A week later (Day 100) (Cat is now 13 weeks along for reference)

As they did every morning, the gang went to the two sets of toilets in the store. Girls in the 'Women's' and the boys in the 'Men's'...obviously. While the girls were changing in their separate cubicles, Cat's big brown eyes lit up in realisation over the events, or lack of, so far during the day. "Guys." Cat called over the cubicle wall to the other two girls "I haven't thrown up today."

"Well done?" Said Jade quizzically, her morning-dazed-brain confused to why Cat was telling them this.

"Or last night." Cat smiled to herself slightly.

"Wait." Jade released what Cat meant. "Your morning sickness is clearing up!"

"Yup." Cat replied.

"YES!" Tori suddenly yelled from her own cubical. "Sorry Cat, but I really want to get out of here."

"It's alright." Cat giggled. "I'm not feeling nauseous either. I think we're ready to leave."

"That's a week earlier than we expected." Tori beamed.

"I'll be back." Jade announced, suddenly kicking open her cubical door and running out of the toilets.

"Where'd you think she's gone?" Cat asked Tori.

"Probably to tell the boys." Tori replied. Her thoughts were confirmed when they heard Robbie scream from the boys toilets telling Jade to get out.

"Pack your stuff!" They heard Jade yell. "Cat's ready to leave!"


Within the next 15 minutes, the whole gang were stood in the middle of the store, ready to make a run for it. Each person was carrying a decent sized bag on their backs and were wielding anything that could be used as a weapon. Beck was currently going over the plan for one final time so everyone was clear what it was. "Stick together and look around for a 7 seat car or a van. As soon as we spot one, everyone stand guard while we search for a key, if that fails, then Jade will try to hot wire it."

"You've gone over that plan 20 times Beck." Andre said. "Let's just run alright?"

"Okay." Beck sighed. "Come on." He started to lead the group out of one of the back entrances of the store and to the road behind it. As predicted, the road was filled with deserted cars, which should have keys in the engines, since their drivers would have been infected by the gas while they were still inside, and climbed out once they became zombies.

"Shit." Tori swore, pointing to the flock of zombies that were gathered at the end of the road. Since they'd seen them last, the zombies had changed. The months of existence had seemingly done a tole on them, erasing their past human-like appearance. Now they had a sloppy gait as they approached slowly. Their jaws dislocated showing their torn tongues and blood stained teeth. Skin peeled away from their bones and organs, showing their black hearts. Although they did not beat, you could see that organs were torn, how their blood had turn in to a thick turbid brown and how their stomach slowly digested the flesh around it.

"Stay away from them." Beck commanded. "And look for a big car." He started to run own the road, in the opposite direction to the Zombies, the rest of the group following. "Everyone doing okay?"

"Not quite!" Cat yelled from the back of the group, finding it hard to run with a bag that was practically the same size as her.

"Come on Baby." Tori grabbed her girlfriend's hand and started dragging her along with them.

"An SUV!" Jade suddenly dug her heels into the ground as they nearly ran straight past the 7 seater car.

"Woah!" Robbie gasped as he nearly ran into Jade's back because of her suddenly stopping.

Beck ran around to the drivers side and looked though the open door. "The key's in the ignition!" He announced, jumping into it.

"Tori!" Cat screamed as a zombie suddenly appeared behind the half-latina. The zombie's lack of eyelids gave her eyeballs a popping look as they swiveled in their sockets, searching for her next meal. Her hair was grey and pulled into a granny's bun, like some dear old lady, but whoever she had been, she was now the enemy. "Duck!" Tori did just as the zombie lurched forward. Cat swung her bat into the zombie, knocking it down.

"Everyone in the car!" Jade yelled, climbing in the passenger seat.

"Tori, Cat you're in the back." Robbie and Andre pulled the middle seats down, allowing the girls to climb into the trunk seats, before pulling them back up and jumping into their own seats. The gang quickly removed their bags and put them wherever there was room: the small trunk space behind Cat and Tori, the foot compartments, or the spare seat between Andre and Robbie.

"Everyone sorted?" Beck asked, putting on his seat belt and adjusting his seat. "This is going to be a rough drive."

"There's a map in here!" Robbie announced, pulling the folded-up road map booklet from the pocket on the back of Jade's chair.

"That's-" Beck started, before a sudden 'bang' came from the side of the car. "ZOMBIE!" He yelled as a zombie repeatedly hit it's fist against his door.

