Hello everybody! Sorry for this update taking like two weeks to come up. I was busy trying to finish up one of my other stories that's currently on the brink of total completion. It's still not done yet, but I can't wait for it to be finished. If you want to read it, then it's a Sonic mystery and crime fan fiction titled, "Sonic the Hedgehog: Attorney of Law". But that's only if you're interested in it.

And I'm also trying to juggle school work at the same time. At least I can say that I'm definitely doing better with my college classes this quarter, although I can't tell how that will translate with my overall college GPA until the quarter's over. Oh well, all I can do now is wait and see if I really did as great as I think I did.

But yeah, here's a new chapter to this story for you all to read. I was honestly debating how I wanted the setting of this chapter to be as. That's also another reason as to why this took a while to come out. I was not sure how I wanted it to flow. Hopefully, you'll all like what I settled on as my choice. Trust me; I never plan ahead when I write these stories. I like being kept in the dark on the details just as much as you do. Whatever I put on here is all that comes from the top of my head. I personally find that thinking ahead both ruins the story and unintentionally sets up personal expectations that can easily disappoint one from continuing should it not be met.

A good example of this would be the last chapter. I honestly had no intentions of having the zombies appearing on the freeway like that. In fact, I had unconsciously mapped it out in my head that they were just going to listen to the car radio about updates on the zombie attacks and use Billy's computer to get some out-of-state reports. Thankfully, I managed to come up with that on-the-spur idea where they had to abandon both the car and most of their goods. Then again, most zombies stories and movies are kind of like that where the unexpected always happens and they're forced to leave what they worked so hard to obtain.

Anyway, that's enough of me and my rantings that I'm sure none of you really care to hear. Let me leave you all alone so you can read this new chapter in relative peace. Please don't forget to leave a review before you move onto the next story that you want to read. They honestly do provide me with the motivation to continue writing these new chapters for you all to read. That and whatever input that you might have for me is always greatly appreciated, be they just the small things or some big-name problem that you happen to have with the story. Both are appreciated so long as neither one are flame-heavy in terms of just bashing at me for no reason.

Until the next update to this or any of my other stories everybody!

Chapter 9: Camping Out in the Woods

"This is definitely not what I had in mind when I was hoping for a change in sophomore year," Billy murmured under his breath with a sigh as he cupped his face into his hands. "How is it that zombies are wandering throughout the city and killing anybody it can get their hands on? This is beyond impossible!"

After having survived a string of encounters with monsters once thought to be a figment of one's imagination, he was feeling more than just tired. He was completely exhausted and wanted nothing more than to fall asleep, hoping that everything was just a part of some insanely jacked up nightmare. Unfortunately, sleep seemed to be just beyond his reach what with all the excitement he has been through.

It had been a little over five hours since zombies had taken over the freeway he was on. The sun had since gone down and bathed the area in a moonless darkness. He along with Teddy and Greg had since found shelter within the wooded trees that bordered the freeway edge. It definitely was not the safest place to take a rest, but they had all agreed that travelling around in the dead of night was an excuse to be taken down by wandering zombies. As such, they had found a small clearing where they lit a fire for both light to see incoming danger and warmth from the cool evening breeze.

However, none of them were anywhere near the point of relaxing. Billy was sitting on a flat rock next to the fire with his face still buried in his hands. It was as if he were trying to allow himself to be swallowed up by the flame's gentle and protective light. Teddy was sitting next to him on a log with a pile of wood next to him and tending to the flames. The supplies that the group had managed to take with them during the freeway incident sat behind him in a small pile. Greg was currently shuffling through said supplies and muttering to himself in a frustrated fashion. Neither of the others knew what exactly he was doing, but they felt it wise to give him some space. After all, it was clear to them that he was still angry at the fact they were forced to abandon a lot of their supplies in the van and was probably just venting it all out on what they had left.

"…Greg, stop messing around with those things," Teddy said after quietly poking at the fire with a long stick for a while. "It's not going to change no matter how many times you count it out. We don't even need to worry about running out of food on the way to Suffern. It's pretty much less than a day's walk from here."

"You don't know that for sure, Teddy!" Greg quickly snapped back without looking up from his work. "Haven't you watched zombie movies before? We might end up having to take the longest route to Suffern just to avoid getting eaten by these monsters. If that's the case, then I doubt what we have here is going to last! That's why I'm here trying to count them out and see how to split the food and water between the three of us."

