Luckily the old warehouse didn't have very heavy security; Chloe pulled a small screwdriver out of her pocket and after some deliberation lifted herself up into the (rather large) vent. She had just started inching forward when she heard a voice and froze where she was.

"Chl- *cough* Chloe?"

Chloe's eyes widened and she jerkily tried to turn around and stick her head out of the vent; there was a large metal clang as she hit her head. "Liz?" she asked, trying to see through the small tears springing up in her eyes. She had probably just attracted the attention of every living thing in a five mile radius with that noise, but she would have to worry about that later. "We thought you died!"

Finally, she was able to see clearly, Chloe looked down to see a girl with waxy pale skin, bruises around her eyes and mussed blonde hair; but it was definitely Liz, right down to the large yellow mickey mouse sweater. Liz had caught the virus.

Derek groaned and rubbed his temple, closing his eyes briefly. This girl was going to give him a heart attack. She was already almost fifteen minutes late, which, ok, maybe didn't sound like a lot but there should either be no hold-ups, or she was probably dead already. How she even got permission to go look for supplies with them was beyond him. She may not be quite as useless as he had initially thought, but she couldn't fight for shit, he briefly entertained the idea that she had been sent with them in an attempt to get them all killed.

Derek had had a less than stellar opinion of her from the moment he first saw her.

Coming to this town of survivors was supposed to give them a break from constantly running, but Derek had the feeling that ever since they had arrived his blood pressure had been steadily increasing with each passing moment. If it were actually possible to have an aneurism due to stress he was sure he would have had one already. The people here were ridiculous – mostly rich kids and their parents who simply flew into this remote town when the epidemic started. Not Derek and his family. They took care of themselves. They survived.

"They're underground. You can find them by looking for the old abandoned summer camp; the security around the camp is minimal, even if they do have crazy surveillance, but to actually get to where they are you need to find the cabin with the yellow XX on the door." A couple weeks ago Derek and his family managed to get in contact with a friend of his Dads, he said he thought he was about to succumb to the virus, but he knew of a town of survivors… he just hadn't managed to get there in time.

They had finally reached the place; in the middle of the night. Twigs cracked in the distance sounding like gunshots (although Derek was starting to wonder what exactly was walking around breaking the twigs), shadows loomed around them; Simon jumped every time. They crept through the camp without incident until Derek spotted the yellow X's. He had always had better than average night vision; not by much, none of that 'as if by the light of day' crap, but he would point something out then after a bit of squinting and leaning forward whoever he was with would eventually be able to make it out as well.

Five hours later and they found themselves sitting in a small, square, completely white room. Still. Someone had been by to see them of course, they had gotten water, a little food, and had a blood sample taken each. Derek grumbled; how long could it take to do a few blood samples?

Just at that moment a blonde woman walked in. She appeared to be in her thirties and introduced herself as Lauren, but what was most noticeable was that she was devoid of the hazmat suit she had used earlier to take their blood. "I'm the doctor here," she smiled, "your blood work came back fine, my niece will be over in a minute to show you-".

A small girl burst through the door breathing heavily, she had the same blonde hair as 'Lauren', a rounded face, large blue eyes, and looked to be five foot nothing. Derek scoffed, he could take her in a fight with his eyes closed; they had heard this was just a town full of rich people – when the epidemics started they had just flown over whereas anyone else who wanted a chance in hell had to actually work for it.

"Ah, speak of the devil," Lauren said. "This is my niece, Chloe."

"Hello Chloe, I'm Kit and these are my two boys, Simon and Derek," he said, gesturing to each of them in turn.

"Hi! Follow me," for one single second Chloe made eye contact with Derek, catching the expression on his face. "I'll t-take you to where you'll be staying," Chloe stuttered; Derek was not impressed.

At her realization Chloe's heart stopped. Absolutely stopped. Liz never should have left. She should have stayed home and been ok. Things like this shouldn't have to happen to such good people.

A weak groan brought Chloe back to reality. Liz had the virus, there was nothing she could do, but by being so close to her she was putting herself – and everyone she was about to meet up with – in danger. She wouldn't drag them all down. She started edging slowly back into the vent.

Liz regained composure with effort. "Ho- *cough* how is Tori holding up?"