"Drive!" Jade yelled at her boyfriend, who quickly twisted the key and put the car into drive.

Because of the amount of cars on the road, Beck was constantly swerving to avoid them, and even taking the car off road at certain points when the road was completely blocked. From every inch of the streets came the signs that the apocalypse was upon them, the previously bustling city was now a derelict shell, a shadow of it's former glory. There were no burials, as there was no one left to approach a corpse, so they rotted right out in the open with their unseeing eyes staring at the group as they drove past them. All in all, it was a pretty hectic and mentally scaring drive. But with Robbie's map reading help, Beck managed to find his way.


After about 2 hours of driving, they'd made their way through LA and across the hilly terrain to a town called 'Palmdale'. Deciding that this place would be a good place to stop, the gang climbed out of the car, 200 metres from the town border, to discuss a route to take. "Look." Robbie pulled out the detailed map and ran his finger along a long road a few miles north that they could take. "This is Interstate 40, it runs all the way to the East Coast and will take us through the Arizona border."

"But as I pointed out, we can't cross the border on a main road." Jade said. "It'll be too guarded."

"Which is why-" Robbie opened the map further, and pointed to a town called 'Flagstaff' in Arizona. "We will go off of interstate 40 here and drive the rest of the way along Highways 89 and 160." He pointed to another road which lead north, and then turned off into a third which would take them across the North-East Arizona/New Mexico border. (Please just google a map of Arizona roads to work out what the hell I'm on about. Also now would probably be a good time to mention that I'm British and know NOTHING about US geography, apart from that it's a lot of desert and mountains in the South West.)

"So is that the plan?"

"I don't know any other one we've got." Tori spoke up.

"What are we going to do about food and water and shelter during all this?" Andre asked, pointing out that his stomach was rumbling. "We've only got enough food in our bags for like 2 days, 3 on a stretch."

"We need to save that." Tori pointed out. "In case we get stranded in the desert or something. For now, I guess we should go further into the town and raid one of the houses." She nodded to the decently sized town they'd arrived at. Seemingly, it was once a busy thriving neighbourhood, but now all that was left was rows of abandoned homes, where windows have long shattered by the roaming zombies. Doors hang on the few threads of their hinges and groan with pain at every sway. Weeds socialise across the cracking asphalt of every road, now the only sign of natural life in the town. From where they were stood, they could distantly see zombie's groaning and moaning as they dragged themselves between the derelict homes.

"Girls stay here by the car, while Andre, Robbie and I try to gather food for a lunch break. Then we'll get back into the car and keep driving." Beck said, picking up his bat.

"We aren't weak you know." Jade growled. "If anything, I'm the best fighter you've got."

"Which is why you're staying- someone needs to protect the van as well as yourselves. Us three," He motioned to himself and the other boys, "only have to worry about our own safety. We can just run from the danger, you need to stay and protect our stuff."

"Fair enough." Jade sighed, her boyfriend had a point, but running into the town still seemed more dangerous.

"Be careful, everyone." Andre said, looking around before taking off with the other boys to the closest house, to gather food.

"Right." Cat sighed, standing up off of the dusty ground, but immediately leaning against the side of the car to steady herself.

"You feeling okay Cat?" Jade asked, seeing her friend's discomfort.

"Ye-no." She scrunched her eyes shut in a feeble attempt to fight off her on-coming headache.

"Get back into the car and lay down for a bit Babe." Tori suggested.

"No... I need to help, I'm not weak Tori."

"No one thinks you're weak Cat." Tori pulled her girlfriend in for a comforting hug. "We just need to make sure you're okay constantly. Remember you're not just looking after yourself."

"I know."

"Could ya just go lay down already Cat?" Jade spoke up. "You two being love-dovey is making me queasy."

"We have to put up with you and Beck." Cat giggled, going on her tiptoes to peck Tori's lips. "Wake me when the boys come back."


With the boys

You'd think that during a zombie apocalypse, running towards where the zombies were wouldn't be a good idea. But nope, they needed food, and unfortunately that was in the town. Luckily for the boys though, all the zombies seemed to be preoccupied with the town centre, leaving the outskirts practically deserted, with only one or two in their eye line. In all respects of the word, this place was a ghost town. Just to stand amid the rotting town was enough to make you feel like a ghost, an unwanted spectre of the humans that came to take and never give, never to love the land or the nature, not to make a home or be respectful. In the still air of this natural depression the stain of their indifference had time to sink onto your skin. It was beautiful and melancholy, haunting in its desertion.

