REWRITTEN 4/20/16
Enia: Onyx took too long. I'm annoyed at her. Her chapter, (if she ever even starts it) will go in as an E.Z.H.F. short. 2016 note, Onyx never did write that chapter. It's been five years. DAMN THIS STORY HAS BEEN GOING ON FOR SIX YEARS.
One Giant-Ass Party
Disclaimer (courtesy of Samik): Wait! You're forgetting something really important! Enia Silverson and the cast and crew of E.Z.H.F. are in now way condoning the use of alcohol during the zombie apocalypse! Drinking is fun and all, kids, but do it safely and definitely don't do it when there are monsters that want to eat you about! She hopes you take this message seriously.
Enia: Phew. Thanks, Samik.
Samik: No problem.
Enia: Hey, have you ever noticed that the word 'circumstance' looks an awful lot like the word 'circumference'?
Samik: And why do I care?
Enia: I don't know.
Anyways.
Onward to writing!
One Giant-Ass Party (For Real this Time)
"What the hell's going on up there?" I wondered, staring up at the library. Lights flashed from all the windows, and loud, Norwegian rock music shook the glass panes. The chaos was quickly attracting groaning mobs of munchers from every direction. They oozed out of hidden streets like termites crawling through cracks in a wall.
Samik started to pull the bags of supplies from the car. "Let's go find out."
I nodded and swung a backpack over my shoulders, heaving the last wooden crate out of the backseat. Zeus grabbed the instruments, disappearing beneath the mound of plastic. The three of us stood in a line at the base of the library, and I solidified the air beneath our feet, lifting us higher and higher until we could climb through a second-story window, just as the first of the munchers arrived at the walls. I dropped my crate to the floor instantly. The music pounded into my head like a falling boulder, and the flashing lights threatened to blind me.
"We're back!" I called, hoping to catch someone's attention.
Then I noticed the mayhem.
The strobe lights alone were enough to give anyone a seizure, but combined with the blasting music, they created a great orb of percussive death. My first question was how they got the equipment to work. I switched to wondering where they had gotten the machinery in the first place. Then I decided it didn't fucking matter; I was going to strangle whoever was responsible anyways.
Someone had created tables out of piles of books and placed overflowing platters of snack food on top. William was hanging from the ceiling, and David was sprawled across the Customer Service desk with whipped cream and Sharpie on his face. Teemo was chasing Onyx through the shelves with a desk lamp while Minka watched all the proceedings with headphones in her ears and a bemused look on her face. Arin was nowhere to be seen.
"What…the hell?" Samik wondered slowly.
"All I know is that if someone doesn't turn off those lights in five seconds, I'm going to kill everybody," I answered.
"I'm kind of scared right now," Zeus said quietly, her hand creeping into mine.
Something banged on the metal door of the elevator next to the stairs. I jumped violently, heart leaping to my mouth. "Help!" yelled a familiar voice.
I cautiously moved over and laid my ear against the steel. "Arin?"
"Enia! Thank the gods! Let me out of here!"
"Why are you in the elevator?" I asked.
"How did they even get the elevator to work?" Samik added.
"And why haven't you escaped yet?" I finished.
"Just open the damn doors," Arin snapped, sounding peeved.
Samik pressed the Up button, and the doors dinged open pleasantly. Arin sat in the center of the elevator, tied to the chair, her hair disheveled, and an annoyed expression on her face. "Do I want to know what happened?" I asked as I moved into the small box to untie her.
"Onyx decided to have a giant, over the top party, and I objected," Arin answered, rubbing at her wrists. "She called me a stick in the mud and got everyone to help tie me up. Even Teemo!" She sounded most indignant about the last part. The last of the ropes crumpled to the ground, and Arin stood up angrily, ready to chew someone a new one.
"Hey, Enia!" Onyx called suddenly from the main room of the library. "What's in these?"
"What?" I responded, ducking out of the elevator. Onyx stood before the wooden crates, prodding one with her foot. "Oh, those. I'm not entirely sure. We found them by the side of the road, but we didn't have time to open them before we got mobbed." I shrugged slightly. "I was hoping they held weapons or food or something."
