The silence after the gunshot was so absolute it was almost deafening.

Charlize slowly lowered the gun and held it tight to her thigh, trying to mask her shaking hands. Her eyes found Travis first, since he was standing right in front of the man she had just shot. His eyes were wide as he looked at her in disbelief. His posture was tense and his arms were still slightly raised in defense, as if he had been frozen in the moment.

The other people in the room were Madison, Alicia, Nick, Travis' son Chris and his ex-wife Liza, the man with the shotgun, and another two people Charlize did not recognize. An older woman with tanned skin - Mexican? -and brown hair, leaning onto a younger woman who looked very similar. Mother and daughter, she guessed. Everybody seemed to be frozen in place.

Nick was the first one to move, pushing chairs away to quickly jog to where Charlize was standing. He carefully took the gun out of her shaking hand and threw it to the floor, then repeated the procedure for the baseball bat, then he focused his attention back on her.

"Hey, hey, hey, are you okay?" his eyebrows furrowed, looking worried. Only then did Charlize remember how she looked, her bloodstained shirt. Combined with the gun and the bloody baseball bat she must've looked like a maniac.

She looked down at her shirt absentmindedly, the stain and splatter looking bigger than she remembered. "This-" she swallowed. "It-it's not mine."

Nick placed his right hand under her chin, gently raising her head so she would look at him. For the first time since they arrived, she looked directly into his eyes. They looked darker than usual, intense.

"Are you okay?" he asked again.

She swallowed and wanted to tell him she was fine, there was no reason to worry, but as soon as she opened her mouth, she could tell that her voice would break. She was crumbling under his stare. She closed her mouth again. She shook her head, hardly noticeable, but she was sure he'd catch it. Then she broke eye contact, not wanting to have a meltdown in front of the whole family. She cleared her throat.

"What the hell is happening?" she asked. Her voice wasn't solid, but she was relieved to find that it was steady enough.

"I don't know. I - I don't know," Nick replied, shaking his head. In the background Charlize could notice that the others had started to move again. The man with the shotgun had gone over to the two women Charlize assumed to be his family; Madison started walking toward her and Nick.

"Haley," Charlize said, turning around. Haley was still standing in the cover of darkness outside, but moved inside when her friend called her. She looked steady now, her face serious. "Nick, you remember Haley. Haley, this is Madison," Charlize said, gesturing toward Nick's mother. Madison gave Haley a warm smile.

"What happened?" she asked.

"Long story," Haley stared. "They burned Charlie's car, so we had to walk."

"Jesus," Madison said. "You must be pretty shaken up. Let's get some food in you first."

Charlize and Haley looked at each other, both thinking the same.

Haley turned back to Madison. "We're starving."

They followed Madison into the kitchen, and she prepared some sandwiches. While looking around the room, Charlize noticed that everybody had left, only Alicia was left, and she followed them into the kitchen. Travis and the man she didn't know had carried the corpse outside. While Madison was working, Haley explained what they had seen while they walked, talking about the riots, talking about the fires, the man in the alley, about everything except what had happened before they had left the flat. Charlize was grateful about that.

By the time they finished the sandwiches and Haley asked Madison, Alicia and Nick about what happened at their house, Charlize was not listening anymore. She was lost in thoughts, going over the events of the day, trying to make sense of it. The more she thought about it, the more unbearable it became. With a start, she remembered she was still wearing the blood-stained shirt.

"Excuse me," she said suddenly while getting up already. "I'm gonna go clean up," she added while gesturing toward her shirt.

"Of course," Madison said. "You, Haley and Alicia can sleep in Nick's room tonight. I'll put up the Salazar's in Alicia's room. We'll leave first thing in the morning." Charlize nodded. She assumed the Salazar's were the Mexican family. She took her backpack from where it was in the living room and walked upstairs to the bathroom, moving through the familiar house with ease.

