The Dead and the Lost
These chapters just keep getting more and more intense, they even give me chills when I write them. Oh and I may go from diff PoVs sometimes but prob not very often, just a heads up. Well enough of me talking, here's Chapter 13. Don't own Slender.
Ewww, what was licking my face? I sat up quickly as I felt a wet slobbery tongue lick my face repeatedly and then I was being suffocated by fur. "Bongo you big oaf! Get off of me!" I heard Charlie snort and laugh as she saw her shepard try and sit on my face, it wasn't very pleasant. "Just get this damn beast off of me please." She whistled and he used my chest as a launching pad as he jumped off of me and onto the floor, trotting over to Charlie with his tongue lolling out happily. I sighed and rubbed my face trying to get all the slobber off, "So you ready for today?" I looked over at Charlie, trying to seem a bit cheerful but it didn't reach my eyes. She shrugged a bit nonchalantly, "I suppose, when do you want to leave?" I ignored the fact that she changed the subject purposefully and I looked at my watch, "Well it's about 8:30 now so we can leave in about and hour or so, sound good?" She nodded and we went about getting dressed before grabbing a small breakfast from what food I had left besides stored deer meat.
We headed outside to take a quick wash before we headed out, no use in smelling like gross on our last day, even if we are heading into town. As we walked down towards the creek I looked over to Charlie, she had her head down and she seemed to be deep in thought, probably about where she was going from here. "Hey, you alright?" She looked up and half smiled, "Yeah, I'm fine. Just thinking." I nodded and let her go back to her thoughts, but I glanced over as she asked me a question, "...Have you spoken to him?" I knew who she meant even thought she didn't say his name, it wasn't hard to guess considering we did not know any other males around, "No, I haven't even felt his presence since that night...it's troubling." And lonely, but I didn't key her in on that, I didn't want to let her on to how down this situation has gotten me. I sighed as I let my feet soak in the water as I threw off my clothes and I stepped in slowly, shivering at the bit of chilliness the water sent through my body.
I quickly walked a bit further in and gave a squeal of surprise as I was pushed in from behind and as I came back out of the water I saw Charlie a few feet away laughing. "Oh ha ha, very funny shorty." She rolled her eyes and dunked her head under the water so she could wash her hair, I let her wash her hair first, I just felt like leaning back and relaxing for a few. The water really felt nice once you got used to it but for some reason I kept feeling a weird breeze, "Hey Charlie, you feel that?" "Uh, feel what?" I looked at her for a moment on confusion but then I just knocked it off as some mind game, whatever it was it had stopped anyway. I focused on getting my hair and body washed then we hopped out, got dressed, and headed back to the cabin to prepare for the trip. I didn't know how long it might take me so I made sure to pack what food that would go bad that I had left, didn't want to waste it, and I loaded it up in the car. We still had about 15 minutes so we went back inside for the last time together, while Charlie was gathering what things she had I grabbed a few pencils, a sharpener, and eraser, and the sketchbook from under my bed. I turned to my friend as she sat back up and I handed the items to her in an extra back pack I had, "Here, you can have these. You'll probably use them more than I do." She looked in to see the drawing supplies and smiled, "Thanks Ella, I don't know what to say..." "You don't have to say anything, now lets get going before it gets to late." She nodded and whistled to Bongo as she headed out and into the car, ready to drive into the unknown territory of the dead, but I didn't head over just yet. "Hey, I'll be right over, I just forgot something out back." I ran inside and grabbed a piece of paper from my journal and wrote a note, 'Have gone out to a bigger town past Winterport, should be back by tonight...I hope you see this.' I took a piece of tape and I taped it to the back of the shack before jogging over to the car.