"Let's open 'em!" Onyx yelled. She rubbed her hands together gleefully. "William, get me a crowbar!"
"How can I? I'm tied to the ceiling," he replied dryly.
"Then David! Get me a crowbar!"
"He's unconscious," Teemo reminded her.
"Then wake him up and go get it," she ordered.
"Why don't you do it yourself?" Teemo grumbled, but he went to do it anyways.
I watched him shake David and then get fed up and dump him off the counter when the Canadian didn't move. David startled awake, and I smirked a bit when he rubbed his face vigorously and spread the whipped cream everywhere. Teemo left him there and disappeared into the depths of the library. Two minutes later, he was back, twirling a crowbar from hand to hand. He wordlessly gave it to Onyx when he returned. I cocked an eyebrow, surprised he hadn't make a joke or some snide comment.
Onyx took the tool and braced the curved end in the crack between the lid and the side of the box. She leaned all her weight on the other side, and the rest of us covered our ears as the nails slowly squealed out of the wood. She let the bar drop with a bang and paused, hands on the lid, to look at each of us in turn. "Hurry up already," Teemo grumbled, rolling his eyes and buzzing with excitement.
Onyx wrinkled her nose at him before shoving the lid off. It hit the floor with a loud thump, and instantly, everyone crowded in to see what secrets the box held. "Someone cut me down!" William wailed from the ceiling. "I want to see too!"
"Please don't," I begged, but Arin betrayed me and took pity on the creeper, probably because she had been tied up herself. She sent a whistling blade of air at the rope, slicing through the thin hemp with ease. William crashed to the floor, and a perverse sort of pleasure flashed through me. He sat up an instant later without a bruise, rubbing at his head. The werewolf appeared to be indestructible. He pushed himself to his feet and dusted his clothes off, glaring hotly at Onyx as he came to join us.
We returned to the box, Teemo rubbing his hands together in antici…pation. The box was filled with green, brown, and clear-colored bottles. Their multi-colored tops poked up out of a bed of loosely packed straw, and the lights from the ceiling danced off the liquid inside. Onyx pulled out a clear bottle and held it up so everyone could see. The label proclaimed that it was Plymouth Gin, and I nodded appreciatively; that was very high-end alcohol. "I was right!" I cheered. "Explosion central, here we come! I've always wanted to throw a Molotov cocktail."
But Onyx obviously had other ideas. She wore a sly grin on her face, and her eyes had narrowed mischievously. She rubbed one hand up and down the bottle gleefully. "We could do that…" she paused dramatically. "Or we could use it to take this party to the next level!"
I instantly understood her meaning and shook my head reverently. "No! No, no, no! Bad idea, Onyx."
She sighed and rolled her eyes, dismissing my refusal. "Stop being such a stick in the mud, Enia."
"I'm not being a stick in the mud!" I spluttered, searching around for support. The others were too busy determining what other kinds of alcohol was in the box. "I'm using common sense!"
"Enia, you've said time and time again that you have no common sense," Onyx pointed out. Unfortunately, she was right.
I folded my arms across my chest. "Then I'm being reasonable."
"You are the least reasonable person I know."
"I'm being logical!"
Onyx smirked. "Logic is illogical and therefore irrelevant."
My eyes bugged out, and I took a deep, offended breath, stuffing my nose in the air. "Don't use my own catchphrase against me!"
Teemo poked his head into the conversation. He had a gleam in his eyes that I wasn't sure I liked the look of. "Come on, Enia. It'll be fun."
And he was supposed to be the adult. I glared at him. "Oh no, I've seen the chaos that happens when you get into the Duice."
Teemo withdrew, pouting. He had about three bottles of booze hidden under his shirt where he probably hoped Arin wouldn't see them. Suddenly, William pushed Minka away from the box so that he could approach Onyx and me. Minka hissed at him, but he didn't seem to notice. William puffed out his chest and raised a fist into the air. "I doth challenge Samik Brekin to a drinking contest for the hand of Enia Silverson!"
