Chapter 5

What Willow Said

Heart pounding, Jesse thought he had lost his mind. Looking over at Kendra, who looked equally as nervous as he did, he knew that she must have heard it too. Not really knowing what to do they heard it again. It was the same timid knock as before.

Grabbing her crossbow, Kendra tiptoed to the door, followed closely by Jesse of whom had grabbed his Colt. Leaning over behind her, he looked out of the doors peep hole, before looking down at Kendra confused.

"It's a woman." he mouthed.

"Stand back." she told him as she threw open the door.

As she did, it seemed to startle the black woman on the other side of the door, as she jumped a little. She seemed to look a little disheveled and she was only about an inch taller then Kendra. The woman could pass for thirty five years of age, but looking deeper in her eyes, Kendra could tell that there was a wisdom to them. A wisdom that only a much older woman could carry.

"Don't shoot!" she shouted as she saw the gun and threw her hands up.

"Who are you?" Jesse asked.

"My name is Lexie." she replied, swallowing a lump in her throat. "Dr. Lexie Carver."

Lexie sat on the couch eating a bowl of Kendra's soup, as both of the young adults eyed her evenly.

"I haven't had anything good to eat in awhile." Lexie started as she placed her now empty bowl on the table. "It was delicious."

"Tank you." was all Kendra said in return.

"Alright let's just get down to business." Jesse said. The suspense was killing him. "Where did you come from?"

"I actually live three houses down from you."

"We've been here all day. Why are you just now coming down here to show your face?"

"Because I didn't know if you were friendly or some kinda bandits or something." she reasoned. "I tried closing that gate since this outbreak happened but I just wasn't strong enough. You two managed to close it and I saw that you got the power to work in this house so I knew you were staying."

"So you just decided to come and say hi?"

"In a manner of speaking... yes."

"So you've been here for almost an entire year?" Kendra spoke up, adding to the conversation.

"I moved here from Salem Massachusetts about eleven months ago because I accepted a job as Chief of Staff at Frazier Park Hospital." as she said that she visibly started to shaken up a bit. "My husband was... was supposed to meet me up here with our son. He called me while I was at work one day and I heard a loud crash and him and my son screaming... I knew that they couldn't have made it."

"My God."

"I'm... I'm sorry."

As that was said the group sat there in silence for a few minutes. Clearing her throat, Kendra needed to know one more thing.

"Have you ever tried to leave?"

"After what I saw on the news before they stopped broadcasting there was no way I was going to leave here. I used to be a cop some years back but I'm still no fighter."

"But you lived this long on your own." Jesse said trying to cheer her up. "That sounds like a hell of a fighter to me. How'd you do that anyway?"

"Well after everything basically went to hell all the families except me and two other couples left for L.A. to go to the CDC center."

"Why didn't you go with them?" Kendra asked.

"Haven't you guys ever seen a zombie movie before?" she asked as they all shared a laugh.

"Anyway, me and the other couples broke into the houses of the people who left and we all took the food and what medicine they left and shared it. Everything was going well for the first couple of months, but since things were quiet one of the couples left and we never heard from them again. Another month later Jerald and Elizabeth... oh God what they did to those babies in this house." she said as she started to weep again.

Excusing himself, after she seemed to calm down Jesse grabbed Kendra by the hand and took her inside of the hallway.

"So what do you think?" he whispered.

"About what?"

"About making her a part of our group." seeing that she wasn't to keen on the idea, he went on. "Look I know she's not much of a fighter, but you trained me right?"

"And look how dat turned out." she joked.

"Hey!" he said in mock offense.

"I already know what you're going to say and you're right we won't leave her alone. Plus she's a doctor."

"So you decided to stay here?" he asked with a smile.

"I'd be a fool if I said no to dis place." she said looking around. "This covers the five basic necessities in life. Food, water, shelter, fire and security."

"Well me and Ken talked it over." Jesse said as he walked back into the living room. "We want you to stay with us in this house. If you want in the morning we can go to your house and get some of your stuff."

"That would be great... all I would need would be some clothes, some books, and a few other nicknaks."

"Well today just gets better and better." Jesse said with a big grin.

"Why do you say, dat?" Kendra asked.

"Because now I have two beautiful women surrounding me."

Lexie sat back and watched the easy back and forth between the two. She could tell that there was a blossoming love about to happen, even as Kendra threw a pillow at her companions head.

"So tell me about you two. How did the both of you meet?"

"Believe me lady if we told you, you'd think we were nuts."

"The world has been taken over by flesh eating zombies." Lexie said as she gave him a look. "I'd believe you if you told me a frog could fart out gold. Now sit and tell me about what happened to the world and more importantly about you two."

After telling her all about dying and then finding each other in Sunnydale and watching all of his Romero movies, he went on to tell her about Willow. Her and a vampire by the name of Spike were all that were left of the Sunnydale residents. It seemed that in the years that he and Kendra were dead, the government had been experimenting with demons and had created a demon/human hybrid by the name of Adam.

Some months before Buffy had defeated the cyborg it had done experiments of it's own on demons and humans alike. It infected the one's it tested with an experimental virus that laid dormant inside of them. Thinking that everything was okay, they went from place to place and in a matter of four months the mystery virus had spread globally. And worse yet it could infect people and demons.

On the first two weeks of the outbreak, since Sunnydale was the hotbed of it all, Buffy got overwhelmed and a group of zombies caught her off guard, dragged her in her house and turned her. The rest of the city fell within forty eight hours and all that was left standing was Spike, Tara, Willow, and an old veitnam vet, who hid out in an underground bunker after hearing about the apocalypse. Before he was killed himself, he taught Willow how to defend herself and use several guns.

Still not being able to put Buffy down, Willow and Tara bound the virus carrying Slayer to her house with magick so that she could never leave. Sensing that magick itself was dying she used most of the last of her power to resurrect a Slayer and an old friend. To go along with the boundaries of the spell she couldn't say who the people were that she wanted to resurrect by name.

The spell didn't turn out like Willow wanted however, because she had wanted to bring back Xander and Buffy. She didn't calculate that Xander wasn't the only friend that she had ever lost and that technically Buffy was still alive, via the walking dead.

As he started to finish his story and telling her that they had no choice but to leave Sunnydale, Lexie just sat back and watched them. Then she did something that neither of them expected. She laughed.

"You've got to be kidding me." she said through fits of laughs. "Demons... vampires... you... you are kidding right?" she asked looking between them.

She sobered up however as Kendra told her a story that Jesse had heard once himself from her.

"De world is older then you know..."

As promised the next day, Jesse helped Lexie bring some of her stuff to the big house. Neither of them got much sleep that night, but the Doctor wanted to prove her worth by showing them and more importantly herself that she could handle her own.

Coming out to a street that they had seen several zombies on the day before, Lexie got out of the truck wearing gloves, arm guards, shin guards and wielding a baseball bat. With Jesse and Kendra trailing behind her, with weapons of their own, they saw a Walker sitting on the curb. It was slumped up against a telephone pole in a deep stupor.

As she approached it the Walker roused and saw them coming. Before he could stand, Lexie was on him. Without pause she split it's skull with a few brutal blows of her bat.

The Walker collapsed, twitching violently on the ground for a few seconds before going still. Breathing hard, she thought about hat she had just done and honestly it was very therapeutic for her. She knew that she couldn't kill the monster that had taken her family away, but this was the next best thing.

"So do you tink she's one of us yet?" Kendra whispered over to Jesse, who grinned back in return.

"Not yet." he replied as Lexie started to vomit on the warm pavement. "Now she is."

A/N There's actually more to the story about Adam spreading the virus that will be told later in the story.