You know what really makes a piece of writing for me? Having good music to listen to while I write it. Fitting music helps me create depth I probably wouldn't be able to achieve without it. I recommend the band Dead can dance when trying to create a mystical, mysterious atmosphere, the song 'Host of Seraphim' in particular. For fights or battle scenes the band 30 seconds to Mars always deliver. For a sad scene or a slow, slightly melancholic scene I frequently play 'Fake plastic trees' by Radiohead in the background. For a scene involving a difficult struggle for a character's life I play some of the more dark songs from Florence and the Machine. Just thought I would share!

I don't own Hetalia or the character Hannibal Lector. All rights go to their original creators, who I am not.

Monday 21st March 2013

Lili is finally awake, and completely awake this time. I was at her bedside when she opened her eyes and sat up with some difficulty.

"Morning Al." she said and yawned. She tried to cover the yawn with her left hand which of course was no longer there. The lack of a hand threw her for a moment, but she remembered and recovered quickly. Her expression when the memories came flooding back was so sad and scared. She looked a little bewildered too. "Oh. I forgot…what's wrong with Heracles?"

"Just a fever." Hera's voice was nasal because of his blocked sinuses. "How are you?"

"Fine. I don't think I will need so much rest now. Where's Luddie?"

One of the medical staff offered to find him. I didn't realise until he left he was the guy who had coldly dismissed Lili's pain earlier. He returned about ten minutes later with Luddie, who looked like he couldn't quite believe his cousin was going to be alright until he saw her upright in her bed and with a smile on her face. He smiled back at her. Their hug was careful and gentle, Lili doing her best with one arm and Luddie trying not to break her. I sensed they needed some time together, so I went to Heracles and drew the privacy curtain around his bed.

"Do you think she knows who bit her?" he asked quietly.

"She hasn't mentioned Vash. I mean she was calling for him when she was asleep but she hasn't asked for him like she just asked for Luddie. Maybe she knows he's gone. Or maybe she hasn't thought about the possibility he arrived while she was down. I don't know man, I haven't thought about my family in a while. It's kinda easier to block it all out and focus on what you have in front of you since you can't do a thing to find them."

He nodded "I don't think about my mom if I can help it. I can't usually."

I patted him on the head. "Kiku and I have been doing the packing thing while you were sick. Now that Lili is finally feeling better, they'll have her out and around soon. We should pick another place to store the stuff."

Unbeknownst to anyone but myself, Kiku and Hera, there are bags under Lili's bed packed with the vital possessions and spare sets of clothes belonging to Luddie, Berwald, Antonio, Sadik, Ivan, Ven, Liz, Rod, Peter, Audrey, Mo, Raivis, Tino, Bella, myself and some stuff for the other two. I haven't packed for everywhere I want to leave with either; there's still Gio, Lili and Eduard to name a few. I know everyone won't want to come. But it still makes me feel better to have prepared for everyone like this, because if there's an emergency than at least they have a little to take with them in an escape. I know it might not be practical to run to the med bay in some cases of emergency, but as the med bay is on the first floor it is an ideal place for a rendezvous.

Only the fourth and third floor have a need for perimeters as they are directly connected to the other half of the school through the hallways we and infiltrating zombies have used to gain access. The first floor is mostly windowless because it was designed to be used as a bomb shelter- according to Mei anyways. I haven't heard that particular use mentioned in all my years here, but hey, if we're bombed then we can find out if it works as one. The doors are blocked up with the usual choke of furniture and duct tape. The first floor would be the easiest to defend and the most practical with these features, and the fact that there is a generator, a garage, a medical bay and the storage rooms and freezers for the canteen on the first floor.

We would have running water, food, medicine and a quick escape route if cars were a possibility. Adding the other survival gear stored in the vents like the sleeping bags, flashlights and the small first aid kits and surviving a siege on the first floor would be comparably easy to anywhere else in the building.

The task I have set myself has opened my eyes in a way, to the people I really value. I fight with Ivan and Bella all the time, yet yesterday I found myself making two furtive trips to the dorm rooms to steal their underwear so they wouldn't have to go commando through the apocalypse. I never considered myself very close with Raivis but I still packed for him and I don't think it's just because he's a 'nation' like I am. I think it's because I want him to live. I want everyone to live, but I know I can only save so many people and the amount I have selected is already pushing it. And I assume if I will it so the people who I have packed for are gonna leave (perceived) safety for uncertainty and survive it and the others I don't pack for are condemned to die at the hands of the staff. Is it playing God? I'm not sure. I'm just reacting.

Trying to save my world I guess. Writing it all down kinda helps me to make sense of my feelings. They are my world, those people I want to save. They have been since I was a child. Plus my exterior family, they are basically everyone in the whole world who I love. I know I say this practically every entry. The thing is every day I appreciate more what they mean to me. It's never at the forefront of my mind, the feeling springs from the shadows when I don't expect it.

This morning I watched Audrey and Peter draw in some old exercise books, laid out in the hallway on their stomachs, tripping hazards for the less observant alumni (Mo stumbled over a pair of outstretched legs each of the five times he passed) and it hit me how much it would hurt if I one day I wasn't able to see them at play like this. And it would hurt if one day I could no longer have a conversation with Luddie and not understand a word of the complex scientific vocabulary. And it would hurt if one day I could no longer feel the hairs on the back of my neck prickle, look behind me and find Suzy staring with a blank face. I don't even want to think about Kiku.

The apocalypse has really put things in perspective for me: the friends first, the hero second.