Where the fuck was a wall that I could bang my head on repeatedly? And where was a nice, sharp knife that I could use to gouge out William's heart so I could stuff it down his ever-open throat? My eyes narrowed into slits as my fists clenched. There was a vein throbbing in my neck. I was getting so damn tired of Samik/William drama. The Puppy-Boy just needed to accept the fact that I hated him and that I would never leave Samik for anyone. He needed to get the fuck over his childish grudge and grow up. Because if he didn't, I was going to beat the lesson into him.
"I accept," Samik said quietly.
Time stopped. I snapped my head around to stare at him in shock, mouth dropping open. It felt like the world had just ripped open. "What?"
"I said I accept," Samik repeated.
Arin and I continued to stare at him in equal shock, and Zeus gasped dramatically (as the situation called for). Teemo whooped excitedly and pounded Samik on the back, narrowly avoiding smacking Onyx in the face as she moved to the create and began to pull out all the bottles of booze. From across the group, David jeered loudly, telling Samik he was going to get his ass whupped. Beside him, William cracked his knuckles threateningly. Minka was the only calm one. She just regarded us all with an amused expression on her face.
I grabbed Samik's arm and dragged him away from the group, not sure if I wanted to make out with him for being amazing or punch him for being stupid. "What are you doing?"
"Challenging William to a drinking contest, I think." He shrugged. Holy Gods, I really wanted to make out with him. I shoved the urge back down. It really wasn't the time for that sort of thing.
"You don't have to do this," I told him.
'I know." He squeezed my hand gently. "But maybe it'll get him off our backs."
"And if you lose? What then?" I hissed, digging my fingernails into his palm.
"Then you can punch him in the face, and we'll throw him out the window." Samik grimaced slightly and carefully extracted his hand from mine. There were four angry, red crescent marks dug into his skin. "But I don't think I'll lose. Remember when we took all that sugar?"
That. I shuddered to remember that. I couldn't believe that it had only been two days ago. Everyone in the group had been as high as a kite. Well, everyone but Samik. Somehow, he had been unaffected by the intense effects of the sugar. He had some kind of freaky tolerance, but I didn't know if we could be sure that same tolerance would extend to alcohol.
I voiced the question out loud.
Samik laughed and reached out to tousle my hair, but I snarled and snapped at him with my teeth. "Don't be such a worry wart. Come on, everyone's waiting."
Without another word, he turned and walked back towards the crate, his hands stuck in his pockets, forcing me to follow. "This is a bad idea, Samik," Arin said automatically, stepping forward to intercept him.
"It'll be fine," he promised, giving her his winning smile.
"This can only end badly," she warned him seriously, but no one seemed inclined to listen.
Teemo snuck up behind Arin and wrapped her in a bear hug, trapping her arms at her sides. "You're not going to be a buzz-kill, are you, Arin? Because if you are, you're going to have to go back in the elevator."
She struggled and twisted against him. "Teemo! You're supposed to be on my side!"
I watched Teemo drag Arin back towards the elevator. She wailed on his shins with her heels, attempting to stomp on his feet or trip him up, but Teemo danced easily through the barrage. Her orange braids bounced through the air as she shook her head fiercely, smacking Teemo over and over again in the face. He simply ignored it, grinning. He man-handled her into the elevator and sat her down in the chair. "This will end badly for him," I commented, watching as Arin attempted to lunge out of her seat. Teemo caught her easily and began looping the coils of rope around her, binding her to the chair.
"Yeah. She'll kill him when she gets free," Samik agreed.
Teemo finished tying his wife up in the elevator and stepped back into the library, turning to blow Arin a kiss. "You'll regret this when everything goes to shit and I'm not there to save your asses!" she shrieked just before the doors dinged shut.
Her words would prove to be strangely prophetic.
Five minutes later, the scene was set. Onyx had dragged one of the wooden reading tables from the library out in front of the Customer Service desk, and Teemo had brought over two padded chairs, setting them up on either side of the table. Then Onyx had placed two bottles of booze in the center, both Grey Goose Vodka. David had wandered off to find cups and had returned with two of those dinky, paper, little-kid-snack-time cups. They had characters from the Lion King on them. I had set up the spectator chairs in a semi-circle around the table, but I suspected they would end up discarded before the first five shots were done.
