(I DO NOT own The Walking Dead, Code Lyoko, or any of the names or brands that appear in this story. But I do own all OCs featured here unless stated otherwise.)
Hours went by after they saw the horrifically violent end of that poor woman on the road. The teens... none of them spoke a word since then.
As the sun started to set, the six Lyoko Warriors decided to stop somewhere to rest for a little while, especially so for William and his injured ankle. They settled on doing so inside the two-story main library of whatever town they had found themselves in...
The library was ransacked but seemed completely deserted of people - infected or otherwise. The group made their way to the second floor of the library and set themselves up in a small reading area with couches and tables by one of the front windows. That way they'd be able to monitor anything in that direction just like how they did back at the house.
The second floor of the library wasn't a full floor. It wrapped around each side of the building with wooden balcony railings and in the center of the building there was a huge open area. A single flight of stairs were on the left side of the room as you entered. To the teens, the library seemed like a good spot to hold up for a night or two.
After triple-checking the building just to be certain there was none of the 'walking corpses' inside, the group allowed themselves to let their guard down.
The group settled in where they were. Yumi set up the looted emergency radio and light they took from that house, and although she was able to turn the light back on, she wasn't able to get a signal on any radio stations with the emergency radio. In annoyance, she put the thing back in her bag for now.
William hissed in discomfort and pain as Ulrich and Odd set him down on one of the couches, using a cushion from another to prop his injured ankle up a bit. It helped, but it still really hurt whenever he tried to move it...
"I saw that there's a pharmacy a few buildings down the street," Ulrich explained, "I'm gonna go there real quick and see if I can scrounge up anything for William's ankle. And for Kiwi's leg too if there's anything for dogs there..."
"I'll go with you..." Yumi told him, not intending to let her boyfriend out of her sight in a situation as dangerous as this. Ulrich nodded at the offer.
William shook his head and tried to sit up, "Guys, you don't need to-"
The teen didn't finish his sentence. As he tried to upright himself, he accidentally bumped his ankle against a table lamp and knocked it over. The sound of the lamp breaking on the wood floor wasn't what made everyone subsequently jump, it was the simultaneous loud groan of pain that escaped William's lips.
Jeremie hurried over to William and laid him back down on the couch again. The injured teen was too much in pain to dare object.
"William, just shut up and lay down for a while." Yumi chastised her former love interest, "Ulrich and I will be back soon with anything we can find..."
Still cringing with pain, William could only bring himself to nod as he settled in on the couch. The less he moved, the better...
Odd, who had been looking through the windows for any signs of walkers, turned to look at the couple in surprise from their idea.
"You're going to go rob a pharmacy?" the cone-haired teen asked.
Ulrich nodded. "Yep..." he said, "I think it's reasonable given the circumstances..."
"It's not any different than us staying in that house last night and borrowing their radio..." Yumi said, providing some sound reasoning.
Convinced, Odd didn't press the issue any further, and neither William, Jeremie, or Aelita disagreed to begin with. Desperate times called for desperate measures and all that, even including robbery. He just hoped the pharmacy owner would understand.
Soon enough, Yumi and Ulrich had gone back downstairs and out the front doors in the direction of the pharmacy down the street. They'd head there and back with whatever they could find to help William's ankle and help him bear with the pain, and to do the same for Kiwi. Should be quick if they were lucky...
After Ulrich and Yumi left, the remaining four teens settled in. Odd continued to keep watch at the window, and William tried his best to rest on the couch.
Nearby, Jeremie could see Aelita sitting against a bookshelf, her legs hugged against her chest as she blankly stared down at the floor in front of her. The haunting last few moments of that poor woman on the road was still troubling her so deeply...
Jeremie approached his girlfriend. Aelita briefly looked up at him, but quickly averted her gaze again...
"... Aelita?" the supergenius asked.
"... I don't wanna talk about it." was all that the pinkette said. Or, rather, all she could say.
Jeremie understood. He didn't try to press the subject any further on Aelita. She just needed some time to process things... they all did...
As Jeremie returned to one of the other couches to sit and think on things, Odd backed away from the window and returned to his dog who he found curled up against William's couch.
Kiwi was a mess by this point. His whole body trembled from the pain which wouldn't stop radiating from the leg. His leg hurt so badly that he couldn't even put any weight on anymore. The poor pup endlessly whimpered to himself...
Seeing his dog in a state like this only brought more heartache upon Odd, so he sat next to Kiwi and gently petted his back in an effort to at least comfort him a little. He felt so much disgust toward himself in not being able to help him more...
He could only hope Ulrich and Yumi would find anything which could help Kiwi...
