Dan

The water level breached the roof of the convoy, and we knew that we would be in trouble from there on out. Beside me, Runo was holding onto Alice's arm as our deceased friend tried to get up and wander about. The orange-haired girl's eyes only gazed around blankly and with confusion.

I didn't know how much longer I, or the others, could stand to see Alice like this. It was clear that the serum didn't work on her, so why were we allowing her to continue to stay like this? Was it because of Shun? Did we want his input on what we should do with her? I wasn't sure.

Shun had to know that there wasn't anything we could do for her, but I had a feeling he would end up being irrational about this whole ordeal. It was true that if this had been anyone else but Alice, Shun would have handled it quite well.

But I knew for a fact all of the hardships that he had gone through to keep her safe all of these years, and those were going to make this all the more difficult for him. Maybe we should just go ahead and put her down, I thought grimly while looking at our zombiefied friend.

The others appeared to have gotten used to Alice being like she was now, but there was still the look of sadness and pure disbelief in their eyes. My gaze fell to Ace's hatchet. Alice would want us to end her suffering. She wouldn't want to be one of those monsters forever, even I knew that much.

The only problem was whether or not Shun could get through his pain and see that as well. He could end up still hanging onto the hope that the serum would work on her, when it was apparent that it was doing nothing for the poor girl.

"Guys," I said under my breath, readying myself to tell them that we had to put our friend down and out of her misery. As they turned to face me, and when I prepared to speak, a blood-curdling scream erupted and filled the loading dock. With that, my current thoughts became distracted as I began to wonder what was going on.

The screams continued, only getting louder and more agonizing. After a few minutes, we realized where the screams were coming from; the observation room where Shun and Layfair were.

A hollow feeling started to form in my stomach when I thought that the cries of pain belonged to our friend, but upon listening more closely, I realized that it was not Shun. It then occurred to me that Jackson had broken off from our group and gone up to the observation room.

With that thought, I had the feeling that those screams belonged to the ex-assistant of Layfair. "What's going on up there?" Julie asked nervously. I shook my head, wishing I had an answer to give her. The screams then began to die down, then cease altogether.

We all stood there in a still silence. Had Layfair killed Jackson? None of us had anyway of knowing since we weren't up there to see with our own eyes. The sounds of low growls and roars then began to spill out from the shattered window of the observation room.

I quickly identified what kind of creature made those sounds; a Lucifer. I tensed with the thought of one of those beasts being in that small room with Shun and Jackson. There was no way they could fight under those conditions.

From the roof of the convoy, I was able to see blood splatter on the white ceiling of the observation room, which was followed by more chilling screams. Julie placed her hands over her ears and began to shake her head. "I don't want to hear it anymore!" she shouted.

I was able to see more blood splatter portions of the walls and more of the ceiling. I hated to know what was going on it that room. Was the Lucifer in there ripping apart Shun or Jackson? I cringed at the thought of either one of them suffering at the claws and teeth of that beast.

From the room, I heard the Lucifer roar one last time, then things went completely silent, the only sound was that of the sprinklers filling the room with more water. The desire to know what happened up there was killing me. But my curiosity was quelled when I saw Shun climb up into the broken window of the observation room.

From what I could tell, he seemed to only have a couple of scratches on him, but he was in one piece nonetheless. I smiled a bit and was about to call out to him to let him know where we were at, but my words caught in my throat as I watched him dive down into the bloody water below.

Shun

I took a deep breath and plunged headfirst into the water. It was cold, but I quickly adjusted to the temperature drop. In the water, everything was difficult to see. The lights above the surface provided light for a few feet, but towards the bottom of the blood-red sea, everything appeared to be black.

All around me, boxes of serum floated around in the water and began to sink towards the bottom. I shook myself back into focus and reminded myself why I had jumped into this sea of death; to find the serum that would help bring Alice back.

