BEST LAID PLANS

They were on the road at first light the following morning, packing a couple of backpacks with water, trail mix and one of the bags of jerky left over from the night before. Alex seemed to have developed a taste for it.

"You know, there was a whole shelf full of that stuff back at the convenience store Gareth and I went to," Hannah said, watching him tear a piece in half with his teeth. He offered her the bag and she waved it away politely. "Never was a fan. My dad used to love it."

Alex and Gareth exchanged uncomfortable looks and she realized that at some point Gareth had told him about her father's abuse.

"Where is your father?" Mary asked, her gaze lowered to the road.

"I'm…not sure," Hannah lied. "I didn't hear from him after this started. I never went looking for him."

"Why not?"

"Hey, ma, you hungry?" Alex interrupted, passing her the jerky. She took a couple of pieces and chewed thoughtfully.

"How far from here?" Gareth asked, falling into step with Hannah. She'd given each of them a gun, the boys rifles and Mary a handgun, strictly for emergencies only. The rifle looked natural in Gareth's hands, though she was certain he'd never fired one before. He had tucked his crowbar into Alex's backpack, and it stuck out for fast and easy access, should anything happen.

"Still a while. You getting tired?"

"Might be worth a stop for a drink."

They paused by the roadside, Mary taking a seat on the gutter as Gareth took a sip from his canteen. Alex and Hannah kept a lookout in both directions.

"We don't want to stop long," Hannah told them, as she accepted the canteen.

"I have a good feeling about this place we're going to," Gareth admitted.

"Really?" she frowned, taking a sip, "Why?"

"I don't know. I just do. I liked what you said about thinking long-term. No one knows how longs this is going to last. No word from the government with any attempts to clean it up. Though considering their last attempt at a solution was to napalm the goddamn city, that's probably not a bad thing."

As she passed the water back, his fingers lingered on hers and she smiled.

"What do you know about gardening, anyway?" he asked, as he packed the canteen back into his knapsack and slung it over his shoulder before they began moving off.

"Seed plus dirt plus water equals plant, right?"

"Right," he chuckled, "but if we're going to do this, no broccoli, alright?"

"Agreed."

"You thinking animals, too?" Alex asked, joining them whilst continuing to keep a close watch on his mother, who walked a little ahead of them. "I mean, eventually? Livestock? Chickens, pigs, cows?"

"I didn't really want to go down that path just yet," Hannah replied, "Plus, this close to the city, I wouldn't have a clue where to find any of those."

Gareth nodded, thoughtful. "I don't think I'd make a very good butcher, anyway," he admitted.

Alex shook his head, agreeing. "It was alright when you didn't know where it was coming from. I'm not big on the idea. Let's stick to vegetables for now. Besides, there's always jerky."

"We're talking about actual meat," Hannah joked.

"It is actual meat."

"Was," she corrected him, and laughed. Distracted by their conversation, the three nearly ran into Mary, who had come to a stop in the middle of the road. A few dozen feet from where they stood, a little girl growled, pulling against her binds. Someone had thought to tie her to a fire hydrant, but hadn't had the heart to kill her. As they drew closer, Hannah saw the bite marks on her neck and face and turned back to Mary.

"Ma, stay back," Alex instructed, putting a hand on her shoulder. She stared at the dead child without emotion.

Gareth and Hannah exchanged looks, negotiating.

"I'll do it," she said, drawing her knife. He glanced down at the blade, then met her eyes and slowly nodded.

"Ma!"

Alex hurried after Mary as she walked towards the little girl, a kitchen knife grasped in her hand. Hannah didn't remember giving her that.

"Let me do it," Mary said calmly, "She deserves to be put out of her misery."

The girl snapped at her as she strained against the rope, gnashing her teeth and grunting. Mary crouched in front of her and ran her hand over the girl's once-fine blonde hair, soothing her. After a moment, she grabbed the hair and pushed her head down to meet her blade, slowly releasing her and sliding the knife from her eye socket. The girl slipped out of her arms and onto the ground.

Hannah stared with morbid curiosity, while Alex helped his mother to her feet. He gazed down at all the blood on her hands and looked over at Gareth, who seemed disturbed by the scene. He turned away and started walking again. Alex wasn't far behind. Hannah followed suit, pausing by the little girl's body to look at her in her teddy bear pajamas and little pink slippers. She wondered if it had been her parents who tied her up, or if they were the ones responsible for the marks on her face. She decided she'd rather not know.