And the players were ready. Samik and I stood on one side, my hand on his shoulder as I whispered a pep talk into his ear. David and William were on the other side of the table, and I could vaguely hear David assuring William that he was going to "kick Samik's ass". I snorted quietly, fighting back the urge to fire off a rebuke. The Puppy-Boy was going down.
Teemo leapt lithely up onto the table, making the bottles rattle slightly. "Contestants!" he boomed into his curled fist. "Take your seats!"
"Let's go William!" David yelled as William flopped down into his chair.
"You got this, Samik," I added as he slid lightly into his seat.
"Onyx and Minka, if you would pour the first shots," Teemo continued. My two friends moved forward and filled the paper Lion King cups to the brim as I returned to my spectator seat. "Prepare thinselves, contestants," Teemo ordered dramatically. They wrapped their hands around the cups, trying not to squeeze so hard that the alcohol would slosh out across the table. William glared at Samik, but my one-and-only grinned back. Teemo slid his narrowed eyes to each of them in turn.
"Three…two…one…DRINK!"
The fighters knocked back the shots simultaneously. William swallowed the liquid expressionlessly, seeming to relish in the burn, but Samik grimaced and stuck his tongue out. "Man, that's gross. Why do people drink this stuff?"
"Because it gets them really drunk, really fast," I answered.
"Want to pull out, Tree-Hugger?" William asked, smirking maliciously.
"You wish, Puppy-Boy," Samik replied, his voice cool and icy.
The smirk dropped of the werewolf's face like butter sliding around in a pan. "Why you little-!"
"Another shot!" Teemo yelled, skillfully interrupting the budding argument. Onyx and Minka moved in to refill the cups. The contestants drank their second shots with out a single facial twitch. And the competition was on.
Ten shots later…
"You don't stand a chance!" William cried. His face was starting to turn a little red, especially around his eyes and nose. Samik said nothing.
Ten more shots later…
"Ya! I got dis!" William words were started to sound more than a little slurred. Samik rolled his eyes and winked at me.
Eight shots later…
"I wuuuuuuuuv you, Enia! And you're gonna wuuuuuuuv me after this!" the idiot werewolf slurred. I dropped my head into my palms. He had turned delusional!
The bottom of the bottle…
"Break open a second bottle!" Teemo called. Onyx brought it forward like a crown on a silk pillow, cracked it open, and refilled the soggy cups.
"Woo!" William yelled, raising his arms clumsily into the air, succeeding only in smacking himself across the face. David groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose as Samik yawned and checked his imaginary watch.
"Drink!" Teemo commanded.
And they drank.
Thirty shots later…
"This is ridiculous," I whispered to Onyx.
"But highly amusing," she replied. William mumbled something about making me love him and turning me into a lycanthrope. She giggled behind her hand.
"He's going to fry his liver pretty soon," I predicted.
"Most certainly." She cocked an eyebrow at me. "How the hell is Samik still so unaffected?"
I shrugged. "I have no idea. But it's kinda scaring me and also kind of turning me on."
Nine shots later.
William belched loudly and blinked heavily, gripping the table with white knuckles. Samik leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up, holding out his slowly disintegrating cup. "Hit me," he said calmly. I whooped and pumped my fist in the air.
The one hundredth shot marked the end of the third bottle…
William finished his last shot with difficulty, his throat working hard to force it down. His cheeks bugged out, and he closed his eyes. A long moment passed. "I give," he gasped finally before dashing from his chair to go throw up out the window. I shrieked with delight and tackled Samik, sending him crashing to the floor. His fifth paper cup disintegrated into a pulpy pile of mush in his hand.
"Celebratory shots all around!" Teemo yelled, opening another bottle and taking a large swig. He smacked his lips thoughtfully. "I still prefer Duice." He passed the bottle around, and everyone took a sip, except for David who mumbled something unintelligible and went off to find Wiliam. Zeus shook her head no.
Then the bottle came to where I sat on the floor in between Samik's legs. I took a careful sniff and grimaced. "Take a drink!" Teemo presed.