As soon as she had closed the bathroom door, she took of the shirt and threw it into the sink. She turned up the hot water and soaked the shirt, starting to scrub it hectically. The water started turning red as the first of the blood started coming off, but it was only a small part. She knew that she couldn't get blood out of a shirt by simply holding it under water, but she couldn't stop scrubbing. The more she scrubbed, the more urgent she became. Her mind was blank, only occupied by one image. Courtney. Courtney, Courtney, Courtney, Courtney.

There was a knock on the door, but she couldn't react. Her mind was too focused on finishing the task at hand: scrubbing. She didn't notice the door opening, she didn't notice Nick walking up to her until he touched her shoulder.

"Hey, hey, hey," he spoke gently and turned off the tap. Only then did she snap back to reality. She looked at him.

"Hey," he said again and touched her cheek. When he removed his hand, it came back wet. She was crying. She hadn't noticed until now. She let go of the soaking t-shirt and dried her hands on a towel, fidgeting to play down her tears. Nick was quiet. She could see his reflection in the mirror. He stood next to her at the sink, just looking at her, patiently. She realized that she had hoped he would follow her.

"I-," Charlize started and turned back toward him, using her left arm to wipe the tears out of her face. "I killed Haley's girlfriend." She did not manage to hold eye contact with him, instead looked at the floor. She was biting her bottom lip, knowing she could not hold back more tears for long. "It was like you said. Her eyes changed, she was trying to get at Haley so,- so I-I just...," her voice broke and she did not manage to get the words out. bashed her head in.

"You had no choice," said Nick. "You saved her life."

"You should've seen the look on Haley's face. I-I don't know...even if I had to..I don't know if she can forgive me." Charlize started shaking her head at the last sentence, the tears were flowing freely again.

Instead of replying, Nick moved one step closer to Charlize and pulled her into his body. His left arm went around her shoulder, his hand on her back. When his hand touched her bare skin she remembered that she was only in her bra, but as soon as she remembered, she had already forgotten again as she rested her head in the little nook of his shoulder. Nick's right hand was at the back of her head, stroking her hair, and he rested his chin against the top of her head.

"It's okay," he whispered once in a while as she silently cried.


Charlize absentmindedly walked to Nick's room. After she had calmed down, he had told her to go ahead, he would clean up. She opened the door and found Alicia already preparing for bed.

"Hi," she said.

"Hey," Alicia replied. "How are you holding up?"

"Oh, I'm fine. I'm just glad we made it here in one piece," Charlize said, trying to sound like she meant it. "How have things been here?"

"Okay, I guess. Nick's been struggling with his withdrawal. It was pretty bad this afternoon, but Mum's stolen some pills from school, to ease him off of it or whatnot." Alicia was shaking her head. "Apart from that, well, you saw the end of it when you got here."

Charlize nodded. Alicia sounded casual as she spoke about Nick, but Charlize wondered how she really felt about it. Alicia had always been the perfect child, and she had to watch her parents, and now only her Mum, worry constantly about her older brother. Charlize wondered if Alicia resented him a little for taking all the parental attention, or if she was sad, or fed up? Alicia was always mature for her age, but was that just who she was, or was it something she forced herself to be, for her Mum's sake?

Charlize laid down in one of the sleeping bags on the floor. She was still wearing jeans and a new shirt, because she didn't know if they had to get up spontaneously. She didn't know what would happen during the night. She was lost in thought when Alicia turned toward her again.

"Have you ever forgiven him?"

Charlize turned her head to Alicia. She was lying two sleeping bags to the left, the middle one free for Haley, and she was looking at Charlize. Her expression was not stern, simply curious.

"Have you?" Charlize smiled at her.

"Touché," Alicia replied and let out a small chuckle. Then, both girls turned their heads away from each other again, each lost in their own thoughts.

Eventually, Nick and Haley came into the room at the same time. They were talking quietly, and Nick offered her to sleep in the bed, but Haley nicely declined and lay down next to Charlize. They tried to sleep, but even after an hour, Charlize could tell that everybody was wide awake. She herself did not manage to close her eyes. Every time she would, she would get flashbacks of the day, and that was even more unbearable than the stinging exhaustion she was feeling. She was wondering if the situation was only this bad in Los Angeles, if other areas of the U.S. were safe, or other parts of the world. Could this be a world wide thing? No, that seemed impossible. Still, she made a mental note to call her parents first thing in the morning.