"We need to go around," she said later, as they sat behind an abandoned car, occasionally glancing over the hood to the horde on the other side that blocked their path.

"How are we going to manage that?" Alex said.

"It's doable," she replied, "Stick close to the buildings and always check you corners. We don't want to be caught by surprise. I'll lead, if you want."

Gareth glanced through the car window again and sat back against the car, looking unsure. Hannah waited for some sort of sign from him, and he finally looked at her and nodded. Mary gripped her knife with both hands, readying herself.

Hannah went first, keeping low as she made her way towards the closest building. She slipped into the alleyway, then motioned for Alex to follow. He peeked around the side of the car, waited, then took off at a fast jog, reaching her side without incident. Mary stayed where she was, murmuring private prayers to herself. Gareth looked over at Hannah and saw her motioning urgently to them. He glanced over the hood again and spotted a couple of strays heading in their direction.

"Ma, we need to move."

She shook her head and kept murmuring to herself. He looked over to his brother for help, but Alex was focused on the approaching dead. Just as he was about to step out and lure them away, Mary made a break for it, attracting the attention of more of the horde, who turned towards their hiding spot and began lumbering in their direction. Cursing under his breath, Gareth made a final dash for it. As soon as he reached the others, they broke for the other end of the alley, darting around the corner out of sight.

"We need to move faster," Hannah directed at Mary.

Alex checked around the corner. "We need to keep going," he reported, eyes wide. Hannah followed his gaze and saw the whole horde pushing its way down the narrow alleyway towards them.

"Go, go, go," she said, starting off in the opposite direction. "The hardware place is just up this road. We can make it."

"Are you sure we'll be able to get in?" Alex asked, breathing hard as they continued to run.

She glanced at him, but didn't reply.

They reached the carpark of the large home-improvement store and spotted the metal shutters pulled down over the front entrance. Hannah grabbed the crowbar from Gareth's backpack and approached, shoving the curve into place and yanking upwards. The shutter didn't budge. She tried again with a grunt of exertion, but nothing happened.

"It's not budging," Hannah alerted them, yanking up on the crowbar with all her strength.

"Here," Gareth offered, practically pushing her out of the way. She glared at him, then glanced back at the steadily approaching horde as it filtered out of the alleyway. They hadn't been spotted yet. They still had time.

Gareth's attempts proved equally as futile, for which he received a sarcastic look from his ex.

"We need to find another way in."

A thought occurred to the pair at the same instant.

"The back?" she suggested.

He nodded and led off.

Around the back, they found several trucks that appeared to have been in the process of delivering stock when they had been interrupted, presumably when someone's flesh had been torn from their body.

Hannah found what was left of one of the warehouse workers hanging off the back of a truck. Out of the three that were parked there, it was the only one that was open. Hannah wasn't particularly keen on finding out what the others held inside.

"Should we try one of these?" Alex asked, trying to ignore the mangled corpse to their right.

"Too big," Hannah replied, "We need to find a van or trailer or something. Wouldn't make for bad defense on the road though. Assuming they've still got some gas in the tank."

Gareth walked up to one of the closed trucks and knocked on the back doors. The sound was answered by several growls and moans. He looked back at the others and shook his head.

Hannah glanced past him and spotted a door wedged open by a brick. It was covered in blood and viscera, as though someone had used it as a weapon before entering the building. She wondered if they'd made it back out.

"There," she said, notifying the others of her find. They jogged up the steps that led to the door, discovering the bludgeoned corpse blocking their path.

"Should we split up now?" Alex asked, once again averting his gaze from the bloodied man. "Two of us go look for the truck, the other two go look inside?"

He did not appear enthusiastic about the latter option. Sensing that he wasn't about to volunteer, Hannah looked to Gareth, who was staring at the corpse. He met her gaze and nodded, turning back to his brother.

"We'll go inside, check out the place. Ma?"

"I'll be out here, helping Alex," she agreed.

"Good."

Hannah glanced back, but saw no sign of any walkers.

"Remember, van, trailer, car. Something we can easily maneuver and still fit a lot in," she began, taking off her backpack and rummaging through it. She pulled out two handheld radios and passed one to Alex. "Here. I've set them to the same frequency, so we should be sweet. I don't know how long the battery life is, so only use them if you get into any trouble, or if you find something we can use. We'll radio you once we have what need. Be careful, okay?"

Alex nodded and exchanged a last look with his brother, offering a solemn, thin-lipped smile before he took off, his mother close behind.

