Author's Note: Holaaa amigos! Just quickly want to thank those that have reviewed, followed, favourited, etc. I'm dedicated to this story and try to update as soon as I can, so I appreciate the response. Now on with the chapter!
Chapter Six - All Is Violent, All Is Bright
We've been moving for ages now, if I had to estimate, it's been about an hour and a half. We've dodged quite a lot of people who seem to be roaming around. I say people, but I know they're dead. I'm not quite sure I'm ready to admit it to myself, let alone to others. It just doesn't seem possible. And yet here we are, once again, coming to a stop and crouching down. We've wasted so much time just doing this dozens of times, I'm beginning to think we'll never get anywhere at this rate.
"Walker at 11 O'clock; seems to be a woman, fair height and build." I try to look past JJ, half fearing that it may be Effy or even mum, but as I catch sight of red, I know that I can breathe easy.
"Remember when Emily had red hair? Red suits her." I turn to JJ upon his admission.
"She used to have red hair?" I whisper back in kind. He nods his head; his eyes still trained on the wandering form that is getting rather close now, as Freddie loads his gun with the silencer.
"Yes, Katie and Emily used to dye their hair red until Katie dyed her hair purple - that was after Emily came-"
"JJ, locked on mate, yeah. Need to focus."
"Ah, yes, sorry." He then looks down, forcing himself to stop. I can't help the scowl that works its way to my face, for I don't believe I will be hearing the end of that story anytime soon. I am then distracted from this train of thought when I notice Freddie stand up, and pretty much reveal his position to the woman, walker, dead.. Thing. She moves towards us, but before she can take another step, Freddie has shot a fire and it hits her directly in the forehead. She falls down.
"Jesus.." I remain crouching down as they stand up with their bug-out-bags, my eyes unable to leave the form of the woman on the ground in front of us. Although decomposing and visually grotesque, she looked to be no older than 30. She was a person, young in age, with dreams and loved ones. She was once breathing in that body, then she was dead in that body, and now.. Now, I don't know. I can only hope that she has finally found an end after being dead.
"Naomi, come on." I feel Freddie pull me up from the ground and drag me down the pavement by the wrist, following a sprinting JJ in the distance.
"It'll get easier." Somehow I don't believe that for a second. He eventually lets go of my limb once he's convinced I will follow, which I do. We make it to a small but modest store with an empty parking lot exempt from a few cars.
"Right, this is the plan. I will head in first, and make some noise. Hopefully there will be nothing in there, but if there are some walkers, I'll handle it. JJ, back me up, yeah?" JJ nods and follows behind Freddie as he opens the door, leaving it ajar. I wait outside, watching as he kicks some stuff that's on the floor. It immediately gathers some walkers attention as they shuffle on over to us. There's about four of them, which makes me panic slightly until Freddie pretty much shoots two of them down in quick succession. I watch as Freddie aims his pistol again and shoot, taking down another before focusing on the last. And just like that, we return to silence – it's both a nightmare and a blessing, I've come to learn. He taps on a railing, but nothing happens. He then looks back to me and smiles crookedly.
"Right, you ready?" I nod my head and follow them as they walk further into store. I thought that it would be full of stuff, seeing as everyone around these days is pretty much dead, but how wrong am I. Shelves upon shelves are empty, aside from a product here and there."
"Fuck, they got here before us." I hear Freddie call out, pushing some crap on the floor that proves useless and broken.
"For a world occupied by the dead, there's a distinct lack of human edible food about..."
"Yes, yes there is. Living in a City has its pros and cons, really. The pro being that there are significantly more stores around, though the con therefore is that the population is larger. The mass population went crazy the day it happened, though I suspect even before that for there were some sightings of raids within the area. The day when it spread to Bristol was havoc, everyone went out and took everything that they could: collecting items in bulk for themselves, their families, and loved ones. We didn't exactly take mind to what was going on because it was so very chaotic, I think a part of me just wanted to rationalise the situation and put it down to riots, but we soon realised it was much bigger than that. It wasn't just families, even companies and the people who would import stock were taking it all back, I remember because Robert was saying how-"
"Jay." I look between JJ and Freddie as JJ continues, his form growing rather animated and passionate. I blink several times and try to concentrate on what JJ is saying.
"Though, I suppose that is what we are doing now, taking all the stock that we find. With time: day by day, week by week, and month by month, we are finding less and less. And the people that do manage to get food are desperate and without consideration for others. We encountered one group who would go out and collect items in bundles, and would go to extreme lengths to-"
"Jay." His voice is stern this time, which immediately ceases JJ's rant, but it quickly forms into something a lot more heated and unruly.
