Ah! I seem to be getting off track of the main point. Next chapter will be dead on, I swear! XD

Several hours later.

"I've got to wash up."

Zoey thought about ignoring the smell of herself, but her skin actually hurt from all the dried on boomer bile and zombie guts. To prove her point, she dug her nails into her neck, peeling of a thin layer of dried slim. Ellis made a face as she flicked it to the ground.

"Where was the working sink again?"

"It's uh… in the back. What about your shirt? There aren't any other shirts just layin` around…" Zoey let him trail his sentence off as she walked where Ellis had pointed.

"Hey, Rochelle. Can I get your help for a second, please?" She could barely maneuver with the makeshift cast on her arm.

"Sure. What is it you need?" She was in the middle of stitching up her shirt. How and where they found a thread and needle set, she'd never know. These people were amazing at being pack-rats.

"I need help cleaning up."

Rochelle set her needle down and followed Zoey into the bathroom.

"Alright, first I'm gonna need you to get your arm under the sink…" Rochelle turned the water on, and with hand soap and cold water, they were able to scrub most of the slim off. They scrubbed and scrubbed, until she got all the slim off her face, neck, and arms.

After Zoey's skin burned from scrubbing it so hard, all that was left was her tank top and hair.

"Okay, thanks Rochelle. I'm pretty sure I've got it now." Zoey waited while Rochelle dried her hands on her jeans.

"Oh, and if you could tell the boys that I'm changing in here, I don't want any surprises."

Rochelle chuckled, "Yea, Ellis would probably die of embarrassment." She put her finger to her chin. "I'd kinda like to see that." She laughed to point out that it was a joke. Zoey smiled instead.

"Right, well maybe we could trick him into walking in on one of the other boys." The image of Ellis face was enough to make Zoey laugh. "Better not."

Rochelle was still chuckling when she shut the door behind her. Zoey didn't waste any time tearing her shirt off and dunking it into the sudsy water. With her one hand she scrubbed it against the sink, and with horror watched the water turn dark green.

"That's fucking nasty." She drained the water and repeated several times until the water didn't turn colors anymore.

Satisfied enough that her shirt was as clean as it was ever going to be, she rung it out and set it over a stall. Realization hit her like a smack to the face. I don't have anything to wear. Deciding it was her only option, she untied her arm and zipped her jacket up to cover her relatively clean bra. Actually, it was her shirt that bore most of the bile, even the jacket wasn't too dirty. Happy enough, she walked out of the bathroom. Rochelle was still stitching, but this time it was Nick's shirt. It was a pretty long tear, almost a foot long across the right breast pocket.

Zoey sat next to Rochelle, the one person that wouldn't ask her questions. She kept humming and Zoey sat on the carpeted floor leaning against the wall. It was pretty comfortable and it gave her a chance to check her surroundings. Ellis was picking something out of his shoe, all of his guns scattered around him. He must be in charge of weapons upkeep…or something. Coach was setting up places to sleep. He found a truckload of suits and tuxes; and it appeared he was throwing them on the floor, making some sort of bed out of them.

She glanced around again to find Nick crouched over his own collection of guns. His broad back was naked, and Zoey was amazed there wasn't any scars or cuts on his upper torso.

"Nick! Your shirts done. Be more careful this time, okay?" Rochelle set his shirt to the side, and begun working on Ellis' hat. Ellis' head popped up and he watched Rochelle like she had his life in her hands.

"You're really into your hat, aren't you?" Zoey wondered outloud.

"Yeaa, it's my pride and joy. Uh…" He looked embarrassed "…Miss."

Zoey laughed. "It's okay that you forgot. I'm Zoey."

"Riiight, right. Zoey. Duh." He tapped his finger against his temple. "Won't forgee`t this time."

"Rochelle, you missed a tear on the side." Nick was still shirtless and must have been checking her work this entire time. When Zoey looked at his chest, she noticed how wrong she was about the cuts. He had a huge scar, deep and bright white across his chest. A peculiar circle shape scar covered the lower left side of his stomach. He had bite marks all across his left arm, those being the only ones that were a light reddish color.

"Damn Nick. Those are some nasty scars you've got." Zoey was still looking at the strange stomach wound. "What's that from?" She instantly felt bad about asking, maybe it was a sour subject.

"Gunshot. Way before this happened." He pointed to the chest scar. "And even more so for these." He rubbed his hand down his arm.

