"Save Quinn."

Elena turned on the radio, only so she could stop hearing these two words in her head.

"Save Quinn."

Elena hit the gas pedal so hard for so many hours, until her feet started bleeding.

"Shit," She said and parked her car, right when she passed a big "Welcome to Lima, Ohio!" sign. She was surprised to hear her voice for the first time, after almost a month without making any human contact. It sounded familiar, maybe a little rusty, but she thought that once she'll start talking to someone again it'll get back to her normal, clean voice. She absorbed the blood that was oozing from three of her fingers with some tissue paper. Then she heard something. She looked around, but the area around her car was clean. Few houses were surrounding her. On the left side of her car, few meters away, she noticed a mailbox. When she tried to focus on what's written on it, she noticed a familiar last name. "Fabray". She took the keys out of her car, but she kept hearing noise from outside. She took her big gun from a box hidden under her seat, and opened the door with a kick. She pulled her legs, one after another, to the ground. It's been a few weeks since the last time she got out of her car, so breathing the fresh air was supposed to feel good. But it didn't. There was a strange smell in the air. Elena ignored it, stood up and shut the door behind her. She loaded her gun, and slowly walked towards the house where Quinn lived. A quiet sound of a broken branch from her right made her stop moving. She swallowed her saliva, and turned her look and her gun towards the direction the noise came from. She wasn't surprised to see the damaged body, limping towards her. One gunshot and it was dead. For real. But Elena knew she made a mistake. She was supposed to save Quinn, not attract more zombies to her house. But it was too late, and there was one thing she could've done. So she ran. The front door was luckily open, but Quinn wasn't there.

"Quinn!" She yelled. "Quinn, I'm here to help you! I don't want to hurt you!"

Silence.

"I'm human! Let me help you, Quinn! Come to the living room!

A metallic noise came from a room in the right, like a pan broke or something. Few seconds later, there was a scream. Elena ran into the room without thinking. She found two zombies going in the same direction. She couldn't recognize who they were going towards, but she was pretty sure it was Quinn. Elena shot the female zombie that was closer to her, and ran towards the blond, frightened girl, that was squeezed in the small space in the corner of the kitchen. She protected her with her body.

"After I'm killing it, I'm going to run. Can you run, Quinn?" Quinn made a squeaky sound. "I'll take that as a yes. Stand up." She stood up, all shaking. "I need you to follow me. Run as quick as you can, okay?"

She couldn't wait for an answer, so she shot and started running outside, through the open front door, to her car, hoping that Quinn was right after her. She opened the door of her car and sat at the driver seat. She coughed for a few seconds until her breathe came back to normal, then closed her eyes, just to rest for a second.

"It isn't over," She heard the soft, quiet, voice next to her. "Look."

Elena opened her eyes and looked through her window. There were a few more zombies, wandering towards Elena's car.

"Do you have any family members or friends left around?" Elena asked while looking at the monsters.

"Only my girlfriend, Rachel. All my other friends left town after graduation, and you just killed my parents."

"Rachel… She's dead too."

Elena started driving and waited for Quinn to respond, but the blonde girl who was sitting next to her was completely numb.

They were driving for a few days or weeks, but they stopped counting after the second day. Elena was driving, sometimes for three days straight. She parked the car and fell asleep when she started feeling like she couldn't stay awake anymore. But Elena wasn't sleeping silently. Every few hours, sometimes minutes or seconds, she started bursting in screams. Cold sweat started covering her body. When she wasn't screaming, she was mumbling words or sentences, mostly "Caroline" or "Jeremy". But the sentence that made Quinn stay awake while she was sleeping, or sticking up with Elena during the whole time, was "Save Quinn". Two words, that made Quinn's curiosity grow so big, until sometimes she wanted to wake Elena up and start asking her why she saved her, why she was mumbling these words, how she knew about Caroline. But since she was awake when Elena was sleeping, every time Elena woke up, Quinn was so tired that she immediately fell asleep. So for days, weeks maybe, these two girls who lived together in that small car, didn't even get to talk. Until one night, they got to remain awake together.

"I'm Elena. I just realized that I never told you that. But you never asked, so that's not really my fault. I should shut up, don't I?"

"No… Not at all. That's fine. I'm Quinn-"

"I know." Elena cut her. "Sorry."

"That's fine. How did you know that?"

"Your name? It's a long story, I'll tell you later."

"We might not have 'later'."

"Right. Still, it's a really long story."

"If you don't want to tell it, that's fine."

"No, it's not that. Believe me, I want to tell you this story. I want to tell you it so bad."

"Then what's stopping you?"

There was a complete silence for a few moments, when Elena considered her words.

"Do you hate me, Quinn?"

"No. Why would I hate you?"

"Because I killed your parents. And your girlfriend."

"You killed Rachel?"

"She was technically dead when I got there. But… Yeah. I'm sorry."

"That's… fine."

Again, there was silence. Elena hit the "Break" pedal and stopped the car in the middle of the empty road.

