EPIPHANY ✁ newt

5 , injuries

"Run, Sephora. You've got to run. You can't save her." a bitter voice spat. "You never could save us, and you never will. Get moving before we leave you here."

Everything was blurred. I was lying on the ground. And I was very aware of the dead body that lay not a foot away from me, getting colder by the second. Out of all the people in the clearing, why did it have to be her? Leya hadn't done anything to hurt them. None of us had. And now Olivia was roughly pulling her away from the body of her best friend.

"Seph, what are bloody you doing!? We've gotta go." Newt's voice pulled me out of my thoughts, he gently grabbed my arm, pushing me toward the exit as fast as he could with his limp, that I had only just noticed. Thomas and Minho were sprinting to catch up to us, and to my horror I saw a few people running after them. They way they ran was just... wrong. Looking robotic and like animals at the same time somehow.

"Go! Get out of here!" Thomas was screaming, him and Minho had almost caught up to us.

"Wha- I'm so sorry! L-let's go." I stumbled over words, looking towards Newt, disoriented. I started running as fast as I could, looking back to make sure we weren't leaving the two boys who had the zombie people chasing them too far behind, but Newt kept the group going.

We ran up some escalators, desperately trying not to trip on the stairs. Teresa, Aris and Newt were in front of me, while Winston and Frypan ran close behind, Thomas and Minho bringing up the rare. "What the hell are those things?" Frypan yelled.

"I don't know! BUT KEEP RUNNING!" Minho screamed. Before I knew it, they had caught up to us, Thomas taking the lead - dragging Teresa with him. I had never been the best at running ever since... an incident in the Clearing a few weeks before we managed to escape and it was really showing now. Heart racing, barely able to catch a breath, I struggled to maintain my position of the middle of the group.

Thomas suddenly halted at the top of the unmoving now-made-staircase escalator. I looked up and with a jolt saw one of the crazy things standing right in front of us. Groaning as it stumbled toward our group, picking up pace.

"ARIS NO-" I heard Thomas yell, and almost screamed myself seeing the boy run forward with a metal stick of some sorts and hit the thing across one of its legs, sending it to the ground with a scream. Suddenly, they were everywhere. Surrounding us. I couldn't help gasping, images and screams flashing through my head.

A clicking sound, girls crying out, footsteps, then a blood curdling holler as they vanished. Leaving me once again surrounded by screams - but this time those of the boys and Teresa fighting the zombies around me. Aris was looking at me with worried eyes. "Seph, you okay?"

That got me off my knees, which I only just realised I had fallen to. My cheeks heated with embarrassment. Why did my brain always have to pop in and do its thing in the absolute worst moments? But Aris had managed to break my out of it, and I reached into my backpack, pulling out the strange baton like thing.

I smacked it in the direction of a woman who lunged toward me, sending her tumbling off the stairs, landing with a sickening crunch on the floor beneath. Doing my best not to hurl at the sound, I followed the rest of the group down a bridge of sorts at the top of the escalators - the zombie things rushing after. It was clear that wherever we were going, it wasn't back the way we came in.

As we ran, one of the things suddenly leaped out of a window on our side, crashing into Newt who was right in front of me, sending both of them to the ground.