"Someone shot you?" Zoey was aghast. Is that what was happening now?

"Not during the Zombie shit. It was years ago." He turned to Rochelle. "Never mind, I can live with one hole in my shirt."

"We've all got scars Zoey. Lookatta mine." Ellis yanked his shirt off over his head before Zoey could stop him. Like a child at show-in-tell, Ellis thrust his shoulder at her.

"See? Big nasty one got me when we were running to the roof." The scar was incredibly large. It looked like two sets of teeth marks and deep long scratches. "Ya see, it grabbed my shoulder with its claws and then sunk its teeth in me a couple a times. Hurt like a bitch."

"Wow." Zoey said quietly. "That's… uh. Impressive."

Ellis was still looking at his shoulder. Then he smiled,

"Yea, ain't it?" He pulled his shirt back on.

Ellis continued, "Rochelle's got some all over her back from a spitter. That was the worse injury we ever had to deal with." Rochelle never looked up when Ellis was speaking of it.

"But, we made it this far. Who knows how far we'll go?" Ellis was in a cheery mood again, going back to making Molotov's. His long legs folded under him. He looked childlike with the determined expression on his face as he messed with the bottles.

"He's a sweet kid." She said, thinking Rochelle was still behind her.

"Yea, sure. Sweet." Nick's voice was what she heard instead. Not that she didn't want to talk to him, it just startled her.

"Um. So how did you guys meet?" She asked only to fill in the silence.

Nick sat down next to her, letting his legs stretch out in front of him. He put his hands on the floor behind him so he was leaning back.

"I met Coach first, and we found Rochelle not a whole day later. Ellis showed around about a week or so after that. Even though we knew he was a bit…childlike, they took him in."

Zoey didn't miss the 'they' part of the story. She turned her head to look at him. His shirt was only half buttoned and he had a loose tie strung about his neck. His hair was disheveled and a light blue bruise was forming under his right eye.

Swallowing she asked "Just they? You wanted no part of it?"

"Well… at first, yes. But strength is in numbers." He was staring at the ceiling. "And we do need numbers."

"Is that why you guys saved me? For numbers?" She wasn't offended. She just need to know their possible loyalty.

Nick turned his head towards her. "And to save you. We weren't going to let you die in that nasty food court."

She smiled back. "Yea… right. Of course."

"You called Ellis a kid. You can't be much older than him." She could tell he was still looking at her even though she had her eyes transfixed on the floor.

"Twenty."

"Yea, well the 'kid' is older than you." Nick laughed.

She chuckled. "Yea, well this infected shit tends to age you a little." Reaching down, she started to take her shoes off.

"Why did you take your brace off? Damnit, you're going to make it pop out again." Nick's mood change startled her.

"Yea, well I needed to wash my shirt. And I'm not walking around shirtless." She caught Ellis looking at her, he went bright red and went back to assembling his rifle.

"Well I guess so. But don't use that arm, okay?" He walked over to the counter and took a tan looking wrap out of the first aid bag. Zoey crossed her legs.

"You want to wrap it up again, don't you?" She sighed.

"Yea. Hold still." He placed her arm across her stomach, and began wrapping.

"After you wake up, take this off and do light exercising. We need to build up the muscle around that ligament." Zoey nodded in understanding.

****.****

Zoey couldn't even remember being shown where to sleep or actually falling asleep. But she did know when she was being woke up.

"Hey…Hey…. get up." Coach was leaning over her, shaking her by her good shoulder.

"You've been asleep for almost fourteen hours. You gotta get up." He looked a bit worried, but she shrugged him off. She had a small headache, and was groggier than shit, but felt a lot better.

Sitting up she looked around her. Her jacket was a tousled, and she quickly zipped it up before anyone else noticed. The bed of tuxes was unbelievably comfortable. At least it felt that way after sleeping on a stone floor for the last couple of days.

"How you feeling, sunshine?" Nick asked as he strapped a two pipe bombs to his upper leg.

"Fine…" Zoey did feel fine, but was feeling a bit confused. Her arm hurt being confined so close to her body. Agitated, she started ripping it off.

"Slow down. You're only going to hurt yourself. Again." Nick had laughter in his eyes.

"I've got it." Zoey mumbled. After unwrapping it, she stretched her arm out. It stung, but still felt better than it had in days.