"Whatever you do," Hannah said to Gareth, "Don't let off any shots unless absolutely necessary. Especially not in close quarters."

"I'm not an idiot, Han," he replied, as they reached the door. Resting her hand on the door handle, ready to push, she turned to give him a look that suggested otherwise. He rolled his eyes.

"Ready?"

"Never been readier."

He slung the rifle over his shoulder, looking so casual that he might have grown up with one in his hands. He readied his trusty crowbar as Hannah pulled out her knife, then they entered.

It was quiet inside the warehouse, but death hung around them like a fog. The door creaked loudly as it swung back onto the brick, and the pair froze. When nothing answered the sound, they continued deeper into the complex.

"You know how to get into the main building?" Gareth asked, crowbar raised and ready as he glanced around the darkness.

"Wouldn't have a clue," she whispered back.

They worked their way up through the side of the building, slipping silently through the aisles, trying to make out objects in the dark.

"See anything useful back here?"

"I'm not seeing much of anything. We need to find the switch."

"Uh, you forgetting about the whole 'no electricity' thing?"

"Big places like this are usually hooked up to a backup generator. We might be in luck."

"Good point."

"I think I see the switchboard."

Gareth approached the square, metal box on the wall and held his hand out for the flashlight. Then they heard the first growl.

"Shit."

"Hang on."

He shined the light on the board, searching for the right button, while Hannah turned to look into the surrounding black, hoping she wouldn't see anything looking back.

A second growl answered the first and she took a step back. A hiss from the back joined the first two.

"Gareth?"

"Hang on. Got it!"

The lights sparked to life, giving Gareth a second of triumph before revealing the dozen walkers closing in on them.

"Fuck!"

"Go, go, go."

She pushed him towards the nearest door and they burst through, slamming it shut behind them.

"Now what?" Gareth asked, as she breathed a heavy sigh of relief. Aisles surrounded them, shelves stocked with a vast variety of DIY supplies.

"We get what we need and get out," Hannah replied, eyes scanning the closest signs for an indicator as to where to begin.

"About that…" he said, looking back at what had been their only exit.

"We'll figure it out," she assured him. "Let's make sure we make the trip worthwhile."

"What about the others? If they find something and come looking for us?"

"They'd let us know if they found something," she replied, tapping the radio clipped to her hip. Sensing his uncertainty, she picked it up and called them. "Alex, do you read me?"

"We read you," he replied, his voice soft. Realizing her voice might attract walkers to their position, she followed his example and lowered her voice.

"Are you guys clear?"

"A couple of them followed us, but we took them out. Did you get in?"

"Yeah, but, uh, there's a bit of a problem. We're kind of trapped in here. We got cornered in the warehouse. There's a dozen or more out there waiting for us. Just don't come looking for us, okay? We'll find our own way out."

"We could try luring them," he suggested. Gareth shook his head at her.

"No, don't try anything. We'll figure something out, okay? Just keep us updated on the transport situation."

There was silence on Alex's end, and Gareth and Hannah exchanged looks.

"I think we might have something," his voice sounded suddenly.

Gareth gave a sigh of relief and turned back to stare at the warehouse door, thinking.

"Awesome. We'll let you know when we're done. Keep safe out there."

She clipped the radio back onto her jeans and playfully poked Gareth in the side. He gave her a forced smile, and turned back to the sprawling aisles before them.

"Worse comes to worst, we'll take them out ourselves. Like we did in the convenience store. Hey, gardening supplies!"

She moved off towards their objective, stopping in front of the stand of seeds to grab whatever would grow to be edible.

"No broccoli, right?" she joked, but Gareth continued to glance back towards the door. He turned to look at her, biting his lip.

"They'll be fine," Hannah assured him, careful to hide her own doubt, realizing now that they had volunteered for what had turned out to be the easier job; Alex and Mary were more likely to run into trouble outside.

Gareth shook it off best he could and focused on the job at hand, scanning a selection of tools. He ran his hand over the closest one, wondering whether it would double as a weapon.

"Trust you to go straight for the hoes," Hannah commented. He stared at her, a smile playing on the corners of his mouth.

"Well, considering last night…"

"Fuck you."

"Kind of my point."

He lifted the tool off the shelf to test the weight.

"This would give you more reach than that knife of yours."

