Cody was sitting under a tree lazily sipping on an iced tea while Zack tossed a Frisbee back and forth with their parents. He leaned over and dug in the picnic basket for the egg salad sandwich he knew was in there but couldn't seem to find. He humphed and put the drink down and pulled the basket closer.

"Here comes a long one, Dad!" Cody heard Zack shout and looked up just in time to see his brother cock his arm back and fling the disc forward. It sailed far to the left, much farther than Zack had intended, much farther than his dad thought he could throw it, and Kurt started after it only to have to retrace his steps when it began a deep curve. He jumped and made a one-handed catch over his shoulder that would make any major league center fielder jealous. "Good catch, Dad!"

"Thanks, Zack. I didn't think I was going to get that one." Kurt gently tossed it over to Carey who then flipped it easily back to Zack.

"You sure you don't want to play, too, Cody? We'll throw it to you so you don't have to chase it around on your ankle."

"Yeah, come on, Cody," Zack called to him. "This is your picnic day, too!" Cody could see his brother's jack-'o-lantern smile and wanted to get up.

"No, I'm okay," he called back just as he found his sandwich. White bread with the crust removed and cut diagonally. Just the way he liked it. He looked out at his mother and smiled.

"Suit yourself, honey. There's some children's Tylenol in the basket if you need it." Carey turned her attention back to her husband and son as the disc flew between them.

"I don't need it," Cody said to himself as he looked down at his heavily wrapped ankle. "It doesn't hurt that bad." He lifted his foot and crossed it over the other and grimaced. "Stupid foot." He'd twisted his ankle the day before when his foot slipped off the side of their patio step. He'd gone down in a heap and screamed bloody murder. An emergency room trip, one negative x-ray and a large elastic bandage later, he was okay.

Zack flung the Frisbee as Cody took a bite and he laughed when it sailed over his father's head and down a hill, out of sight. He was studying the sandwich and didn't see his father return. "Kurt? Kurt? Are you okay?" he heard his mother ask. He looked up and she was crouched over him a few dozen feet away.

"Dad? What's wrong?" Cody asked as he hobbled to his feet. He couldn't see much from his angle but he was all but positive that most of his father's shirt was now red instead of the white it was earlier that morning. "Dad?" Zack screamed as their mother looked up, her eyes glazed over and skin suddenly a mottled grey. Cody tried to yell when he saw the jagged hole on the side of her neck but the sound caught in his throat. He dropped his sandwich in the soft grass.

Carey was halfway to him when he finally got his frozen muscles to respond. He turned on his good heel and started limping away as fast as he could but it wasn't working. He seemed to be stuck fast and she kept coming. "Mom! No! Mom!" Cody's throat finally opened and he let loose with a scream that split the heavens as her dead fingers wrapped around his shoulders.

Zack, who had been sleeping beside his brother in a borrowed bed, was instantly awake with gun in hand after the first half-second of Cody's yell. He slammed a hand on their battery lantern's on switch and the room was bathed in cool light. Cody was sitting straight up in bed with a look of abject terror on his face.

"Cody, wake up, Cody. Come on, wake up," he said as he slid the gun back under his pillow and sat up beside him. He wrapped his arms around Cody and pulled him tight, one hand gently patting his back as he slowly woke up. "It was just a dream. Wake up now."

After the longest five seconds in the world, Cody's eyes opened and he looked around the room. He put his hands on Zack's shoulders and stared him dead in the eyes. The waking world sunk in and the dream faded away. Cody put his head back on Zack's shoulder. "I had it again," he said softly as he wiped his eyes with the back of a hand.

"The picnic dream?"

"Yeah." Zack swallowed a sigh. This was the fourth night in a row that Cody had woken up screaming. "Sorry, Zack."

"It's okay, buddy," Zack told him as Cody broke the embrace. Zack slid off the side of the bed and walked to the window of their small room and peeked out through the curtains. Nothing looked out of the ordinary and he let the fabric fall back into place. He stretched and checked his watch with a silent groan. Well, at least he waited until almost five in the morning to have it this time. Zack yawned while he pondered whether to try to go back to sleep or simply stay up. Up, he decided.