"Are you telling us you're rationing out our food?" Billy asked in slight disbelief as he brought his face out of his hands and looked at Greg. "Do you really have to do that? We managed to take a lot of canned food with us, and I doubt any of us would be stupid enough to go on an eating binge."

"Unfortunately, the canned food has to be put out of the equation," the other bitterly corrected as his frustration grew more apparent by the second. "Believe it or not, we somehow failed to take the box that had the can opener in it. Without it, those cans are nothing but a waste of space. So unless we miraculously manage to run into another one, all we have left now are some fruits, some bags of chips and peanuts, and a couple boxes of gummy snacks. Note that I'm not counting the three cases of water we thankfully took with us. I think this does call for a bit of rationing so we don't waste what little we managed to save."

"…Are we really in that bad of a situation with the food?" the blond teen asked with slight hesitancy as if he were afraid of the answer. "I mean, you're kind of making it sound like we might have to live out here for a while."

"If either of you ask anything that has to do with this one more time, I swear I'm going to knock you out! I don't need any more annoyances topped onto this. Now stop bugging me and give me some time to concentrate!"

With that threat that sounded more than serious, Greg went back to rationing out the food with no further distractions from the other two.

"Greg's really taking the food rationing seriously, isn't he?" Billy asked in a low whisper so as to not run the risk of seeing Greg make good on his threat. "I didn't think he'd get so worked up over this."

"I'm actually not surprised he's acting like this," Teddy replied as he took a log from the pile and fed it to the fire before prodding at it again. "One of his cousins is right now fighting a war somewhere overseas. Greg told me that he taught him how to ration food and other small-scale stuff just in case he ended up living through a life-or-death situation like some kind of deadly natural disaster. Just basic survival training and all that jazz. How'd you think he learned to make this fire without burning down the rest of these trees? I didn't think I'd actually see him implement all this, though."

"Heh, so I guess we should consider ourselves lucky that he's coming along with us," the raven haired teen stated with a small half-smile. "I doubt either of us could've successfully started a fire without first accidentally burning this whole place down. Did his cousin teach him anything else besides this?"

"Well, he was excited when he was going to learn how to shoot a gun, but his mom quickly put a stop to that when she found out," the blond explained with a small chuckle at the thought. "Not that I blame her since Greg tends to get overexcited when he's holding onto something he thinks is really cool. But it was pretty funny to see him all gloomy when he came to school.

"And speaking about stopping gun lessons, I still don't feel comfortable about having you using a gun," he quickly changed his tone to seriousness as his eyes wandered to the gun resting in the holster on Billy's waist. "I know you already proved you're good with it, but I still don't like it. Perhaps you should let me hold onto it when you're not using it. That way, we can prevent any unfortunate accidents from happening."

"Stop trying to treat me like I'm an irresponsible kid, Teddy. I'm not going to get into any accidents with this. Trust me when I say I'm more than responsible with it in my hands. And besides, how am I going to defend myself if you have the gun and are busy trying to knock some zombie up in the head? I'll be a sitting duck!"

"…I suppose you have a point. That doesn't mean that I'm just going to stop worrying about you. I mean, can you really blame me, your best friend, for feeling like that? I'm already stressing enough with all this without having to wonder how good your handling with that thing really is."

"Then stop wondering and start relaxing," Billy replied as he flashed a smile at Teddy. Despite the chaotic insanity that the day had brought them, this little exchange did wonders for his badly frayed nerves. "Unless I absolutely have to, I'm not going to be aiming the gun anywhere near you or Greg. And I'm not going to be trigger happy and start randomly shooting at whatever pops into my view. Those arcade shooters did teach me to never jump the gun in case they're actually people."

"Oh, why did you have to throw that last part in?" Teddy groaned out as his moment of relaxation quickly went away. "You literally had me believing you for a moment until you brought up the arcade games again."

Instead of continuing on with the discussion, the other simply rolled his eyes and let a chuckle escape him. He knew the blond only had his best interests in mind, but he could sure be a pain about it sometimes.

For the next couple minutes, both settled for just staring into the fire that was now starting to die. Teddy reached for the wood pile and threw another log into the starving flames. The sound of crackling embers soon pierced the relatively silent atmosphere. Greg was still busy sorting out their supplies and murmured out an occasional curse when things supposedly did not turn out what he had in mind.

"…Can I ask you something, Teddy?" the raven haired teen suddenly asked as he kept his gaze at the invigorated flames.

