Wither With Me

CHAPTER 7 - DIVISION

Nora's heart felt like it would burst out of her chest at any moment. She could barely breathe, she couldn't feel her legs, she believed she would just drop on the spot if she stopped running. William's voice resonated on her ears, mixed with a lot of other noises. Was he encouraging her? Hard to say, she couldn't tell for sure. But it definitely seemed like something was about to happen.

Suddenly, she lost her footing. She tried to scream, but nothing came out of her mouth. Then, before she could think of anything else, she felt the cold embrace of water.

Once again, she tried to scream, which caused her to swallow a large amount of frigid water. She thrashed, unable to tell up from down, left from right. There was no way to know where the water's surface ended or where the bottom began. However, she managed to briefly catch a glimpse of moonlight, coming from somewhere below her. Nora tried her best to swim in that direction with all her strength, fighting with the current. Her bones and muscles were stiffening up from the cold water.

Eventually, her face broke the water's surface. She took one long and panicked breath. Her heavy backpack felt like a giant stone slab on her back. The current was still dragging her downstream, and the turbulence in the water kept intermittently pulling her back underwater before letting her breathe again. During those swift moments of respite, she started discerning a big shadow approaching her in the darkness of the night. Or rather, she was approaching it.

She slammed against something hard. Instinctively, she held onto it for dear life, doing everything she could to stick her hands to its rough surface. It felt like concrete.

...

'A-Am I... alive...?'

Slumped on all fours, Nora kept coughing up water while trying to regain her breath. The constant coughing fits gave her a burning sensation on her chest.

'Uggh...!'

Somehow, she had just pulled herself out of the river, onto what looked like a concrete ramp. Her body started to hurt all over.

Then, she heard a male voice complaining nearby. She looked around, but she couldn't really see anything in the darkness. That area in particular seemed darker than usual, as if something big was blocking the moonlight from above.

With a lot of effort, she stood up, stumbling a little bit in the process, and tried to follow the sound to its source. She walked with caution. With her sight disabled, it'd be easy to misstep and fall back in the water.

The ramp led her onto some kind of flat surface. The grumbling voice sounded closer and closer, but the noise from the water stream made it difficult to identify who or what was producing it.

"W-William...? I-Is that y-you...?" she asked to the darkness.

There was a tense moment of silence.

'Please, don't be one of those t-things... Please, God, I'm begging you...'

Then, a sudden flash of light hit her right in the face. At least it wasn't a shambler, that was for sure. Unless they somehow knew how to operate a flashlight. Nora gasped and covered her eyes from the blinding light.

*cough* *cough* "Nora...!?" *cough* "You... made it..." she knew that voice.

"William...!"

For once, her prayers seemed to have worked. She couldn't help but smile, although it was a bitter smile. She knew they weren't home and dry yet.

"Help me out here, quick...! Grab this flashlight for me and give me light." he requested.

Wondering what was going on, Nora obeyed. She grabbed the flashlight and aimed it at William. As expected, he was completely wet from head to toe, and his clothing was all messed up and ripped in several places. His face was pale and it looked tired, probably no different than Nora's face. He pulled up the sleeve on his left arm. Nora noticed how there was a quite severe rip on that place in particular.