Don't Send Help (Darker than Night 2)

Chapter Two - The Ruins

As we stared into the destroyed quadrant, neither of us spoke, however Taylor began to cry.  Suddenly she screamed in anger.  "It was all for fucking nothing?!"  She grabbed a stone, and hurled it as far as she could.  "My Aunt is dead...." she said sadly.  "Maybe there were survivors."  I said.  "It was my fault."  She told me.  I shook my head.  "You couldn't have controlled this." But she stopped me.  "Not this. I mean Samuel.   He sacrificed himself for me.  I could have saved him." As it got dark, I had her tell me the story of what happened, and why she was here.  "Seems like you had no choice but to run.'' I told her, when the story was over.  She cried, and we went to sleep, as the fire I had lit put itself out.

I woke up to rain.  Since we lived in the desert, it almost never rained, but today, the skies had opened, and the large drops were pouring down on Taylor and I mercilessly. "We need to get to shelter!" I yelled as the lighting struck, and the thunder roared.  Taylor nodded her head, and seeing no other option, we headed toward the ruins of Quadrant Seven.

We walked past the dead bodies, making sure they were really dead.  As we entered, we saw that large buildings had collapsed.  We wondered what could have done this, no zombie could have.  We climbed into a half caved-in building, and decided to wait out the storm.  "Where is your family?"  Asked Taylor.  "Not around." I said, dodging the question.  She left it alone, and we talked about what we would do once the storm was over.  "We could search for supplies." She said.  "And survivors" I added.  "And survivors" she repeated me, nodding her head.  We watched the storm as it whipped through the quadrant, and just as suddenly as it had come, it departed.

We climbed out of the building, and I, deciding Taylor needed it more than I, handed her my pistol.  "Thank you"  she said, running off. I moved some wooden planks, searching for anything useful, or anyone who was alive.  All that I found was more corpses, heads blown apart. As I rounded a corner, I saw an automatic rifle, the kind soldiers use.  It only had twenty bullets, so I had to use them wisely.  Suddenly a high pitched scream came from Taylor, and where she stood filled with a cloud of white smoke, as it exploded. 

"Taylor!"  I yelled, believing she must have been dead.  As I approached, I saw a tank.  "Guess I know what happened to Quadrant Seven now" I said to myself. The tank hadn't seen me, as it began to pull away.  I looked, but saw no sign of Taylor. As the tank disappeared from my view, I looked around the crater. Surely she hadn't been killed, because there was no body. "You here Taylor?" I said. Taylor emerged from behind a boulder, visibly shaken. We decided we'd call off the search for now, and leave the quadrant.

As we ran away from the tank-containing quadrant, we heard growling, and shuffling feet. "Shh." I said. We crouched to the ground, hoping to avoid them. I believed there to be about five, and one tripped over me. It turned back towards me, hungry. I had to kill it, but alerting the other four was not an option. I considered using the machine gun I had found, but instead, Smashed the temple of the beast with the butt of my gun. It laid on the ground, paralyzed, but wouldn't stay that way for long. Taking a gun out of the zombie's pocket, we continued to move quietly. until we reached a small cave that we decided to make shelter in.

"Marcus..." Taylor began. I looked at her attentively. " What happened to your family? I know I asked before, but, you know all about me, I don't know anything about you." I sighed, and sat across from her. "My dad used to hit my mom. Sometimes it got so bad, she would just cry all night. One day I snapped. I shot him with his own gun. I'm a fugitive. Wanted for murder."