I kicked my feet, propelling myself downwards through the water. I reached the point of where the light could no longer filter through the blood and water. Although, not everything was black; I could see in front of me just a bit. In order to tell when I hit the underwater floor, I kept my hand out in order to feel the submerged tiles.

My chest was starting to tighten as my lungs craved fresh air, but they would have to be deprived until I found the serum; that was my top priority at the moment. I finally hit the bottom and began to look around for the vial of purple liquid. I could make out the shapes of boxes of serum as I swam by, but that was about it.

My hands continued to feel around for whatever might have been a vial. The tips of my fingers then brushed over something, and when I felt to see what it was, I flinched back. It was a body. I could feel the ripped flesh and exposed bone.

I then reminded myself of all of the dead bodies that had littered the loading dock floor, and that I was now swimming in the same water as them. This left a sick feeling in my stomach, and human nature was screaming for me to get out of this water.

But I can't. I have to find that serum, I told myself sternly. My chest was now on fire, and it felt like my lungs were about to collapse in on themselves, but I pushed forward, regardless of what my body was telling me. A flash then got my attention out of the corner of my eye, and when I turned to face it, I also caught a glimpse of purple.

Not hesitating for a moment, I swam over towards what I had seen, and snatched it up. Sure enough, it was what I had been searching so desperately for. I tilted my head back and was able to see a tiny dot at the surface of the water where the light was filtering through.

Kicking my feet, I hurried towards the surface, vial clutched tightly in my hands; I wasn't about to lose it anytime soon. As I swam upwards, I began to realize that I was swimming past bodies floating through the water.

There had to be hundreds, maybe even thousands of the corpses drifting along. Seeing this only made me speed up more, and before I knew it, I broke through the surface of the water.

Dan

I stared in shock as Shun jumped into the water. "Shun!" I shouted just as he vanished beneath the crimson sea. I expected to see he emerge from the water right after he dove in, but he never did. What does he think he's doing? Has he gone nuts? I asked myself.

The others appeared to have the same thoughts as I did. What had provoked Shun to jump into the water? Was he trying to kill himself? If so, then it wouldn't work, the serum would make sure of that. Then why jump? As far as I knew, there was nothing below the water of any concern to us.

A few minutes passed, and there was no sign of Shun. I began to grow worried. What was delaying him? Could there possibly have been something down there that attacked him? Like another Lucifer? Just as my worries were reaching their peak, Shun broke the surface of the water, taking in several deep gasps for air.

"Shun!" I shouted, a flood of relief washing over me. His eyes locked onto us and our flooding convoy, and he began to swim towards us. When he reached the edge, Ace and I helped pull him onto the roof of the vehicle. "What the hell were you doing?" I asked him.

As he coughed some of the bloody water up, I noticed something clutched in his hands. "Shun? What's that?" I asked, pointing to the vial. His eyes looked down to the object, and he held it up to show us. It was a vial, much like that of the one the serum was in, but filled with purple liquid, rather than blue.

I raised an eyebrow in confusion. I said, "Alright, that doesn't tell me what it is though." Shun coughed up the last bit of the water and told us, "It's a serum Layfair developed in secrecy. It fights the Lucifer virus. This is what will save Alice." Suddenly, I could see why he jumped into the bloody water for that.

This vial was the most important thing we had come across so far. "Are you serious?" Murucho asked, staring at the vial like the marvel it was. Shun nodded and began to look around. "Yeah. Now, where's Alice so we can hurry up and give this to her," he said urgently. His scanning eyes then froze, and I knew he had found her when his face drained off all of its color.

"Alice," he said under his breath. She was behind me, Runo still holding onto her living, lifeless body to keep her from wandering off into the water around us. I told Shun, "We gave her no telling how many doses of serum, and as you can see, none of them did anything to slow the virus down. But now that we have that serum, it should bring her back."