Ulrich and Yumi carefully hurried down the street as soon as they left the front doors of the library. They saw no 'walking corpses' out here, but they didn't dare risk growing complacent. They didn't dare take any risks after everything that's happened so far.
The couple carefully approached the front doors of the store, finding that they had already been broken open. Broken glass was everywhere so they carefully crouched and went through the broken-open glass paneling of the door.
The interior of the pharmacy wasn't much better. Shelves were laying on the ground, products - whether destroyed, damaged, and pristine - were scattered all over the floors. The two teens even noticed a dried pool of blood on some of the ceramic tile near the cash registers.
Naturally, this tensed them up more than they already were.
"Be extremely careful..." Yumi reminded her boyfriend. "We don't know who or what is in this place..."
Ulrich gave a simple silent nod in response before he and Yumi continued deeper into the pharmacy.
The couple kept themselves calm as they made their way to the first-aid aisle and looked around for anything which remained. They could already see that there wasn't much which, but hopefully there was at least enough left for William and Kiwi...
Grabbing some discarded shopping baskets to carry whatever they'll find, Yumi and Ulrich went down the first-aid aisle and carefully began picking through what was left.
An ankle brace for William... a few vials of antibiotics from a broken first-aid kit... bandages-
*SLAM!*
"AH!!!" Yumi, who was closer to the sudden loud sound, exclaimed as she dropped her basket and fell onto her back from the unexpected shock.
Ulrich instantly dropped his shopping basket and hurried the few feet it took to reach Yumi's side. The teen had an alarmed look on his face.
Before he could ask, Yumi simply held up her hand and gave him a nod.
"I'm fine..." Yumi promised him before the two looked around for the source of the sudden nois-
*SLAM!*
*SNARL!*
The source of the sound was found quickly enough. Ulrich helped Yumi back up to her feet, but neither of the teens broke their gaze from a security gate which was closed down and locked on the pharmacy counter, separating the whole store from the medicines which were in there.
On the other side of that counter, though, was one of the 'walking corpses'.
The creature snarled and slammed its fists against the security gate in a desperate attempt to get a fresh meal, but to no avail. It was only after they calmed down from their moment of surprise that they noticed the 'walking corpse' was wearing what looked like an employee uniform...
Yumi and Ulrich watched for a long moment as the creature desperately kept trying to reach them. It didn't seem to tire one bit...
The two were disturbed by the sight of the 'walking corpse' hitting the metal gate so hard that it was injuring its own hands. Darkened blood soon dripped from its skin, and it didn't take long before both of its hands were covered in a layer of the blood...
... this creature truly wanted them dead. Could it even feel the pain it was causing to itself ...?
The 'walking corpse' snarled even louder than before. The two saw it was wearing a nametag - "MANAGER - Daniel Mendoza."
Although they had planned on getting in and out of the pharmacy quickly, Ulrich and Yumi found themselves stopping to watch the undead creature's futile attempts to reach them. The two teens were so bewildered by its murderous rage...
"God, just look at that thing..." Ulrich murmured, unable to turn his eyes away from the 'walking corpse'.
Yumi likewise could only stare with wide eyes. She hadn't had an opportunity to actually get close to one of these things without risking her life...
The Japanese teen's eyes suddenly cringed when she saw what most likely ended the manager's life and turned him into this... thing...
"Look..." Yumi pointed toward the creature's neck, "that's what killed him..."
Ulrich noticed what she meant. There was a deep blood-covered bite on the creature's neck, right above its collarbone. The poor guy never had a chance...
The sight of such a fatal wound, and the sight of the creature caused by it, only motivated the two teens ever more to avoid this fate at all costs...
Hesitantly, Ulrich took a few steps closer to the security gate to get a closer look at the 'walking corpse' still slamming against it from the other side. The teen suddenly felt a sense of sadness as he looked into the face of the reanimated man...
This used to be a person. A man. Someone who had a life, a job, likes and dislikes... Someone who had a family and friends, just like him and Yumi...
Now... now he was just this... a monster...
Ulrich's face fell as he studied the hostile creature. A question popped into his mind as he did so...
"... do you think that any of him is still in there somewhere?" Ulrich couldn't help but ask.
It took a moment for Yumi to actually register the question. She hadn't thought of that before... and now she couldn't get it out of her mind.
With a soft voice, she responded.
"... do you really want to know the answer to that, Ulrich?" Yumi asked him in complete candor.
"... no," Ulrich admitted after taking a bit to decide, "... no, I, uh... I'd rather not know..."
