Chapter 17

~Dodger's dream~

"Enid!" I laugh as a threw a pillow back at my little sister, who is 5 years younger than me

"What?" She laughs, her hair a mess

"You invite your boyfriend to our slumber party?" I teased her

"Dodger! I don't have a boyfriend!" She crosses her arms in disapproval

I roll my eyes and smile, "You always say that, then I catch you kissin' the kid"

"That was one time..." She looks down at our pillow quilt

"One time ya say?" I ask standing up

She looks up at me and nods. I pick her up and throw her over my shoulder.

"Dodger!" She laughs, smacking me from my shoulder down to my ass

I laugh and spin around in a circle a few times, making us both dizzy. I playfully tossed her on the couch and sat on top of her.

"Get off Double D!" Laughing, she shoves me off. She knows I hate being called that

We playfully wrestled for awhile before we grew tired. We made our bed, shut out the lights and turned on Netflix. Enid took the remote and put on some kind of zombie show I've never seen before. These things don't scare me, nothing in horror/drama shows or movies do. By the time she fell asleep it was 12:30 AM. I shut off Netflix, tucked her in and fell asleep next to her.

I awoke the next morning before Enid did. She was out like a light, peacefully in her dreams. I went upstairs into the kitchen and made our favorite breakfast, chocolate chip waffles. It wasn't too long before she came upstairs probably from the smell of the waffles.

"Well good morning sleepy head" I smile to her, putting a plate full of waffles on the table

"Dodger it's 11 in the morning, why are we up?" Enid asks, rubbing her eyes

"It's almost time for lunch E..."

"But I'm tired..." She yawns, eating a waffle

I sit across from her, "You overslept, that's why you're still tired"

She shrugs and continues to eat her waffles. I take my plate over to the counter and turn on the news. Panic, urgent messages are flashing on the screen, people running around frantically. I quickly shut it off, Enid doesn't need to know what's going on yet, I don't even know.

"What was that all about?" She asks

"Eh who knows, probably somethin' goin' on elsewhere. No need to worry" I flash her a reassuring smile and check my phone to see what it was all about.

Nodding, Enid goes back to eating her waffles. I sit on the counter and go onto the local news website. All I read is about some outbreak and that everyone in the city is being evacuated. Me and Enid are quite a few miles from the city, we live on a ranch with no neighbors. I continued on reading other news websites and all they kept saying was 'major, deadly outbreak.' None of them said what kind though.

"Enid, stay here I'll be right back" I hop off the counter and throw on my boots

"What's wrong?" She asks tilting her head

"Nothin', I just gotta make a phone call. I'll be walkin' up and down the drive if ya need me" I quickly go out the front door and call up the news station

"Can someone please tell me what is goin' on!?" I ask

On the other side, all I could hear was screams and objects being thrown. I hang up and call another station.

"What is goin' on!?"

"Ma'am if you are in the city, you need to leave right away, it's not safe!" The man on the other line demands

"Just tell me what is goin' on!" I yell at him

"Ma'am the dead have reanimated, you need to stay away from the city. Do not let any sick person into your home. It starts with a fever, the fever burns you up and you die then come back"

"How do you know this?"

"I'm a doctor. Destroy the brain. Nothing else will kill them. Remember, if someone gets scratched or bit by the dead, it's either game over or chop the limb off. Cut or slight non-dead scratch, just clean it majorly. Don't forget, the brain shuts it down. Be safe, keep your loved ones close-" The doctor was about to finish his sentence but a scream came through instead.

I tried taking in what he had just told me but I just fell to my knees. Could this really be happening? I have to be dreaming, this can't be real... Looking down at my phone, I went to call someone, anyone, to tell me this wasn't real but the service was shut off. There was no more phone, no more Internet no more anything.

"Dodger...? W-What's going on..?" Enid asks, her voice shaky. She knows something is seriously wrong

I stand up and take her back inside, "Get a backpack, get two or three outfits in it. A book or two and a pad of paper with a pencil"

"But why?" She asks, starting to get scared

"Enid please just do as I ask, I promise I will explain later"

She nods and goes up to her room. I get a carry back and fill it with Pop-Tarts and bottles of water. I fill as many containers as I could, stuffing the bag. Enid came back downstairs as I was zipping the bag.