"Sure, ask away," the blond replied as he brought his attention to the other. "What's on your mind?"

"Remember back at the end of lunch at school? Well, you said you had something important you wanted to talk to me and to wait up for you after school. I just remembered about that, and I'm honestly a bit curious as to what's so important you'd actually ask me to meet up with you."

"What are you…? Oh yeah, I remember! It completely slipped my mind. You can't really blame me what with all this creepy zombie business suddenly popping up. I'm amazed you managed to remember that."

"Yeah, I kind of have a mind that goes on random memory digs every now and then. It just popped up to me a few seconds ago. So are you going to tell me what was so important that you couldn't bear to wait even a second after school was over?"

"Umm, I really don't think now is the most appropriate of times to be discussing that," Teddy quickly responded as he felt his cheeks begin to redden. Apparently, whatever he had wanted to say was, to some extent, embarrassing on his part. "I mean, couldn't we at least wait a bit until we're in better circumstances?"

"Do you really think things could get any better than this?" Billy asked as he smirked at the sight of his best friend's suddenly shy demeanor. "Things are right now as calm as they could be considering. Come on, don't leave me hanging. The suspense is kind of killing me here."

"Geez, you never let up when your mind's set on something," the blond replied as he let an amused sigh leave his lips. "I don't know whether that's a good or bad thing. Fine, I'll tell you. Just promise me you won't laugh or do something that'll make it harder for me to say what I have to say."

"I always find it hard to take you seriously when you say that," the raven haired teen teased as he could not help a little giggle slip past. "But yeah, just tell me already! If it's really that embarrassing, then I'll try not to laugh…too much!"

"…I swear; you're doing this on purpose. Good to know your annoying side hasn't suffered much through all this.

"Anyway, here's what I wanted to talk about earlier," he began after taking another deep breath to calm his blush. "It's been five years since we first met. I didn't think that I'd make a friend so soon after starting a new school. Imagine how happy I was when I saw how we considered each other to be best friends right from the start.

"But yeah, I'm kind of starting to get off-topic here. I don't know why I do that when I'm nervous. What I wanted to say was…"

"Alright, I'm done with the rationing!" Greg suddenly exclaimed in a loud tone that was enough to startle the two from their conversation. "God, that took forever! Come over here guys so you can see how well I worked the food system."

"Do you really have to talk that loud, Greg?" Teddy asked with an audible growl reverberating from his throat at having his important conversation interrupted. "We're just a few feet away. What if there are zombies nearby who heard you shouting? They could be coming this way right now!"

"Oh, nothing a good whack to the head can't fix," the teen quickly brushed off as he seemed oblivious to what he did. "Just come over here and see what I did."

"Okay, no need to sound like a kid who just finished his first project by himself," Billy replied with a roll of his eyes. He was clearly disappointed at having his private moment with Teddy so suddenly interrupted like that. He then said to the blond just as they were both getting to their feet, "We'll continue this conversation later."

"If there is a next time," the blond grumbled to himself quietly so the other would not hear. They then made their way to where Greg was still standing with his arms crossed in a triumphant fashion.

"Hey, why are you guys looking so pissed?" Greg asked as he finally took note of their facial expressions. "Don't tell me you're still angry at me shouting like that. I'm telling you, we can take care of whatever zombies decide to come our way."

"We're not pissed," Teddy replied in a tone that clearly said otherwise. "Just hurry up and get to why you're so excited."

"Geez, somebody seems a bit too wound up tonight," the other teased lightly before turning his attention to the three distinct piles of food he had been toiling away for the past few minutes. He failed to notice the dirty look he got from the baseball player. "But yeah, take a look at these piles of food I just set up. They may all look different, but they all got about the same amount of food in them. If we each ate just one thing from the pile for three respective meals, then the food will last for just a little over a week. If we can split the fruit we have into three pieces, then I can stretch that number to two weeks."

For a moment, the other two teens just switched their gazes between Greg and the three different piles of food. It was as if they were in thought about what they just heard and wondering how it was all going to work.

"…You're not serious, are you?" Billy was the first to speak up after a few seconds. "Do you really expect us to just eat just three things from the pile for one day? You're being a bit extreme here. We can't possibly last a whole week by eating so little food!"

"Don't go dissing what I've done, Billy! If you don't like it, then feel free to do whatever you want with your pile of food. Just remember that when you run out of your own food, you're going to have to share with one of us. That'll end up chipping away at the food until we have no more and have to try our luck at finding more. Extreme or not, this is going to be the conditions we're most likely going to have to live with when this all gets worse. Best we start getting used to it now rather than later."