Yumi nodded in agreement. In the end, it was a question that both agreed should never be answered...
Without another word, Ulrich and Yumi went back to collect their shopping baskets - Yumi having to put a few things back into hers which fell out when she was startled.
As the 'walking corpse' kept snarling and hitting the security gate, Yumi and Ulrich left the pharmacy behind them with all they could carry...
In the library, the four teens simply passed the time in silence until Ulrich and Yumi returned about thirty minutes later.
The couple seemed to have lucked out. The four could see that Ulrich was carrying a shopping basket full of some useful medical supplies - bandages, antiseptics, antibiotics, scissors, a syringe, an ankle stabilizer, some needle and thread, and a couple of bottles of isopropyl-based alcohol were counted among the items they had brought back.
"Jackpot." Ulrich told the others as he set the shopping basket on a table in-between two of the couches.
Odd instantly hurried to the basket to get the things he needed for Kiwi's leg. Jeremie hurried to gather some things for William's ankle.
"Thanks guys..." Odd told the couple with genuine gratitude before hurrying over to Kiwi. Jeremie did the same before hurrying to William.
William hissed as Jeremie used the scissors to cut off the shin of the right leg of his jeans, clearing some room for him to put the ankle stabilizer on his friend. There wasn't any open cuts but Jeremie still went through the effort to clean and disinfect the skin around William's ankle.
"Did you guys run into any trouble?" Jeremie asked without looking away from what he was doing.
"One of those 'walking corpses' was in there," Yumi explained, "but he couldn't get to us since he was behind a security gate. We're both fine."
Jeremie nodded, looking relieved at the answer as much as Odd, Aelita, and William did. All weren't anxious to count any of their friends among the cannibalistic creatures...
Soon, the ankle stabilizer was on, and all William had to do from here on out was rest and heal for a while. The group can scrounge up a wheelchair for him somewhere.
Nearby, Odd approached Kiwi with the syringe, a few glass vials of antibiotics, the needle and thread, and some bandages. He was already dreading what was to come...
Kiwi's wound had to be cleaned, and it looked deep enough to probably need some stitching too. He was going to have to hurt his precious pup to help him...
Seeing what Odd was about to do, Ulrich and Yumi both hurried over to his side to help. Kiwi was going to need to be held down as Odd fixed his injury. The poor pup was deathly afraid of needles and the pain they gave him...
"Make sure not to move him too much... or let him escape..." tears ran down the sides of Odd's face as he gave these instructions to Ulrich and Yumi. He gripped the syringe tighter in his hand as he spoke this. He had never so much as yelled at Kiwi, and now he was going to have to hurt him...
"It'll all be over quickly..." Yumi assured the cone-haired teen. "He'll suffer for longer if we don't fix his cut now..."
Odd didn't reply. He just wanted to focus on this and get it over with...
Kiwi looked up to see Ulrich, Yumi, and his dad approaching him. At first he thought they wanted to pet him or feed him or play with him, but when he saw that sad look in his dad's eyes... he knew that something bad was about to happen.
If his leg wasn't hurt, Kiwi would've sprinted away to safety. But he could barely stand at this point. Before he knew it, Odd had already taken off his collar for the time being. The teen stuffed it in his pocket so he wouldn't lose it.
In desperation, Kiwi looked toward Aelita, then Jeremie, and then William in the hopes that any of them would help him. But all they did was stare at him. They didn't move an inch, not even when he whimpered so loudly in fear...
Why wouldn't they help him...? Had he been a bad dog ...?
The pup was both helpless and terrified as Ulrich and Yumi reached down to hold him in place against the wooden floor all while his dad revealed a syringe. The sight panicked Kiwi as it reminded him of all his terrifying trips to the vet.
Whimpering even louder, Kiwi desperately tried to free himself from the grip of the two teens, but to no avail. He scratched so much against the floor that he left claw marks...
"Make it quick..." he heard Aelita murmur to the three from where she was sitting, "Kiwi shouldn't have to suffer any more than he already has..."
His dad filled the syringe with some liquid from a tiny glass bottle as Ulrich and Yumi held down the pup. Then he approached...
When his dad finally started to press the tip of the syringe into him, Kiwi could only whimper...And his dad could only cry...
It was now very late in the night, hours after the teens arrived at the library. Hours after Odd, Yumi, and Ulrich finished cleaning and treating Kiwi's injury as best they could. The dog was finally asleep and past the horrible event...
Most of the group was asleep. Their first time truly getting any sleep in the last couple of days. They hadn't found any chance to sleep ever since they left their hotel in South Carolina... their time before arriving in Georgia already felt like it was a lifetime ago for all of the teens.
