled back, picking up the pace and entering the hollow at a full sprint. On the other side of the glen Melanie was disappearing back into the Aspen trees. A startled rabbit burst across the path, almost making me trip. Any other time and I would've stopped to kill the furry bastard. Paulina made a good rabbit stew with dumplings.

Once in the Aspens again, the trail gained a steeper grade. This was the stretch where I could always catch her. I steadily gained ground until I heard her shallow breaths. Instead of falling into pace beside her, I smacked her on the ass and kept pushing ahead.

"You're gonna pay for that, punk," she wheezed in a flirtatious tone.

"Looking forward to it," I replied over my shoulder.

I stopped at the top of the trail to wait for her and catch my breath. The stream to my right and her footfalls were the only sounds in the world at the moment. The fish in that stream had been left in peace for far too long. That would be remedied soon. Melanie finally caught me and attacked my ribs with her long fingers.

"One of these days I'm gonna beat you. You just wait," she promised and gave me a kiss on the chin. We walked the rest of the way to the pond, stopping once or twice to admire the views of the valley below us. Tranquility in every sense of the word, but there was still restlessness inside me. I'd always preferred order and hated that there were no guarantees in life anymore. Maybe there never was.

Dead Man's Lake, at least that's what we called it, acquired its name from the old man we'd found sitting in his boat, stark dead, still clutching his fishing pole. Naturally, we removed the body and buried him beside the shore, along with his fly rod and the picture of what we assumed was his family we'd found clinging to the bottom of the boat. It appeared he died of natural causes. That wasn't common these days. Some might say he was lucky. Many of the elderly weren't strong enough to survive in the early days.

We passed the old man's grave and I said a silent prayer, as had become routine each visit to the lake. The water was particularly tranquil this morning, a vivid blue-green hue that reflected the mountains, trees and cloudless sky like a painting on a canvas. Melanie grabbed the fishing rods and tackle box while I untied the rowboat. We sat on the lake for a couple hours, casting lures and the last bit of PowerBait. Melanie caught three rainbows and I caught a few snags. Ever-conscious of daily chores, we cut our fishing trip short before either of us wanted to. Stringer of fish in hand, she walked with extra swagger on the way home, my sexy master angler.

The sound of hammering met us as we neared the house. Alexi and Justin were building a new auxiliary fence along the interior perimeter. Incorrectly, but at least they were trying. Levi had a renewed sense of anxiety since the night of the party. It was about damn time. He'd grown far too comfortable in the past year, not striving to improve the defenses and letting Alexi and Riley run rampant. We had no room for their immaturity and he needed to get them in hand.

Alexi wiped his brow and looked up at us with a sour, frustrated look. Good, get angry. Hard times breed hard men, the kind suited to surviving in this shit world. Alexi showed no signs of the mental toughness needed to stay alive.

Now came the fun part. "Alexi, Justin, you're supposed to get all your posts planted before attaching the barb wire! Before that, you're supposed to dig all your holes!" I bellowed, trying to conceal my enjoyment. "Now start over!" I left them there, dumbfounded, and jogged to catch up with a giggling Melanie. Before long I could hear angry curses in my wake.

"I know how much you're enjoying this," Melanie chided when we were out of earshot.

"More than you know, baby," I answered with a grin.

Upon entering the house we were met by the smell of something delicious cooking. We took off our shoes by the front door to avoid pissing off Paulina. Even with the precarious state of humanity, she was tenacious about keeping her house clean and our shoes were filthy after trekking through the wilderness. Never make the mistake of leaving mud tracks on the hardwood floors. That was viewed similarly to religious blasphemy and complaining about her cooking. Both of which would earn you the threat of a swipe of her wooden rolling pin.

I followed Melanie into the kitchen and was surprised to find Riley stirring a pot with the same sour look Alexi wore outside. "No, no, no, white pepper, not black pepper," Paulina chirped in her ear. Why couldn't every day be this way? "Stop rolling your eyes at me, girl!" Thank you, Jesus. "Don't forget to flip the pork chops!" Paulina ordered a petulant Riley.

Melanie washed her hands, grabbed a cutting board and her favorite filleting knife, and got to work on today's catch. Levi, Anya, Kyle and Zeke were nowhere to be seen. "Hey, Paulina, where is everyone?"

"Anya and your father went to Mac's to check on the cub. I sent a plate of food with them. I doubt that old man eats properly." She insisted on calling Levi my father, like that would make me adopt the habit myself. He was my dad, it was just weird calling him that. "Kyle and Ezekiel are at the watchtower. They took a couple bows and targets with them," she continued. "Hopefully that boy's better with a bow than he is with a bar soap."