"Still, we can't be in that bad of a situation where we have to ration food like this," the raven haired teen countered as he seemed content to see things Greg's way. "How many people do you think have your kind of mindset with all this? We shouldn't be having problems with food until this all gets worse and people start hording it."

"Like I just said, it'll be best if we start getting used to the rationing idea now," Greg repeated despite having nodded in agreement to Billy's statement. "You're right in that we'll definitely find more food than we can handle right now. However, don't start getting used to that idea. My cousin's a member of the army, and he's told me of times where he had to sneak through enemy territory just to get to their base. He never really had much food because they had to travel light, so he was taught how to ration food in a way that it was stretched thin and barely enough to satisfy hunger. I'm just using what he taught me since I'm sure this constitutes as a dire emergency."

"I feel the same as you on the whole rationing idea, Billy; but I think we'll have to go along with Greg's suggestion," Teddy admitted despite a heavy sigh indicating his distaste leaving his lips. He then continued as he fixed his gaze back at Greg, "And I feel the same as him in that we shouldn't have to be so ration-heavy with what we got. We're not that far from Suffern, and I'm sure we can stock up on more food when we get there. There's no need to be this strict yet. Give me an honest answer here; how long can the food last if we ate three things from our food pile for only two meals?"

"…Not counting trying to break the fruit into pieces, about three-and-a-half days," the teen stated after thinking on it for a moment. "There are twenty-one pieces of food in each pile, and what you're suggesting basically doubles what I've set as a daily cap. But I suppose you guys are right," he added in a begrudging fashion. "With Suffern so close, I guess I am kind of jumping the gun. I mean, the cops did say that the town was the safest if Southfields' shelters became too dangerous. We're just going to have to make sure that we don't take too long getting there. The food is definitely not going to last that long."

"Like you said, we have three days' worth of food if we go with my food suggestion," the blond reminded as he went and threw another chunk of wood into the neglected fire. "I know for sure it'll take less than a day to get there depending on how many zombies are in our way. Of course, we'll worry about that tomorrow. For now, I think it best we start relaxing before getting some sleep. I hope then that this puts an end to our food argument?"

"As if it were even an argument to begin with. But yeah, I guess we don't have to be so strict for now. Just keep in mind that I might suggest we get that serious sometime soon. Like it or not, that's the reality we're going to face soon."

"Alright, enough with the gloomy talk," Billy stated in whining fashion before moving back towards his rock. He then pulled out his iPod and headphones before sitting down and fiddling with the device. "I'm going to listen to a couple of songs before going to sleep. Might as well enjoy it while I can seeing how it's almost out of batteries."

"Then I'll go ahead and keep watch for zombies," Teddy volunteered as he started prodding at the fire again with his long stick. "We can't all go to sleep unless we plan on not waking up for the rest of our lives."

"I guess that makes sense," Greg agreed with a shrug of his shoulders as he gave one last look at the food before taking a seat near the fire. "We're going to need someone keeping watch so we don't end up literally getting our asses eaten."

"Why do I have a feeling that you were trying to make a reference to something of a rather…explicit nature?" the blond asked as he raised an eyebrow at his baseball teammate who merely sent him a secretive smirk. "Anyway, how do you guys feel about switching off every two hours?"

"Huh?" the raven haired teen dumbly asked as he failed to understand the sentence. "You mean you're not going to keep watch all night?"

"…Were you really thinking that, Billy? I need some amount of sleep if I'm going to be more than just some monster's easy meal tomorrow; I just volunteered to be the first person on watch. Once two hours are up, I'll wake one of you guys so you can take over."

"Makes perfect sense when you put it that way," the other simply admitted. "Most people in zombie movies usually die when they get into a false sense of security. And we need someone to tend to the fire so we can have a good view around us at all times. My watch beeps every hour," he added as a soft beeping reached their ears. He then continued on as he brought it to his face, "It's right now midnight. You can go ahead and wake me up when two hours have passed. I'll then wake Billy up and he'll repeat the cycle with you. That way, we'll all get at least four hours of continuous sleep. We should all be up and getting ready to head to Suffern when eight comes rolling by. Is that a fair plan?"