(On the road) I considered us lucky for being able to drive down this road without coming up to a blockade of some sort, but getting through Winterport was another story. As we pulled up to the town I heard Bongo whine, "Yeah, it scares me too buddy..." I tried not to look around as I drove slowly around parked cars and what not, trying not to make too much of a ruckus so we weren't mobbed by dead. I noticed that there was a restaurant type building a bit farther up and I saw the door to the storage freezer, the memory made me shiver and I tried not to look around anymore for fear that I would see the other building where...yeah. "Hey look! There's the exit!" I turned my view a bit and saw she was right, I had never been fully through this town so I didn't really know where it let out, but as soon as she pointed it out I sped towards it and breathed a sigh of relief as we left it behind. "Why are you so relieved?" "I just don't like being stuck in small towns...that's all." She seemed to want to question further but let it go as we sped down the deserted road. After we had been driving for what seemed like half an hour I finally saw a sign that said we were close to a place called Hartstown, about 3 miles. "So...do you want me to drop ya off before or after I gather stuff?" "I mean...I want to help you so you can always drop me off after wards if it's not too late." "Where do you think you'll stay?" I glanced over to see her shrug and I became a bit worried, would she be looking for shelter all night? And near a larger town seemed quite dangerous if you ask me.
We drove on until we pulled up to what seemed to be a small outlet looking place, some stores here and there and it seemed to be a place you did not want to go into alone. Most the passages to the larger stores were kind of blocked off with other cars but I managed to see a few stores off to my left that were fairly open, and they seemed like they may have had some supplies in them. "Alright, looks like were headed over to that depot store first, do you have the machete with you?" She grinned and held up her blade, looking ready for some action, and as I parked the car and grabbed my duffel bag I did the same, "Let's hit it." We hopped out and stayed low to the ground, we had left Bongo in the car so he didn't get lost or made us found, and I saw the front door was slightly ajar. "Ok let's get in and get out, it's only about 10:45 so we'll have plenty of daylight to come." She nodded firmly and we slipped in, seeing shopping carts everywhere in disarray, some lights busted out, and some of the walling was smashed. I pulled out my flashlight and handed one to Charlie since it wasn't too brightly lit in the store, "I'm gonna head over to the garden supplies and you head over to the clothes, but be careful." We split up and I walked silently down the isle towards the gardening tools, it was so eerily quiet in stores than when I used to come in here with my family. A lot of things had been knocked off the shelves and about half of the tools had been taken, but I saw what I needed was still there. I began to put some smaller shovels in the duffel bag along with a hose and a bucket or two, I also managed to snag a weed whacker and a few batteries. I hadn't heard from Charlie yet so I decided to keep looking around for anything useful like a few walkie talkies or some netting, but all of a sudden I heard a commotion over near the clothes section. "Shit Charlie!" I whispered harshly to myself and started to jog over, leaving my bag near the fishing supplies to come back to. As I neared the Isles I saw she had taken down two dead and was just finishing off a third, "What the hell happened?" She grunted as she pulled out her machete and turned towards me with a disgusted look, "I wanted to go to the bathroom but as soon as I opened the door I saw these perverts in there!" I tried to hold back a chuckle as she had on her dead serious face and I changed the subject now seeing that she was okay, "So what did you manage to find?" "I got a few winter jackets and some sweaters...some pants...a few shirts and long sleeves...ooo and I found some winter boots!" I rolled my eyes as she held up two pairs, one for me and one for herself, "Aren't they fantastic?! The dark blue ones are mine and the grey ones are yours." I smiled as she stuffed them back in the bag and I motioned for her to follow me back to where mine was, "Oh wait, I saw an isle back that way with walkie talkies and stuff, wanna check it out?" I waved my hand and told her to grab a few pairs and I would load the bags in the car, I watched as she jogged off then I turned, grabbed the other duffel, and headed out to place them in the car.
(A bit later in the day) We had been gathering supplies for at least 4 hours and it was nearing 3:50 p.m. So I wanted to finish up in the next half hour or so. We had been able to get in a few small grocery stores and collect some canned foods that were still there, they weren't expired yet, and I was able to get more seal tight jars for storing meat. I was currently eating a piece of deer jerky and watching Bongo sit and beg for a piece of Charlies, he had already eaten a bowl of dog food we had found and Charlie even managed to get a few cans of dog food that were there. "Did you get what you need Charlie?" "Yeah, I appreciate you helping me out and all. I probably wouldn't have made it out here without your help." I chewed slowly and contemplatively before I place my water back in the car and walked a bit closer towards her, "You know...you don't have to go out by yourself. You could always stay with me, and we could look for your parents before winter starts. It would be a lot safer."