Shun continued to stare in shock at Alice for a bit longer, then appeared to snap out of his disoriented state. "Yeah. You're right," he said in a somewhat rushed tone. This couldn't be an easy sight for him to stomach; it wasn't easy for any of us. Murucho took the vial from Shun, and removed the cap, revealing a syringe that was built into the vial.

The short blonde then walked over to Alice and told her gently, "It's going to be alright now, Alice. Just be patient." Our zombiefied friend only continued to look around the room in confusion. Murucho then stuck the needle into her arm, and the purple liquid drained from the vial and into Alice.

When I looked back at Shun, I could see the anxiety in his eyes. I was sure he was afraid that this serum might not work either, but the only thing we could do at the moment was wait.

Shun

When the needle attached to the vial went into Alice's arm, a hollow feeling quickly formed in my stomach; and it wasn't from the fact that I had jump into a sea of dead bodies and blood. It was due to the fear of this serum not working.

Layfair could have lied to me, telling me that this serum would cure Alice as a means to distract me during our fight. I didn't want this to be the case. I had gone through too much to have the only thing I had left leave me forever. I tried to sit by and watch for the moment Alice showed any signs of being cured, but I couldn't bring myself to see her like she was.

It reminded me too much of the nightmare I had sometime ago, where she was infected and came back as a zombie with no recollection of who she, or anybody else was. I felt a hand on my shoulder, and glanced back to see Dan. He was giving me a sad smile when he told me, "Quit worrying so much. She's going to be fine."

How could Dan stay so optimistic right now? I recalled saying that exact same thing when we found the serums and gave them to Ace and Alice, and look how that turned out. We discovered that the regular serum didn't work on those infected by the Lucifers.

Dan then sat down beside me and asked, "So, what all went on up there?" I assumed he was trying to keep my mind off of Alice, but he wasn't doing a very good job. Although, I did appreciate it. "And what about Jackson?" Dan asked as well. I cast my eyes down at the rolling waves in the bloody water.

"Layfair was winning for a while when Jackson showed up. If it hadn't been for him, then I'm sure that I would still be up there being tortured by that psychopath. But Jackson ended up getting infected with the Lucifer virus, and was turned into one."

Dan's eyes widened with hearing this news, but remained silent as I continued on with my story. "The Lucifer….Um…Jackson…Ended up trying to kill me, but accidentally knocked Layfair into the pool of blood that had gathered on the floor. And you remember how the Lucifers don't attack Layfair cause they know his scent?" Dan nodded and I continued.

"Well, the blood masked that, and Jackson turned on Layfair and infected him with that version of the virus." Dan held up his hand in order to signal me to stop for a moment. He then said, "Wait, how could that infect Layfair? I thought nothing could hurt him thanks to all of the doses of the serum he had in him."

I sighed and told Dan, "I was getting to that. You see, the Lucifer is a totally different virus, and just like how the other serum wouldn't work on Alice, it didn't work for him either. That was how he was infected. Plus, he must have seen no need in injecting himself with the serum for the Lucifer virus since they wouldn't attack him."

Dan nodded to show that he understood what I was saying. "So," he started. "It was his own doing that did him in." I nodded, recalling how I had left Layfair's lifeless corpse up in the observation room with the blade of my sword stuck in his skull.

I tilted my head back, allowing the sprinklers to throw water on my face as I gazed up at the florescent lights. It still hadn't set in that Layfair was really dead, and that this apocalypse was actually coming to an end. I then glanced back over at Alice.

She was laying on the roof of the convoy, rather than sitting and looking all around like she had been before. When I looked a bit closer, it appeared that her skin was more lively now, almost like it was getting color back. Then, her eyes flew open, and she took in a gasp of air.

chapter title based off the song Bring Me To Life by Evanescence. check out the poll on my profile. i added another story that i actually came up with yesterday and it's one that has a pretty solid plot for the moment (just in case the other stories didnt catch anyone's attention). please check it out and vote if you have not. read, review, and other things. ~Copperpelt~