Listen to me. Already planning how to evade an enemy that may or may not be imaginary. Paranoid like a true hero.

But am I really being paranoid? Dawson watched as Lili and Hera struggled for their lives, and let's not forget the breach at the perimeter, Suzy's gunshot wound and his broken hand (one of them was inflicted for sure by Security personnel) and the total lack of teachers and janitors. I haven't seen a Matron turn on a kid yet, but at this point I wouldn't trust anyone in a position of authority higher than myself. My fears aren't totally unfounded and there are other rational people who share them. Maybe we accidentally convinced each other of a plot against the students because we need someone to blame for our problems, or maybe it is really happening.

Some days I feel like Ivan is the only sane person here and it's really the rest of us who are nuts. He has handled this whole thing with a calm sort of unruffled ease. Death doesn't bother him. I wonder why. His family are hale and hearty back in Russia. He has an older sister named Katyusha and a younger sister named Natalia. The first has the biggest pair I have ever seen and the latter exudes a creepy aura I can feel even through the photo of the two of them he keeps in the wallet. His dad is named Yuri. Can't tell you what he looks like, never seen his photo. Either I missed it the time I 'borrowed' Ivan's wallet or someone has some daddy issues. Anyways back on track, none of his family have ever died, and somehow he is still comfortable-ish in the presence of death. If he specialised in medicine like Sadie then I would ask no questions. That boy ain't right somehow. Nevertheless he's a good guy and I would miss him if he went outta my life one day.

Gotta go now. Kiku and I are gonna go ferret around in the storerooms for some supplies, which are unguarded. Thieves got nowhere to go. Plus we're rolling in supplies, the remainder of the school could live off this stuff comfortably for at least 2 years.

Later.

How can I describe the trip to the store room?

Going there I was nervous as hell we would be stopped and questioned or once we arrived we would be caught and punished. However we weren't stopped nor were we caught. We did make some VERY interesting discoveries.

The storerooms are a series of large, warehouse-like rooms connected by corridors. There are six in total. The first and second hold food products, the third hygiene products (I don't know what girls use a tampon for and I don't what to know because it looks like a fake dick) and other necessities in the same vein along with spare medical equipment, the fourth survival gear such as the things I expected to find in the vents, the fifth held the equipment for the science labs and classrooms and the sixth held a bunch of unlabelled plastic boxes that were taped shut.

The fifth room absolutely stank of flowers. Air fresheners had been stacked on top of every available surface in little towers, their combined scents so thick and overwhelmingly pungent I could barely breathe and every breath I took seemed to leave a coating of droplets of the sprays. Kiku examined a few of the boxes.

"These are large enough to hold a person." he remarked.

I understood immediately what he was getting at "Let's not open any right now. We'll come back tonight with some more people, just in case. Don't wanna be caught if this something really serious."

I already know it will be.

We left after less than a minute. I came out with the tastes of the sprays on my tongue and the smells in my hair and clothes. It was disgusting while it lasted, but thankfully it faded about ten minutes later.

So that interesting discovery we made I mentioned earlier? In the chemistry section of the storerooms, I opened up a metal box labelled 'volatile chemicals' and discovered a big glass jar wrapped in bubble wrap and nestled in a foam stand. Inside the jar sat a small chunk of grey metal. It was under oil and looked just like any other anonymous metal I have used in the labs in the past. However being in the same lab as Ven and Ivan, the evil scientist lab partners, has taught me any mineral can be made into a lethal weapon in the hands of someone who either knows what they are doing or has no idea. (Ven and Ivan were always the latter and they were still fucking dangerous. They blew up at least one test tube a week and always emerged from the safety of the underside of the workbench laughing. One time they blew out every window and shattered every glass object in the classroom and I am not willing to say it was a mistake.)

I had no idea what I had in my hands, so I checked every inch of it for a label. Eventually, I found one on the bottom. I'll admit: when I read it I yelped.

Are you familiar with the element Francium? The last in the first group/column of the Periodic table and the most reactive of the alkali metals. When I say reactive, I mean it is so reactive it is nigh on impossible to find any in the earth naturally. It's ultra-radioactive but since it doesn't have a half-life longer than half an hour it's not much use as a fuel source. Long story short, if I were gonna gain the chemical properties of one metal and become a superhero with these powers, I would pick Francium because I could produce an explosion as powerful as a grenade going off with less than an inch of matter in the water and give all my enemies radiation poisoning. Then again I would blow up every time it rained, but hey, great power means great responsibilities so I should wear a raincoat so it's not a problem.

I called Kiku over and we gaped at it for a while. In chemistry classes our teacher Dr Miller used to talk about the Periodic table loads, so we were familiar with this element as it was one of her favourites. It's illegal to have because it's so damn reactive. I knew our school did some sneaky, dodgy things occasionally…but possessing an illegal chemical? Damn! You'd think they would at least seal it up somewhere separate from the other commonplace chemicals and where curious students couldn't easily get to it.

It's nice to know we have some explosives lying around. And that was only half sarcastic. If they needed to I'm sure Ven and Ivan could turn it into a great weapon.

Kiku and I collected some loose canned and boxed goods, stuffed them in a bag which Kiku will stuff under Lili's bed when he goes to check on her and Luddie. We also made an inventory of what we have to work with and how easy it would be to transport. We're not doing bad. Should we need to make a run for it, we could collect supplies for the trip easily.

Must depart now. Time to steal Eduard's underwear. And that is just about as weird as it sounds.

Thanks for reading my dear readers. See you again soon I should hope. Good night.