Hello, children.
Carmina Burana was on Thursday. Let me tell you something; it went a lot better than I thought it would be. It really sounded good, and I am perfectly satisfied with the result.
And I'm sorry to everybody out there, but somebody dies in this chapter. I'm not going to say exactly who dies, but a lot of you won't be happy with the results. Therefore, you've been warned.
You know the rest. Here's the chapter, and enjoy!
Sunday, July 18
12:57 P.M.
Jet walked forward, his companion following rather closely behind. The streets were still barren of any visible sight of the horde, and there was still hope even though Shadow had the stench of rotting corpses wafting in his nose.
Still, they walked forward with a relatively calm demeanor surrounding their movements, Jet occasionally casting glances back at the hedgehog.
They eventually sat down on the stairway of a rather ancient-looking building that lay six blocks from where they had left several days earlier, and Shadow looked back at the building that they had stopped in front of.
Upon noticing that Shadow's expression softened a little into a depressed expression, Jet leaned forward.
"Somethin' up?" asked the hawk.
The hedgehog seemed taken by surprise by Jet's question, but he looked at the hawk.
"We're in front of the museum of natural history…" said Shadow.
"And why's it important to you?" asked Jet.
"Because it was Knuckles' favorite date location when we were together…" responded the hedgehog.
The hawk nodded.
"Oh," said Jet. "I'm sorry to have brought that up…"
"Don't worry about it," responded the hedgehog as he inched closer to the hawk. "It actually feels good to talk about it."
"Why'd you say that?" asked Jet.
"Knuckles always told me that somewhere deep within my mind, I also thought this was a great place for dating," responded the hedgehog. "And since we're here now, well, you never know what could happen."
"Wait, are you tryin' to hit on me?" asked Jet.
"What?" asked Shadow. "No! That's not what I meant! It's just…"
The hedgehog sighed, trying to get his wording together. After a few seconds, he opened his mouth.
"What if we stuck around in this hell hole long enough to fall in love?"
"Dude, you really need to slow down," said the hawk. "I know that we're both gay and shit, but I'm the kind that goes slow."
"And I respect that," said Shadow. "But still, what if we did wind up falling in love and coming back to the museum by coincidence? It would be a sort of first date, right?"
"I guess you're right," responded the hawk. "Still, let's not get it on as soon as we enter the building, 'kay?"
The hedgehog immediately tensed, though, and he abruptly stood up.
"Shadow?" asked Jet, standing up as well.
"The horde," said Shadow. "It's here."
And indeed, a massive group of decomposed individuals began to march on the museum towards Jet and Shadow.
And there were nothing but zombies; when Jet turned his head to find an opening, the only other two nearby ways out of there were infested with zombies. There were zombies everywhere on the streets, which meant that the only option for escape was the natural history museum.
"Crap," said Jet. "I guess we have no option."
Jet turned and ran up the steps, Shadow following suit as they ran into the museum.
3:35 P.M.
Jet and Shadow had somehow managed to climb up a tyrannosaur skeleton in the three hours that they had since they had gotten there. The two of them had eaten, drunk, and found some Neolithic tools in the museum that could be used as close range weapons in case the zombies got too close for comfort.
They were actually rather high up in the skeleton; the two of them had somehow gotten into the dinosaur's ribcage without sending the entire setup crumbling down to the floor. They were pretty sure the rest of the dinosaurs in the room didn't mind the intrusion, though, so they stayed in the ribcage where they would be safe until the horde arrived.
Jet was busy taking a nap in the ribcage, the ammunition bag resting on his shoulder and the handgun resting on his stomach as he slept peacefully. His facial features had relaxed for the first time in days, and he looked rather peaceful sleeping there.
Shadow watched the teen sleep, gaze cast on the steady rise and fall of his shoulders as he slept. The hedgehog cracked a smile as the hawk slept in the protective bones, feeling at home with Jet inside what they hoped would be their bed for the next few nights.
The zombies were not far from Shadow's mind, though; they still had not made it past the turnstiles or the windows, and even though they were on the third floor of the building the detestable groaning was still reverberating around the halls with a constant murmur that would annoy some people greatly. Shadow reasoned that they had yet to get into the building, so they were safe then.
But for that moment in time, Shadow's attention was fixed on Jet as he napped amidst the afternoon sun.
5:17 P.M.
Sonic held on to the rocket launcher as he walked behind Rouge, Cody, and Tails.
It was still a beautiful day, the sun casting a brilliance on the city as it slowly began to set, pinks and reds becoming one in the sky as the sun dipped below the horizon.
They had not been having a good day. They had run into small pieces of the horde, and they had narrowly gotten out of each small situation alive. The four of them had grime all over their fur from the firepower they had put into defeating the horde, and they were in no mood whatsoever for anything else.
Nothing was said between the group as they walked. And really, there was nothing that needed to be said; they were tired, they were hungry, they were thirsty, and there was really nothing they wanted to talk about anyway.
