AN: Short chapter is short sorry :( Next chapter will be longer and might be in Matt's POV
On day six we ran out of food, after all how far was a group of sixteen people supposed to survive on a pack of saltine crackers and ten chocolate bars? We were all curled up in the train car together trying to stay warm, the days and nights had been freezing and we didn't have the advantage of a bright sun in the morning anymore. Matt and I had closed up the cracks in the train car with bits of scrap metal and wood that couldn't be used for kindling, it didn't help much but it was better than nothing. Once everyone was asleep Matt and I wriggled out to talk by the fire.
"What do we do about this?" I whispered. "How long can humans survive without food?"
He seemed stressed. "I don't know…maybe…maybe fish…"
"Matt. There is no fish. It's an empty river."
Actually saying those words made everything truly sink in and for the first time I think I really realized how much trouble we were in. He and I sat in silence for a long time, both unwilling to say what needed to be said. Discreetly I looked at the body not too far away from us, it was the only source of food left. The thought of considering another human being food made me sick to my stomach but did we really have a choice? It was either use what we had or starve.
"Matt…"
He shook his head. "I know. Don't say it."
We went back to staring into the fire blankly, warming our hands and drawing absent patterns in the dirt around us with our fingers. Obviously we'd wait to talk to the group about it; we had to take a poll on who would agree to do this. I wasn't sure what Matt and I would do if people disagreed or if people reacted badly. Neither of us was very big and I didn't think the two of us could take on any of the other people in the group if they decided they needed to attack us for the suggestion. We didn't go back to sleep that night, instead we sat in front of the fire and waited for the sun to rise and for everyone to crawl out of the train car. Gathering them in a circle Matt and I stood at the front, I took the lead to talk to them.
"We're out of food." I started off shakily. "There's no fish in the river, we have nothing except…for the body."
Immediately people protested horrified at my suggestion and the very idea of it.
"Hey!" Matt interrupted. "This isn't the time for your traditional morals okay? Like Mello said we have nothing. You all want to live and go back to your kids and spouses right? So shut up and take a second to think about what we're saying. We can either eat the meat off of the body or we can all slowly starve to death. Everyone who wants to live stand on the left, everyone who'd rather starve stand on the right."
Slowly people stood up and separated into groups on the left and the right; there were only three people on the right who would rather starve than eat a body.
"Right," I sighed. "Matt and I will do the…gathering of the meat. Everyone I suggest you go back inside the train if you don't want to see."
As soon as the squeamish people went back inside Matt and I went to work at carefully gathering everything edible from the body and setting it on a large piece of metal we'd washed off in the river. I ended up having to wash off a few more pieces to have a place for all of the meat as Matt cooked it but soon we had a good amount of meat that we could save. It was Matt's idea to put it in the coldest corner of the train—the one that we all stayed away from—to keep it fresh. It didn't look too bad; it almost looked just like little pieces of steak that you got in a fancy restaurant. The organs didn't look so normal but I had insisted on keeping every edible bit of meat. Matt and I would have to make this last as long as we could.