Cody buried himself under the covers while Zack sat in one of the mildly comfortable hotel chairs and tied his shoes. It had been four days since they'd left the Marines and they were still creeping their way through the mountains of West Virginia. He couldn't wait until they got out onto flat ground and put all the roadblocks and blown bridges behind them.

They'd found cars by the dozen here but could never drive them for more than a few miles before they'd come upon some obstacle and have to get out and walk again. He fondly remembered the Camaro they'd had for all of five minutes. Canary yellow with black seats and a sun roof and more horses under the hood than he thought possible. It was probably still sitting at the foot of a deckless bridge with the doors wide open and keys in the ignition. "I liked that car," he said quietly.

They'd had to climb down several thousand feet and cross a river that day, something that Zack did not remember fondly. It had taken the better part of the afternoon and the delay put their daily distance somewhere right around five miles. He rolled his shoulders to loosen them as he walked to the hotel room door. No point in worrying about it now, he told himself. Another day of mostly uninterrupted travel would most likely put them out of this hilly backwater and onto flat ground again. "Or so I hope," Zack said as he closed the door behind himself.

He toured the hallways of the hotel, checking open doors when he found them, until he found what he was looking for. Zack stood before a small alcove with vending machines stenciled above it. His hand immediately went to his pocket and started digging for change before he could stop it. He grinned a wry grin and pulled it out and took a step back. Two seconds later his foot was shattering the thin glass of the machine and hundreds of candy bars stood ready for the picking.

"Oh yes, Zack, everyone knows that two Snickers bars are the cornerstone of any nutritious breakfast," he heard his mother's sarcastic tone in his head as he unwrapped the first bar. "Quiet, Mom. A growing boy needs his calories," he said as he inhaled it and let the wrapper drift away. And he did. Badly. Before zombies showed up, Zack had been weighing in somewhere between one-fifty and one-sixty but all the extra pounds had melted away over the last few weeks. According to the scale they'd found the day before, Zack now weighed in at a whopping one-twenty-six.

"It's the Apocalypse Diet," he said wryly as he unwrapped the second bar. "I need to market it if we ever get back to normal. I'd make a fortune." Zack grabbed a few extra bars and reached back in to grab some Milky Ways for his brother. Zack hated them but for whatever reason Cody loved the disgusting things. Pockets full, he started walking back to their room.

Zack settled on the end of his bed and started cleaning their assortments of guns. He didn't know every last thing about them but knew enough that he needed to keep the parts in top shape if he expected them to perform perfectly each time he pulled the trigger. He'd taken their pistols apart and reassembled them after giving them the works and had moved on to their shotguns when Cody finally woke up.

"Hey," he said.

"Morning," Cody replied.

"No nightmares this time?"

"No, thankfully. Though, it might have been better if I did," Cody said as he sat up against the headboard.

"Oh? How's that?" Zack couldn't think of a reason why waking up everyone in a two-mile radius with your screams could possibly be a good thing.

"I had a dream about Bob being a bikini model."

"Wow. I really don't know what to say about that," Zack told him as he began loading shells back into the shotgun. "Just wow."

"Yeah, it was weird."

"I bet it was."

"He wasn't a very good model," Cody continued.

"Shocking. Absolutely shocking," Zack said with a grin, struggling to keep the image from forming in his mind. He finished loading the shotgun and moved on to the pistol clips.

"Those look like different bullets than you used before," Cody said as he leaned forward and picked one up.

"They are. They're hollow-points."

"What's the difference?" Cody spun the bullet around between his fingers, taking note of the open space at the front of the slug.

"They're better zombie killers. In theory, at least," Zack answered. "They hit you and mushroom inside your body. They probably won't be quite as effective against a zombie as they would against a normal person but I think they'll give us an extra punch."

"How come I haven't seen any before?"

"I've been hoping we'd come across some since we left the hotel but a lot of places ban them."

"Zack? How do you know all this stuff?" Cody asked earnestly. "I mean...I don't think I ever heard you talk about a gun at all before this happened but you just took all ours apart and put them back together."