Stashing the recovered seeds into her backpack, Hannah joined him, perusing the selection in a similar manner. She spotted the more practical looking items instantly; axes, pickaxes and shovels. As she reached out to take one, her thoughts went back to own garden at home, and the shovel that was still leaned up against the garden shed, a stark reminder of her father's grave. Her hand fell back to her side.

"We don't need any of these. I've got all we need back at the house."

Realization hit her suddenly, as she thought of what they would find once they started digging up her yard. She made a mental note to herself to find a way around it.

"You alright?" Gareth asked her, "Zoning out on me again?"

"Huh? Yeah. Sorry."

She picked up a pickaxe and tested the weight of it in her hands before taking a test swing. Gareth caught it mid-swing just above her grip, and she looked up at him.

"I'm still getting my head around the fact that you're willing to do all this for us."

"Well, I need food and water too, you know," she reminded him, "So it's not exactly a selfless act."

He chuckled. "No, I mean letting us into your house, trusting us, looking out for us. It's….it's not common to do that anymore."

A funny look appeared on his face, driving her curiosity. She waited for him to elaborate.

"A neighbor we'd known for years tried to break into my ma's place to take whatever food she had. She was terrified. I don't know what he would have done to her if Alex and I weren't there to fight him off. I honestly didn't think people would turn to that so quickly."

"You know what? I honestly don't think there was much holding most people back in the first place. All it took was a hint that society as we knew it was collapsing, and the breakdown of law enforcement, and everything became one big free for all. People's true natures began to come out."

She lapsed into thought, recalling the types of visitors she had received over the last few weeks, hostile and friendly alike. Almost as an afterthought she added, "There's still good people, though."

"This is probably going to sound ridiculous," Gareth responded, "Especially given the circumstances. But Alex and I were talking a while back, after everything happened, but before we lost Alicia. About finding all the good ones. Bringing them all to one place. Starting something. Like a…a community for everyone. Civilization. Or at least, a taste of it again."

Hannah smiled as she listened, recognizing a familiar optimism in his voice. He'd had so many big plans in high school, and had such infectious energy whenever he spoke about them. Even now he still had that effect on her. She was already picturing this community – survivors banding together to fight off the dead, bountiful gardens supplying them with all the food they needed, water catchments set up for drinking and bathing. All of that would mean leaving the safety of her already well-stocked home, though, and she couldn't see a good enough reason for doing that. That would require a huge leap of faith, and from what she'd seen of the human race over the past few weeks, she wasn't willing to take that dive just yet.

"You telling me you want to sublet my house?" she joked, trying to keep the pessimism from her voice.

"I was thinking a little larger scale than that, Han." He stared at her, hands on hips, brow furrowed. She realized he was completely serious about this idea.

"So what, like secure the neighborhood, build up a wall –"

"No. It would have to be an isolated location. Something with pre-existing structures to provide shelter and security."

As he spoke, his eyes grew distant as if he were seeing the entire plan laid out before him. He rubbed at the stubble on his chin, smiling thoughtfully.

"You had something in mind?"

"There are a few places I remember from when I was studying landscape architecture. How the city was designed, how it connects up to surrounding areas in the state, why things are built in specific locations. There are prisons scattered around the state, all built at a safe distance from any areas with large populations. I mean, think about it – these places are built to keep people in, but work just as well keeping people out, or for our purposes, keeping any biters out."

"Except for the ones already inside," she pointed out.

"That's the downside. Assuming they just shut down the prisons when all this went down. I doubt that they'd have made the effort to extract the inmates."

"Well, the military had its priorities," Hannah replied with dark sarcasm. She hadn't trusted the military from the start, the moment they had begun trying to 'get things under control'. Their 'for the greater good' mentality, though something she hated to admit she now possessed, had shocked her. Watching them napalm half the city without clearing it of civilians first had been the deciding factor for her.

"We'd have a big job clearing it out. I don't think it's something we could manage, just the four of us. A dozen in a warehouse is too much for us. Imagine being stuck in a prison full of undead inmates."

"Or worse, live ones. Did you have a plan B?" she chuckled.

"One other place that's kind of stuck in my head for a while is a train yard."

"A train yard?"

"Yeah. There's a big train yard right smack in the middle of the state. They used it for train maintenance, so it has tracks connecting it to almost every major town and city in Georgia. It won't be as secure as a prison, but in terms of accessibility…if we want to bring in other survivors, that'd be the way to do it."

He was smiling to himself now, enjoying his own ingenuity.

"How do you even know about this place?"

"Do you know how much I had to study the goddamn state map? Railroad systems and stations were an entire unit in one of my classes."