"We going into one house together, or 3 different ones separately?" Robbie asked, peering through the broken glass window of the home closest to him.

"One." Andre replied. "So we can cover each other in case of an attack." He hoisted his body up and over the shattered glass rims of the window frame and into the small home, the other two following. Turns out the town wasn't fully abandoned as spiders had laced the walls with cobwebs of intricate beauty, claiming the empty home as their own.

The house itself was a mess: sections of ceiling hang limp in the stagnant air; fragments of plaster lie dry over a long untrodden floor, their only purpose to lay still in the California heat; there was also an inch of dust covering every inch, causing the asthmatic Robbie to loose his steady breathing pattern.

"Come on." Beck lead the boys though the room and into the adjoined kitchen. "Search the cupboards for anything we can eat now. No out of date stuff, and nothing that needs cooking."

A pile of cereal boxes, canned tuna, crackers, peanut butter, canned fruit, bottled water and various other long-lasting foods started to form on the lonely table in the middle of the room as the boys raided the kitchen. "This should last us the day." Robbie said, grabbing an armful of food and climbing back out of the house, followed by Beck and Andre.

Before they made it 10 metres away from the town and towards the car, they'd managed to attracted the attention of some of the un-dead residents. However, with piles of food in their arms, they had no way to defend themselves. "Just start running!" Beck commanded, picking up speed to complete the rest of the roughly 200 metre run. "Drop the food at the car and then turn back." His breath came in small spurts, hot and nervous. Behind him, he could hear the baying groans and jeering laughter of his enemies. His lungs and heart were pumping, but the air didn't seem to be enough as he sprinted forward, panic trembling in his exhausted limbs.

Once they reached the car, they turned around to see that a group of 10 zombies were only about 20 metres behind, which meant their running had not been in vain. "They've gotten faster." Andre spoke up, dropping the food by the car and turning to fight. By this point, Jade and Tori had jumped to their feet, taking the place of the near-collapsed Robbie. "Where's Cat?" Andre asked as the zombie's kept approaching.

"In the car." Jade replied bluntly. "She wasn't feeling great, probably asleep now."

"They're too close for us to wake her now." Beck sighed, still low on breath. "Let's fight."

The group of four (Andre, Beck, Tori and Jade) sprinted forward to the oncoming horde, mentally agreeing that when it comes to the fight there's no honour, no code. All that matters is the win and we take nothing for granted.

Then the first blow came, as Jade threw a pair of scissors into one of the zombie's head. The sight of it passing straight through the rotted skull was a horrific one, but as the creature fell to the ground, the gang knew that was 1 down and 9 to go. Beck and Andre, still exhausted from their run, managed to muster up enough strength to knock down 4 zombies between them, whilst Tori did the same with another 1. Jade pried her scissors from the 1st zombie's skull and pushed them into the black heart of a seconded, killing the 7th zombie of the horde. Just as Beck turned to gape at his girlfriend's hand on combat,when another zombie managed to club him around the head with the torn off arm of one of his fallen comrades, knocking Beck out cold. In a moment of pure anger and rage, Jade threw her scissors at lightning speed into the Zombie's eye, killing him in a painful manner. As Tori and Andre finished off the final 2 zombies, Jade dragged her boyfriend's unconscious body back to the car.

"I told you to wake me!" Cat yelled as she bundled out of the car, finally awoken by the sound of fighting.

"Not the time!" Jade chocked out, panicking over what to do about her unconscious boyfriend.

"Here." Cat raced forward and crouched down beside Beck. "He needs to be in the recovery position." She started to bend Beck's limbs in the appropriate way and rolled him onto his side.

"Is that the right way?" Jade chocked out though her tears that had formed over seeing her boyfriend hurt.

"My brother used to knock himself out a lot." Cat said calmly. "I know what I'm doing."

"Is he okay?" Tori and Andre asked simultaneously as they approached Cat, Jade and Beck.

"He'll be fine." Cat remained calm. "What happened to Robbie?" She asked, motioning to how Robbie was laying on the ground a few metres away from her, trying to regulate his breathing.

"Asthma." He chocked out. "Plus... running... equals... this."