"Remember how I told you that you should check out my Google history? It's one of those things that went along with my zombie planning, Cody. I never mentioned it because I thought you and Mom would think I was going to shoot up the school or something. Or you'd make fun of me. Kind of like I do you and your cooking and your studying and your-"

"I got it," Cody said with a wry grin. He rolled out of bed and went to take care of business in the hotel's bathroom, walking slowly across the faded carpet. He returned a few minutes later and sat down beside his brother, pulling the blankets around his shoulders and pooling the edges in his lap. "Have you ever thought about what we're going to do when we get to the farm?"

Zack looked up from his pile of bullets and thought before he spoke. "Yeah, we're going to either find Mom there waiting for us or wait for her to show up."

"I mean after that."

"No, not really," Zack admitted.

"I've been trying to figure out if we can really stay there or not."

"Why couldn't we?"

"A couple of reasons. The weather, for one. You remember how cold it gets out there in the winter, right?"

"Terribly cold. But her house has a fireplace."

"Yeah, but she bought her firewood. Not a whole lot of trees out that way. Not all that many people out that way, either. We'd have to loot every house and store in at least a fifty mile radius to stockpile enough to last the winter."

"I take it that you have an idea?" Zack asked as he started feeding bullets into a clip again.

"I'm working on one but it won't work on a farm."

"How about you give me the short version, Cody?"

"Okay, long story short, there was a show on one of the smart channels where a group of people were dumped in an abandoned city and told to recreate civilization. They did a bunch of stuff that I bet I could copy."

"Cities aren't empty in our world, buddy."

"I know, but I bet it would work."

"Tell you what, you keep thinking about it and tell me when you've got it all worked out."

"I can do that," Cody said, a bit relieved and proud that Zack didn't dismiss his idea out of hand. There was still a lot to work through in his mind but he knew he could do it.

"In the mean time, why don't we get a move on? We can be out of the mountains and back on flat ground in a few hours if things go our way."

They did get a move on and things did go their way. Zack was behind the wheel of an late-model Pontiac and Cody was curled up in the passenger's seat fast asleep. Cody was leaning against the door with his knees brought up to his chest and Zack swore his brother was shivering even though the air conditioning was set on low. Zack grumbled low in his throat when he reached a hand over and put it on Cody's forehead.

"He's burning up," Zack said to himself. "Shit. Shit shit shit." He kept driving but glanced over every few minutes whenever Cody changed his position. When he saw Cody was on the verge of waking up, he pulled the car to the side of the road and put it in park.

"How are you feeling, Cody?" Zack asked when his brother's eyes slowly came open.

"I feel like ten pounds of crap in a five pound bag."

"You were sweating while you were sleeping earlier," Zack told him. "I'm going to ask you a question and I want an honest answer, okay?" Cody nodded. "How's your leg?"

"Asleep, thanks for asking," Cody told him as he shifted position and stretched it out.

"Not what I meant."

"It's not infected if that's what you're thinking. I've cleaned it as well as I could whenever we've stopped and it looks like it's almost completely healed. I'm going to have to pull the stitches out in a day or two."

"You're sure?"

"I promise, Zack. I'll show you if you want. I've just caught a bug."

"I believe you. When did you start feeling bad?"

"Last night, about an hour or so before we stopped. If it matters, I felt like twenty pounds of crap in a five pound bag then."

"Should we call it off for the day? Being sick isn't like it used to be."

"No, I'm okay. I wouldn't mind if we stopped somewhere so I can find some aspirin or something, though. I'd feel a ton better if I could knock this fever down."

"We can do that. You go back to sleep and I'll wake you up when we come to a town that's more than just a wide spot in the road." Zack started the car back up and pulled back onto the highway. Cody was asleep again before the odometer rolled over once.

As Zack drove, he felt his body unwind. He'd been scared, much more scared than he wanted to admit, when Cody admitted to feeling sick. He could shoot a zombie in the face but he couldn't do anything to a microscopic virus. He ran a hand through his hair and shivered a bit himself when he wondered if whatever made someone into a zombie was now floating through the air. "No. We would have both caught it by now. I think. Hope," he said quietly after a long consideration. Zack settled back in and wished this car had cruise control.