"Dodger please tell me what is going on" Enid pleads

"Don't move from here, don't answer the door or go near the windows. Let me pack a bag and we will go" I hand her the largest kitchen knife I had

"But..."

"Just until I come back down" I put the knife into her hand and close her hand, making her grasp the knife handle

I go upstairs and change into a pair of jeans and a thin tshirt. Grabbing a hiking bag, I throw some clothes into it along with two family photos. I throw some hair stuff into the side pocket and slip on my boots again. I go down to the kitchen to find Enid eating waffles.

"Grab your bag, bring the knife, follow me" I say going out the back door

She nods and brings the plate of waffles with her. I take one and eat it. We walk to a shed that has always been forbidden to go into. It held weapons, knives, and survival kits.

"Woah..." Is all Enid had to say

"Now listen to me Enid, I'm going to teach you how to use a knife and how ta shoot a gun. Right here, right now" I take a pistol off the wall and grab a dagger

"But why...?" She asks confused, putting the plate on the table in the corner of the room

"The zombie apocalypse has begun" I didn't know how else to tell her and I didn't want to sugar coat it

Her face lost all its color and she stared at me blankly. I put the pistol and knife on the table and hugged her.

"Don't worry, we will survive together" I reassure her

"But Dodger I can't do this..." She tells me trying not to cry

"Enid, yes you can, I believe in you"

She looks up at me and nods the tiniest bit.

"How do I use a knife?" She asks

I small smile forms on my lips and I demonstrate on how to kill with a knife. Through some practice, she gets it pretty well. Next was the gun. I showed her first, then explain everything she needed to know about how to use it, clean it, reload, the basics. Then I saw a dead person stumbling towards us, Enid immediately started freaking out and ran behind me.

"Cover your ears" I told her, pointing the pistol towards its head. It was about 150 feet away, and the bullet went through its forehead

Enid came out from behind me in amazement.

"Who taught you how to do this?" She questioned

"Dad did..." Our dad was killed in a car accident years ago, Enid had very few memories of him

"Now let's get you situated with a weapon" I said quickly changing the subject

I equipped myself with my dad's lucky crossbow and my favorite hunting knife. I put a small revolver in the back of jeans. Enid picked up the pistol I had taught her to shoot with and our dads favorite knife.

"Good choice, dad would have agreed too..." I smile

"Why is that?" She asks curiously

"Well we have all his favorite weapons on us"

"Really?" She says looking at the weapons in our hands

I nod and put on a knife holster thing around her waist. She puts her knife in the slot and looks up at me, "W-what about you Dodger?"

"I have one don't worry" I grabbed a smaller version of a holster, one that fight around your thigh and strapped it onto my right thigh

"Why on your thigh?"

"I never liked the one around my waist, thigh seems easier to get to for me" I demonstrate my reasoning by putting my hand at my side, which happens to be right on the knife

We ventured out, killed some dead things, got some good practice. I explained to her everything the doctor had said to me. It was a lot to take in for a 13 year old. She didn't cry, she didn't stop, being with me made her confidence skyrocket. Seeing my little sister be so strong made me proud, I actually did something right for once.

While walking away from the city, a large group of the dead were closing in on us.

"Enid use your knife! Conserve ammo!" I yelled to her, stabbing multiple things in the head

I watched her stab them in the head, not afraid. She tried running out of the way but tripped and fell down a hill.

"ENID!" I scream and saw a living human run after her

I couldn't run after her, the dead had me completely circled. Before I knew it, someone screamed 'duck.' For some reason I did, and all the dead fell on top of me, limp.

A very small group of people, faces covered, came over to me and helped me up.

"Now go on, try not to get caught like that again" A man had said

I nodded quickly, in thanks. I loaded my crossbow and darted off into the woods, the direction Enid had rolled off into. Searching for hours upon hours with no signs of her, I reluctantly gave up. A piece of me was gone, I couldn't tell if it was because I missed Enid so much or because she was... gone... I sat on a log and cried my eyes out silently into my hands.

~end of dream~

I woke up, hyperventilating and crying. Daryl was stroking my hair and holding me closer than before. I look around in confusion trying to figure out what was going on.

"It was just a dream baby..." He says soothingly