Snatching a canister of black pepper from Riley's hand, I was sure Paulina just saved our dinner from being ruined. I surveyed the stove hungrily. Homemade tortillas, which accompanied almost every meal, refried beans, chicken mole and fried potatoes from the garden. Paulina made sure we never went a day without full bellies. When she announced it was done, I called Alexi and Justin in for lunch and we all sat down at the kitchen table to enjoy a family meal. Afterward, Melanie and I did the dishes and put the leftovers in the fridge while Paulina set Riley to cleaning the house. It seemed a new era had begun, one in which my two youngest siblings pulled their own weight.

"Viktor, will you take some lunch to the tower for the boys?" Paulina requested after we finished our tasks.

"Sure, but it's our turn in the garden," Melanie answered for me.

"Oh, don't worry about that. Riley can help me do it," Paulina assured us happily. I was beginning to like this new regimen. Perhaps Riley would quit obsessing about her looks and the dates she'd never go on and instead learn skills that were actually useful.

Melanie and I packed two containers of food, some water and our full array of weapons for the trip down the mountain. Melanie mounted the four-wheeler first, leaving me to ride behind her like a pansy. A dark storm front was moving in from the west when we set off. We followed the main road down about a mile before turning left onto the winding deer trail. The harsh sounds of our vehicle were welcome to me in the too quiet forest.

We parked below the watchtower and waved up to its occupants. A target was nailed to the trunk of a tree about twenty yards from the tree stand. Two arrows stuck out from the target, a few were stuck in nearby trees and one was standing straight up in the ground about five feet short of the target tree. So the kid wasn't a natural, but it was start.

"You guys hungry?" Melanie shouted up.

"You didn't spit in it, didja?" Zeke yelled back. It was going to be a long uphill battle with that one.

Kyle and Zeke climbed down and greedily dug into their lunch. Melanie climbed the tower and unleashed a few arrows at the target, twice hitting it and once sailing wide right. Her marksmanship had improved immensely since she joined us. I'd like to think I played a part in that. Zeke inhaled the food, barely taking time between bites and, to be honest, I wasn't sure he even took a breath.

Finished eating, I tried to teach Zeke the little bit I knew about archery. "Hey, keep your elbow up, kid. Try to find a consistent anchor point just below the chin."

That got a, "Shut your goddamn mouth, I'm trying to concentrate," from the little brat. Always good to know you're appreciated. His next four arrows hit the target before the fifth sailed just to the left. He was listening to my advice even if he didn't want to admit it.

"Zeke, you know what you did there?"

"Do ya ever stop talkin', you big oaf?" he fired back.

I ignored his insolence. "Loosen your grip a little on the bow. You're holding it too stiffly and it's causing a slight pull."

Melanie and Kyle chatted amiably about the upcoming wedding and I thought I overheard something about how much he was looking forward to sharing a bed with Anya. Melanie's low laughter made me think I heard correctly. I'd let that one go since he was a good kid when it came down to it. Plus, who was I to talk when I'd been doing the same with Melanie for years. Not that I wanted to hear about him and my little sister.

Over the next hour, Zeke's form started to solidify and, with frequent practice, there was a chance he'd end up the best marksman in the group. Lightning flashed to the northwest and thunder came not long after. The storm would be on top of us soon if we didn't get out of there. We started packing up all our stuff to head home. A loud cracking bang echoed through the mountains.

"Wait, that wasn't thunder," Kyle stated matter-of-factly.

"No, that sounded more like a gunshot to me," I agreed warily. Another crack echoed from down in Breckenridge. Kyle, Melanie and I each jumped on the four-wheelers. "Zeke, climb up the tree stand and stay there!" I commanded before taking Zeke's four-wheeler and following Melanie and Kyle.

We sped down the mountain, wind whipping in our faces, listening as more shots rang out. Parking our rides at the edge of the trees, only fifty yards away from the highway, we crouched behind some shrubbery for coverage.

There were three vehicles parked on the side of the road. One of them showed a flat tire on the rear passenger side, obviously the reason they stopped here. Dozens of the infected surrounded the cars, desperately pounding at the windows, insatiable hunger their only reason for being. The storm was now over us and the rain fell slowly at first before becoming a downpour.

"We don't owe these people anything. Do you think they'd risk their lives for us?" I reasoned as Kyle and Melanie each made a move to leave the sanctuary of the woods.

That halted them. Melanie turned to me with fearful brown eyes. "I wish Anya was with us."

"We can't keep her on a leash to perform at our command!" Kyle retorted angrily, clearly frustrated with our dilemma.

"She didn't mean that and you know it," I argued. This situation sucked, but I wasn't sure any of us could live with ourselves if these people died and we didn't help.

As we watched, the two vehicles without flat tires fought through the zombies inch by inch, finally breaking through to leave their friends behind. Apparently, they wouldn't even risk their lives for people they knew. No doubt they'd watch as my own family was massacred. Loyalty and honor were the hardest characteristics to come by in this cruel new world.

In the next instant, two little hands emerged from the top of the SUV. A child's head appeared through the sunroof. Frightened and crying, the little girl was trying to climb onto the roof of the vehicle. Simultaneously, the three of us broke into a full-fledged sprint when we spotted her.