She felt someone grab her hand, "Give me your other, stretch them out like your flying." When she did, Nick grasped both hands and slowly raised it above her head.

"I know it stings, but it will help." He let her slowly drop her arms. "I want you to baby that while we're out today."

"Ok Dad." She joked

Laughing he patted her head. "That's a good girl."

Zoey headed over to where food was kept.

"What can I have?" She asked Coach. He seemed to be the one in charge.

"Whatever you'd like. I'll be bagging whatever we don't eat in the next hour." He was munching on a bar of chocolate.

She thanked him and picked up a can of garbanzo beans. The top had a leaver to pull to open. She struggled with it for a minute, but it was worth the fight. Attempting to slow down when she was eating was more difficult than she thought, her appetite hadn't been sated from yesterday. Right after the beans, she dug into some canned ravioli.

After she was done eating and was able to drink a good amount of water, she had her weapons and adrenalin set out. She then proceed to find her tank top and put it back on.

She found it in the place she had left it, only this time it was clean and dry. She wasted no time slipping it back on. Walking out she passed a mirror. In horror she saw how dirty her hair was.

Without thinking, she dunked her head under the sink and began rising it. It took her a while, but when she didn't feel any slime, leaves, or broken shards of wood in her hair she rang it out and attempted to style it the best she could around her face.

"Here hun. We've got a brush." Zoey whipped around in excitement to find Rochelle in the doorway.

"Oh thank you!" She started immediately started brushing, but it was quite the workout. She had huge rat's nest in her hair and she didn't want to have to cut it. Unfortunately she did have to borrow scissors to cut only a few inches off the bottom. It was a disgusting mess at the bottom of her hair line, and she knew she couldn't fix it.

Now with relatively clean clothes, brushed hair, and her arm fixed she felt like new.

"Look! She is human." Nick pointed out.

"Har har." She couldn't come up with a proper retort. What was wrong with her? She had a million for Francis, but none for him? Her eyes stung at the thought of the others.

She went over to her supplies and began strapping them in. An auto shotgun, baseball bat, and pistol. Plus a Molotov. And to her delight, a lighter was strapped to the bottle.

"`member to keep that lighter after you use it. Don't throw it with it." Ellis eyed her warily. She laughed.

"Someone threw the lighter? Wow." She could see it now. Moron.

"Uh, well to my defense, I was in a life or death situation. I tend to fo`get." Ellis bit his bottom lip."I didn't mean to."

Nick couldn't help but join in on Zoey's laugh. "It took us days to find a new one too. That's why he's only allowed boomer bile. Can't mess that up." Nick eyed him carefully. "Hopefully anyways."

"Don't you worry now. I'll be real careful." Ellis turned back to what he was doing. He was still smiling though. Another man who thinks this life is hilarious. Zoey sighed. Better than the other way around.

****.****

Nick was more than relieved when they began moving again through the mall. They found more supplies like food, medical crap, and another person. But the shopping strip was still a death trap and they needed to get out. He and Rochelle took point this time, with Ellis and Zoey taking the middle, and Coach taking the rear. This seemed to work out pretty well. Ellis wasn't shooting him yet, which was always a plus. And Zoey was making some good kills. She may be worth this.

He scratched his chin. Well… it was more than that. He couldn't deny the odd attraction to her, though he hated it. She had such intense eyes, they were so earthy. He was use to the blue eyed vixens. Thinking back on his ex wife, Joanna, he smiled, she was a gorgeous vixen though. She was all curves, but even with thinking of her Zoey still crept into his mind. How is that I can find her more attractive? Zoey wasn't uncommonly beautiful, and that was only after he saw her cleaned up. It unnerved him as to why he felt like standing next to her instead of Ellis, when she shivered he had to subdue the urge to punch the mechanic as he comforted her with a warm arm on the shoulders. Gritting his teeth, he took his frustration out on a jockey that had jumped on Coach.

"Dammmn, Nick. Settle down. It's dead." Ellis was laughing.

"Shut your mouth, Ellis."

"Ookay."

They walked for while, realizing that there were no more survivors and no more decent supplies they headed for the exit. To get there they had to walk through the biggest room in the mall.

"That's Jimmy Gibbs Jr.'s CAR!" Ellis ran into the glass elevator, plastering his face to the window. His eyes fixed to the blue car downstairs.

"So?" Nick shrugged his shoulders. "A car isn't going to save us, Ellis."

