Chapter 18

Over the next couple of days tensions had started to ease and Nanako kept any and all thoughts of suspicion under her belt. For someone who'd apparently lost their mother and then potentially lost their father, Chiharu seemed to be in decent spirits. Sure, kids tend to process things differently but she hadn't even cried once since she arrived here.

Today marked one week since everything went to hell and Nanako was surprised they'd lasted so long. In all honesty she suspected that if they hadn't all been together when it started, things wouldn't have gone as they had.

There was nothing on Chiharu, no bugs, no hidden cameras but that didn't stop Nanako from still having a tiny bit of suspicion about the girl and that suspicion may or may not be a good thing.

"So who is going on this supply run?" Ranka asked as the group sat around the dining table.

"Who wants to go?" Nanako asked, wanting to give the group the choice, not make it for them.

Everyone raised their hands. The tension over the last couple of days had been enough to make anyone want to run off and Nanako was surprised Ritsu hadn't taken off during the night.

"Well then… we can't all go… someone's gotta stay here with Chiharu" Ranka looked around the group.

"I'll stay" Nanako nodded

"Me too" Ritsu wasn't about to leave Nanako alone with the suspicious child.

"I'll stay" Kyoya looked around at the group "we all know I'm better at logistical stuff anyway"

"I guess I'll stay, be the responsible adult" Ranka nodded.

"Okay, looks like we got that sorted pretty quick" Haruhi smiled softly "six of us to get supplies and five to hold down the fort"

Nanako's POV

After we saw the others off, our little group got to doing a little tidying up. It wasn't easy keeping things clean when you had no cleaner to do it for you and thankfully for us, Ranka was an almost expert at housework. It surprised me because I thought Haruhi did all the housework but apparently that was mainly because Ranka was always so tired from working as much as he could that he only cleaned on his days off.

I took to cleaning the living room, Kyoya took the downstairs bathroom, Ranka took the kitchen and Ritsu took the dining room. Chiharu sort of bounced between the four of us, helping where she could. The bedrooms would be the responsibility of whoever slept in them and the rest of the rooms were split between the four of us and our little helper.

"Nanako… where have the others gone?" Chiharu asked as she straightened out the couch cushions.

"To get supplies" I answered as I cleaned the coffee table.

"Where to?" boy was she a curious one all of a sudden

"I don't know" because I didn't, not really.

"Oh… when will they be back?" such a curious little bug!

"Soon" okay that was a lie, they would probably be gone a few hours but I wasn't going to tell her that.

"Oh okay" she moved on to putting some books away that I'd stacked next to the coffee table.

That nagging feeling came back that something was wrong but I stuffed it away as quick as it had come and began to sweep the hardwood floor. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Chiharu slip out of the room and head towards the kitchen, probably to bug Ranka about something.

Once the living room was cleaned, I moved on to the entrance hall and then up the stairs, figuring I could at least sweep throughout and then work on the bathrooms. It took a couple of hours but finally the house looked presentable.

Wandering into the kitchen, I saw Ritsu making coffee, Kyoya sat at the island with some books and Ranka fussing about with what I could only assume was probably going to be lunch.

"Hey where's Chiharu?" I asked, plopping down on a stool at the island.

"She's not with you?" Kyoya asked, looking up from the book he was reading.

"No… last time I saw her, she was heading this way but that was about an hour and a half ago" I frowned

"Well I haven't seen her since we started cleaning" Ritsu walked over to place a cup of coffee in front of me.

"Ranka?" I asked, tilting my head as he seemed absorbed in what he was doing.

"Hmm?" he looked round.

"Chiharu, have you seen her? She came this way about an hour and a half ago" I took a sip of the coffee Ritsu had made.

"She did? Well I haven't seen her" Ranka put down the spoon he was holding.

All of us sat in silence for a moment, staring at each other.

"Well I saw her come out this way" I slid from the stool "right after she asked a bunch of questions about where the others had gone"

"What did you tell her…?" Ritsu asked

"They were out supply running… she then asked where and how long they'd be but I told her I didn't know where and they'd be back soon" I paused and then "Damn it… I hope my suspicions are wrong but… we gotta find her"

Ranka took the downstairs, Ritsu took the upstairs and Kyoya and I took the grounds between us. Chiharu had an hour and a half on us and I was hoping to every higher power up there that she'd just found somewhere to curl up and had fallen asleep. We'd each taken a radio so that whoever finds her could let the others know.

After about twenty minutes of searching, I'd still heard nothing from either Ritsu or Ranka or Kyoya and so I thought now would be a good time to check in.

"Come in Ranka, Ritsu, Kyoya?" I let go of the button and waited.

We'd tinkered with the radios so we had a longwave and a shortwave system so we could communicate while around the house and not disturb anyone who was out on supply runs… thank god for that because I could just about hear Haruhi freaking out that we'd somehow lost the kid if we hadn't tweaked them.

"Ranka here, found her yet?"

"Ritsu checking in found anything yet?"

"Kyoya here, everything okay?"

