I was constantly going in and out of consciousness. I remember feeling a cold breeze as my arm was being wrapped. I remember swatting Allen's hand as he tried to draw a penis on my face. I remember stopping while everyone was amazed at a field full of horses.
I woke up and we were still sitting next to the horse field. Out of the window I could see Allen, Morgan, and Hannah creeping up next to a horse. To my left was Justin. I figured he was keeping watch because he had his pistol out. He noticed I was awake and asked, "How did you not bleed? Like you have absolutely no blood, not a scratch, nothing. I still have an indent in my arm from pushing against the front of the truck."
"How long has it been? What are they doing?"
"You've been asleep for three hours and they're getting horses because we ran out of gas. They've been trying for half an hour unsuccessfully because the animal whisperer," he gestured towards me, "has been asleep. Good timing for the wildlife rehabilitator in training to wake up."
I pulled myself out of resting position and out of the truck. I pulled my bag out of the trunk and brought it with me. I walked up to Allen, who was chasing after a fast, pure white horse. He stopped when I called his name and he said, "We'll be in Alabama soon. We're headed to California, gonna stack up completely on supplies, and we're gonna steal a plane and go to an island. We decided to go to a remote one. We're gonna take a crap ton of gas and supplies, we're gonna build a community, then we're gonna come back and rescue survivors. We ran out of gas though."
"Which is why you need horses." I took my bag off of my back and sat it on the ground.
"I'd prefer a Pokemon but a horse will do."
I walked towards the white horse, "Sure, I'll just summon Rayquaza while I'm at it." The horse reared at me, and I stopped walking. It backed up two or three steps - it's hard to tell based off of how horses move their hooves even when they're staying in the same spot. I stuck both of my palms out in a cup, too high for the horse to see that it was empty. After about two minutes of arm aching, the horse slowly started moving forward. Curiosity killed the cat, but it also gets you a good horse.
He started sniffing the inside of my hand. Slowly, I moved my hands and gently stroked each side of his face. He neighed and spit all over my hoodie. Allen came up behind me and asked, "Do you want him? Or can I get him?"
"You can have him. You wanted him first." I turned around to a face full of horse cake (if you know what I mean.) I walked around the horse which had golden brown and snow white hair. It neighed as if to say "Haha, you sniffed my butt!" I climbed onto it and it sprinted off and jumped as if it were a bull - it's a good thing I'd never fallen off the mechanical bull at the fair. I clung to its mane as it bucked and reared. Allen tossed me my bag and I caught it. Pulling the rope out with one hand and holding onto the horse with the other, I made a make shift leash and wrapped it around his neck. As soon as I got it on, he stopped bucking, but the noise brought two of those things running towards me.
It was a couple, a man and a woman. They looked to be around the age of twenty, and I figured they had been taking a walk in the woods. They didn't look like they had turned, except for the blood red eyes and the holes in their chest which I guess were from a shot gun. Shouldn't have been in the woods during deer season.
It'd only been a few hours, so they didn't have time to rot I guess. They looked pretty normal, which is what made the next part worse. Two bullets flew by, hitting each of them in the head. I looked back and saw Justin on a cream colored horse and his pistol out. I clapped and said, "Bravo, but let's try to stay quiet and conserve our ammo." He smiled and rode off. I guess everyone else had followed my example. Allen was on his pure white horse, Justin on his cream horse, Hannah on a black and white horse, and Morgan on a dark brown horse.
I looked down at mine and said, "I think I'm gonna call you Gremlin, or Troll. How about Butt Face?" He reared, "Fine, I'll call you Taco because I'm obsessed withTaco Bell." Everyone rode up next to me and I asked, "Travel by horse or go get gas? Getting gas would be safer but back tracking, traveling by horse would be faster but more dangerous."
Justin decided, "Let's take a vote, all in favor for horses?" No one raised their hand. "Jeep?" No one raised their hand. "Anal?" Allen raised his hand.
Hannah suggested, "I say we set up a camp. It'd be better than going all night by horse because we need our sleep. And we can sleep in the Jeep but it'd be hard to get proper sleep. We'd be hidden though, and the horses would be like an alarm, they'd run from whatever comes near."
I agreed, "Brilliant idea as always. What was the point in becoming friends with the horses if we're gonna leave them though?"
"How about we push the Jeep out of the road and into the field where the horses are?" Allen thought. "Shawn and I can push while Justin, Hannah, and Morgan make a small fire."
"I have matches in the Jeep," Justin remembered.
Everyone set off to work. Justin and the girls were off building a fire while Allen and I started pushing the truck. He watched me push for about half a minute smiling until I asked, "What are you doing? This would be in the field a lot faster if you helped."
"I know a good way to help," he reached into the window and pulled the gear shift, and the Jeep started moving a lot faster. "By taking it out of park and into drive. You do the stupidest shit sometimes. There's a crawler coming up behind you by the way." I stopped and stomped its head with my boot. "This is why I had you and sent Justin with them. Each of the two groups has a killer with them."
I pushed, halfway where I needed to be, "You just wanted the easy job with the silent killer." I stopped for a second and ran my fingers through my Afro. I looked at my reflection in the jeep. I knew my peanut butter color skin would bake soon in Alabama. There were small beads of sweat on my forehead, and I realized how alert my light brown eyes were. I told Allen, "Your turn, I'll keep watch."
He started pushing the Jeep at the same pace I was. I walked next to him and kept watch with both of my daggers out. We made it to the fire pit that was blazing low. Justin joked, "You should've grabbed an axe. You could've cut us down some trees to make seats. Make a decent living in this field."
I sat near the fire, "Remind me to next time the apocalypse happens. Let's be realistic, there's a certain amount of people in the world. It may take years or decades or centuries even, but the apocalypse has a limited time."
Everybody else sat around the fire. Justin started telling everyone what happened after we left school and went to Walmart. Morgan told us what happened after we left. I fiddled with my sea shell necklace and stared into the fire, daydreaming and partially listening to the conversation. I was snapped out of my daydream by a scream that came from the woods.