Most of the group was having nightmares. With everything they've seen and everything they've been through, it was to be expected...
In a cold sweat and soft whimpers escaping from his lips, Jeremie dreamt of his mother and father as being some of the 'walking corpses', each begging him to help them.
Yumi, with tears rolling down the sides of her sleeping face, twisted and turned as she dreamt of Hiroki being ripped apart exactly like that doomed woman in the campsite...
A sleeping Ulrich kept muttering to himself, saying things like "please stop" or "no" as he dreamt of being trapped in the pharmacy with the undead manager, eventually being cornered and with no way to save himself from being eaten alive and turned into a 'walking corpse'...
Aelita, dreaming of her parents and her brothers all helplessly being swarmed by the creatures as they cried out to her, was close to hyperventilating in her sleep.
Odd's whole body trembled in horror as he dreamt of the napalm burning people alive on the highway... their endless screams and the stench of their burning flesh...
William was different. Unlike all of his friends tonight, he simply couldn't sleep. He tried for a number of hours and in the end he just gave up. His bout of insomnia was mercy compared to what the others were going through right now...
With a lot on his mind, the injured teen had dragged himself up off the couch and hobbled his way to a row of bookshelves in search of a place in the library that was dark and quiet. Somewhere where he could think and, more importantly... be alone for the moment.
Being careful with his ankle, William hobbled to the "Non-Fiction" section of the library and allowed himself to collapse to the floor. He rested his back against a book shelf and enjoyed the slight cozy feel of being between two shelves in the middle of a long row of them.
William sat in silence as he dwelled on all that has happened so far. Including the likelihood... the certainty... that his family and most of his friends were gone...
The injured moody teen tried his hardest to keep it all in. To not let his grief overtake him like a torrent. If he did... it would drown him.
He had to just keep it all in... just keep it in...
Just...
Keep...
It...
...
...
... oh god.
Tears fell down the sides of William's face as he was unable to hold it in anymore. The normally-stoic teen was brought down to a mess of choked sobs within moments.
His parents... his friends... his home...
All of it was gone forever... Maybe because of XANA, maybe not... but still gone regardless.
William buried his face in his hands and tried to keep himself as quiet as he could, not wanting to wake up his friends.
He was right - he was drowning.
XANA had captured him for a long time. Over a year. Over a year of his life was wasted being trapped inside Lyoko and doing the evil bidding of that damned virus each and every day...
Sometimes he was even forced into fighting his friends... even almost killing some of them...
But after he was finally freed, William wanted to make up for lost time with his parents... he didn't get nearly enough by the time this outbreak happened.
And now he would never see them again...
"... William ...?"
William looked up to see Yumi was standing near. Her face was tired from her horrible nightmare, but it was also marked with concern and shock. The latter feelings made it a rare look of Yumi Ishiyama from his point of view. He wasn't used to seeing her worried...
Sniffling, William wiped away his tears with his shirt sleeve and looked away from the girl. He didn't want anyone - especially her - to see him like this...
"... what do you want ...?" the boy murmured.
"I had a nightmare... I woke up and I saw you make your way here." Yumi explained with a gentle tone, "I figured that I should probably check on you..."
William didn't respond to that, nor did he turn to look back at Yumi. He... wasn't comfortable expressing himself when he was like this... showing himself like this...
Yumi approached the boy and she sat down on the opposite side of the book aisle directly across from him. William still didn't look at her.
For a while, neither of the teens said a word to each other, though Yumi didn't leave and William didn't ask her to.
Eventually, Yumi broke the silence.
"... you know you're not alone, right?" she murmured. She didn't think herself that good at helping people open up, but she wanted to try for William's sake...
"..."
Yumi's face fell at the lack of any response. Silence wasn't good...
"William..." Yumi tried once again, "you don't know for certain that your parents are gone..." she told him, "Maybe things in Glasgow are better than what the news-"
"They're gone, Yumi." William interrupted her. "My parents, yours - all of our parents are either dead or they've joined the 'walking corpses' out there."
Now it was the Japanese teen's turn to go silent. She herself was struggling just like how William was...
Sensing how his words impacted his friend, William closed his eyes and let out a sigh.
"... I'm sorry," he apologized, "I'm not trying to make everything worse for you than it already is, and I do appreciate what you're trying to do," he explained. "I just... I just..." he couldn't find the words and gave up after a moment.
"I know what you mean, don't worry..." Yumi said with understanding. It took a lot of personal strength on her part to not break down into tears like William has...
The former love interests continued to sit together, neither of them saying a word for what seemed like a long time.