By now the entire horde had descended onto that one car without the other two cars to distract them. The SUV was rocking precariously back and forth, leaving the poor little girl struggling to hold onto the ski racks. Zombies on the driver side finally won the tug of war and tipped the SUV over, crushing the mass of undead on the other side.

The child spilled across the pavement just as we reached the action. A zombie lashed out at the girl, who was frantically kicking her legs to keep it at bay. Lightning struck, disorienting the infected temporarily. Melanie put a bullet through the zombie's head as it broke through the girl's defense. Kyle plugged the next one in the temple before it could attack. I dropped two trying to climb into the vehicle's sunroof. The little girl ran toward us now, cowering behind Melanie and peering around her leg. Jesus, she couldn't have been older than six.

We retreated a few steps, unloading everything we had while drawing the infected away from the SUV. Behind the zombies, two arms were reaching through the sunroof then a woman's head popped out. She pulled herself through, eyes darting wildly, searching for her child. The woman pulled a handgun and started shooting at the nearest undead, which now numbered in the twenties. Her firing lured a handful of zombies from away us.

"I need to reload! Cover me!" Melanie screamed beside me, with the little girl still clutching her leg in fright. Twenty feet to my left Kyle was also reloading. The zombies were closing in around us, their numbers now whittled down to the teens. The child's mother was still trying to put down the infected that followed her, but her marksmanship was shoddy at best. Two zombies were still pursuing her, but she'd run out of bullets. Impulsively, I ran for her, hitting one biter then taking down the other while exhausting the last of my ammunition.

I unsheathed my billhook machete, started slashing left and right, taking her with me as I worked my way back to the others. Only a dozen zombies remained but we were entirely out of rounds. Kyle, Melanie and I formed a protective wall to shield the mother and daughter. The odds were better now and I was both relieved and confident at the same time.

Everything seemed to be going fine until Kyle sprinted from our ranks to the toppled vehicle. Between strokes, I saw Kyle huddled against the SUV, holding little hands and struggling to pull the second child free. It was then I realized the mother must've alerted Kyle to the presence of a second child in the SUV.

A single biter trudged through the torrential rain, closing in on a distracted Kyle. He was too exposed and engrossed in his task. Melanie saw the biter, too. "Kyle, look out!" We broke into a run, hacking at the remaining zombies in our path. Kyle turned to look at us at the same time the zombie snapped at his exposed neck. Instinctively, he put his arm up to block the bite but the zombie sunk its teeth into his forearm instead. Kyle swung around with his knife, landing the blow in the nude female zombie's eye.

My friend, Kyle Pearson, looked down at his injured arm with a grim quirk of his lips. He turned back to the sunroof and wrenched a little boy free. The scared boy immediately darted to his mother. Leaning against the car, Kyle stretched his feet out and closed his eyes. When we approached him, he opened them to reveal tears mixed in with rain. The rain continued to fall.

Melanie and I checked the fallen zombies to make sure they'd stay down while the mother embraced her two children, thanking us profusely. Kyle stared blankly to the mountains and I couldn't even imagine the thoughts running through his head. If I had to guess, though, his mind was on Anya. Possibly on the wedding and future they'd never have.

Headlights approached from the south. The deserters had come back. A man got out of the driver's seat of the first vehicle and walked toward us. For some reason he carried his gun raised, like we were the threat and hadn't just risked our lives to save his people.

"Give us your weapons!" he shouted from twenty feet away. This coward deserved to be shot.

"Like hell! We just saved them!" I bellowed angrily while nodding at the little family huddled beside the SUV. "One of ours was bit! You can go fuck yourself!"

"That's sad and all, but we need your weapons," he insisted. "While you're at it, take us to your base. We're short on food and clothing."

"There are forty of us," I lied, wishing there were bullets left in my gun. "Is it really worth dying, for some Chef Boyardee and second-hand clothes?" I sneered at him. "You can get clothes anywhere. Why don't you try that road you fled down earlier?"

Kyle finally managed to get up and walked over to Melanie and me. He held his arm up for the man to see. Blood was running down to his elbow, dripping and mixing with the little pools of water on the road. "Just go," he told the man monotonously. "This isn't worth it."

Our adversary gestured the family over and conferred with the mother quietly. After a minute, shaking his head, he turned around and got back in his truck. The family followed and loaded into the second car. Both vehicles retreated back the way they came.

When they were out of sight, Melanie and I walked a dazed Kyle back into the woods, loading him onto his four-wheeler. It seemed like muscle memory took over from there and he wound his way back up to the watchtower to retrieve Zeke.

"Ya'll left me here like an jackass! I was sure as shit I was gonna get hit by lightning!" Zeke squeaked when we arrived. It took him a few moments to ascertain the situation. Even then, he looked from Kyle's blood soaked arm back to us a few times before hopping behind Melanie on her four-wheeler.