Eventually, she fell into a light, restless sleep.


"Who's next?" Charlize asked as Liza, Haley and her walked out of the Coulson's house.

"It's only minor things now, so we can split up," Liza answered. "I'll go check on Mrs. Sanchez, Haley you go re-bandage Griseldas foot, and Charlize you can go and change Hector Ramirez' morphine drip." Haley and Charlize nodded and silently walked off into different directions, Charlize heading to the Ramirez' house, which was right next to the Clark's.

It had been nine days since the power went out. When they wanted to leave on the morning after Haley and Charlize had arrived at the Clark's, they were stopped by the military moving in. Men with rifles and camouflage suits had build up fences and declared the area they were in a safe zone. Charlize guessed that the zone they were in had about 150 people in it, but she could not tell for sure.

The military had put on a strong regime. There were curfews, regulated hours when the power would be on, and no one was allowed to leave the safe zone and enter what they called the dead zone. In return, the military provided them with food and limited medical supplies. They had also taken everyone who was in contact with any of the infected, taking them God knows where, they wouldn't tell. Thankfully Travis had buried Peter, the man Charlize had shot who had turned out to be the Clark's neighbor and friend. Madison had lied to the military about the fresh grave, saying their dog had died a couple of days ago, so that the family could stay inside the safe zone.

Even though the military had moved in and the people inside the safe zone were as safe as it got, the atmosphere was tense. A lot of people were restless, since there was nothing to do but wait. Wait to see what happened next, wait to see if they could move out of the safe zone eventually. Many people were also concerned about the military itself, and this was a conflict Charlize experienced first hand in the Clark's house. Travis has been keeping close contact with Ltd. Moyers, who was in charge of the safe zone, and Madison was not happy about it. Travis was supportive of how the military handled the situation, whereas Madison was mistrusting and concerned about their measures. She spend most of her day fidgeting around the house, repainting the living room walls to cover the blood stains, trying to find something to do. Alicia had been spending time with Ofelia, the daughter of the Salazar's. Turns out Travis, Liza and Chris had found shelter in Daniel Salazar's barber shop when the riots started, back when Travis picked up his family in the city. When Griselda, Ofelia's mother, had hurt her food while they were trying to escape the madness, Travis had taken them with him.

Nick had been slowly eased off the drugs with the Oxycontin Madison had gotten from school. She slowly decreased the pills she gave him, so he could get clean. He was doing surprisingly well, and Charlize was surprised about how well he dealt with the withdrawal. She hoped he had finally started to grow up and come through.

Charlize herself has been one of the only people inside the safe zone who was constantly busy. As it turned out, Liza, Haley and she were the only people with any sort of medical background, so they had spend their time going from house to house, checking on sick or injured people, and making an inventory of all the medication they had inside the safe zone. Even though Liza was also only training to be a nurse, she had advised the other two girls to not disclose this information to people. They would feel safer if they thought their caretakers were fully trained. "Don't lie, simply leave some things out," Liza had told them.

When she reached the Ramirez house Chalize knocked on the door, and after a short while Hectors' wife Cynthia opened the door. She looked relieved when she saw her.

"Come in, come in." She opened the door wide and Charlize walked in.

Hector Ramirez was doing bad. He was suffering from acute heart failure, and since they could not leave the safe zone and there were no doctors, all they could do was make him as comfortable as possible. Nevertheless, Cynthia was relieved that there was someone who could help, even though her husband would not get better.

They silently walked toward the bedroom and when they entered, Charlize went straight to work. Hector Ramirez was a middle aged man, maybe in his 50's. He was sleeping and on his right, an IV was dripping morphine into his system. Charlize checked on the man; checked his pulse and the IV.

"He's stable," she told Cynthia. "The morphine's helping."