"What do they have to do with architecture?"

He narrowed his eyes and glanced at her, a condescending gesture that received an eye roll in response.

"Sorry. They're just one of the most complex structures to design in terms of functionality. Especially one as large as this. It connects up with nearly every other station across the state. Planning something like that you'd have to take into account the volume of traffic you'd have passing through, the amount of platforms you'd need, how many control towers, the positioning of every element. Anyway, my point is that if we want to start up a community for other survivors, it'd be ideal. Easy access from across the state, easy travel and simple directions. What?"

She had failed to keep her expression in check.

"It's a bit of a Catch-22 situation, though, don't you think?"

"In what way?" His eyes narrowed again.

"Like what we were discussing before, about how quickly people can go bad. I get the vision, I really do. In an ideal world, it would be amazing to bring people back together, start over and start rebuilding. It's just, it's really hard to tell the good from the bad these days. The more people you bring in, the more likely you are to attract the rogues. How do you know you'll be attracting the right people?"

"We'd still be armed," he replied, "We'd just have to be careful about it. Maybe I just have a little more faith in humanity than you do. Though so far you seem a pretty good judge of character."

His mouth quirked up into a smile.

"That remains to be seen."

He chuckled.

"Anyway, it's just a…dream. I guess. For now, I'm content with it just being the four of us."

"You've been with me, what, four days? And you're already planning how you're going to move out."

A strange look came over him.

"You'd be coming with us, Han. Don't think this is me abandoning you or something."

She had been joking, but the level of sincerity in his voice made her uncomfortable. She countered the feeling the only way she knew how, with another scathing joke.

"Because for all you know, there's no other women left out there, right?"

He stared at her, genuinely concerned by the remark.

"Sorry. Bad joke."

He brushed a loose strand of her from her face and ran his finger down her cheek, distracting her. She felt all her negative thoughts drain away, and she hated herself for it; the way she could be manipulated so easily by a simple smile or touch, that she couldn't hold onto practical anger the way she thought she should to keep herself protected. She couldn't allow herself to trust him, not entirely, even despite what they had been through together so far. But as he smiled down at her and leant in for reassuring peck on the lips, she realized he had already won.

Blushing, she shook her head.

"Let's just get the rest of the stuff, shall we?"

He stepped back as she placed the pickaxe back on its hook and looked around for an indication of where to start next. Hannah was already heading down the aisle, looking left and right as she reached the end.

"I think I see a sign up here."

She disappeared from his view.

"Hannah!" he called, in a harsh whisper. Rounding the corner, he caught sight of her checking out a sign at the end of one of the rows, which listed the aisle's contents. Finding nothing of interest, she strolled over to the next one.

She turned back to him, "Where the heck do they keep the water containers in this –"

She froze as she looked past him. He turned and watched as a dozen or more walkers shuffled towards them. They had closed the door properly behind them, he was sure of it. Alarmed, he looked back at Hannah, who was gesturing for him to get out of sight. He backed up into the aisle of garden tools, thankful to have functional weapons within arm's reach, wondering what Hannah was doing to keep safe. Plucking the pickaxe back off the hook, he stood considering his next move.

A crash echoed from her direction and he found himself sprinting down the opposite end of the aisle, taking a cautious route to her position. Several aisles down, he spotted her tipping over a stand of ceramic pots as a second loud crash sounded. Dumbfounded, he tried to get her attention as the walkers drew nearer to her, but not before she disappeared into the outdoor furniture section. The walkers crossed over the broken shards littering the ground, cutting open their feet and leaking blood across the polished floor, coming to a stop behind the makeshift-wall of display stands. Intent on finding the source of the racket, they groaned their protest at the minor setback. Distracted by the scene, Gareth didn't notice Hannah come up behind him, and jumped when she grabbed his hand.

"If they're the ones from the warehouse, this'll be our only chance."

"We haven't even got half the stuff we came here for," he protested, watching the biters trip over one another.

Hannah gave him an impatient look. "Come on. We might be able to find something out in the warehouse. Let's go."

Annoyed by the outcome, he let the pickaxe clutter to the ground before he could realize what he'd done. Hannah clenched her jaw and glared at him.

"Shit."

"We need to go. Now."

They moved down the back of the aisles, staying out of sight of the horde and keeping as quiet as possible. The exit came into view. The door was still closed.

"What the fuck is going on?" Hannah cried, turning back to walkers as they began to close in.