She looked at me with what seemed to be disbelief and uncertainty, "I appreciate the offer but I don't know if I could wait that long I mean...I just want to make sure they're OK...or even alive." "But we can do that, I have a car now and it'd be much faster than trekking all the way to who knows where with the dead lurking around." "I-I don't know...I'll have to think about it ok." I nodded and let it go, just feeling a bit better now that the idea was in her head, hopefully she would make the right decision. "Well, let's head off to the last place then before it gets too late alright?" She said nothing and both hopped into the car and I drove over to a place called Planet Studios, "What's this?" "I don't know but maybe it has something in it that we can use, It even has two stories and a rooftop. She rolled her eyes and we made our way to the front, I growled as I saw there was a lock on the door but the windows had been busted out. Instead of making a bigger fuss about it we just carefully climbed in and landed on the carpeted floor silently, "Wooow, would you look at that..." It was the biggest comic book store I had ever seen, sure some of it was trashed but it was actually in better condition than most of the places we had been too today. "Well it may not be totally useful stuff but we might as well check it out right-" But I saw Charlie had already run up the stairs to the second floor, I shook my head and began to go through all the small and large comic books they had lined up on shelves. "Pfft, like anyone wants to read a comic about the freakin aquaman..." I picked up a few Transformers and Batman comic novels and I decided to head up to where Charlie was to see what she was up to, but when I got up there I saw that she was looking out the window in horror. "Charlie what's wron-" "Ella they're coming here fast! We need to get up to the roof!" I looked out the window to see a large mob of dead heading our way, teeth gnashing and their moans of hunger echoing in the air. I don't think they knew we were here but the moment they passed by the broken and half hanging doors they were bound to smell us and come in, "Alright well, don't worry about Bongo he's staying down and the cars a bit ways over. Let's get up to the roof." She nodded and we made our way over to the side door that said 'Staff Only'.
I tried to turn the handle but it was locked and the door wouldn't budge, "Shit! We need to get this opened!" We looked at each other for a moment before looking around for something to use as a battering ram, I was about to give up but then I saw a ladder in the corner. "Hurry Charlie, over here!" She scrambled over as she heard the dead moaning downstairs, some of them had already found their way in. We picked up the ladder and backed up in front of the door, "On three, One...Two...Three!" We charged forward and smashed into the door, it didn't give but I perked as I heard a splintering noise, "One more time!" I saw the dead climbing the stairs eagerly, "One...Two...Three!" We charged forward again and this time the door smashed open and splinters flew through the air. "Go!"
We threw the ladder at the large mob of dead headed towards of and ran through the door, looking around and spotting the staircase that led to the roof. "C'mon!" I grabbed a hold of Charlies arm and pulled her up the stairs, breathing a heavy sigh of relief as I found the door was open. "Ok just lock the door so they can't come through." "I can't the locks broken!" I tried to make it stay shut but it wasn't going to happen, "Shit...Shit shit shit! I'm sorry Charlie, I shouldn't have taken you I'm sorry!" She was about to say something but then the dead started to pour through the rooftop door, "I'll hold them back!" I started to cut into the dead, making sure to stay a safe distance away but not letting them around. "Ella I found a ladder down!" I turned in surprise to call back but I was tackled to the ground by a large zombie. "Ugh get off!" I tried to push him away as his teeth snapped about an inch away from my face, he dug his nails into my arm and raked a large cut down my forearm. "Fuck!" I continued to struggle only to receive another few cuts on my face and he caught me on my collar bone a few times, luckily Charlie had seen and ran over. She swung her machete and chopped his head clean off before helping me up, "C'mon! We have to get out of here!" I felt a bit dizzy but I nodded and followed her to the roof edge, "You go first." Charlie looked at me worriedly for a moment before nodding and shakily descending down the rusted fire escape ladder, all the while I was cutting down anything that was trying to get by. I started to back up as she called up to me that it was clear and I hurriedly got over the ledge and onto the shaky ladder, I felt my head spin more as I looked down...it was a pretty far drop. I descended down slowly all the while Charlie yelling encouragement but I had only gotten a few steps down when the ladder started to shake even more, I cried out and tried to grab the wall as the bolts came loose and I was flung backwards as the ladder fell off the wall.
The last thing I heard was the moaning of the dead and Charlie screaming my name...