The first days had been difficult. Charlize felt thrown into cold water, having to diagnose and treat people without supervision. She felt nervous and overwhelmed. But as the days passed, she got more confident. She now knew the patients, knew who needed what, which helped her act like an actual, fully trained nurse.

She opened her medical bag and got a new IV out. Hector's IV needed to be changed every 24 hours. She then started to exchange the old IV for the new.

After she was finished, Cynthia led her to the door.

"You can stay?" The woman said, hopeful. "I made some soup."

"Thank you, but I have other patients to check on," Charlize told her and felt a pang of guilt. It must be lonely in the house with her husband never being conscious, knowing he would die.

"Please take some with you," Cynthia insisted, so they walked to the kitchen and she filled up half of the soup for Charlize to take.

"You must've seen a lot of people like Hector at the hospital," the small woman said while she poured. It sounded more like a question than like a statement.

Don't lie, simply leave some things out. Liza's words rang in her head. She didn't want to lie to this kind woman standing in front of her, but she felt like no matter how she would twist her answer, it would be a lie anyway. So instead of answering, she gave Cynthia what she hoped would look like an empathetic smile.

"Take it," Cynthia said as she handed her the soup. "I don't know what I would have done, Hector is all I have."

"Thank you," Charlize said and put a hand on the woman's shoulder.

"Thank you," Cynthia replied.

With a "See you tomorrow!" Charlize said goodbye and headed back to the Clark's house. When she entered the front door she was immediately greeted by Haley asking from the other room if it was her.

"Yeah," Charlize said as she walked into the living room where Haley was sitting with Griselda. The older woman was sitting on the couch, her head leaned back in the cushions. The injury on her foot was giving her a lot of trouble. Haley had her hair back in a ponytail, and was wearing gloves because she was in the process of cleaning Griselda's wound.

"Do you have a bandage for me? I forgot that Liza has all of mine with her."

"Yeah, sure," Charlize said, but as she wanted to get it, she sighed heavily. "I've left my back with Hector. I'll quickly go get it."

When Charlize got back to the Ramirez' house, Cynthia was outside working in her garden.

"I left my bag inside. I'll just quickly go grab it," Charlize explained in passing as she went back inside.

As she entered the bedroom she stopped in her tracks, because she was immediately struck by the change in Hector's condition. Where his breathing was quiet and easy when she had left, now it was labored and loud. It sounded like he was in pain. Her first thought was that she had made a mistake when she changed the IV. Her hands started sweating and she mentally scolded herself for not paying more attention as she quietly walked around the bed to get to the IV.

However, as soon as she reached the foot of the bed she stopped in her tracks. Lying on the floor, between the bed and the wall, was Nick. His eyes were closed and his hands were resting behind his head. He looked relaxed. Charlize looked at him for a moment, confused, until she looked further down his body. Her heart dropped and at the same time, a hot rage built up inside of her. She had made no mistake with Hector's IV. The reason Hector sounded like he was in pain was that the morphine drip was no longer connected to him, it was connected to a vein in Nick's foot.

"You have got to be kidding me," she said without a trace of sympathy in her voice. Nick opened his eyes, but he did not look fazed at all about having been caught.

"How long?" Charlize asked, exasperated.

"I wasn't feeling so well when Mum cut down my pills, so Hector here volunteered to help me out," he said casually, giving her a confident smile. At this small gesture of him showing no guilt whatsoever, Charlize lost it.

"Get out," she said quietly.

He didn't move. She bend down, pulled the needle out of his foot - with more force than necessary, causing him to hiss in pain - and repeated herself, this time louder.

"Get out!"

"Jeez, okay..okay!" he repeated himself as he got up and Charlize started pushing him towards the terrace door that was connected to the bedroom.

"No, Nick - it's far from okay! You were lying to everybody about finally getting off the drugs and instead you come here, stealing a dead man's morphine!"

Nick still did not understand how serious she was. "Yeah, I mean he's dying anyway and-". Charlize didn't let him finish.