Eventually, though, somebody had to talk, so the hedgehog took it upon himself to open his mouth.
"So, those were some crazy people in the horde today, right?" asked Sonic. Rouge jumping up in surprise.
"Sonic, we don't need to know," said Rouge. "We can do a lot better than this."
"You sure about that?" asked the hedgehog.
"How many people are there in that horde anyway?" asked Tails, Rouge just now beginning to sign everything for Cody.
"I don't know," said Rouge. "There's a population of six million in the city, and that's not counting the people that were already lying in their graves. So it's hard to gauge just how much of the horde there is left to go."
"So, basically, we have a lot of zombies to kill," said Sonic.
"Yes," said Cody sardonically. "That should be pretty damn obvious, too."
"Relax!" said Sonic. "We all know it; I'm just wondering exactly how many left there are."
"Sonic, please," said Tails. "We don't have time for this."
Rouge froze quite suddenly in front of an alleyway.
"Shit," said the bat, signing along. "I can smell the horde. And it's pretty damn close, too."
Sonic looked into the alleyway, figuring it would be a great chance to get them a strategic vantage point.
"Quick!" said the hedgehog. "In the alleyway!"
The group ran into the alley, where it turned out that they could make a right turn deeper into it. When they reached the end of it, they found a discarded mattress and some sheets that looked like they had not been used for over a week. There was also a table pretty close to the center of the alleyway, so it did indeed provide a strategic vantage point for them.
"Finally, we can be sure of staying alive here," said Cody. "Sheesh."
The group readied their weapons and waited, Tails and Rouge camping out behind the table with Sonic and Cody on top of it.
Finally, the mass of decaying flesh appeared in the alleyway in a constant march towards the group.
"Fire!" shouted the dog.
Sonic sent a rocket launcher blast flying at the group that severed the head off of one zombie and exploded on the abdomen of another zombie. The blast sent some zombies flying from this point, but the horde was still pouring in.
Rouge and Tails opened fire soon afterward, the table shifting from the force of Tails not getting a good footing to protect himself from the blasts. Cody opened fire as well, the hedgehog taking a rocket from within their ammunition stock and loading another round into the gun.
When Sonic lifted the rocket launcher again, the horde was beginning to get closer to them, so Sonic frantically pulled the trigger without aiming, the shot somehow getting to the center of the horde and sending more zombies flying.
However, the zombies kept on coming in, and they inched ever so closer to the table with their detestable moaning.
"Shit…" said Cody. "Alamo! Alamo!"
The Alamo was, of course, the mattress, and everybody got from behind the table and ran to the mattress, lifting it up as to form a defense between themselves and the horde, the members taking turns firing from behind the mattress at both sides as the horde began to fall dead.
Eventually, the horde had begun to die in size, but there were still plenty of zombies coming in from the end of the alleyway. The group of survivors had to shove the mattress ahead of them at points to shove the zombies back.
There passed a point where the zombies were far enough away that the mattress could be discarded, so they did this and stood to face the enemy, Sonic standing on the edge of the mattress closer to the horde as the rest of the group ducked behind it.
However, the horde got closer to the survivors again, and then the rest of the group tried to erect the mattress with Sonic still loading a rocket into his launcher.
This proved to be a mistake, for nobody said anything as they grabbed the edge of the mattress. Thus, Sonic was sent tumbling in front of the mattress, dropping the rocket launcher as he tumbled forward.
The rest of the group realized their mistake all to late when Sonic yelled an obscenity from the other side of the mattress, but they still had to take turns firing, Sonic desperately dodging each member of the horde as he tried to find the rocket launcher amidst the bodies that were steadily being shot.
Eventually, over the course of five minutes of this activity, the horde had thinned to three zombies, all of them hovering in front of Sonic. They were very close, and it was the one break in the action where everybody was loading.
This gave the zombies enough time to attempt to attack Sonic. However, two of them were finished after Rouge was finished reloading.
The third was killed by Tails, but the head of the zombie was already clamped on Sonic's leg, and the hedgehog screamed in pain.
Cody stepped out from behind the mattress, Tails and Rouge doing the same after they peeked out.
"Well, that's the horde," said Cody. "Jesus Christ, that was a lot of ammunition."
"You're telling me," said Rouge.
Sonic then tried to step out of the zombie's mouth only to find that bite marks were embedded in his skin.
The rest of the group noticed as well, but they dismissed it.
"So, Sonic, are you getting up now or not?" asked Tails.
Sonic looked at his leg with shock riddled all over his face. His frame began to shiver a little, his breath coming in heavily as some realization dawned on him.
"Sonic?" asked Cody.
The shock on the hedgehog's face remained when he turned to Cody, after which he mumbled something.
"What?" asked Rouge. "I can't sign for him if you don't speak up."
"Kill me…" said the hedgehog, more audibly this time.
The rest of the survivors were surprised by this proposal from the hedgehog.
"Kill you?" asked Tails. "Why?"
