II - Mentally, Physically, and Emotionally Tested
-Six Weeks Later-
Mosquitos buzzed around the prison buses as the heat cracked down at the unlucky passengers. Different buses, same story. Some of the passengers were coming down with an illness, an strange malady as Lisa described.
"It's a large concern," said Dr. White. "People are beginning to question what we're really doing for a cure."
"There's nothing much we can do about it, right? Carol is out getting mushroom, fruits, and herbs. We have to focus on the task at hand."
"People just want to see us do something. They want to see that we care. They want to see if we know what we're doing."
Dr. White looked closer at Lisa. But Lisa didn't want to look at the doctor. She kept her eyes on the test tube filled with potassium chloride.
"You know something, don't you?" asked Dr. White.
Lisa cleared her throat.
"It seems that this disease comes from a unique strain of malaria but it's something I've never encountered in my life before."
"We shouldn't be quarantining people then, right?" asked Dr. White. "Malaria is not contagious. We should only worry about the damn mosquitoes."
"This one is," said Lisa. "I don't know how, but this strain… it's gotta be influenced by the necrosis influenza. That's the only way I can see it happening."
Dr. White looked at the bus behind their own. Many of the passengers in the other bus refused to leave, so they were now at risk at getting infected by the sick.
"We really can't do much. We don't have to right medicine. Herbs are only going to prolong their suffering. We need medicine and we need it soon."
"I'm back!" said Carol, carrying a bucket of mushrooms and berries. "I got some herbs for tea as well!"
Carol walked inside the bus and headed to the widowed Mrs. Coleman.
"Did Zoey behave?" Carol asked.
"She's a lil' fussy but she's fine. Guess all 'em mosquitoes bites are torturing her."
"Mosquito bites? Gee, I gotta soothe those bites."
Dr. White approached Carol.
"Carol? Lisa and I need to tell you something. Follow us outside."
Carol followed Lisa and Dr. White while carrying Zoey in her arms.
"We need to start taking the risk of going into the big cities," said Dr. White.
"What for?" asked Carol.
"Stockpiles of chloroquine, proguanil, maybe even quinine," said Lisa.
"Quinine? That's used to treat malaria!"
Lisa and Dr. White nodded their heads as they walked back inside the bus. Carol looked down at her baby daughter, staring at the mosquito bites. Her leadership was now tested.
Somewhere in west Massachusetts, Lori, Lincoln, and Luan were gathered around a campfire near a large tent and a hammock on the side. The shade provided great cover from the burning sun and the smoke provided protection against insects.
"That joke knocked him dead!" giggled Luan. "Get it?"
Lincoln sighed before letting out a chuckle. Lori poured the can of beans into Luan's can and Lincoln's can. And she did it with a smile like she was feeling better from a long-lasting ailment.
"Cutting-edge jokes," sighed Luan before giggling again. "I'm sorry– it's becoming a habit."
"It's alright," said Lori. "If dark humor's how you cope in the apocalypse… go for it."
"I mean I already did like dark humor. It's just coming back to me now, ya know?"
Lori placed her spoon inside the can of beans and began to nourish herself. The crackling fire filled the silence– and not an awkward silence– but a peaceful one.
"Think we'll find the others?" asked Lincoln. "I forgot how many days it has been and we haven't seen one sign that someone's been going in this direction."
"It's the only way I know," said Lori. "I wanted to avoid the cities by the coast, so I chose to go to the place that I can't stop having nightmares about."
"Someone had to have gone to Albany," said Lincoln. "Maybe we're ahead of everyone else."
"Regardless, we will find some of the others in D.C. I already stressed how important this mission is… so important that people would give their life for Lisa and Dr. White."
"So we're not going to find everyone," said Luan.
"Not two of our sisters for sure…" murmured Lori.
"Hey, what's that supposed to mean?"
"Luan, you saw–"
"No, I know what I saw. I know she did. But not Lynn! I know you're not talking about Lynn!"
"I mean, Luna was hit by artillery as well," said Lori. "Maybe she couldn't have gone away."
"No, you were talking about Lynn!" said Luan. "Christ, Lori, have some hope! Haley and I went through hell to save her! I know she's alive. She believed in me and I believed in her!"
Lori lowered her can of beans while staring at Luan intensely. Lincoln gulped and stood up, grabbing his MP5.
"That was the last can, right?" he remarked. "Let me go out to hunt. I was taught by– I'll get a rabbit."
"Alright, but we need you hare soon!" chuckled Luan. "Get it?"
Lincoln smiled as he walked out of the range of the light emitted by the campfire. The sunlight continued rising in the sky, providing light through the holes of the wilderness canopy. He looked around, not really trying to hunt a rabbit, but just to have a moment of peace and quiet.
He felt kind of bad, though. He was around his sisters for six whole months while Lori and Luan were captured by Black. And not once did he want a moment of peace and quiet. But now, he hasn't seen his sisters besides Lori and Luan for more than six weeks, yet he feels the need to be alone.
Maybe it's just not the same without Leni and Lynn.