Once again, Yumi broke the silence again after a while.
"Just... promise me that you'll be okay, William?"
William simply looked at Yumi, but soon he relented with a sigh and a nod.
"... I'll try, Yu-"
*CRASH!*
The sound of a window on the first floor being shattered drew Yumi and William's gazes as well as instantly awoke all of the other Lyoko Warriors. All four of the awakened teens either sat upright or sprung up to their feet.
Aelita was the first to hurry over to the window to see... to see...
...
... the pinkette was horrified to see dozens of the 'walking corpses' outside. The whole street was full of the things...
Now, with the accidental breaking of a window by one of them, they were trying to get inside! The noise had drawn in all of them!
"GUYS, THEY'RE COMING IN!!!" Aelita screamed in a wild fear to her friends as she hurried away from the window.
The others immediately went into action to try and defend themselves. All aside from William, who could only watch in sudden worry as he hobbled to look out the window.
Odd hurried to look out a window at the back of the second floor to see how the emergency exit looked down below. To his relief, it looked clear.
"The back exit!" he called out to his friends, "let's get our stuff and get out of-"
A gasp from Jeremie interrupted him.
"Oh God - guys!" the supergenius exclaimed in warning to the others, "They're already coming up the stairs!"
The eyes of all the teens turned to the stairs which led up from the first floor. Already there was a few of the 'walking corpses' making their way up them...
Odd and Ulrich hurriedly grabbed a couple of lamps from the reading tables and they hurried to the top of those stairs. They briefly thought about pleading with the creatures in a desperate hope that they'd leave them alone... but after the highway, and after that woman at the campsite, they didn't dare take chances.
As one of the creatures approached, Ulrich slammed the table lamp against its skull as hard as he could. The lamp fractured into hundreds of ceramic pieces which clattered on the floor or tumbled down the stairs. The 'walking corpse' likewise fell backward, then proceeded to tumble all the way back down to the first floor.
The group could hear more windows downstairs get shattered. They didn't have long.
"Pack up everything you can! We need to go!" Yumi barked at the other teens.
Aelita and Jeremie hurried to pack up the group's things while Ulrich and Odd tried to buy as much time for them as possible. It wasn't easy. Bit by bit the two boys were starting to lose their ground against the dead.
Meanwhile, Yumi hurried to Kiwi and engulfed the pup in her arms since he couldn't walk on his bad leg. She turned to William after that.
"William, can you walk?!" Yumi asked as she tried to think of how they can all escape this time.
William tried to make his way to Yumi, only for a bad flash of pain to hit his injured leg when he put some weight on it. The teen gritted his teeth at the pain and was forced to stop and lean against one of the couches for support.
"Not really..." William said with a grimace on his face.
Yumi muttered a Japanese curse word under her breath before hurrying to help Aelita and Jeremie. Escaping wasn't going to be easy this time...
Ulrich and Odd tried as hard as they could to defend their friends despite the odds. Ulrich kicked one of the 'walking corpses' and sent it tumbling down the stairs back to the first floor. The sight of the creature immediately getting back up despite having clearly suffered a broken leg was disturbing to him.
"Stop it!" Odd desperately called to the creatures advancing upon them, ignoring the tactic of diplomacy which he had already dismissed earlier. "What's the matter with you people?! Can any of you even understand what I'm saying?!"
The creatures were totally unfazed by Odd's words. All they cared for was his flesh.
In desperation, Ulrich charged himself at one of the 'walking corpses' as it came to the top of the stairs. Next to the stairs was the second floor railing which was part of the interior balcony that wrapped around each side of the library. The teen slammed his body against the creature hard enough to push it right over the railing where it impacted another 'walking corpse' below.
As the creature went over, the teens heard the wooden interior balcony railing let out a loud creaking sound. It still stood, but it must've not been able to hold such weight or force very well...
Aelita hurried to the railing and looked over, cringing at the sight of the 'walking corpse' which Ulrich pushed over. Both it and the creature it landed on had clearly suffered some broken bones and other bad injuries, but like the one which went down the stairs, they were getting up as if nothing had happened.
"What will it take to stop these things?!" Aelita exclaimed in a mix of confusion, horror, and desperation.
"We can't!" Odd called to her, "we gotta try to get out of here and-"
"ODD, WATCH OUT!!!"
Jeremie's voice made Odd turn, but he didn't turn quick enough to push away the 'walking corpse' which had gotten behind him.