Chloe's train of thought was – again – completely derailed by Liz, this time turning to immense feelings of guilt pricking at her. She lived with Tori, she should know how she's doing, she should have checked up on her when it became obvious Liz wasn't coming back. "Ok, I think…"

Liz looked troubled.

"I mean, obviously, she misses you… and she's sad. She kind of just... shut herself in her room."

She nodded, "tell her I miss her too... and promise… you have to make sure she's ok."

I nodded and started to inch back again, "Liz, I promise I'll make sure Tori's fine, but I need to… I need to go. Meet up with the rest of the group."

Liz paled, though Chloe wasn't sure how that was possible, "Oh god, I could give you the virus."

"No, I'm sure it's fine!" She wasn't. Chloe was terrified. "But I have to go, I'm late already."

Despite his amazing night vision, Derek hadn't been able to properly see the camp when they arrived. He didn't get the chance until about two weeks later when they went above surface again. The cabins were covered in graffiti, faded in colour from the elements, same as the signs throughout the camp proclaiming cabin names and directions to rock climbing walls and canoe shacks and the dining hall.

A small group of people came up to the surface daily to checked on the gardening patches scattered throughout the camp. They had been assured that whatever virus was turning people into zombies could not survive outside of a human host for more than a couple seconds, so the food, though relatively unguarded, should be fine. There were also people who thoroughly washed the food before it was eaten and everyone who went up - no matter for how short a time - was given a blood test upon returning.

Derek thought they were kidding themselves, this virus had taken over god knew how many people; it was only a matter of time before it got past their piddly little security measures. Today they were going out to scavenge food and try and raid a pharmacy. One of the rich, fat residents had gotten sick.

"Follow me," said a figure wearing a sweatshirt that went to her knees, jeans, and a large gas mask as she darted around cabins and rows of vegetables. If Chloe weren't so much shorter than everyone else he wouldn't be able to tell her from the cocky six foot tall teenage boy who was with them. Derek tailed along a few steps behind a man named Milos (the 'supervisor' for today), and Rae, the only other member of their party, kept pace with Chloe at the front gabbing with her.

Derek wouldn't have gone at all but he was getting stir crazy and driving his brother and Dad to insanity along with him. There wasn't too much of a risk anyway. From the sounds of it they had done this a million times before. Dr. Saunders was doing research into a vaccine for the zombie virus and needed a lot of supplies they didn't have, Chloe was her runner.

Chloe crawled in through the vent and dropped lightly to the floor. "Chloe! About time!" Rae called, rushing forward. "You have no idea how dull the guys are."

Chloe stepped back quickly, back colliding with the wall, and held up a hand to ward Rae off.

"What is it?"

"I saw Liz," she answered, practically in a whisper.

"What?" Rae screeched in return. "You mean she's alive!? That's great, where is she?"

"No, Rae - I mean, yes, she's alive, but she's got the virus. I don't know if I c-caught it or not but you need to stay back." Rae's eyes went wide.

"What the hell were you thinking!?" Derek roared, looming over to the two of them and stopping next to Rae, who was a fair distance away from Chloe.

Chloe jumped slightly and blinked at him owlishly (though he didn't know it due to the gas mask). 'Where did he come from?' she thought to herself.

"Standing around talking to some infected girl. And then bringing it back here to get all of us killed as well! Good going." Chloe could feel the weight of Derek's glare through his mask.

His tirade managed to make her snap back into action, and she took a deep breath. "Look, I just came to tell you what happened, and make sure you can get back by yourself. I'll go ahead and wait until all of you are done getting tested before I get mine done." That way she'd never be in contact with them after this – unless of course she was clean, she reminded herself, then it wouldn't matter either way, everything would be fine.

As Derek continued to tirade about her carelessness Chloe took a look at him and realized he wouldn't be done for a while. She looked back up at the vent (too high to jump to), then grabbed a crate a few feet to her right to hoist herself up on. As she crawled away and Derek's voice began to ebb, she reasoned to herself that she really couldn't afford to sit through the whole thing and further risk infecting them.

A/N - I wasn't sure about posting this cause I'm not sure if I'll be able to continue but I figured why not. I know it kind of jumps around a lot, if I continue the next couple chapters shouldn't be like that. Kind of a lame name, I know but I normally don't do zombie fics (actually I never do) and I don't completely know where this one's going.