Then, near a burrow in the ground, by a stack of dry leaves and flint, below a crooked branch hanging low, a rabbit chewed on the overgrown grass. Lincoln grabbed his knife and waddled through the small heaps of soil in the ground. He kicked a pebble in one of the soil, scaring away the rabbit.
He groaned as he felt going back on his search for peace and quiet. But then he thought about the last can of beans. He turned around and tracked the rabbit's footsteps, pressing his shoes against the soft soil, suppressing the noise.
After a few minutes, he found the rabbit again, this time chewing on a leaf. Unaware that a boy was approaching behind it, it continued to chew on the leaf. Then, the rabbit once again fled.
Lincoln sighed as he noticed a roamer lurking down the small slope of soil. He placed his knife away, saving it for the rabbit, and grabbed his MP5. He grinned, not being stupid enough to fire the gun at the roamer and scare the rabbit, so he turned the gun around with the stock facing the monster.
He slid down the slope before bumping the roamer's knee, knocking it down. He then lifted his gun and slammed it down on the rotten skull. Not enough, he had to slam it down again. It wasn't enough again. He slammed it over and over until the cracking of the skull turned into a mushing of the brain.
He sighed and rubbed the stock against the soil on the ground. Next, he climbed back up the slope and into the heaps of soil. Then, he spotted another beast, but not of the dead kind.
"Oh, crap," muttered Lincoln. "It's been a while since I've seen one."
The bear turned its head towards Lincoln, crawling out of the shrubs that it was hiding in. It walked closer and closer as Lincoln stood still, keeping a guarded posture. Then, it lunged towards him.
Before he could even let out a yell, the bear knocked him to the ground and growled at him, its saliva flowing down on his shirt. Lincoln panted as he quickly stood up but the bear clawed him in his right thigh, rolling him down the slope.
"Dang," groaned Lincoln, as he lifted his ruffled head up. "No…"
The bear ran down the slope as Lincoln dragged himself back. The bear stood up, raising its claws as Lincoln grabbed the roamer's corpse. As the bear swung down the claws, he mutilated the corpse's left arm off, before clawing on its back. The bear kept mauling the corpse as the rotten blood was slung everywhere.
Lincoln screamed as the bear slashed his forearms, before biting his legs. The bear shook the boy's body as it continued to hold its grip on his leg. On the verge of losing his leg, Lincoln held his knife and stabbed the bear in the nose.
The bear roared as Lincoln pushed his knife deeper. It stood up and shook its head as Lincoln dragged himself behind a tree, the blood from his arm squirting into the soil, leaving behind a trail. But the bear didn't give up yet.
It chased after Lincoln as he tried to sit upright. Then, the bear lunged towards him, mauling his back. Its large claws tore off strips of flesh from his back before he was tossed into the tree.
Lincoln pulled out his knife again and stabbed the bear's right paw, causing it roar even louder. The bear then lunged towards the boy's neck before he pulled out his MP5. He pressed on the trigger and did not let go as the blood blasted off from the bear's body. Its roar turned into a desperate cry before collapsing to the ground, inches away from his body.
Lying against the tree, his clothes ripped apart, and blood spilling out of him, Lincoln dropped his gun and cried in agonizing pain as he turned pale. Tears flowed out of his eyes as they turned blurry, before he blacked out.
"Lincoln!" yelled Luan.
Panting and grunting, both Loud sisters ran across the woods and through the heaps of soil, bruising their feet little by little. They stopped by the slope of soil and slid down the slope, finding a destroyed corpse and a bear carcass next to a tree. Then, they found Lincoln lying against it, his face looking down.
"Oh my god!" gasped Luan.
Both girls ran up to Lincoln and lifted his head up, finding him unconscious. His body remained intact– at least his bones were– but pieces of his skin were ripped apart.
"Go back to camp and get the hammock!" yelled Lori. "I'll treat him right now! Go!"
Luan ran back to camp as Lori removed her backpack. She took out a white rag and patted it across her little brother's face.
"Jesus," she whimpered. "Please be okay. Please be okay."
She looked at the bear in the ground once again before turning to the MP5 on Lincoln's arms.
"You literally fought off a bear? Oh god... "
Lori dropped the red-stained rag and took out clothes from local stores. She wiped off blood from Lincoln's forearms, wrists, and legs. Then, she took out large strips of bandages and wrapped them on each wounded area. However, noticing that she was running out, she decided to use Lincoln's ripped shirt to wrap his leg with.
She pulled him away from the tree, when she noticed the blood stain left on the bark. She looked at Lincoln's back, gasping at the large claw marks that deepened into his flesh and the small streaks that would scar around it.
Lori choked back tears as she used the remaining bandages to cover the wounds. She looked back at the roamer corpse in the ground, bursting into small and silent tears, realizing how mauled Lincoln would've been if the corpse wasn't there.
Suddenly, Lori heard a low growl. She turned around and swung her hatchet at the roamer's neck, before removing it and swinging it down its skull.
"More roamers. Great…"
Lori stood up and prepared to fight off the other roamers as she found more of the infected monsters surrounding her.