"Right, yes, bloody twats, they're all twats, fucking taking everything and leaving nothing for us!" JJ then begins to kick some shelves, completely lost in a rage. Freddie is quick to move to him and bring him close, attempting to console him as I just stand there, not knowing precisely what just went down, and not feeling like I can exactly comment on it. As I watch JJ slowly calm down, an idea comes to me.
"What about stock at the back?" Freddie pulls back from JJ as they turn to me, not fully understanding my proposition.
"Well, you say how all the big supermarkets have been cleared completely, but what about stores like this? I mean, it's big but not that big that it warrants people involved with the store to reclaim their produce..." They just continue to stare rather vacantly, not catching on.
"Must I spell out what I'm saying? This place is small; therefore their inventory room should still be intact compared to the big marketed ones, yes?" Freddie looks to JJ who shrugs lightly.
"It's worth a shot."
We walk down the aisle to where we finally reach a door that we suspect to be the stockroom. Freddie decides to kick at it, before realising that it is locked. He then uses his gun and shoots at the lock and it unfastens. He then repeats the action of kicking it open, and this time the door goes flying back. We move in to the room slowly, wary of how rather dark it is in here.
"Fuck, JJ, got flashlights?"
"Yes, always." He produces three from his bag and distributes them evenly. We turn them on roughly at the same time to reveal the beautiful sight of piles and piles of stock. It doesn't matter that it's a box room with shelves that look to be assembled DIY style, because Freddie and JJ are extremely gobsmacked by the sheer quantity of items available.
"Yes Naomi, you fucking Queen!" Freddie surges forward into the room to grab whatever he can find first, clearly excited by this turn of events. We move into the room more and note what stuff we see:
"Yes, razors, gonna need those."
"I have bottled water here, Freddie."
"Soap here."
"Canned goods."
"Batteries, light bulbs."
"Toilet paper, kitchen rolls." We all continue to call out the new discoveries we make and bag them based on their importance.
"No medicine though." I turn to look at the two and hear JJ sigh, clearly troubled by this as Freddie pats him on the shoulder.
"It's okay, maybe next time, yeah. I'm sure there'll be more next time."
"Are you sure you've looked everywhere?" I decide to join in, which I regret as JJ nods, pointing to the empty rack which happens to be empty aside from a couple boxes of pills.
"Won't these do? I mean, Ibuprofen are quite effective.." I watch them exchange a look before Freddie walks towards me and smiles tentatively.
"Yeah, they're good, bag them." I pick up the two boxes and put them into my bug-out-bag. I look back up to see them sharing another moment before I continue to stroll around. I find myself smiling as I note the array of teas on offer and pull at least one batch of every flavour I find, including vanilla caramel, and making sure to get a few extra of those just in case. I get other essentials until I've completely filled the bug-out-bag I have. As I zip it up and lift it onto my back I catch sight of something that intrigues me. I use the flashlight to illuminate the tiny boxes, making sure to get two of them and stuff them into the sides of the bag.
"Naomi, you ready?"
"Yeah, let's go." Yet as we leave the dark room we are confronted by a gang of walking dead, hurdling straight towards us like a herd.
"Fuck, run. Get out of the store!" We separate into the different aisles of the store, trying to avoid the people that roam around, wanting to seemingly eat us like we're food – I guess we are to them. I try to run, but the bag is too heavy, and I find myself falling down with it as a result.
"Fuck, fuck." I haven't run far enough and notice under my current duress that one of them is walking on over to me, his dead eyes staring straight through me as he sways along. I force the bag off my shoulders and get up, trying to get the knife out of the holster. Somehow it's getting jammed and I find myself pulling at it desperately.
"Jesus, fuck, please." He's so close now that I can smell his stench and hear the way he snarls; his teeth mocking me. I finally wretch the knife out and hold it up in the air with both hands, and with a blood curdling scream I shove the knife down in the air, and directly into the top of his head. He stops, and for someone who is dead, I'm surprised to watch the life completely drain from his form. No longer is he mobile. No longer is he creating sound. No longer is he anything. He ceases to exist, and I am the reason for that. And even though he was long since dead, that doesn't console me in the slightest, because I have killed someone – something - and I feel utterly sick. I watch as he collapses to the floor, and proceed to ignore the sounds of fire and nearby onslaughts occurring around me. It's too much what I have done. I look down at his form as I grip the knife in my hand. He didn't deserve this end. And what's more, that man could have even been my father, and now I will never know. Every man, every dead, every something, had a life once. And I've just stolen his.
