until the very end

part 7

“So you really did it?” Aria wiped a strand of her messy brown hair behind her ear and studied me with a raised eyebrow, leaning against the wall. “You really joined her side?”
I shrugged, shooting her a casual grin. “Why not? This place is one big adventure and I’m trying to make the most out of it.”

“Yeah, I get that… but I’m not sure if joining a serial killer in her plans to wipe out humanity, is the right way to go about that.” Aria bit her lip.
“It’s a new world, Aria,” I said. “The old laws don’t really apply anymore.”
We were ‘on watch’. Being on watch basically meant hanging out in front of the supermarket, occasionally getting up to greet the kids coming into the supermarket and checking their list as they got out. We were, in all seriousness, given baseball bats to defend ourselves in case someone would use violence, but neither of us had touched the ridiculous things. Officially, there was a group of physically strong kids that took turns guarding the supermarket, occasionally replaced by ‘volunteers’. The both of us had only decided that today would be a good day to accept our responsibility towards the town – AKA, it would be an easy way to sneak out some food for ourselves and hopefully watch some new drama unfold. The first few weeks of the FAYZ had been total chaos, but now that things were calming down and there was a council with laws… if we weren’t careful, things would get boring in here.

“Yes, but what about your morals?” Aria laughed slightly when she saw the look on my face. “Okay, I guess you don’t care about those. But what if we do get out and we’ll see our family and our friends?” She looked down. “I mean, we’ve all done terrible things. I have hurt people. I have… badly wounded people during fights. Most of them were out of self-defence, but one time… a couple days ago, when I was really hungry, I robbed a bunch of ten-years-olds. When they tried to fight back, I punched one of them in the face.” She clenched her fists, so hard it looked painful. “I watched the blood start to drip out of his nose, and as his friends gathered around while he cried out in pain, I just took the fish and ran off.”
I stared at her. She flinched slightly, studying my expression insecurely. “What?”

“Aria. People are killing eachother,” I said. “It’s the FAYZ. More and more people are getting acces to guns. People are literally stabbing and shooting eachother over a piece of gum. And you’re worried because you punched someone?”
“He was just a kid,” she mumbled. “They didn’t even have weapons. They were defenseless.”
“Aria, sometimes I worry about you.”
She rolled her eyes. “Not this again. I know. You think I’m too innocent for this world.”

“Especially for this new world.”
“You don’t know everything about me,” she said. “You don’t know all of the stuff I’ve done.”
“Pretty sure I’ve done worse.” I watched a group of young girls leave the supermarket, clearly bringing more food than they were allowed to. They glanced over at us nervously, but I just gave them a lazy nod, not really caring whether or not they actually stuck to their food limits.
“Anyways. We’ve all done bad things.” Aria barely seemed to notice the people entering and leaving the supermarket anymore. She kept glancing around, nervously. “But let’s say we get out. How would you explain to your family that you have literally attempted to murder little kids?”

“The only family I have left is my sister, and she’s dead to me,” I said flatly. “And I don’t have a lot of friends out there either. Besides, if we get out, that probably means that my new master succeeded in her plan to kill everyone.” I winked at her.
“Yeah. As if one girl is able to take on everyone else, despise having a ridiculous lot of powers.” Aria nervously wiped the lock of hair around her ear again, but it kept falling back in front of her eyes.
“She’s not just some girl, she’s some creature from some other part of the universe. And now that I’ve met her, I have to say I’m kind of impressed. She seems to know what she’s doing.”
“Yeah, or maybe she just thinks she does. As do you, apparently.” Aria laughed slightly, but then she froze, gripping the baseball bat as a tall guy with brown hair crossed the corner. He frowned slightly at her, hesistating for a moment. She relaxed, giving a stiff nod as she put down the baseball bat. The guy gave us both a weird look before he made his way into the supermarket.

I raised an eyebrow. “Aria, is everything alright?”
“Yeah, I’m f-fine. It’s just… I thought he was someone else.” She took a big, shaky breath.
I turned to face her. “Aria. I know you. You know I have a lot to say about you, but you’re not one to be easily afraid. What’s wrong?”
She looked around carefully before opening her mouth. “You know, Gwen…” She lowered her voice. “Do you remember a couple weeks ago, when all of the adults suddenly disappeared and the cellphones didn’t work anymore, and chaos errupted? When we slowly started to realize that the world as we knew of, didn’t exist anymore?”
“As if I could ever forget how the FAYZ started.” I grimaced.

“Well… do you remember how I jokingly said that the only good thing about this new situation, was that at least I knew I wouldn’t have to be afraid of my brother anymore?” She laughed wryly.
I felt my stomach twist. “Aria, what are you saying?”