Zack had just crossed over the river into Kentucky and was a little disappointed that the Appalachians didn't abruptly end once he changed states but the need to stop and stretch his legs won out. Zack had been driving for almost four hours and it was time for a break. He pulled off the interstate and drove to the nearest small town.

"Hey, Cody. Wake up. It's time for lunch," he said as he shook his brother's shoulder. Cody twisted and moaned before coming fully awake. "Feeling better?"

"Better than this morning, yes. Completely better? Not yet, but I'm getting there. Eight pounds or so."

"You're not covered in sweat like you were earlier. That's probably a good sign, right?" Zack steered the car into a drug store's parking lot and turned it off. He spun the keys around his fingers and slid them into a pocket. Cody still hadn't moved. "What's the matter?" he asked.

"I don't think I'm hungry."

"Well you can watch me eat, then. And maybe we'll find you some aspirin in here." Zack gestured to the building beside them.

"I hate feeling like this," Cody told him as he began to pour himself out of the car. Once on his feet, he walked around the lot while Zack watered a nearby car. He began to feel more like himself as he strolled, enjoying the warm sun on his face. Cody yawned and stretched and shook the fatigue out of his arms.

Zack finished his business and the two boys walked around the building's perimeter to ensure there weren't any unexpected surprises waiting to take a bite out of them. Cody pulled his pistol as they returned to the front door. He took one side and Zack took the other and on a silent three count, ducked into the building like a SWAT team, Cody covering one direction while Zack had the other.

They listened for any kind of sound, be it a footfall, the rustle of paper, or the crunch of broken glass, but heard nothing. They advanced into the building and began looking around. This store, unlike most of the others they'd been in, hadn't been heavily looted. Aside from a shattered pane of glass in the front door and a few items scattered on the floor here and there, it looked almost untouched. The twins walked across the front of the store and checked down every last aisle.

"I think we're good here," Zack said softly.

"Yep," Cody replied. "Let's see what we can find."

Zack grabbed a hand-held basket and started walking the aisles, randomly dropping things into it. Cody headed straight to the pain relievers and picked two bottles off the shelf. One went into a cargo pocket and he opened the other, dry swallowing two of the pills and then adding a third after he tossed the cotton packing to the floor. He started heading over toward his brother but stopped when his eyes saw Pharmacy stenciled above a window on the back wall.

"Just in case," he said to himself, a hand running over the slowly healing line of stitches on his leg through his shorts. Cody walked to the door that separated the space behind the wall from the rest of the store and tried to turn it. He expected it to be locked but it wasn't. He pushed on it gently and then toed it open.

As he looked at the shelves lined with oversized bottles, Cody whistled. The pills in this small room were more valuable than gold now, as dangerous than plutonium if used improperly. Cody walked down one row and saw nothing but names like Polymyxin B and Trimethoprim and sighed. "Just plain old penicillin or something like that would be nice," he said as he switched rows. This time he came across names he was more familiar with. A large bottle of Erythromicin and a smaller bottle of Tetracycline went into his pocket.

Cody was searching for a dosage book when he got the sudden feeling that he was being watched. He looked up and out the window and surveyed the store but didn't see anything. Cody eased the pistol out of his pocket and stole to the door. He stuck his head out and took a few steps into the store but only heard his brother mumbling to himself at the far wall.

"Zack?" he called.

"Huh? What?" Zack replied.

Cody was peering through a shelf of boxed tissue, trying to see through the pegboard into the next aisle, when a pair of brown eyes met his. "Shit!" Cody yelled as he jumped back, any idea of telling Zack they weren't alone were gone in his sudden panic. One foot tripped over the other and he went falling to the tile. He landed squarely on his ass and slid a few inches before yanking the gun and training it on the end of the aisle. He nearly pulled the trigger when he saw a pair of legs step around the corner but stayed his hand at the last possible second when he saw he was looking at a dirty boy no more than ten years old in ragged jeans and a red tank tap.

"Jeez, kid. You almost got yourself shot," Cody said, barely hearing himself over his hammering heart. About that time, Zack came dashing to his side, gun drawn and ready. Cody put the gun down and tried to hide his shaking fingers.