The ride back to the house was silent except for the rumble of the engines. We parked the four-wheelers beside the school bus and walked the rest of the way to the house. Once we were inside, Melanie led Kyle to our bathroom where she washed his wound and doused it with alcohol.

He was completely silent for the first couple minutes before asking, "Is Anya back yet?"

I shook my head no and he instantly retreated back within his own mind. Once his bite was properly tended, Melanie set him up in our room. He had to be isolated.

Outside the door, Justin and Alexi were whispering quietly. I dismissed them with a hard look and went to find some tools.

Paulina and Riley were sitting on the couch when I passed by, Riley crying loudly, with her head in Paulina's lap.

Through the window I saw a distraught Zeke hacking at a tree with his machete.

I needed a drink, hell, a whole bottle, but first I had to install a deadbolt outside my bedroom door.

Anya would be coming home soon.
CHAPTER ELEVEN

I heard Riley crying as soon as I walked through the front door. Nacho ran up to greet me and I leaned down to scratch behind his ears. "What's the big baby whining about now, Nacho?"

Walking into the living room, I was bombarded by tears and snot as a red-faced Riley rushed to meet me. "Oh, Anya, it's so horrible!"

Holding her away from me before she could face-plant her mess onto my shirt, I said, "I'm sure you're exaggerating, Riley."

"You don't understand, Anya. He's been bitten!"

A chill coursed through me and, I don't know why, but the first person who came to mind was Justin. " _Who_?" I whispered.

"Kyle's been infected!" Riley cried out.

In a knee-jerk reaction, I slapped her across her lying face. "That's not funny!" Riley palmed her cheek, sobbing louder.

Feeling a hand on my shoulder, I looked down to see Paulina's solemn expression. "Viktor and Melanie locked him in their room upstairs."

I pushed past both of them, heart thundering in my chest. "Kyle!" I shouted, running to the stairs. Tripping halfway up, I scrambled the rest of the way. At the top, Melanie stood with her arms crossed and head down. "Anya," she rasped. This wasn't happening. This wasn't real.

"Move out of my way." She complied and went down the hallway, encountering Viktor in front of the deadbolted bedroom door, billhook machete in hand. "Unlock it!"

"Where's Levi?" he questioned stubbornly.

"He's still outside, putting gas in the cars. Now let me in there!" I screamed at him. "If Kyle is infected, he's got two days!" Stopping to take a deep breath, I pleaded, " _Viktor_ , that means I only have two days with him."

After a long moment of just staring down at me with a mixture of pity and sadness in his eyes, Viktor turned around, inserted a key and swung the door open. "I'm locking the door behind you."

I wasn't listening to him anymore. Kyle lay partially on the bed, with his legs hanging off the side and his arms clasped together over his eyes. The bandage on one arm was a harsh dose of reality.

"Honey?" I breathed, moving to the bed while hearing the lock click behind me.

Uncovering his face, he looked at me with dry, bloodshot eyes and opened his arms to me. I swallowed my tears and practically threw myself into his arms. We laid there for a long time, more than long enough for my dad to be informed. Long enough for the room to darken because of the setting sun. Viktor must've told him to give us time alone.

All I could hear was the beating heart in the chest beneath my right ear. It sounded so strong. The house was quieter than normal. At this time of day the family would mostly be in for the night and competing personalities usually meant a cacophony of sounds. I'd been crying off and on, trying to do so as silently as possible. I wanted to be able to keep hearing the steady beating of his heart.

He coughed, interrupting my vigil. "I really wanted to marry you, Anya."

Lifting my head off his chest, I got up onto my elbows, cupping his cherished face in my palms. "You are my husband, Kyle. We don't need a chapel and Pastor Dan to make it true."

"I want to kiss you so bad," he said.

"I know, me too," I commiserated. We'd never kiss in that way again. It was thought that the virus passed on through saliva. We couldn't risk it. Instead, I kissed him on the chin, then up his jaw and back down to kiss up the other side.

My thoughts were becoming crazy. It felt as if my world were upside down, tilted askew, slowing down. If this man died, it would stop completely.

This wasn't supposed to happen. I was supposed to protect everyone.

Popping to an upright position, I stared down into Kyle's somber brown eyes. "Are you sure, Kyle? I mean, what exactly happened?"

Kyle sat up, peeling back the bandage from his arm. There was a deep, bloody impression of teeth. "Maybe you're immune. Remember we heard rumors?"

He shook his head and recovered the wound. "Come here, babe."

With renewed tears, I let him hold me. Not much longer passed before there were three knocks on the door. "Do you guys want some dinner?" my dad asked gruffly through the door.

"You should eat." Kyle nudged me and I tightened my arms around his midriff.

"I'm not hungry," I told him.