"Kill me, god damn it!" shouted the hedgehog, grabbing the collar of Cody's security uniform and shaking it with all his might. "Don't you get it? I'm going to be one of them!"
"What are you—?" asked Rouge.
But then, the realization dawned on her.
Most of the people that were alive when the horde first formed were bitten by the zombies and turned into zombies themselves.
True, the virus was in the air, but by then she figured that it must have been depleted bringing the people in the graves back to life. So that left the question of how there were so few survivors in a city that was inhabited by six million people.
And Rouge realized that the half-eaten corpses had been eaten not by worms, but by zombies.
The bat frantically signed everything that Sonic had told Cody to do, and the dog stepped backwards, taken aback by the request.
"No!" shouted Tails, the realization dawning on him too. "You can't die! You're my older brother."
"I know that!" shouted Sonic. "I have too much going for me, damn it!"
"Then why are you asking to die?" asked Rouge.
"Because I don't want to hurt Tails!" shouted Sonic, the tears beginning to form as he yelled. "He's everything to me, and I don't want to hurt him because I got turned into a zombie! Kill me, god damn it!"
There was silence as the words sunk in, Rouge signing what the hedgehog was saying.
Finally, the dog nodded, and held out his hand for the bat, who handed him her handgun.
"Well, if you want it, then you got it," said Cody.
"Wait!" shouted Tails, jumping next to Sonic before Cody was able to step forward.
"What?" asked the dog irritably.
"I don't want him dead!" shouted the fox. "He can't die! This is a dream, right? I'm dreaming, I tell you! I'm dreaming!"
"I wish we were, Tails…" said Sonic, patting the fox's head.
"Indeed," said Cody, looking attentively at what Rouge was signing. "Now, if you would leave us to—"
"No!" shouted the fox, arms wrapping around the hedgehog. "Please! Give me some time with him! Alone!"
"Why?" shouted Rouge. "You have to get away! He doesn't want to hurt you! Why do you want to delay the inevitable?"
There was a profound silence as the fox's gaze aimed towards the ground.
"I want…" began the fox, choking on his words as the tears began to roll down his cheeks. "I want… to tell him… everything… I never told him…"
Tails' profound words moved Cody after Rouge finished signing them slowly, the scene remaining quite still for a few seconds.
The dog nodded.
"Of course," said Cody. "You have the right to do so. Very well then."
Cody took Rouge's hand, placing the handgun on the tabletop.
"We'll give you an hour," said Cody. "We'll be back in exactly one hour."
The fox nodded, and Cody walked out, leading his girlfriend by the hand as Tails looked up at his older brother.
The next hour played out much like a painting to the two of them; two boys hugging each other with tears slowly climbing down their cheeks, the two of them exchanging words under their breath of all the troubles they had never dared to relate to each other before the end of the older one's life. Their eyes remained closed for basically the entire hour, neither daring to open them, praying that it was a dream and that they really would be back into the swing of a normal life as soon as they had entered it.
Finally, the hour expired, and the young fox heard Cody's footsteps as he walked back into the alleyway.
Tails finally parted from the hedgehog, the hedgehog remaining in a kneeling position as the fox stood up.
"Tails, I'd like you to go with Rouge," said Cody. "You probably shouldn't see what I'm going to do next…"
The young fox nodded, but Sonic grabbed his hand quickly.
"Tails?" asked Sonic.
"What is it?" asked the fox.
Sonic removed a locket from the glove on his left hand, handing the golden heart to Tails as the fox took it.
"If you ever see Sally again, give this to her," said the hedgehog. "Tell her that it was to be her birthday present. And if she asks, hold nothing back. This is my last request."
Tails looked at the locket, then at the hedgehog, nodding slowly as he comprehended what he must do.
"It'll be done," said the fox.
The young fox took Rouge's hand, and the bat silently led Tails out of the alleyway, the two of them disappearing around the corner.
The dog then walked over to the hedgehog and knelt next to him.
"You have anything else you want to do before you die?" asked Cody, apparently trying his best not to offend the hedgehog.
Sonic shook his head.
Cody nodded, standing back up and taking the pistol that he had and putting the barrel up against the hedgehog's head.
"Goodbye, lil' bro…" muttered the hedgehog under his breath, the words quivering in his vocal chords as a solitary tear flowed down from his left eye.
The gunshot went off soon afterwards, and the now-dead hedgehog remained still for a moment before he fell to the ground, blood pouring freely from the fatal head wound that would both end the hedgehog's life and keep him from coming back.
The dog looked down at Sonic's still form fighting back the urge to cry. It was part of the job, and yet he could not help but feel the pain of the young fox who had lost his best friend in the city.
Cody walked away from Sonic's body and out of the alleyway.
When he walked out of the alleyway, he saw Rouge and Tails sitting together by a garbage dumpster, the fox crying into the bat's shoulders as she hugged the young fox comfortingly.
The dog realized that they needed time alone, so he stood at the distance from the two of them and watched the young fox mourn the death of his best friend.