"I don't know," I murmured. I wasn't against drinking; I just didn't do it a lot. I'd never tried hard liquor before, and mostly, I just drank hard cider which had a load of sugar in it.
"Do it!" Onyx ordered.
"Stop peer pressuring me!" I cried, half joking. I took a small sip and almost immediately spat it out again. The vodka tasted like burned plastic, and it seared my throat. "Jesus Christ on a shit stick! How did you stand it, Samik?"
He shrugged nonchalantly. "I stopped tasting it after about the fifth shot."
"Does anyone have any pot?" I asked hopefully. Booze made me sleepy, but pot hyped me up.
"Sorry," Onyx replied. "No pot."
"Damn," I sighed and reluctantly took a larger gulp from the bottle before passing it on.
"I'm going to find the sugar," Zeus decided. "Alcohol is nasty."
#
The party began in earnest. Teemo proved himself to be a lightweight, quickly succumbing to the alcohol. Soon, he was yelling and prancing around and literally bouncing off the walls. Onyx started giggling uncontrollably, her face bright red as she sat cross-legged on the floor. Minka drifted off into her own world, smiling dreamily to herself and banging her feet on the desk she was sitting on. Whenever someone wandered past her, she would reach out and grab their arm in order to pull them close and tell them something really important. I grew more and more talkative with each pull of booze, and Samik didn't change, though he also didn't drink anymore. David and William didn't reappear.
Someone cranked up the music until it made the windowpanes shake and our heads buzz. Everyone started to sing along giddily and in very off-key voices, though no one seemed to know any of the words. "Let's go downstairs!" Teemo suggested, hiccupping and burping at the same time.
No one thought to disagree. Probably because nobody but Samik had any facilities left with which to think. Faces were starting to blur into round disks before my eyes, and I couldn't figure out where the floor was. We cheered heartily and paraded down the stairs, tripping over our feet. It was a wonder I didn't fall and take everyone down with me. I was pretty sure Samik was holding onto my elbow to keep me steady, but I couldn't really tell because I couldn't actually feel my elbow.
"I'm a birdie!" Teemo yelled. Flames were flickering up and down his arms, and each step he took left cracks in the floor.
"No, I'm the birdie!" Zeus argued, transforming into her silver hawk form and taking to the air.
Everyone oohed and aahed. The lights pouring down from upstairs reflected off her feathers and danced across the ceiling, sparkling over everything. There were two hawks in the air, moving in perfect tandem. I clapped my hands and laughed, pointing them out to Samik with a shaking finger. It looked like he had spiders on his face as he smiled at me.
"No fair!" Teemo shouted and flung out his arm…
His powers reared their brutal heads, his control over them weakened by the alcohol. A fireball burst from his hand and punched straight through our barricade of shelves against the library door, shattering the glass. It razed a hole through the horde clustered right outside the building and disappeared into the night. The merriment ceased instantly. I froze in place and stared uncomprehendingly at the new entrance into our fortress. Already, dark, misshapen figures were pushing through the rubble and staggering towards us, some of them slipping on the hot rocks and falling to the ground to be trampled by the others. Somewhere in the back of my head, I noticed dimly that the sky was still blue.
The moaning quickly overpowered the blasting music. The contorting lights illuminated the rotting faces briefly then flashed away, leaving spots of color burning on my retinas. It was like being inside of a fucked-up fun house, and my addled brain knew that we should do something about the giant hole in the wall, but I seemed to have lost control of my limbs. I was floating somewhere, and it wasn't in my body.
"Opps…" I heard Teemo mutter.
The first ranks of the army were fully inside the library, their stench penetrating straight through my muddy senses. Instantly, every bit of booze in my stomach threatened to surge up and out of my throat, but I clamped down on it hard, falling to my knees, head whirling. I heard someone throw up nearby, and it almost undid me, but I wrapped both hands around my mouth and held on for dear life. "Get up, Enia!" Samik yelled, dragging me roughly back to my feet. My knees wobbled dangerously, and I clung to him for support.
I couldn't see him through the blur of tears in my eyes, but I could feel his solid warmth, and that was comforting enough. "I think you should go get Arin now," I whispered in his ear.