"Well, I am," he replied, helping me to my feet. I wasn't sure he was telling the truth. Most likely he just wanted to push me out of my stupor and force me to take care of myself. "Unlock the door! We're coming out to eat!" he called out.

The door opened a moment later and Viktor and my dad stood there, looking stern. Holding Kyle's hand in mine, I announced, "Kyle and I are going down to the kitchen to eat."

My dad and Viktor shared a look as if deciding whether or not to allow Kyle out of the room. Finally, my dad moved aside, clearing a path. As we passed my dad, he stopped Kyle by gripping his upper arm. "I'm sorry about this, son."

Kyle cleared his throat. "I'm just glad no one else. . . ." he trailed off.

"I know," my dad acknowledged.

Trying to summon a smile, I pulled on his hand. "Let's go eat, honey."

On our way down the stairs, we passed by Alexi and Justin who were sitting on the wooden steps, playing cards. Alexi lifted his troubled face to look at us. "I'm sorry, man, this sucks. You going out like that."

Justin nodded in agreement. "Yeah, man, sorry. We're gonna miss hanging with you."

Their condolences stirred anger in me. "Just shut up, you two! He's not dead yet!"

"They just want to let him know they care, Anya," Viktor admonished from a few steps above us.

"Thanks, guys," Kyle said softly, defusing the situation.

We entered the kitchen where Paulina was dishing up two plates of spaghetti and buttered bread, while Riley stood fidgeting against the counter. I thought the servings were rather large, but maybe overfeeding us was Paulina's way of coping. She set the plates next to each other on the table and wiped her hands on her apron, gazing at Kyle. "Eat up, you'll need your strength." Her voice cracked on the last word and she put a hand over her mouth, leaving the room.

"I'll get you guys some iced tea," Riley offered, spinning around to get glasses from the cupboard.

Viktor stood in the doorway, standing guard. "Where's Zeke?" I asked, trying to distract myself.

"Still outside somewhere," Viktor explained, "Levi went to go look for him and bring him in."

Kyle sat down in front of one of the plates, gesturing for me to do the same. I was worried if I tried to eat, I'd throw it right back up. He let out an appreciative sigh. "This looks good. I've always loved Paulina's homemade spaghetti sauce." Contradictory, he took a bite out of the bread first.

Riley set the iced tea in front of us and I took a drink of mine. It'd been hours since I'd last drank anything. I still wasn't hungry, but I didn't want to disappoint Kyle. Taking small bites, I was able to make a dent in my large serving. Kyle finished half his food before declaring he was full and I took that as my cue I could stop eating.

The sliding door opened and a nervous-looking Zeke entered. I didn't notice the gun until he raised it in his shaking hands. "S-sorry," he stammered.

"Put that gun down!" Viktor barked.

_Not yet_ , I wanted to shout.

"He's goin' to turn into one of those things," the little boy said, looking frightened. "He won't be himself anymore. We have to do it now before he kills us." Tears were running down his freckled face and I could tell he was trying to be brave.

Kyle looked resigned as he stared at the kid, and I didn't like the thought that he had already given up. I squeezed his hand, hoping to bring him back to me.

The gun was snatched out of Zeke's hand from behind as my father entered through the open sliding door and came upon the scene. Eyes growing wide, Zeke looked even more scared now. "Upstairs, now!" he yelled at the boy. Zeke didn't waste time and his footsteps could be heard pounding up the steps.

My dad let out a frustrated breath while glancing from me to Kyle. "Sorry about that, son." My dad was about to give a harsh lecture to the kid, but he took the time to put some food on a plate for Zeke before following him upstairs.

Wordlessly, Kyle pulled me out of my seat and led me out the still open sliding door. We sat in our usual patio chair on the deck and he pulled me into his lap. The sun had set and the storm had since passed. Stars dotted the clear mountain sky. How many times had we sat just like this over the years? This would likely be our last time. As had happened over the past few hours, another crack formed in my heart. When he died, it would shatter into dust.

With my arms around his neck, I leaned my head against his. "I love you, Kyle." My words were a whisper, just for him.

"I'll always love you, Anya, I always have," he said sadly. "Wherever I go, just know that I'll be missing you."

I put my hand on his heart. "We'll see each other again. You're my soulmate."

"Oh yeah?" Kyle asked playfully. "Can't resist me, huh?

"Something like that," I joked along with effort, giving in to the levity he wanted.

More seriously, he said, "I don't want to talk about anything depressing. Just for tonight, let's pretend this," he held up his injured arm, "doesn't exist."

"Okay," I told him quietly. "So, what do you want to talk about?"

"How about the wedding?" he suggested and it took everything in me to keep from bursting into tears. I wouldn't let him down. I would give him the night he wanted. "Tell me," he began, "how short is the dress you're going to wear?"

That got a little laugh out of me. "Not too short. Now, the negligee I'll be wearing that night. . . ."