"No, it's not 'fine'! It's- you should hate me! Why don't you hate me? I killed your girlfriend! You loved her! Hate me Quinn, hate me! Blame me for everything! I'm ready! I'm-" Her strong voice, that just now yelled so loud, broke. She started crying. "I'm ready,"

"Elena, I'm sorry, but I don't hate you."

"Why? Why don't you hate me!" She yelled and cried at the same time.

"Because you saved me. Without you I'd be dead, or worse, I'd be one of them."

"But I killed your girlfriend."

"She was dead anyway, right? It's not your fault."

"It is my fault." She started driving again while speaking. "Because I let Caroline die, and I didn't do what she asked me to do, and I failed her, and I failed you, and everyone just keep on dying, and I don't know if Jeremy's even alive, and it's all my fault."

"I'm… I'm sorry."

"Don't be. It's my fault, not yours."

"Stop blaming yourself. You have no one to blame, so you blame yourself. But it's not your fault. Where are we going?"

"Denver."

"Why are we heading to Denver?"

"To look for my brother."

"Jeremy, right?"

Elena nodded.

"How old is he?"

"He's… sixteen. He was sixteen when he left."

"When did he leave?"

"When our parents died."

"I'm-"

"Don't say you're sorry. Keep asking these questions. It's- It's good to talk."

"Who's Caroline?"

"What?"

"You wanted me to ask you questions. Who's Caroline?"

"You know who Caroline is. She's your sister. She told me you knew."

"I... I know. How did you know her?"

"She was my girlfriend."

"How did she die?"

"She gave up."

"On what?"

"She gave up on that fight. She preferred being dead than being a monster. She gave up."

"Why didn't you stop her from dying?"

"Because I knew she was right. I would've done the same, if I weren't so scared."

"Did she tell you to save me?"

"Yes."

"Do you want me to drive?"

"No. I'm fine."

"Do you want me to drive?"

"Yes."

They changed seats.

"My parents had a car just like this, so I know how to drive it."

"Good. You might need to drive it for a while, if in some point I'll-"

"Don't say that. We're going to get through this. Together." She grabbed her hand and held it for a whileת hand and held it for a while. it for a while. f in some point i'rself. 't even get to talk., until Elena fell asleep.

This time Elena didn't scream or talk. She slept silently, laying her head on Quinn's shoulder for a while, then changed her position. When she was sure that Elena was completely asleep, Quinn let a small tear fall on her cheek. She turned on the radio quietly so Elena won't wake up. Few songs from a simpler time, when neither of them was even born, started playing. It was a quiet song, and it was catchy. Quinn started singing along quietly. She looked at Elena few times during the next few hours. She looked more peaceful than she looked in a while. Everything was quiet, but not silent. Quinn even let herself open up the window when the sun appeared in the grey sky. She even forgot that she was in the middle of a zombie apocalypse that day. When Elena woke up they parked the car in the middle of the road, far away from any town, in a place they thought they could've lived in for years until any zombie would notice them. They took out of the car few bags of chips, few snacks and bottles of beer, and started walking towards nowhere. They walked for a few hours, enjoying the fresh air. Then they got to a lake. Without thinking they took off all of their clothes, and jumped into the cold water. They swam and played like little girls, or maybe like the nineteen year olds they actually were until everything started. At few points their naked bodies touched, but they acted like it didn't happen. But in one point, when they were both underwater, they couldn't resist the temptation that existed in both of them ever since Elena saved Quinn. They swam towards each other, until they could touch. Then, Elena's lips reached to Quinn's. They started making out, all naked. They started touching each other, breathing heavily, outside and inside the water. They swam together and pulled their bodies outside of the water, where they could breathe normally and do all the things that they couldn't have done in the water. Both of them moaned loudly as they did all the things they didn't have the time to do with Rachel or Caroline. When they were done, they dressed up and ate some of the food that they brought with them. They didn't talk on their way back to the car.

"We have to keep going." Elena said when they got to the car. "This was a waste of time."

"What?"

"I'm so stupid. Look up. It's morning. We've been here the entire day. Do you know what can happen in a day? Jeremy could've got killed by now. Every second matters. I'm so stupid."

"Elena, it wasn't a waste of time."

"It was- don't you get it? You have no one to live for, you have nowhere to go. You could stay here forever, in this little world we discovered. But I can't. I have to go on. Caroline told me to save you and I did. You're safe. I'm leaving."

"What? You're just going to leave me here, in nowhere, and run away?"

"Yes. Quinn, I have to find my brother."

"Then I'm coming with you."

"No, you're not. I had to save you. This might be the last time we're in a safe place. If you're coming with me, we're back in this chase. You'll have to spend the rest of your life running away from something that is much bigger than you. You're not coming with me."

"Elena, I'm coming."

They stood there, next to the car, for long seconds.

"Fine," Elena finally said. "But you're gonna have to fight. Are you ready?"

"I'm ready."