He nodded and swiftly disappeared, leaving me standing there swaying. The whole world was spinning. I couldn't tell what was up and what was down. The munchers' dimensions looked distorted, and their distance from me swelled and diminished with every beat of my heart. Two of them were stumbling towards Teemo, but they were identical, and I couldn't figure out which one was real. They would be on him at any second. I sent a desperate wheel of fire at the munchers – it wobbled like an uneven hoop – but it slashed straight though an arm without leaving a mark. Teemo stumbled back, running into an empty bookshelf.
A flash of movement tore my attention away from Teemo's predicament. There were two pairs of shifting, curving twins lurching towards me. I didn't know which of them were real, and I didn't know how close they were. I didn't know anything at all. I just knew with a sudden, panicked certainty that I was about to die.
"G-get away," I ordered, voice cracking, as I started to stagger away from them.
One of the munchers lunged forward, suddenly much closer than it had been before. Cold fingers scratched along my cheek. I shrieked and threw myself backwards. Too close! Too fucking close! My calves struck something lying on the floor, and I lost my balance, falling and striking my head hard on the thinly carpeted concrete. My vision swam, turning the munchers into featureless blobs.
I scrambled backwards frantically. I still couldn't see properly, and suddenly, my back struck something hard and covered with ridges. It took me too long to figure out that it was a bookshelf. I shook my head swiftly, and the world shimmered into focus for a moment. The munchers were only a few feet away and closing fast.
I placed my hand on the floor beside me and swept it up and across my body, encasing myself in a cocoon of earth. It was as weak as my concentration and even flimsier than my resolve. It wouldn't last long.
Shitshitshitshitshit. I couldn't think anything else. There was no room for other words or other thoughts, no place for a plan to come to. The first dead fist struck my protective shell. The rock shuddered. More hammering fists joined the first. My head throbbed with each uneven beat. Dust rained down on me.
The first pinprick of light fell onto my eye, accompanied by a shower of tiny pebbles, but it was immediately covered up again by the pounding of an undead palm. The light reappeared, disappeared, reappeared, again and again and again, stabbing into my skull each time it came, leaving blinking, flashing lights every time it left. With each concussive thud, the cracks around the tiny hole grew. My eyes began to water in a vain attempt to ward off the dust settling on them.
The white noise of my panic blocked everything else out. I should fix it but I can't I can't I can't make myself move I can't do it I'm terrified I'm dead oh gods I'm dead my luck has run out I'm going to be devoured oh gods I don't want to be devoured someone save me please help me help me oh shitohshitohshit
Then the only thing between me and the dead – my death – broke.
Somehow, I managed to fling my arms up as the bag of cold, dead, decaying skin fell on top of me, catching it in its chest. The muncher's clothing crumbled to bits beneath my fingers and drifted down to land on my cheeks as its deformed face leered and snapped, bloody drips swinging from its teeth. The cords in its neck bulged as it strained for me. There were tears welling in my eyes, uncontrollable, distorting the face of the muncher into a grey blur.
Something grabbed my ankle, cold and dry.
I shrieked, burning my vocal chords, and lashed out with my other foot. My grip slipped from the muncher's chest, and it collapsed towards me, but my luck held for one last second, and my forearms got lodged in its throat. Its face was only inches from my own, but I couldn't tell what it looked like. Couldn't see the raw, black gashes running down its cheek. Couldn't see the missing nose, or the filmy yellow sclera. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to will the terror away or force into a tiny box deep inside me where it wouldn't be able to bother me. The cold hand tugged aggressively at my flailing foot, wanting to force it to stay still long enough to be bitten, eaten, devoured.
I'm dead, I thought. I'm really properly dead. "HELP!" I screamed, voice cracking in my charred throat, as my strength began to give out. My arms shook, and each tremor brought the muncher millimeters closer to my face. My flailing leg slowed, weaker and weaker with each passing moment. Any second now. At any second, I was going to feel jagged teeth tear through my skin and slice through my muscle, straight down to my pearly white bones. I could already feel the looming phantom of the searing pain.
