Apocalyptic Love - The island

Chapter Thirty-Four - Testing

A few months later..

"You ready?" Carter smiled as he nodded towards the lab.

The past few months had been busy to say the least. Laindon was under round the clock supervision, he never left the sight of the guards as he worked and the only way for him to test a dose was on himself. It was the only way to know he wouldn't taint it.

After taking small vials of Hayley's blood, he'd managed to work up a immunity. It wouldn't be able to cure the virus, but if someone was bitten it would stop them from turning. The people selected a few to act as a council, people who would make the decisions for the group and a way of keeping the order on the island.

"Lets do this" I smiled brightly as i intertwined our fingers together.

Laindon was sat in his lab chair, two guards by his side watching him like a hawk. His face was pale, his hands shaking as he held a syringe in-between his fingers.

"How does this work?" I was the first to question the man, this would be a possible immunity to the virus and that would change everything.

"This dose should take about twenty four hours to set in my bloodstream, if we test it too soon it might not work" I still hated Laindon after what he did to Hayley, but he was the only chance of ending this war and we all agreed this was the only option "Tomorrow I will inject myself with the blood of the dead. Then its simple, if I don't die. It worked".

I looked to Carter for reassurance, his hazel eyes looked in on mine softly and a small nod of his head was all I needed. "Lets do this then".

The two of and the guards stayed present as Laindon prepared himself. He wrapped his hands in a pair of gloves and strapped a tightly held wrap around his arm before injecting the serum into his vein.

All of our faces were the same. Worry, determination and a sprinkle of hope. This could solve most of our problems, we couldn't bring back those we lost but we could stop the losses that were sure to come. We could never fully go back to humanity, we were all too far gone and I don't think we could pretend what happened was normal.

Laindons face paled, but not because of the serum. The man was nervous, if this didn't work he would die and after everything he did, this was his only chance at redemption.

"Now we wait" Carter gazed down to me.

The waiting was excruciating, myself and Carter stayed for the first couple of hours then we left the guards to watch over him. Laindon made no changes, his nerves calmed down and he hooked himself to a heartbeat monitor.

"How's it going?" Matt was waiting outside the lab with a heavily pregnant Sarah at his side. The woman was cradling a huge perfectly round bump, her face practically glowing as she held all of our hope.

"Nothing yet. Tomorrow will be the decider".

"It will work" Sarah smiled "He's an ass, but he's also a scientist. Im sure he wouldn't try it on himself if he thought it would kill him".

Carter nudged my side with a smile "That's what I told her".

"It's just after everything. It just feels surreal that this nightmare could be over, what if we can never be normal again" I admitted. Part of me wanted a normal life. I had a husband, a kid and a fucked up world. All I wanted was to protect them.

Matt pulled me into his side "Bug. Even if we didn't find a cure, you would sure as hell beat this world. I know that for sure".

"You lot have to much faith in me" I laughed looking around to each of them.

"Well actually, you did blow up a police station" My uncle teased.

"And lead a herd from a hotel on your own" Carter added.

Sarah was next "it does always seem to be you Katie".

"And each of them things I did was to save you stupid assholes" I punched my husband's arm while pushing my uncle off me with a smile "But I'd do it again".

Carter wrapped his arms around me from the back, resting his palms flat on my stomach as he nuzzled into my neck "Let's not forget when you stabbed a dude in the hand. Now that one was bat shit crazy".

"Actually I take Katie's side on that one, that dude deserved it" Matt added.

Everything we went through would have broken a person. Sure we weren't the same people we were, and parts of us were definitely broken. But we filled in the gaps, kept the good parts of ourselves and managed to survive.

The next day we all huddled into the Lab, baring Hayley, I didn't want her to see this, she'd seen enough horrors and if this turned out bad I didn't want to break her hope.

Two guards stood either side of Laindon as he once again strapped his arm to reveal a vein. The serum had a whole twenty four hours to work, the scientist had no symptoms and I don't know why that made me worry more.

Carters fingers intertwined with mine the moment the man injected himself with the corpse blood, Carters face was dead straight but he had hope. I could tell by the way his lips slightly parted and his hand gently squeezed mine, his stare wasn't hard and his body less tense.

The first hour after injecting himself the fever kicked in, his dark skin was paling fast and the drops of sweat coated his body. The guards moved him from the lab to a bed whilst the rest of the group cleared out "Katie". His voice was raspy and his words mumbled as he called to me.

"Give us a minute" I was still so angry at him, for starting this, ruining my life and almost killing Hayley "What?".

"I'm sorry" Laindon croaked.

My head shook and my fists clenched "for what?".

"Hayley, what I did was wrong and I was desperate. She didn't deserve that".

I dropped into the chair next to the bed, leaning my elbows against my knees as I moved closer to him "No she didn't. I wanted to kill you, slowly, I wanted your death to feel like what she felt when she thought she was dying".

Laindon slowly nodded, clutching his stomach in pain as he took in my words.

"But if this is your last moments I want you to know what your virus did".

I spoke through every excruciating detail until Laindon was sat in horror. I started with the death of my baby brother, then the fate of the rest of my family. My father's rein and his murder of my best friend. Every single good person we'd lost to this world that he caused. Laindon was shielded from the death, from the apocalypse he caused and this was my way of making him live it.