"That's Jimmy Gibb's stock car. Even in an apocalypse, it's worth the stop." Coach was standing behind Ellis, admiring the car as well.

"Why don't we drive it out of here? There is no way we're walking out." Zoey pointed to the doors. She guessed at least several hundred zombies in the lobby. Plus a smoker and charger were on a balcony fighting each other. More must be around.

"It won't have no gas…" Ellis said sadly. "I would KILL to drive that car."

"There has to be a way…" Rochelle started the elevator and the noise immediately alerted the mass of infect at the bottom. Nick sighed.

"Get your chainsaw ready Coach, you're going first out there." He was checking his gun to make sure it was loaded and was working properly.

"HEY! HEY!" Ellis was jumping around excitedly. "Guys there's gas cans set up nearby! Maybe they were gonna use it, or maybe it was to keep a fire going..." His voice blurred into background noise as Nick looked where he was pointing and noticed scorch marks all along the wall on the far side of the building.

"Grab them and pour it in, we won't be havin much time." Coach was barely able to finish his sentence before the doors opened and they were greeted by a smoker. Coach brought his chainsaw down on its shoulders, killing it instantly. A cloud of smoke blinded Nick's vision but he pressed forward. He knew where the car was, and the gas cans weren't far away.

He wielded his machete killing several zombies that awaited them by the car. Ellis was excited but careful as he prepared the car. Thank-ya God.

They had the tank almost filled, and the girls were already loading up in the car. Bags and bags of supplies were thrown in the trunk, and they climbed in the back.

"We gotta go people!" Coach was yelling at Ellis, who was across the room digging up a lonely gas can that had been looked over.

As the young man was sprinting towards them, a loud roar rang over all the zombie screams.

"Jesus! Ellis HURRY!" Nick slammed the door on Zoey and Rochelle who were now stuck in the back. He ran towards the mechanic, pulling out his AK.

The tank burst out of a side room, shooting the shattered remains of the door twenty feet out. Its only target appeared to be Ellis, who was not too far ahead of it.

"Oh man, oh man!" He dropped the gas can and shot it with his pistol. Flames built a wall between the tank and the rest of them, but it was not enough. Although it was now on fire, it didn't slow down.

Finally meeting up in the middle, Nick grabbed Ellis by the neck of his shirt.

"Just run you son-of-a-bitch!" Ellis had frequently stopped to shoot and it was going to cost someone their life.

Coach was still firing nearby, and Nick yelled at him to run.

It happened so fast, but he seemed to have watched it in slow motion. The massive inflamed arm grabbed Coach around the shoulders and neck and lifted him over his head.

"COOOACCHHH! NOO!" Rochelle had freed herself and was running wildly towards them screaming.

The Tank threw him like a rag doll. His body hit the wall thirty feet above the stock car. Nick watched in horror as his lifeless body hit the ground. The cracking noise almost made him sick.

Rochelle was screaming and crying, but Ellis grabbed her and ran to the car. Nick ran to Coach and dragged him to the car. Ellis was already starting the car while Rochelle sobbed in Zoey's arms in the back seat. Nick pulled Coach into the passenger seat with him.

"We're not going to let you die here alone Coach." Nick squeezed in the middle and Coach leaned heavily against the door, coughing and groaning.

"This is it guys, I'm done." He had blood pouring out of his nose, and had obviously broken his arm and both legs.

Ellis slammed on the gas, ramming the glass windows that adorned the west side of the building. Nick heard the glass shattering and by the grace of God he never felt any tires go flat.

Coach sputtered, and coughed for a long time. Nick tried to help him the best he could, but Coach was just in too much pain. After a while, he demanded that they stop.

"There arn't any infected around. Let me out." Coach's shirt was covered in blood. Ellis pulled over and hopped out of the driver seat.

"Come on man, I'll help you." Between Nick and Ellis they were able to get him outside. Coach asked them to sit him in the grass with his back against a tree.

"I'm going to give you guys two options, and both will suck. But trust me when I say I need this." His dark eyes set on Nick. Ellis was shaking next to Nick, obviously aware of what he was going to ask.

"We can't... come on Coach, we could patch you up..." Ellis knelt at his feet.

"I've got two broken legs, boy. I've got some nasty internal bleeding, and I can barely breath. Its the end for me." He smiled at the young man and then turn his attention back to Nick.

"Shot me, or leave me."