"Yeah, I guess that's fair," Billy answered before putting one of the ear phones into his ear. "Best we take turns so none of us are overly tired tomorrow. So you're going to take over at two, and I'm going to be up at four. Four hours of undisturbed sleep for the most part. As if I'm going to sleep that much after what I saw today," he added with a sort of bitter murmur that Teddy caught onto.

"Hey, try not to think about it," Teddy reassured him as he got up and gave his best friend a reassuring pat on the shoulder. "That's a surefire way to be off your game tomorrow. God knows how we don't need you lodging a bullet into either of us."

"You're never going to stop teasing me about me with the gun, are you?" the raven haired teen asked rhetorically as he gave a playful pout. "Maybe I should shoot at you if only to get you to stop it."

"As if you'd even think about pulling a stunt like that!" the blond replied with an amused chuckle before locking the other in a light headlock and rubbing at his head.

"…Those two sure are close," Greg murmured to himself as he watched Billy futilely try to escape from Teddy's grip from the other side of the fire. "People might actually mistake them for brothers what with the way they act. I wonder," he added thoughtfully as a thought crossed his mind that caused an impish grin to appear on his face. "The way I've seen them act looks almost like how my girlfriend and I were before we tried our hand at dating. I wonder if they like each other and don't know it yet. Oh, it'll definitely be interesting if they do end up hooking up!"

With a quick chuckle leaving his throat, the teen lied down on the ground and tried to get some sleep, all the while ignoring the admittedly humorous scene that was still taking place with the other two.

Well, I admit that this is by far the shortest chapter that I've written for this story. But in the scope of things, I don't think you'll really hold it against me for this chapter. After all, this really is more of a relaxation chapter; and they're winding down from the hectic day they just went through.

This was literally just a chapter slapped together with a bunch of random thoughts. I saw Greg being very possessive with what little food they had left and also having him as the group's self-proclaimed zombie expert. I honestly couldn't see anybody else fitting that role except for him, so I guess it's a good thing after all that I decided to keep him in the story. Let's just hope that his food rationing idea doesn't have to kick in for a long while or he'll have a couple of irritable teenagers breathing down his neck.

But yeah, I do hope you like my attempt at keeping the serious tone while trying to bring it up to another level by producing a food problem they're now facing. I know it's probably not a major problem yet, but these things have to progress slowly. Or as slowly as they can get considering this is a zombie story where things sometimes suddenly get into a fast and hectic pace.

So let me leave you with the outtakes now. There's probably not going to be as much as previous chapters seeing as how all these random ideas don't really have much branching points as to how they could alternately play out. Then again, I just might end up surprising myself and come up with some relatively funny bits.

Please don't forget to leave a review before you move onto the next story that you want to read on this site. Until the next update to this or any of my other stories everybody!

Outtakes:

Teddy: Are you still messing around with the food, Greg?

Greg: (Without looking up from work) Shut up, Teddy! Someone's got to make sure the food's evenly distributed amongst us.

Billy: Are we really that low on food?

Greg: It's enough to last us about a week. That low enough for you?!

Billy: ...But it's only less than a day to Suffern from here. You sure you still have to do that?

Teddy: You're stressing out over nothing, you know?

Greg: (Momentarily stops working) ... ...Shut up, you two! (Continues on with work)

/

Billy: So what did you want to talk to me about earlier after school, Teddy?

Teddy: (Starts blushing) Uh, I don't now's really a great time to be discussing that.

Billy: (Looking amused) Are you blushing? It can't be all that bad, can it? Just tell me!

Teddy: (Blushes even harder)

Billy: Ted...!

(Teddy roughly brings his lips to Billy's and starts kissing him)

Greg: Alright, done with the food rationing! So how about we... (Sees the two teens now full-on making out) ...Yeah, I so don't need to see this right now. (Goes back to working on the food)

/

Greg: (Observes Teddy and Billy messing around) Those two really are close. I wonder if they're more than just best buddies?

(Starts daydreaming)

Dream Billy: Hey Teddy; want to come over to my place today?

Dream Teddy: Sure, what's the occasion?

Dream Billy: Oh, it's nothing. I just have a little surprise for you! (Winks seductively at Teddy)

Dream Teddy: (Starts to blush) Oh, but didn't we just do it last week?

Dream Billy: (Smiles suggestively) Didn't you say you had other things you wanted to try out?

Dream Teddy: (Now looking excited) That I did! (Follows Billy home like a little lost puppy)

(Back in real world)

Greg: (Smiling impishly) Oh, I can so see that happening!