I sighed as all three of them checked in "No… nothing… but the grounds are huge… how's your search going?"

"She's nowhere in the downstairs of the house" Ranka's voice was filled with worry

"She's not upstairs either" Ritsu paused "I'm going to check the attic"

"Nothing in the front yard either" Kyoya reported

"Okay… I'll keep looking out here" I sighed as I continued further into the grounds.

I searched and I searched until my radio buzzed to life.

"Nanako… you better come back to the house" It was Ritsu.

"I still haven't found her!" I couldn't believe he was asking me to call off the search

"Just come back up to the house…"

Grumbling, I made my way back up to the house. I knew the others were going to be back soon and that just made this whole thing worse. How was I going to explain to the others that we'd lost the kid while we were cleaning? The whole point of the four of us staying was to keep an eye on Chiharu and make sure she was okay and somehow we'd ended up losing her!

Entering through the back door, all I could think about was how I was going to explain things, my mind racing. I couldn't even think of how Chiharu could have gotten out of the grounds and I was hoping that maybe she was playing a trick on us maybe? A little hide and seek to get us all worried before she popped out and had a giggle about it?

"Nanako, in here" Kyoya caught my attention and motioned to me as I stepped into the entrance hall.

Titling my head curiously, I followed him into the camera room.

"Why did you call me back? I hadn't finished searching outside" I eyed Ritsu, who was sitting at the cameras.

"I hate to break it to you but it doesn't matter how many times you walk the grounds, you aren't going to find her" he turned away from the cameras to look at me "come look at this"

With a raised brow, I approached the desk and watched as Ritsu pulled up some camera footage from about the time I said Chiharu was heading to the kitchen. I honestly couldn't believe my eyes with what I saw next.

The footage showed Chiharu coming out into the entrance hall where she stood for a minute or two just out of view of the living room before approaching the front door and opening it slowly before slipping out, shutting the door behind her carefully. Ritsu then pulled up the next piece of footage in the timeline, showing the grounds to the front. Chiharu could be seen walking down to the gates where she tries to put in a number but it doesn't work. She stands there for a few more minutes before appearing to walk back up to the house.

"Did she want to leave?" I asked, looking to Ritsu "I mean… doesn't she understand how dangerous it is out there?"

"Wait, there's more…" he sighed, flicking to the next screen, which showed just outside the gates.

Standing there was a group of about five or so people and they seem to be having a conversation with someone on our side of the gate before walking off. Immediately red flags went up all over the place. This footage is from about the moment that Chiharu tried to open the gates.

"You'd think she'd come and tell us if survivors were outside the gates, not try and let them in" Ranka blinked a little.

"They seem awfully familiar with her, look at their body language and the calm nature they have while speaking" Kyoya observed, tilting his head.

"That still doesn't explain where Chiharu is" I looked to Ritsu who nodded.

"No but this will" he switched to another camera view and hit the play button.

Chiharu was walking around the grounds and taking her sweet time to do so before heading back towards the front of the property again before changing her mind, something having caught her eye. We watched, open mouthed as she approached the outbuilding that was used to house the gardening equipment and climbed the trellis on the side of it and up onto the roof. Chiharu moved to the edge of the roof and up onto the wall.

"What the hell?" I blinked as Ritsu switched to footage from the camera that was set at a different angle.

The camera from this angle showed the group of people from before standing at the bottom, with one on a ladder, you know the kind? The ladders that extend and collapse, who reached up to catch Chiharu as she jumped down into his arms, the ladder wobbling a little as the ones at the bottom held onto it to steady it.

"Wait… that… that's her dad" I freaked a little "you know the one who was bit? The one who said he didn't have much time left? I knew something was fishy!"

We watched as he kissed her cheek before she climbed onto his back and they went down the ladder. The group seemed pleased as they ruffled her hair while her father collapsed the ladder and the group walked off, the ladder carried by two other people.

"Oh hell no" I shook my head

"They used us" Ritsu grumbled "they used a child to see how trusting we were and now they know how trusting we are… I wouldn't be surprised if they turn up in the next day or so asking for shelter"

"They can stick their need for shelter up their ass!" I slammed my hands down on the desk "we thought he was dying! That he was going to become a zombie and we took her in out of pity! I felt sorry for him! For her! How fucking stupid!"

Normal POV

Time ticked by slowly, Ritsu remained on camera duty with Nanako who was still internally beating herself up about the whole situation. Ranka was checking on lunch and Kyoya was reading his book in the kitchen.

"Come in, we are almost at the gates"

Nanako looked up at the cameras and sure enough the others had returned in the van.

"I'll let them in" she reached for the keypad and put in the first code, watching as the outer gate opened and they drove inside.

Once the outer gate was closed, she pressed the code for the inner gate, both she and Ritsu watching the camera carefully as the van came through the second gate just before it closed behind them. Nanako was not looking forward to the talk they'd be having in the next ten minutes.

Exhaling slowly, Nanako left the camera room to go and help bring the supplies in, mentally preparing herself for that little chat.