Suddenly, miraculously, the weight was torn from my arms, and I could hear loud, wet ripping noises. Next, the cold hand disappeared from around my ankle, yanked away so hard it almost tore my foot off. I opened my eyes, cracking one open and then the next, then carefully sat up, my entire body trembling. The room was filled with brilliantly lit dust, but I could see someone nearby, panting heavily as he stood over two dismembered corpses. Unable to believe I wasn't dead, I flung myself at my savoir and wrapped my arms around my neck. "Oh thank the fucking gods, Samik! Thank you, thank you, thank you!"
"Uh…" William said the instant before I kissed him on the cheek.
I froze, mortification sliding down my spine, and shoved him away as quick as I could as if he were made of lava. We stood across from each other awkwardly for a few moments, each staring at anything besides the other. "Uh…thanks," I said finally. I owed him that much at least.
"No problem," he muttered and rubbed at the back of his head.
"Enia!" Samik yelled, and I spun around. He was running frantically towards me through the dust and the smoke, leaping the motionless corpses. I saw out of the corner of my eye that the hole in the building had been filled in with a wall of rock. Samik skirted around William without sparing him a glance and swept me up into a tight hug, crushing the air from my lungs. I wrapped my arms around him in return and let my body melt into his, closing my eyes and trying to shut out the world. "Are you alright?" he demanded.
"I'm fine," I answered, my voice muffled by his shirt. I took a deep breath and shoved the tears back down into their ravine.
He broke the hug and held me at arm's length, staring deep into my face. "Are you sure?"
"Of course." I forced my lips to quirk up into a smile and finally slammed the lock on the roiling feelings of terror and nausea inside of me. "That would have been a sucky way to die on Christmas Eve."
Samik frowned. "Don't joke about this, Enia."
I grinned more convincingly, shoving a hand through my hair to make sure it was still standing up in its trademark spike. "I'm fine, really. I think I'm just going to head upstairs and find a restroom. I suddenly have an extreme need to pee."
He nodded his assent and touched my cheek gently, though I could tell he wasn't convinced by my act. I'd never been able to truly pull the wool over his eyes. But he didn't push it. "Okay, go ahead. We'll clean up down here."
"Thanks." I walked away before my dam broke, picking my way carefully through the ruined bodies, I could hear Samik and the werewolf talking behind me, though they spoke quietly.
"Thank you," Samik said to William. "For saving her."
"Uh, yeah, sure," the other boy answered. "Is she really okay?"
I imagined Samik shaking his head. "No. I don't think anyone would be okay after that, but Enia's not going to tell us if she isn't okay. She doesn't like sappy feelings or things like fear. I've never been able to figure out if it's just because she doesn't like dealing with them, or if it's because she thinks they make her seem weak." He paused, heaving a sigh. "She'll only ever show happiness or anger. She buries everything else and won't talk about it. She prefers to make jokes about those other feelings, and since she jokes about everything, it's hard to tell what she's actually feeling. So no, she's not okay."
"And you're just going to let her walk away?"
"The more you press her, the more she'll clam up. I think she'd prefer to be alone right now."
I did want to be alone. I didn't want to deal with the questions or with people trying to comfort me. I just needed time to regain control. I passed Teemo and Arin on my way to the stairs, but Teemo was too drunk and Arin was too busy glaring at him to notice me. "Come here," she snapped. "I'm going to cure you of your stupid drunkenness."
I realized that my own buzz was completely gone. Utter terror would do that to you.
"Glory halle-glue-yah!" Teemo cheered. There was a loud, wet thwack as Arin smacked him upside the head with a curl of water. "OW!" he yelped indignantly. "That was harder than it needed to be!"
I allowed a small smile to show as I crossed the second floor of the library and let myself into one of the offices. I closed the door behind me, curled up under one of the desks, shut my eyes, and started to shake.
Enia: And that, Dearest Readers, is why blackout drunkenness is bad during a zombie apocalypse. And you thought this story was never going to teach you any life lessons. This will probably be the only chapter with one. And I do realize that the amount of alcohol Samik and William consumed was totally unreasonable. Their magic powers let them drink that much. Leave a review!