"Naomi.. Hey." I know that Freddie has his hand on my arm, he is touching and yet I don't really feel it.
"Just…. Release the knife, yeah?" I feel him trying to peel the knife from my grasp, and eventually he succeeds.
"It's over now, okay… It's over." I turn to him and look, with sensation not quite returning to me just yet. I think this is what they describe as being numb, you know, when you've experienced something traumatic.
"You okay to carry this, Naomi?" He holds my bug-out-bag, and I merely nod, in which he gingerly slips it on me.
"There you go.. Now let's get back to the shed, yeah. You did good today, and we can eat well for weeks." His coaxing annoys me, but I can't seem to locate my voice. JJ walks on over and frowns at us.
"We've been too long, we won't be back until sundown.. They won't be happy."
"Fuck them, JJ. They don't have to do what we have to." Freddie then lifts my chin up with his hand.
"It's going to be alright, just follow us okay. Keep close; everything will be okay, Naomi. Just stay with us, yeah?"
JJ's right, we don't make it back until the sun has set, and I just feel Katie's anger swell through me before the door has even been opened. We get inside and we're obviously met with an immediate ambush by none other than Kateikins.
"Where the fuck have you been? We've been well sick with worry! Thought that bitch got you into trouble or something."
"Katie, leave it."
"No. Why you been out all this time? What did she do?"
"Seriously Katie, please." Bless Freddie for trying, but even I can see that Katie wants to throttle me given the chance – and she finally has that chance. She looks to me and catches on, noticing my mute behaviour.
"She did something, didn't she? I knew she couldn't be trusted! Especially with her being best buds with this Cook guy. Let me at her!" I watch with no feeling as she launches herself at me, only to be stopped by Freddie.
"Fuck sake, babe, you really are fucking bat shit crazy sometimes. Just leave her alone, it's been a tough afternoon on her, yeah."
"I don't give a shit about her, she can-" She stops when I slam the box down onto the counter. Everyone practically stops with the force of it; I'm surprised it's still even intact. I shoot Katie a look and then lower the bug-out-bag completely to the floor before walking quietly into the bathroom and locking it behind me. It's a moment of déjà vu as I slide down the door; I listen to what they say outside. I hear Emily's muffled voice.
"Mature, Katie, real mature. If you even paid her any attention, you'd fucking realise just how hard this is on her. Christ knows why she got you that fucking hair dye after the way you've treated her, it's obvious you don't care!" I expect Katie to scream, to retaliate, but instead I am met with silence.
I sit there for a while before I leave, feeling bad for keeping such an important room occupied when I'm not even using it. I dare a glance in the mirror and peak a glance at my own reflection, and it haunts me. I even look like one of them; I swear I am one at this moment. I feel dead; maybe I should just join them?
I walk out of the bathroom and head into the lounge; it's a safe place to be, for I know sleeping with them is not an option. I notice that the hair dye is no longer there, and it makes me smile a little, before I feel completely devoid once again. I sit down on the couch, and I've never felt so foreign and out of it in my life, and I've experienced quite a few substances during my short life.
"She really appreciates what you've done for her." I look up to see Emily standing there in the kitchen; I must have not seen her. I nod my head in response and look back down to the ground, but not before catching sight of the bug-out-bags that remain untouched on the floor, in a heap. I debate with myself before I stand up and walk on over, picking up my bug-out-bag as I go. I steal a look at Emily, who eyes me curiously, before I easily pull the other hair dye box out from the side of bag and place it down onto the counter.
"Heard you like red." I then place the bag back down to the floor, but not before rummaging through it to produce some tea bags. I put them onto the counter too and look away, that is until I feel Emily's hand on mine. I look to the counter to witness her squeeze my hand, forcing me to look up at her. She has such expressive eyes, I notice. So brown, so kind, so open. I'm surprised that they even exist in a world like this. Her mouth curls into an elated but gentle smile.
"Thank you, Naomi." I feel the side of my mouth switch into a small smile. I then nod lightly and pull my hand away from her, and turn on my heels back to the couch. I lie down on it and curl my frame in, longing for this day to be over already.
But I suppose when I truly think about it, there exists some light in this dim, dark world. And it emits from the living.
That's all for now, folks. As always, reviews and such are welcome! And thank you for reading :)