The cone-haired teen let out a gasp as the creature grabbed him. Then he let out a scream as the 'walking corpse' put all of its strength toward trying to take a bite out of his neck. Ulrich tried to rush to his best friend but a couple of 'walking corpses' coming up the stairs now separated him from saving Odd...
Odd struggled to keep the creature from eating him, but he was quickly losing his strength...
Any second now and he'd-
"Let go of my friend you goddamned corpse!"
To the astonishment of everyone, William, despite his painful injury, had now suddenly burst forth, shouted that 'battle cry', and slammed his full weight against the creature which was trying to kill Odd.
Releasing Odd but quickly realizing that another fresh meal had grabbed it, the 'walking corpse' now tried in vain to bite William. The teen struggled against the cannibalistic hostile creature as it took control. The creature scratched at William's arms but they were protected by the sleeves of the jacket he was wearing.
Separated from the other teens now that more 'walking corpses' had come up the stairs, the 'walking corpse' which was attacking William had pushed the teen against the second floor railing and tried as hard as it could to sink its teeth into any part of William it could reach.
Both Ulrich and Odd tried to get to William and help him, but they couldn't get close because of all the undead pouring in. The two had to keep fighting for themselves for now.
"William, just hold on!" Ulrich called to the teen as he grabbed a chair and broke off one of the legs to serve as a weapon,
"Ulrich and I will try and get to you!" Odd called as well, desperately picking up a thick book on Georgia tax laws to hit the creatures with. It was as solid as a brick.
"Make... it... fast!" William said through gritted teeth. He was pouring every ounce of energy he had into keeping the 'walking corpse' from eating his flesh.
Behind the teen and the creature trying to end his life, the wooden railing started to let out more loud creaking sounds.
Yumi likewise could only watch William helplessly, as she was busy trying to pack up with Aelita and Jeremie. She still had Kiwi held in the crook of her arm and the dog was endlessly snarling at the 'walking corpses' which were attacking them, but at none more so than the one which William was fighting...
"Easy, Kiwi!" Yumi scolded the dog as she finished packing up one of the suitcases, then hurried to help Aelita with hers.
"It's the 'walking corpses', it's agitating him!" Aelita defended her friend's dog while continuing to pack.
Odd continued to back away from the creatures advancing on him, only hitting those which got too close. Ulrich did the same in the other direction, likewise only hitting any of the creatures which got too close. Both tried to lure as many toward them as they could to protect Yumi, Aelita, and Jeremie.
Luckily, as the teens had already seen, the second floor of the library wrapped around each side of the building's interior, creating a large open central area in the middle. Because of this, Ulrich and Odd wouldn't get themselves cornered anywhere on the second floor at least for the next few moments.
After using the chair leg to hit another 'walking corpse' in the chest and sending it to the floor, Ulrich gave a quick glance back to Aelita, Yumi, and Jeremie.
"Guys, finish getting the stuff and get moving!" Ulrich barked at the three teens. It was not a request.
Aelita and Jeremie finally finished packing up the group's things. The two geniuses gathered up the group's suitcases and they hurried together to the safety of the back wall of the library where the second-floor's emergency fire exit was. Jeremie had seen that part of the store was clear earlier, and thankfully it still was. The two wouldn't dare go through the door until everyone else was there with them...
Yumi, however, remained where she was. She was torn by the sights of William struggling for his life and both Odd and Ulrich being cut off from her, Jeremie, and Aelita.
She had to help them. She had to save them all... but how can she do that with all the creatures pouring onto the second floor?!
William noticed Yumi was just standing there in deliberation, and the sight both scared and bewildered him.
If she got caught by these creatures...
"Yumi, go!" William urged as he felt the hot awful and rancid breath of the 'walking corpse' against his face. He was losing more strength by the second...
Yumi turned to reply to her friend, but she didn't get the chance to reply to him.
... without warning, and seemingly without any consideration for his own hurt leg, Kiwi bolted out of Yumi's arm and ran straight for William.
"Kiwi?!" Yumi gasped and tried to recapture him, only to fail.
"KIWI, NO!!!" Odd exclaimed in horror as he saw his precious dog jump from Yumi to run face-first into danger.
As the wooden indoor balcony railing started to make more loud creaking sounds due to the weight of William and the creature pressing against it, Kiwi, angry at seeing this mean person trying to hurt one of his dad's best friends, did what any other brave good boy in his situation would...
... ignoring his own painful injury, Kiwi rushed forward and he jumped, sinking his teeth into the creature's back. The loyal dog angrily bit down into the creature's flesh as hard as he could in a desperate effort to save William from further harm...
William saw this and he tried to reach out to Kiwi and pull him off of the creature to save him... The other teens could see the look of panic and worry on William's face...