He tensed beneath me and I thought myself stupid for bringing up that topic. I let out the breath I'd been holding when he finally said, "Ah, the honeymoon, my favorite part."

"Mine too," I agreed.

Kyle abruptly changed the subject. "What'll we name our first kid?"

"Well, that depends. If it's a boy, Kyle Pearson Jr., of course." That got a smug grin from him.

"And if it's a girl?"

"Svetlana," I told him, awaiting his reaction.

I wasn't disappointed by his grimace. "Anya, babe, your mother was great and all, but her name?" His head tilted. "Not so much."

"Kidding!" I told him, looking up at the sky. "We'll name her something really pretty and old-fashioned, like Victoria or Charlotte."

"I approve." He yawned loudly. The sound brought me back to reality. It was still early for him to be so tired. Was it the virus coursing through his system? The thought of him going to sleep and never waking up, maybe going into a coma, only to reanimate after dying, terrified me.

This wasn't actually going to happen. It was too soon for Kyle to succumb to the virus. Two or three days was the typical timeframe for someone bitten to die and come back. It only happened sooner when the person died from their injuries.

"Let's go upstairs and snuggle under the blanket," I proposed.

"Alright."

We went in together, running into Viktor where he sat at the kitchen table. "Going upstairs?"

"Yeah," I replied. "Kyle is tired."

"Anya, he can't be left untied tonight," he warned.

I gave him a disgusted look. "Fine, Viktor, but you better bring me something soft to tie him up with." It wasn't as if Kyle would be turning tonight. Viktor was just being paranoid. Maybe Kyle wasn't bit deep enough and wasn't infected at all. Maybe when we woke up tomorrow he'd be as healthy as he'd always been. Maybe he was immune. There had been rumors years back.

After giving me a scarf to use, Viktor locked us in the room for the night. I guessed he or my dad would take turns standing guard while Melanie slept in my bed.

Kyle eyed the black scarf. "Kinky."

"I think it's Paulina's."

"Makes it even hotter," he moaned dramatically.

"You're sick!" I wrinkled my nose, laughing.

When he started to unbutton his jeans to get ready for bed, I took off my shorts, letting them slide down my legs. He stopped what he was doing, scanning my body in only a tank top and panties. When I started taking my top off, he grated out, "Anya, no."

Walking to him in my undergarments, I yanked his shirt over his head. "We may not get a real wedding night, but we can touch each other and I can kiss your body."

He looked torn, so I took the opportunity to remove the rest of what little bit of clothing there was left. "I'll love you forever, Kyle, but we may only get this one night." I couldn't hold back the tears as two escaped. "Help me remember it."

We locked the door from the inside.

I woke up alone in bed. For the briefest of moments, I was confused to be in Melanie and Viktor's bedroom. It came crashing back in the next instant. Panic surfaced when I saw the scarf hanging from the bedpost. The bathroom toilet flushed and the door opened.

Kyle stood there with a towel wrapped around his waist. "You suck at tying a man up, Anya."

Relieved, I joked, "I haven't had much practice." It was as he neared the bed in the early morning light I saw the dark circles under his eyes. My stomach dropped. I knew I wasn't imagining that his eyes looked sunken in, also.

It must have shown on my face, the despair, because he dragged me up into his embrace. "Hey, it's going to be okay."

"No it isn't," I groaned. "I won't be okay without you."

"No more tears," he ordered, tenderly wiping his fingers across my cheeks.

I forced a smile. "Okay, I'll try my best."

"Let's go feed you. I know you're probably hungry after last night," he teased.

"Famished," I drawled.

Surprisingly, neither Viktor nor my dad were outside the bedroom door when I opened it. We showed up in the kitchen where Paulina and my dad were sitting, drinking mint tea. Paulina got out of her seat as she saw Kyle and came over to give him a hug. A foot shorter than him, her head rested on his chest. I insisted on being the one to cook Kyle's breakfast, making him bacon, eggs and toast. He ate it slowly, not able to finish. It wasn't until he was rushing to the bathroom to vomit that I realized he wouldn't be able to eat anything anymore.

I was in the bathroom, running my fingers through his hair as he hung his head over the toilet. Melanie came into the bathroom, handing me a wet towel. Thanking her, I used it to wipe Kyle's face. I saw Viktor over her shoulder and, from his still-wet hair, figured he must have been in the shower earlier.

By noon, Kyle's skin was taking on a yellowish hue.

By dinner time his cheekbones were more prominent and he looked as if he'd lost twenty pounds.

By the following morning his muscles were cramping in pain.

Kyle wouldn't live past today, decisions had to be made. My family would no longer leave us alone together. Viktor told me my dad wanted me downstairs to talk. I kissed Kyle's temple, telling him I'd be back in a few minutes. He was tied loosely to the bed for comfort and drifting in and out of sleep.