"What's your name, kid?" Zack asked as he made his pistol disappear.

"Anthony," the boy told them as he studied the twins. "What's yours?"

"I'm Cody and this is my brother Zack. What are you doing here, Anthony?" Cody queried as he got back to his feet.

"I saw you two come in and followed you. You're the first people I've seen in a long time," the boy answered as he started unwrapping a candy bar. The twins watched him devour it in three bites.

"You need to make a little noise next time," Zack told him.

"I wanted to make sure you two weren't freaks before I did. I didn't expect your brother to come out of the little room as fast as he did. I guess I'm not as quiet as I thought."

"Quiet enough, kid," Zack said. "I didn't hear you at all."

"I just felt like someone was staring at me. I didn't hear you either," Cody admitted. "Luck, I guess."

"We're not freaks, by the way," Zack added.

"Are you all by yourself, Anthony?" Cody asked as he dusted himself off.

"I am. I haven't seen anyone else but the zombies in two weeks. My mom got chomped when a zombie busted in our house and I ran." They could tell that the boy was trying to be brave about his mother's fate but neither commented on it.

"You must be one brave boy to make it this long by yourself."

"Nah, not brave. Just smart. They're easy to run from as long as you hear them coming."

"That's true," Cody admitted. "Have you seen many of them around here in the last few days?"

"Not many today but they seem to come and go. Yesterday, they were everywhere. The day before, too. I'm glad you didn't come yesterday because I would have still been in the attic hiding," he said, his eyes instinctively drifting to the front door.

"Why don't you come outside with us and we'll eat lunch. It's not a hamburger and fries but it'll be better than a candy bar," he said to the boy. Anthony answered with a nod and a shrug.

Cody and his new shadow left the store and Zack followed a short distance behind them. Zack wandered off and stood under a nearby tree, clearly waiting for Cody, while Cody put together a quick lunch for their guest on the back of their car. "You go ahead and dig in, Anthony. I need to go talk to Zack for a few minutes."

"Okay," Anthony told him as he started eating. He watched as Cody walked over to his brother but lost interest once he realized he couldn't hear their intentionally low conversation.

"No," Zack said, shaking his head as soon as Cody arrived. "He's not coming with us."

"What? Why not?" Cody asked incredulously, his arms wide.

"We're having enough problems taking care of ourselves."

"That's crap and you know it, Zack."

"It is not. We're eating fucking Spam and crackers because we can't find anything else. I might not know much about eating healthy but I know that's not good for a little boy."

"It's not, but I guarantee you it'll be better than what he's been eating since he fled his house. If he's had anything but candy bars and soda I'll eat my shoe, Zack. When I was making him lunch a minute ago I could clearly see each of his ribs through the side of his shirt. It looked like skin stretched taut over a xylophone."

"No."

"We have to help him."

"Bullshit we do."

"What the hell, Zack? Really? That's heartless. He's a little kid for crying out loud! I figured you'd be on board with it right away. Why?"

"I just am."

"You're going to have to give me a better answer than that or you can just get back in the car and drive the fuck off and I'll take him myself." Cody was absolutely livid.

Zack went silent and stared out into the distance before he answered. He'd taken long enough that Cody was about two seconds away from walking off and getting his stuff out of the car. "Okay, I'm going to give it to you straight, Cody. It's like this. I've spent just about every waking moment since we left the hotel trying to figure out how to keep the two of us alive. I promised myself that I'd get us out to Aunt Jolene's farm no matter what. It's been rough and there's been a few times when I didn't think we were going to make it. But we did. The two of us. Two reasonably fit and healthy teenagers.

"If there's someone else, a little kid, for example, who's to say that it won't completely change things? What if, this is going to sound selfish but it's how I see it, what if it came down to choosing between him and you? Or him and me? Could you do it? Could you choose one of us to die? I know I could if it came down to you and me. I'd die for you in a second. A heartbeat. But add some little booger eater in the mix and I don't know."

"I'd die first," Cody replied.

"That's a cop-out answer and you know it."

"I think we were meant to find him. To help him."

"What? Are you a Jedi now or something? Is that why you're acting all noble?"