"Hang on, William, I'm coming!" Odd shouted, determined to reach his friend and his dog no matter how many cannibals were in the way.
"Odd, don't!" William exclaimed. "Just stay back! Don't come over here!"
"William!" Ulrich gasped. He wanted to try and help Odd get to William but there was too many of the undead!
Before Odd could reach William and Kiwi, the creature attacking William pressed much more firmly against the teen. Its teeth was mere millimeters from William's neck...
Then the railing finally gave away.
Ulrich, Odd, Jeremie, Aelita, and Yumi all looked on in utter horror as they watched their friend and the pup both fall into the crowd of 'walking corpses' down below.
"WILLIAM?!" Yumi exclaimed in disbelief, her face having gone totally pale.
"NO, NO, NO!!!" Odd screamed, hurrying to the balcony to look down below.
The teen looked just in time to see William, his attacker, and Kiwi all fall together into the middle of a giant horde of the cannibalistic undead monsters...
For a long moment it seemed as if time had frozen. But then... then...
"AAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
William's scream of agony brought everyone back to their senses. Yumi, Aelita, and Jeremie hurried to the spot where William and Kiwi went over.
The group looked into the sea of dead just in time to see Kiwi being grabbed by some of the dead...
As Odd finally found a way past the creatures, he hurried to another part of the second floor balcony railing... just in time to watch his heroic dog be torn apart.
The dog's haunting wails of agony as his arms and legs were ripped from his body would forever haunt each of the five teens who looked down into the mess. Odd more than anyone, as he promptly fell to his knees and unleashed a torrent of sobs and wails of dismay. He and the others could only helplessly watch as Kiwi was devoured alive...
The only thing good in any of this was that Kiwi's suffering didn't last long. As soon as his limbs were torn off of him, several of the creatures proceeded to grab onto Kiwi and devour him. He was a small dog, so it mercifully wouldn't take long for him to be eaten to death...
Odd briefly saw Kiwi glance up to him from the horde, their eyes meeting for the final time. The dog looked utterly terrified and in unimaginable pain toward his dad, and with one last wail of agony, one last cry for help toward the person he loved most of all, he disappeared somewhere under the black mass of 'walking corpses', never to be seen again...
As they saw Kiwi's suffering finally come to its end, the group could simultaneously see something thrashing under the swarm.
William.
"GET OFF ME!!!" they could suddenly hear William scream in pain and panic as he fought to survive, "GET OFF OF ME YOU CRAZY THINGS!!! GET OFF!!! GET OFF!!!"
"WILLIAM!!!" Yumi exclaimed, wide eyed in shock and horror.
William couldn't hear her. He was too busy trying to keep himself alive to focus on any other thing.
"WHAT THE HELL'S WRONG WITH ALL OF YOU?!" he exclaimed at the dead.
Before any of the teens could think of trying to save him, they could see it was already too late...
Across William's entire left arm the group could see nothing but deep bite wounds and a massive amount of blood.
Despite that, the teen kept fighting for his life... only to suffer the same fate as Kiwi.
"STOP!!! STOP!!!" William screamed as he felt a pair of teeth dig into his left arm again. He couldn't stop them. They couldn't stop themselves. "PLEASE!!!"
The last the group saw of their friend was him being dragged into the black mass of 'walking corpses'. He continued his struggle for a moment or two... but soon there was so many of the 'walking corpses' on top of him that they couldn't detect any of his movements anymore...
They heard one last outburst of agony from their doomed friend... and then they heard nothing but snarls and growls from the dead.
... William was gone.
... their friend was dead.
The five Lyoko Warriors were stunned into silence and disbelief as they watched William be lost to the dead. They couldn't believe what they had seen...
This wasn't right... this wasn't what should have happened...
They've always survived whenever XANA attacked... all of them did. No Lyoko Warrior ever died...
... until now.
Snarls from the creatures soon drew the teens out of their disbelief. They had to focus on getting out of this place before they join William and Kiwi in death.
"RUN!!!" Aelita screamed to her friends.
As Aelita and Jeremie bolted for the emergency exit again with the group's suitcases, Yumi froze when she noticed that Ulrich was still separated from her and the others.
By now, Ulrich had backed away from the indoor balcony and he was now pressing against one of the windows on the side of the store. The creatures still advanced toward him...
"Ulrich?!" Yumi gasped.
"Go! I'll climb out the window!" Ulrich called back as he picked up a decorative paper weight from a reading table, "I'll drop into the alley next to the library and meet up with you guys down the street! There's not any 'walking corpses' down in the alley which I can see from up here!"