*****

The bindings hadn't been hard to escape. Kyle Pearson threw one long, pensive glance back at the room he'd occupied for the past couple days with Anya. _Finally get to share a room before marriage and the hourglass was running out of sand._ He went to the double-hung window and worked on the latch. This took much longer than he'd expected. Already the virus was wreaking havoc on his motor skills, making something as simple as unhooking the locking mechanism a difficult and painful task.

Outside the sun was shining brightly. After pulling the window open, he had to reevaluate his choices. Even if he managed to slide down the roof, the fall would break a bone or two but may not kill him. At this very moment the love of his life and the people he'd grown up with were having a family meeting, deciding who would put the bullet in him and where it would be done. He didn't want any of them to face the guilt of shooting him in the head, especially Anya.

Quietly opening the bedroom door, he made his way to the top of the stairs. Avoiding the stairs that creaked, he debated whether or not to try for the front door. He could hear the family emotionally debating in the living room what would happen when he turned. Levi, out of love for his oldest daughter, volunteered to do the deed when the time came.

Anya, between bouts of tears, whimpered, "Please let me chain him up. My powers are stronger than they used to be. Maybe I can learn to fight the virus. I could fix him." His stubborn girl, she was still in denial but there was no saving him. She knew as well as everyone else her abilities didn't extend to anything like curing the undead.

"Anya, we can't keep him here. It'd be a threat to our safety," Viktor spoke gently but firmly.

"He's right, sweetheart. Kyle wouldn't want his reanimated body chained up in a shed, tormenting you and everyone else. It won't be Kyle anymore, only his infected corpse. We'll give him the peace he deserves," Levi insisted.

When he heard Anya become hysterical, he wanted to be the one in there, giving comfort. Instead, leaning against the wall for support, he left the entryway, heading for the door near the back of the house that led to the walkout basement. He almost fell down those stairs when the muscles in his legs spasmed painfully. Holding tightly onto the handrail saved him from tumbling down.

Kyle left the house through the walkout basement. Nacho greeted him without barking and Kyle quietly ordered him to stay. He made his way to the old school bus, refusing to take any more glances back at his home and the girl he didn't want to leave behind. Kyle clambered into the driver's seat of the silver Volkswagen Golf he and Viktor had been fixing up. He chose the Golf because it was car least likely to be missed. With a deep breath, he turned the engine over and began the descent down the mountain.

Kyle reached the main road, rolling down the windows so he could feel the warm breeze as he drove. It was becoming more difficult to focus on the road. Moments of lucidity were frequently mixed with mini-blackouts that grayed his vision for seconds at a time.

He glanced down at the picture of himself and Anya from when they were only thirteen. Even then he knew she would always be his girl. They were so innocent back then, having no idea the following year would begin a new life of survival and violence.

Kyle swerved onto the state highway which headed north out of Breckenridge. A few minutes later, he came to as he almost ran off the road. Righting the wheel, he gripped it tightly, putting everything he had into concentrating on the road. It was going to happen soon, death and after-death. The vitality of the sun in the sky and the spring growth around him mocked his weakened, diseased body. With a glance at the gun on the seat beside him, he began looking for a side road to pull off onto.

Kyle gained consciousness with his head throbbing, crashed in a ditch with smoke billowing from the crushed hood of the Volkswagen. He turned the ignition over, but nothing happened. He cursed loudly and resigned himself to making his way on foot. He needed to be further away from the cabin. He didn't want his body ever found by the others. Let nature bury or devour him.

He reached for the gun on the passenger seat only to find it gone. Scrabbling around for it, he couldn't find it in the car. _Fuck_! It must've flown out the window when he crashed. Kyle irritably swung the door open and even that task took much of his energy. Stumbling around, he searched the forest floor. Several yards away, amongst dry foliage, he found the gun.

He couldn't get the safety off, his fingers weren't working properly, too stiff and cramped. He screamed into the sky and was answered by the birds who took flight. Glancing to the road sign at the side of the highway, he read _Welcome to beautiful Frisco, Colorado_. He patted his breast pocket where the picture rested, now his most precious possession, and limped into the woods instead of heading toward the town.

He wouldn't give up. He would walk until he found a cliff. He would end this before he became one of those monsters. Walking deeper into the woods, his determination drove him past the pain in his legs, the sadness in his chest.

Leaning against a boulder, he just needed to take a short rest then he'd be on his way. He felt dizzy, so closed his eyes until it passed. Kyle's last coherent thoughts were of hazel eyes, blonde hair and kisses that drove him crazy.

Milky eyes opened and he continued on his way. His gait was changed and suddenly he was starving.

*****

We searched the woods surrounding the cabin until Viktor realized the Volkswagen was gone. We'd almost made it to the interstate before finding the missing car. It had crashed against a tree off the left side of the highway. After finding the car abandoned, I yelled Kyle's name in all directions. Reaching out mentally, I could barely feel the aura of dead coming from the small town nearby.

Not wanting to say it out loud, I told my dad and Viktor, "I can feel . . . something, coming from the town."