"Get out, you selfish son of a bitch. Do you even care about anyone but yourself?" This was the first sentence that struck something within Nick, and for the first time, the relaxation disappeared out of his eyes.

"Everybody here is pulling together, helping each other," Charlize rambled on. "And you're lying to everybody, hurting other people to get what you want. I've fucking had it with you, Nick Clark. You're acting like a God damn child," "No, no, Charlie-". Nick seemed to have come off his morphine high and grasped the situation. He tried to explain as Charlize pushed him out of the door.

"Stop making fucking excuses! You don't care about me. You don't care about Alicia. You don't care about your Mum. You don't or you wouldn't be so fucking selfish! You only care about yourself." Charlize exclaimed and gave him one final push, closing the door behind him. Nick look startled and a little bit shocked. He made a step back toward the door, putting his hands up on the glass.

"No, no, no, Charlie wait,-"

But Charlize was done waiting. She closed the curtains, not only because she didn't want to see him anymore, but also because she didn't want him to see her cry. She was so angry the tears couldn't help but flow freely. She slowly walked back to the IV and removed the needle Nick had used and threw it in the trashcan next to the bed. She carefully fitted a new needle into the IV, disinfected Hector's skin, and put the morphine drip back where it belonged. Once in a while she used her arm to wipe away her tears.

When Hector's breathing calmed down again, she slowly sank to a sitting position against the wall. She could still hear Nick at the terrace door. She was so angry at him, but more so, she was angry at herself. She should have never started to believe that he was capable of change. He wasn't, and he had proved that today yet again. It was remarkable how easy it was for him to wrap her around his finger. She didn't believe that he meant harm. She believed that in his own, twisted way he did care about her, but as a junkie he was focused on caring about himself first. Always. And if hurting other people meant getting your next fix, that was a price worth paying.

She sat there for a while, dreading to go back to the Clark's, dreading being stuck in a house with him, thinking that this epidemic had pretty damn horrible timing.


The next morning Charlize got up extra early to get out of the house and make her rounds. She had slept on the couch, because she was still too angry at Nick see him. To her surprise, Liza was also already on her feet.

"You're up early," she said as she walked up to Travis' ex.

"Hey," she smiled at her. "I was just on my way to check on Hector. How did it go yesterday?"

Charlize decided not to mention the whole Nick disaster, so instead she just said: "No changes."

When they got to the Ramirez house they were surprised to see that Cynthia already had another visitor.

"Cynthia, what's going on?" Liza asked surprised. Next to Hector's wife was a younger, taller woman. She had long, dark brown hair that she wore in a ponytail, and she was wearing a black t-shirt.

"Hector is getting the help he needs," Cynthia said with a big smile on her face.

"Who are you?" Charlize asked the tall woman.

"I'm Dr. Exner," the woman said, her tone confident.

"She's from the government," Cynthia added.

"Cynthia has told me all about you," Dr. Exner added.

Oh?

"What did she tell you?" Liza inquired.

"That you are very good nurses. I believe there is supposed to be a third?"

"Haley," Charlize added quietly, and then louder: "Where did you take Hector?"

"Sit down," Dr. Exner said and gestured to the chairs around the kitchen table.

"I want to see him," Liza said. Both of the women did not really trust this Doctor after what they had seen from the soldiers stationed in the safe zone. They were too secretive, too condescending.

"Cynthia was kind enough to show me the chart you have written to keep track of Hector, and I must admit, I am not familiar with some-"

"I should explain some of these," Liza interrupted and Charlize swallowed. They had not known all the professional jargon yet, so they had made their own for some of the things they had done. Dr. Exner must have looked right through it.

"Cynthia, could I speak in private with these two?"

Cynthia nodded yes. "I should get packing anyway," she said with a smile and left the room.

"Where is she going?" Charlize asked, surprised.

"She's wants to be with her husband."

"And where is that?"

"So, you've used a morphine drip?" Dr. Exner asked, ignoring Charlize's question. "Unorthodox."