Then, a sword pierced through a roamer's face before being pulled out. Luan held the mesh hammock wrapped up under her arm while holding her katana on the other. She sliced another roamer and another as she made her way to her siblings.
Lori held a steady pace towards a roamer before taking it out with a hard swing. Then her wrist turned as fast as her arm as the hatchet killed another roamer. Now her brother was safe from the infected.
Luan placed the katana back in her sheath and let loose the hammock. Lori picked up her backpack and placed Lincoln's MP5 in there before zipping it closed.
"Pick up his legs!" exclaimed Lori. "I got his arms!"
She and Luan picked up Lincoln and lowered him softly into the hammock. Then, Lori grabbed one side of the hammock while Luan grabbed the other. As they began to climb up the slope, the growls of the roamers grew louder in the distance as they followed their decayed senses. By the time they stumbled upon the slope, the Lori, Luan, and Lincoln were long gone back at camp. They ignored the slope and decided to go for the bear.
Dozens of miles away, though still in west Massachusetts, Luna began playing the notes to "Hello" by Evanescence on a keyboard. She looked outside into the city of Springfield, recalling what just occurred moments ago while also thinking about the events in Houlton.
"Playground school bell rings again..."
Gunfire went off as Luna, Sam, and Kotaro fought their way through a street filled with roamers. Kotaro led the group through an alley as the roamers kept on them.
"Rain clouds come to play again..."
Kotaro turned around and fired at the roamers as Luna and Sam hopped over a fence. As he ran out of ammo, he placed the gun on his back and leaped over the fence.
"Has no one told you she's not breathing?"
Luna hesitated to shoot a roamer in front of her. Instead, she turned her rifle around and smacked the roamer to the ground before stomping it with her boots.
"Hello, I am your mind giving you someone to talk to… hello…"
Kotaro and Sam slammed against the door to a building. Cold sweats broke as Luna aimed her rifle at the approaching roamers. She couldn't pull the trigger. Then, suddenly, Sam pulled her inside the building. The group looked ahead and found the roamers that they would have to face off.
"If I smile and don't believe…"
Luna beat the roamers in the side with her crowbar as Kotaro swung his wrench around and Sam stabbed the roamers with her ice pick.
"Soon I know I'll wake from this dream…"
The trio moved around the room– which they found out was a music store– and took out all the roamers inside. Sam ran to the entrance of the store and shut the door.
"Don't try to fix me, I'm not broken..."
Kotaro told the group that he would try to siphon more gas from cars a few blocks away, so he needed the girls to distract the roamers.
"Hello, I'm the lie living for you so you can hide… don't cry…"
Luna grabbed a keyboard and carried it upstairs. Sam looked around the store, searching for whatever supplies they could loot. Luna turned on the keyboard, noticing that the batteries still had a lot of juice to them. So she smashed a window open, and sat down on the floor with the keyboard on her lap.
"Suddenly I know I'm not sleeping…"
Kotaro ran out the building with the siphoning hose in his hand and a jerry can on the other. Luna began to tap on the note, bringing her back to the present.
"Hello, I'm still here…"
Luna cried as she continued to sing the song. The roamers surrounded the building and the somber notes only attracted more of them.
"All that's left of yesterday."
Sam snuck into the room, wiping off the sweat from her face before realizing that some of it were tears. Luna whimpered, being able to barely finish the song. Sam walked and sat next to her before her girlfriend lied her head onto her lap.
"I feel nothing but negativity inside me," said Luna. "Am I fucked up for asking this?"
"Asking for what?" said Sam.
"I want to do it with you," said Luna. "You're going to be my first time… anything to feel happy for a second."
Sam blushed slightly as she looked away.
"You're not fucked up for thinking that… I-I've been wanting it a long time but… are you sure now's the right time?"
"When is it ever the right time?" asked Luna. "And I mean, I love you, so… I want you to be happy…"
Sam gulped and looked into her glossy eyes. Luna closed them before standing up and softly placing her lips on Sam's. Then, Sam closed her eyes and placed her arms back on the floor as Luna placed herself on top of her. She released her lips from Luna's to find her removing her shirt.
Sam gasped with a rosy blush on her cheeks, as she slowly removed her shirt as well. Then, Luna unbuckled her belt and lowered her pants as she quickly slid her hands in between her legs. She gasped softly as Luna moved her own fingers and stimulated her. Then, Luna once again placed her own lips against Sam's and lowered her underwear. She pushed her fingers in, letting a soft moan from Sam out.
Kotaro walked along the street with the jerry can in his hands. He walked towards the building and found that the roamers were still moving towards it but no song was being sung by Luna. Not a musical one, at least. He looked into his binoculars and saw the two girls, sweaty and nude.
"Jesus," he muttered as he grabbed his walkie-talkie. "Girls, I can see you two from here. Quit screwing around and let's get the hell out of this place."
"Oh shit," panted Sam as she grabbed her walkie-talkie. "We'll be at the car in a couple minutes! I'm so sorry, you had to see that!"
"Ugh, just put some clothes on. Good lord, you two are going to stink up the car."
"Alright, just go."
Kotaro sighed. It was going to be a very awkward car ride to Albany.