"No, I'm just acting like a human being who isn't so engrossed with himself and what he's doing that he forgets that there's other people left in this world." The words exploded off his tongue and he was satisfied with the sting he saw in Zack's eyes.

"Zack, look," Cody softened his tone now that he'd gotten through. "You don't have to carry the burden all by yourself. I can help. You've done a great job getting us this far. No one would or could deny that. You don't have to be scared to fail." Zack vehemently denied he was scared but he knew was losing the argument. Cody's words struck home with him harder than he would have ever expected. He had been driving them the whole way, putting the weight of the world on his shoulders, and his brother was equally capable. Chewbacca to his Han to borrow some of Cody's favorite characters.

"What if he's been bitten?" Zack asked.

"I'll check."

"He does seem like a smart kid."

"I think so."

"And he probably doesn't eat that much."

"Probably not."

"He needs a bath."

"So do we."

"You know I hate it when you do this, right?"

"Pretty much, yeah."

"You knew I'd cave on this the whole time, didn't you?"

"I didn't, but I had a feeling. I didn't expect you to be so against it, really."

Zack squatted and then sat down Indian style. "I'll never admit this to anyone but you, Cody, but you're right. I am scared. Of failing. Of letting you down. Letting myself down. Terrified of it. I've looked at this entire trip as my responsibility and it's been hard enough getting the two of us this far. Adding another apple to the cart might make it even harder."

Cody was amazed at his brother's candidness. "I've been scared since day one of this, Zack. You've been here for me, though. I'm here for you, too. Don't forget that."

"What if we screw up and something happens to him?" Zack asked, his voice not entirely steady. That was the crux of his resistance and Zack felt better the second it was exposed to the open air.

"It's possible, but we just have to try and make sure it doesn't." Cody sat down next to his brother. "We're not perfect. No parents are. We just have to do our best and watch out for each other."

"Parents?" Zack laughed, "Cody, you are the only guy I know that would willingly take on a kid without any of the fun that comes with making one."

"I guess I could have chosen a better word."

"No, it kind of fits. Why don't you go back over there and check on our new partner, Cody? Give me a little while to get my head straight."

"Will do. Remember what I said, Zack. Don't be scared. You aren't alone."

"Gotcha," Zack said as Cody walked back to the car. He sighed, leaning back against the tree as he looked over at Cody and Anthony. Cody was right but it was going to complicate things one way or the other. He let out a long, slow breath.

"He doesn't want me to go with you two, does he?" Anthony asked as soon as Cody got to the car.

"Huh?"

"Your brother. He doesn't want me to come."

"How do you figure that, Anthony?"

"I could tell by the way he was acting when you walked over there. That's okay. I can take care of myself." Anthony stood up straight, all four-foot-two of him, and tried to put on a tough front.

"You're a smart kid. He wasn't wild about the idea at first but he's okay with it now. If you want to, that is. We never even asked you."

"I don't want to cause problems between you two."

"You won't."

"You're sure?" Anthony gave him a very studious look.

"Promise. Are you in?"

"I'm in."

"Good. I have to ask one thing, though. You haven't been bitten, have you?"

"Nope," Anthony said as he lifted up his shirt and turned around. Cody bit back a wince as he saw how skinny the boy really was. Fifty-five pounds soaking wet. Probably closer to fifty. "Want me to take my pants off?"

"Not until we get you some new ones. I believe you." Cody had already looked at the boy's pants and found they were blood free. Dirty enough to not have been changed any time recently but blood free. "Is there anything you want to get from your hiding place?"

"Just a few little things. It's just around the corner." Cody nodded as the boy pointed.

"Hey Zack," Cody called, "I'm going to walk Anthony over to his place and grab a few things. You coming?"

"You two go ahead. I'm going to grab some stuff from the store and load up the car while you're gone." Cody didn't like that answer and Zack could read it on his face from twenty feet away. "If I need you, trust me, you'll hear the gunshots."

"He doesn't like me," Anthony said as they walked across the parking lot.

"He does. Zack is...Sometimes he's...He's hard to explain." The two boys crossed the street and walked half a block before Anthony stopped them in front of a white shuttered house.