"We didn't have any nitrates, so we had to salvage from the other neighbors," Liza explained.

"We had to get the pressure off his heart," Charlize added.

"What about the other patients? I've already met four that swear that you three are the reason they are alive."

Charlize and Liza looked at each other, both not knowing what to make of this doctor.

"We're just trying to make them comfortable,-" "You're doing very well for the fact that you are not actually nurses," Dr. Exner said casually.

Charlize swallowed, sweat forming on her forehead.

"Are you?" Dr. Exner asked as neither of the two answered.

"He was dying," Charlize started. "We didn't know what else to do. We needed to get them to trust us so..so that-so that we could help."

To their surprise, Dr. Exner answered with something that Charlize would not have expected. "Can you pretend a little longer?"


The rest of the morning, Charlize spent going to see the other patients with Dr. Exner. She asked her all kinds of questions, and as far as she was allowed to tell, Dr. Exner answered. Charlize found out that they were bringing the sick or injured patients to a fortified military facility where they had more doctors and could take better care of the patients. This evening, they were going to take all the sick people from the safe zone and bring them there. Then, to Charlize surprise, Dr. Exner asked if she wanted to come and help patients there.

"What?" Charlize asked surprised. They were on the way to the Clark's house to see Griselda.

"We're taking all the sick people tonight. Your help is needed at the facility much more than it is here." They entered the Clark's house, and before she focused her attention on Griselda, she turned to Charlize one more time. "Think about it."

Charlize stood still for a second. When she saw Haley standing in the kitchen, she walked over to her. Haley was alone, wearing some of Alicia's old clothes. A white tank top with a band logo. Her hair was in a pony tail.

"Who's that?" she asked, gesturing to Dr. Exner.

"She's a military doctor," Charlize answered and Haley raised her eyebrows in surprise. "They're taking the patients to a military facility tonight where they have all the injured people. She asked me to come.." Charlize trailed off, still surprised by the offer.

"Let's do it," Haley said immediately. This surprised Charlize even more.

"What?"

"You've seen Madison, and Alicia, and all the others here. They are so restless because they don't have anything to do but wait," Haley explained, sounding casual. "I don't wanna be like that. There we could actually help and honestly? Helping feels pretty good," she concluded.

Charlize thought about that for a while and had to agree with her friend. She did not want to stay here and feel useless. And be around Nick, another, quieter, part of her added.

"Good," she said smiling. "Because I wasn't going to leave without you."


Charlize had finished packing her backpack with a few spare shirts and toiletries she would need for staying at the military facility. Haley and her would return a week from now with Dr. Exner, to conduct another routine check on all the people inside the safe zone. Before she left the room, she instinctively packed the gun she had stolen from the man in the alley and hid it underneath all the other clothes. You never knew.

Downstairs she found Madison, Haley and Travis, who were in the living room with Griselda and Daniel, her husband and the man who had been holding the shotgun the day of the riots, waiting for the soldiers to pick up Daniel and Griselda, who were also going to the facility. Charlize and Haley said goodbye to the Clark's, telling them they'd see them in a week, and walked outside to the military caravan that would leave to the makeshift hospital. Charlize had not said goodbye to Nick; he hadn't come to see her and she was still too angry to go look for him. Madison could tell him she had left.

They got up on one of the vans with Dr. Exner and made ready to leave when they heard a commotion from the Clark's house. Charlize looked to the door. The soldiers were carrying out Griselda, but behind was not her husband, but Nick. Charlize's eyes widened in surprise. He was handcuffed and two soldiers were pulling him to another car, pushing him in. His eyes were wide in fear. They must've mistaken his withdrawal symptoms for him being actually sick, she realized.

Charlize instinctively looked back toward the Clark house and she could see Madison standing in one of the windows, looking after her son. As the truck Charlize and Haley were on started moving, Madison's eyes found hers, and she shot her a pleading look.

Look after him.

Charlize nodded her head. I will.

Then the truck left, passed the fence and drove off into the night; into the dead zone.