A Walk Among The Dead

Chapter 6

It felt as if we'd been gathering supplies from the car lineup for hours. Brady and Daisy weren't speaking to me, and Dad and Bill were disposing of the body I'd attacked during my outburst. So, I was left to scavenge by myself.

Even though it felt like it'd been hours, I surely hadn't collected hours worth of supplies, not that there was much to collect. A first aid kit and a lousy can of peas just wasn't cutting it.

Most of the cars had been picked clean already, even after only a day of this whole zombie outbreak thing. Why is there so much dirt and grime on these cars? They can't have been here for that long. Maybe from all of the chaos...

The next car I was about to raid looked dirtier than any of the cars I'd picked so far. It's red exterior reflected a red tint onto my body. I reached over to pull the handle of the backseat, only to find out that it was locked.

"Hm," I furrowed my eyebrows. None of the other twenty something cars I've already picked were locked...

I tried the drivers side, but no luck. My kitchen knife was of no help either, considering I'd already tried to pick the lock with it.

"Well I'm not gonna bother if there's nothing good on the inside." I whispered to myself.

The windows on this car were extremely dirty, making it almost impossible to see through them. I pulled the edge of my sleeve down over my hand and began to wipe the muck off of the glass. Once I'd made a pretty clear patch to see through, I peeked inside.

"Holy shit." I backed away from the car, stunned.

Click. The sound of the lock echoed through the silent air. The door on the opposite side of me opened slowly. A young girl with a dark brown ponytail emerged from the car, pointing a gun straight at my face. She didn't appear to be older than twelve.

"Drop the weapon, and back away from the car." She said, her voice a lot deeper than I was expecting.

I slowly bent down and set my knife on the pavement, watching her closely. She seemed to know what she was doing, so I did as she told me.

"Look, I don't want any trouble." I said. She didn't move an inch.

"Neither do I, so get the hell away from my car." She deadpanned. Her look of determination and evil was almost chilling. 

"Where are your parents?" I asked quietly. The girl still remained emotionless.

"None of your damn business." She half shouted. I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. She must have caught someone's attention.

"How old are you?" I asked. The girl scowled at me.

"I'm not twelve if that's what you're thinkin'. That's what everyone thinks." She whispered the last part to herself.

"Well, how old are you actually?"

"Fourteen." She said. I inwardly sighed with relief. What's a fourteen year old gonna do?

"How'd you get to be by yourself?"

"How'd you get to be so nosy?" She snapped.

"And how'd you get to be so ignorant?" Brady held a gun, I'm assuming he found while scavenging, to the back of the young girl's head. The color flushed from her cheeks and her eyes widened. She didn't even hear Brady coming.

"Set the gun down." Brady practically growled in her ear. She bent down and set the gun on the ground with a trembling hand.

"Brady, calm down, she's not a threat. She's only fourteen. She was just protecting her territory." I said, calmly. Brady looked at me skeptically before lowering his gun. The girl stood frozen, not daring to move.

"What's your name?" Brady demanded.

"Amelia." She said in a hushed voice.

"So, Amelia, what makes you think you can just go around pointing a gun at people?" Brady asked. He was acting like some kind of military commander.

"I- I felt threatened. And it's not like there are police around to stop me. They're all gone." She whispered.

My throat tightened as I realized what Amelia just said. Law enforcements are gone?

"What's goin' on over here?" Dad and Bill came running over to us, followed by Daisy.

"This little rogue had a gun pointed at Rowan." Brady told Dad. Dad sized up Amelia, then turned back to Brady, disgusted. He thumped Brady on the back of the head.

"She's just a little one. You probably scared the shit out of her yellin' like that." Dad scolded Brady in front of all of us.

"She had a gun! What'd you want me to do? Let her shoot Rowan square between the eyes?" Brady shouted. His arms flailed in the air like a child's.

While Brady and Dad squabbled in the middle of the abandoned interstate, Amelia and I stared at each other.

She really did look twelve or so. Her face was just so youthful. Although, she was quite tall for her age, almost my height. I noticed her sky blue eyes matched the tattered shirt she was wearing. You could also tell just by looking at her that she liked to bite off more than she could chew, explaining the current predicament.

Amelia appeared to be frustrated. Her fists were balled up at her sides and she was biting her lip impatiently. Her stare no longer fell on me, but on Brady and Dad.

"I don't care, Brady. She's only fourteen! You don't just go and-"

"Will you two shut the hell up? I've got places to go and biters to kill! So if you'll excuse me." She went to storm off away from us. Amelia's shouts, along with everyone else's, drew in the attention of some wandering rotters in our proximity.

Dad grabbed Amelia's arm firmly when he noticed the dead coming towards us.

"You're not going anywhere."