"Be careful and follow me. I made some traps to slow the zombies down." Cody nodded and walked behind the boy, careful to avoid the sheets of plywood with nine inch nails driven through them that littered the front yard. He was impressed since neither he nor Zack had thought of that. The front porch was filled with as much clutter in front of the door as a small kid could manage to move. Three gas grills, four bikes, and half dozen car tires took up just about every inch of space.

They walked around the side of the house, dodging more nails, and came around to the back yard. Yet more nails and junk blocking the door. Cody was beginning to wonder how Anthony could possibly get in the house when he saw the boy climb a shed and jump to a wrap-around balcony. Cody was impressed again as he duplicated the boy's moves. He might be young and slight but he was far from dumb.

Once inside, Cody looked around while Anthony picked up his few belongings. "The only thing I really want is this picture of my Mom," he said as he showed Cody a picture of Anthony being hugged from behind. He didn't know what to say and just nodded as the boy slipped it into a small bag. "It was taken about a week before the zombies showed up. We were at my cousins' house for a pool party," Anthony told him.

"I'm sorry, Anthony." Cody put an arm on his shoulder.

"Thanks. I still miss her." He grabbed a few more things and they were finished within a minute. Cody stood on the balcony while Anthony jumped to the shed and climbed down. He was about to jump across when he heard the gunshot.

"I knew this was a bad idea! Damn it!" He leaped across and hopped down and pulled the pistol from his pocket, instantly wishing he had more than just that. Anthony's eyes were wide as they raced through the makeshift minefield and back to the store. They heard Zack yelling profanities between roars from a shotgun. A trail of splintered zombies and spent shell casings greeted them as they rounded the corner.

"Cody! Come on, it's time to fucking go! Oh no you don't, you ugly zombie motherfucker!" His shotgun coughed and a zombie fell apart.

"Here we come, Zack!" Cody shouted back.

"The keys are on the hood. I'll lead these assholes away and you get the car started and pick me up," Zack shouted just before another series of blasts rang out.

Cody dashed, Anthony right on his heels, into the parking lot. Zack had managed to get the vast majority of the zombies to follow him toward the back of the store but there were still a handful wandering around the lot near the car. Cody slowed his approach and took steady aim, sidestepping as the zombies moved in on him.

"Stay behind me," he ordered, and moved the boy to his back, keeping his body on one side and the car on the other between any zombies and Anthony.

"Yeah, no problem," Anthony answered, his voice quavering slightly. One of his hands was on Cody's waist and the other in the middle of his back and there was barely an inch of space between their bodies.

His pistol rang out, sounding like a toy compared to Zack's shotgun, and two of the zombies dropped immediately. "Backseat," Cody said as they backed up to the car. Anthony pulled the door open and dove in. Cody bumped the door closed with his hip and circled to his right and dropped two more. The last one seemed to reconsider its attack for a second before lunging in and Cody missed his first shot before decapitating it with his second. He snatched the keys from the hood and threw himself in the car.

Engine growling, Cody slammed it into gear and peeled out, chasing after his brother. Zack saw him coming and pointed to a spot a few yards behind him. His shotgun yelled again and one zombie fell and another lost an arm. Cody pulled into the designated spot and opened the door and Zack hopped in after one more shot.

"Go go go!" he said as he closed the door. Cody floored it and the car sped away and the three of them began to calm down. "Before you say it, I was stupid a few minutes ago."

"I wasn't going to say it but I was thinking it," Cody admitted it. "You broke your own first rule."

"Not happening again, I promise." Zack shifted around in the seat and pulled on his seat belt. "Those things came out of nowhere."

"So you're over...everything from before?" Cody asked him, carefully phrasing his words.

"Yeah. Zombies have an amazing ability to put things into focus." He looked into the backseat at Anthony. "Welcome to the family, kid."

I didn't think this would take anywhere near as long to get done as it did. Between only having time to write a few paragraphs at a stretch and debating on whether or not to include Anthony in the chapter, almost two weeks went by before I knew it. I was hoping to get the story finished before my vacation but now I'm not so sure that's going to happen. Anyway, thanks for reading.