"We need food." Sean kicks a lonesome rock out from the forest and onto the road beyond.

"I know." I watch the town ahead of us, looking for movement, waiting for it.

"I don't think it's worth the risk," Sean tells me, picking up his bag from the floor and handing me my spear. "We'll check the next town."

I shake my head, scepticism in my mind, hunger in my gut. "Whoever set up those traps is probably long gone."

"We're so close to DC now. That's where your Dad was flying to before things went tits up. He'll have plenty of food there."

"We're closer," I correct him. "We've made good distance since LA, but we're still only in Georgia."

Sean lets out a snort. "Man, don't act like I know which state is where." Sean kicks another undeserving rock away from us while he speaks. "I miss home. England didn't have this many places to remember."

"I miss home too but don't act like you were any good at directions back there either. It wouldn't kill you to read the map once in a while."

"Nah, man, that's your job."

"Well, if I'm in charge of directions. Then we're searching this town."

Before Sean can argue, I leave the underbrush, making my way forward, a smile creeping across my face when I hear him chasing after me and shouting for me to wait up.


"You didn't read the signs."

"I-I did."

"You didn't!"

"I did. Please."

Blood trickles down my forehead as it throbs from where the man's gun had connected. The room I'm in has tall ceilings and the walls look like blackboards, words are written on them, words that scare me, some in chalk, some in blood. The man has his gun trained to my temple, sweat running down his and into his short beard.

"I can just g-go," I tell him, my whole body shaking with fear.

"Why didn't you read?!"

"I-"

"Why didn't you listen?!"

My hands burn- the cable ties holding them behind my back start to dig against my skin, new blisters searing.

"You're friend got away. You could have too," the man is pacing the room now, his eyes crazed with indecision. "Why didn't you!?"

"Are you going to kill me?" I try to control my voice, but the shaking won't stop. Every word is a sign of weakness.

"I have to. But I can't... I never could... I couldn't then, and I can't now!"

I stay quiet, scared my next words will be my last. The words that push him over whatever edge he's standing on.

We came to this town for food. We needed to eat. Now Sean is gone, and I'm going to die. Thanks to my shitty decision making.

"There's a way out." The words bring me relief through a sigh, hope flooding through me, a chance to survive.

The crazy man leaves the room, leaving me to wait, tied to a radiator with the fear of death looming over me.

A set of throwing knives are stuck in the wall above me. I think about trying to reach for them, but anxiety holds me fast. Keeping me to the floor, under ties and tension.

A black tarp covers the window of the apartment building, sunlight bleeding past the edges, bouncing off the wooden floor, and hitting the tips of my scuffed trainers.

The man storms back into the room with his rifle over his shoulder. A small pistol in his hand.

He grabs my spear, pointing it at me. Making me flinch so hard that my head bangs into the radiator behind me. "shit!"

"Did you make this?" the man asks me, ignoring my outburst.

"Me and my friend did," I answer, trying desperately to make as much space between me and the spearhead as possible. My head throbbing.

"Smart." the man nods, "keep them at a distance so they can't bite."

I just nod back, slowly, not sure if the same man had come back that left. His whole demeanour is different as he studies the spear.

He laughs, and it terrifies me.

"You made a spear out of a kitchen knife and a broom handle?"

I nod again.

"That's creative. So was he."

"Who?" I stutter.

The man's eyes go dark again for a moment, the rage that had left the room with him finding its way back in.

"My boy," The man seems to calm down. "He was creative. Liked his comics, even drew them sometimes too."

Again, scared of saying the wrong thing, I just nod along as the man speaks.

"...How old are you?"

"Fifteen," I answer.

"He'd be your age now... Maybe older. I- I don't remember." The man's eyes were swimming in his tears, drowning in his sadness.

"Well, he, um. Sounds like he was talented."

"He was."

The man pointed my spear towards me again, holding it close to my face, the knife kissing my cheek.

Is this it?

He pushes the spear behind me, snapping the plastic ties.

Maybe not.

The crazy man grabs me by the shirt, pulling me to stand before him, holding me up when my legs fail to be brave.

He puts the small pistol in my hand.

"There's only one bullet left for that, but it's a good gun. Berreta 70..."