We piled back into the Suburban, with Viktor driving in the direction of Frisco's Main Street. We crept slowly, weaving around the few vehicles in the road. I hadn't been here in a while. We'd long since relieved the stores of anything useful. A cat ran around the corner of a building and I pointed in that direction. "Over there. Drive around the side."

The zombie was a small female, probably in her teens when she'd died. At the sight of us, she stopped pursuing the cat and stumbled toward our SUV. Viktor parked and disappointment was heavy in the car. "Where is he?" I questioned uselessly. "Has he even turned yet or is he out there somewhere dying alone?"

"Anya," my father began cautiously, "He's been gone for hours. We have to assume. . . ."

"I know," I croaked. "But we have to find him. If we don't, he'll be walking around out there as one of those _things_." I'd already failed him in not being there when he'd been bitten. I couldn't fail him again.

Anger coursed through me, directed at my own failings. A little bit of it was for Kyle, too, for taking off on his own where we couldn't take care of him. The selfish part of me was angry at him for risking his life to save strangers. Because of his bravery, I'd lose him.

Dad and Viktor were in the front seat, deliberating which area to search next. The young female zombie writhed against my window now, practically salivating at the prospect of sinking her teeth into my flesh.

Hatred grew in me, unlike anything I'd ever felt, the kind which consumes you. Some dark instinct within me, in the little corner of my brain where my ability came from, overtook me. My body felt as if it were vibrating, with rage or power, I didn't know.

My body began trembling uncontrollably and, as if from far way, I heard Viktor shout out my name. My eyes rolled into the back of my head and I felt a trickle of something run down my lip. Lifting a finger, I saw I had a bloody nose.

Anger, frustration and hatred churned inside me. My eyes finally focused on the infected girl outside my window as her writhing stopped and she started shaking. Her head snapped from side to side as her moan became more of a wail. Black sludge dripped from her bloodshot eyes.

The scene came to a crescendo when the zombie's head exploded, splattering the SUV with decayed flesh. My body stopped shaking and I felt more tired than I'd ever remembered feeling. The last thing I saw before passing out was my dad's fearful face.
EPILOGUE

The infected male stood beneath the tree for hours, gaping ravenously at the creature above. He'd chased the squirrel until it sought sanctuary from him on the branches. While scratching in an attempt to climb up, his nails tore from the repeated motion but no blood flowed.

Frustration

Hunger

The dark of night blinded the infected and he stumbled away until he came to a clearing where the moon lit his way.

Seek

Hunger

A mountain lion crept into the clearing, sizing up its potential meal, sniffing the brisk night air, trying to determine what kind of creature it had found. Dead flesh, beyond what it preferred, filled its nostrils and the cat's instincts warned against feeding on the rotten, diseased man. The zombie neared the large cat, groaning in anticipation.

Feed

The animal snarled in warning but its high-pitched scream only excited the infected. Confused, the mountain lion darted away to find new prey. The zombie lurched into the dark woods again, in the direction the animal had bounded.

Follow

It stumbled into several trees before it sunk to the ground in an inactive state. At daybreak, it again had light to continue the hunt. For weeks the infected man wandered the mountains. His solitary meal during that time was a dead bird he happened upon after it fell from a towering spruce. He tore into it voraciously, crunching bones and all. The flesh was satisfying only until the small feast was over. Unrelenting hunger returned, driving him on.

After several weeks of travel, the zombie came upon a house. The sight, different from the forest it had become accustomed to, drew the infected. Circling the building, the back door was open and it clumsily climbed up the back steps. The filthy kitchen it entered was empty, as were all the other rooms the zombie explored.

Pictures on the walls of the family who used to live there captured the biter's attention.

Food

Reaching out, the zombie pawed at the wooden frame, stroking distorted fingers against the glass-covered images.

The zombie struggled for an hour to find a way out of the house. Still unsatisfied, it resumed its trek through the wilderness, occasionally changing course as the land or sounds of nature dictated. He encountered a highway strewn with the occasional car and traveled east on it. Passed by a vehicle driving the same route on the second day, the zombie was encouraged to stay the course.

Seeing figures in the distance, he picked up speed, eager to feed on flesh. As the male zombie neared the group, it recognized its own kind. Not flesh to eat, but other infected with the same never ending drive to feed.

With mutual urges, the infected male joined the horde, passing up the weaker of the group to take his place at the front. Walking alongside the blonde female zombie, he came over a rise. Down below, buildings spread out across the horizon. As they descended into the city, hordes passed going the opposite direction, trickling into the Rockies. The pack walked for hours and hours until they came upon a swarm numbering in the tens of thousands. This throng surrounded a stadium. Inside, a group of survivors bided their time.

Book 2 of the Dead Chaos series

Late 2013

www.aprilbrookshire.net

Other works by April Brookshire:

Young Love Murder

First in the Young Assassins series