Yumi hesitated for a moment, but with the amount of 'walking corpses' still coming up toward them...
She relented. But she didn't like it.
"Fine!" Yumi called to her boyfriend, "just stay safe!"
Ulrich simply gave Yumi a nod before he threw the paper weight against the window and shattered it. Without concern for cutting himself on broken glass, the teen hurriedly climbed out of the window before any of the creatures could grab him.
He would be on his own for now...
Aelita kicked open the emergency exit, turning to look at her friends. She saw Ulrich as he jumped out the window he broke open, and she saw Jeremie was with her and Yumi was running to catch up with them.
But Odd... she saw he was still on his knees by the interior balcony railing, sobbing loudly to himself.
"Jeremie, get Odd!" Aelita told her boyfriend as she pointed toward the devastated teen.
"On it!" Jeremie nodded before setting off at a running pace.
It took only a couple of moments for Jeremie to reach Odd, but he was running out of time. A few dozen of the 'walking corpses' were already on the second floor and some were already going after him. He had only a moment to get his friend out of here...
As Jeremie approached Odd, he grabbed the grieving teen by his shoulders and forced him to get up to his feet.
"Odd, we've gotta go! We can't stay here!" Jeremie begged his friend to get moving.
Odd didn't answer. He continued to endlessly sob as he gazed at the broken part of the railing where William and Kiwi fell and met their end. Tears continued to roll down the sides of his face. He couldn't stop hearing their screams...
"K- Kiwi..." Odd murmured, barely able to speak through his sobs. "Oh, god, Jeremie, Kiwi's... he's dead! My dog is dead, Jeremie!"
"I know, and I'm sorry, Odd!" Jeremie told him with as much sympathy as he could muster in a time of worry and near-panic. "But we've got to get out of here before we join him and William! We need to go! We need to get out of this place!"
Again, Odd didn't answer and just continued to sob where he stood.
Jeremie could see that the creatures were already very close. They had only seconds left before they'd be ripped apart and eaten alive...
With no other options left in his mind to save his friend's life, Jeremie resorted to a desperate measure which hopefully would make Odd get moving again...
... Jeremie raised his hand and slapped his friend across the face. Hard.
Stunned, and with his left cheek now stinging in pain, Odd simply looked toward Jeremie in disbelief at first. But soon enough, thanks to the slap clearing his mind for the moment, he was suddenly aware of everything happening around him again. And as much as he was devastated over Kiwi and William, he didn't wanna die with them.
As the creatures stumbled their way toward the two boys, Jeremie and Odd turned and hurried for the emergency exit. Once they made it there, Aelita and Yumi opened the door and all four of them hurried out of the library together, with Yumi slamming the door shut behind them.
The four teens found themselves on a flight of fire escape stairs on the side of the building. They all hurried down them as quick as they could.
"Did that just happen?!" Yumi asked the other three with utter disbelief and horror. "Please, God, one of you tell me that didn't just happen!"
"We'll talk about it once we're safe, Yumi! Focus on staying alive!" Aelita responded, her tone holding more venom in it than she actually intended.
Although just as bewildered and horrified about what happened as all of her friends all were, Aelita focused on survival.
Jeremie almost couldn't believe any of this was happening. Yumi was deeply saddened by William's death, though she was keeping her composure simply for the sake of her friends since they all needed to keep moving and keep a step ahead of the creatures...
Odd... he was devastated. He was keeping himself together for the moment, but a part of him almost wished he didn't leave that library...
The four Lyoko Warriors reached the alleyway and looked around for Ulrich, but at first they didn't see him, much to their alarm.
A very alarmed Yumi almost started to think that the 'walking corpses' got her boyfriend before she and the others suddenly heard the sound of a creaky door being opened. The four all turned to see Ulrich holding up the shutter of an old garage, urging them to follow him inside.
"Let's get out of here!" Ulrich quietly urged the others so the creatures couldn't hear.
Without hesitation, Yumi, Jeremie, and Aelita all hurried to the opened shutter door, but Odd stayed and turned to look back at the library again.
... the library ... now the tomb of his precious dog and a good friend...
"Odd?" he could hear Yumi quietly call to him with impatience, "Odd, c'mon! They'll find us if we don't go now!"
Tears welled in Odd's eyes again before he finally forced himself to turn away from the library and hurry to catch up to his friends. There was nothing in the library for him now...
As soon as Odd hurried into the garage, Ulrich carefully allowed the shutter to fall. The group then hurried out through the other side and away from the area... minus two of their own now...
William... Kiwi...
Both of them were gone...