My blank look doesn't pass him by unnoticed.

"It's a good weapon," he insists.

"Um, thanks?" I hold the gun, taken aback by the change in circumstance. Not sure if I'm insulted by the fact he knows I won't use it on him.

The man grabs my collar suddenly, pulling me in close. I can smell his warm breath against my face. "Don't hesitate to use it. You can't. That's what-"

"I won't," I let out suddenly, trying to bring the tension down from the high ceilinged room. I think it works because the man is nodding a lot, telling me to follow him.

I do, following him past a blood-soaked axe hanging from the ceiling, and down the stairs of the apartment, avoiding a tripwire when he warns me, and jumping over a mat with the word 'welcome!' written upside down. I don't ask why he doesn't want me to step on it.

The man hands me a satchel and my spear once we're past his defences, which are blocking up the whole street. I stuff the gun under my belt and take them with thanks.

"Don't waste time chasing the dead, kid."

"I have to look for my friend," I tell the man.

"No, you don't. He left you to die."

"I haven't got anyone else." I don't mean to sound as desperate as I am.

"There's a prison. People live there..." The man isn't looking at me while he speaks.

"Really? Where?"

"They'll all die. We all die, but you'll be safe there until you die."

It feels like the man is having a debate with himself. Like he can't decide if he cares about me living.

The crazy man hands me my map from his back pocket, a red X now sitting near a dense forest, not too far from here.

West Georgia Correctional Facility.

"You think I'll make it?" I ask, not sure if he cares.

A Deadhead slips off a spike holding it to one of the man's traps, landing by my feet and making me jump. I bring my foot down hard on its squishy skull, an explosion of blood and skull fragments coating my scuffed shoes.

"I think you'll be fine." The man nods, shaking his head. He keeps shifting his weight, restless through our conversation.

He turns to leave.

"I'm sorry about your son."

"Kid, don't ever be sorry."


It takes two days to get where the map tells me.

The two days suck.

I feel guilty the whole time.

Did I leave Sean for a wild goose chase?

Was that guy lying to me?

He didn't even tell me his name... To be fair, I didn't tell him mine either.

Walking makes guilt easier. Focusing on my feet as they drag across the scolding roadbed. left. Right. Left. Right. Lef-

My thoughts are put on hold when my legs stop walking forward. My brain asks them why, but my ears answer the question.

Gunshots, splitting through the air from up ahead.

I jump, off the road, running through the woods in their direction, hoping for a break.

After several minutes of running, a stitch is biting at my gut, twisting around its emptiness.

A dirt track comes into my view through the dense treeline, tire tracks running up and down it. I stop for breath, only to find that I see something coming up the dusty track towards the cracks of gunfire.

A horse flies past me, bounding down the track. A woman sits upon the mount, a sword bouncing across her back, dreadlocks flying in the wind.

Have I finally gone mad?

A moment of hesitation tries to take control. I manage to ignore it, leaping out of the woods, and chasing after the Rider.

Maybe I have gone mad.

I follow at a jog, quickly losing sight of her while holding my middle in pain and swearing to myself between heavy breaths.

Rounding a corner, I stop dead in the dust, partly due to what feels like my lungs collapsing, but mainly for what stands before me...

A prison. Although, the man could have said that a fortress would be a better description. With two fences wrapped around its perimeter and watchtowers standing tall, looming over the landscape. Clearly a new addition, spiked defences hide a huge set of orange gates. They look as if they're made from shipping containers.

The gates are open, and inside is the Rider, struggling with two Deadheads, looking much shorter off the horse.

I somehow find more energy inside me, beginning to run towards the gates. What started as a heroic choice quickly turned to a desperate limp for salvation.

The Rider trips on what looks to be the gate pully system. She falls under the weight of the Deadheads, colliding with the ground hard.

I draw my small handgun.

Bullet in the chamber.

One of the dead gets kicked off by the Rider, its head exploding to a boy holding a rifle, hiding behind a chain-link gate.

I managed to slip through the orange gates before they swing shut.

Still unnoticed by the other two, I raise my gun, pointing at the Deadhead, now snapping its teeth inches from the Rider's face.

I don't hesitate.

I pull the trigger.

...

I miss.