A Different Virus: Heartfire

Chapter 8

"Quick, pull it in before it gets away!" Sheila laughed as I managed to catch another fish.

I quickly pulled in the struggling fish. Alex had made good on his word. There was now a class dedicated to fishing where they taught us how to use any method that might possibly help us catch a fish, although they drew the line at dynamite and explosives. They even included about a dozen ways to cook fish with a wood fire.

This was our first day using the archery method. It was harder than it looked since the light hitting the water caused a visual magic trick called refraction, making the fish look higher up than they actually were. I triumphantly held up the fish once I had removed the arrow. I threw it in the bucket before peering into the water to hunt for another fish.

It had been two weeks since I had graduated and nothing had really changed. Same work, same zombies, and nothing really eventful. Kailey and Evan had been making some serious progress in their relationship and were no longer hiding it. I fully expected them to request a room for themselves in the next few weeks.

We fished for a while longer before our group walked back while pulling several small kids' wagons full of fish. The lack of zombies was proof that a Raider group had been luring them away from our location while we fished. I still kept a watch on the trees around us since it was always possible for someone to miss a zombie.

We managed to get back without incident and left the fish with another group who offered to clean them for us. Instead of splitting up like we usually did, all of us headed towards the showers, teasing one another that something smelled unusually fishy today.

       I killed an hour studying a book before heading down to dinner. I paused in the hallway as I noticed someone giving ten people a tour. I didn't recognize any of their faces. The wet hair and new clothes led me to believe that they were newcomers, which was kind of surprising since it had been over two weeks since any new people had arrived.

Kailey probably already knew their names, positions, and birthdates... That girl lived for gossip almost as much as she loved junk food. With that in mind, I continued towards the mess hall.

Kailey and Evan had already eaten half of their meal when I sat down with my plate. Kailey didn't need any prompting to spill the beans on all the details she knew.

"We have new people! They heard our radio broadcast and have been travelling for about a month to get here. They came from somewhere in Montana, and apparently, there are a lot more zombies down there than up here. That is probably due to their larger population originally. There were eleven of them travelling together. One ran out of insulin, so the Nurses are trying to stabilize her in the nursing area."

I swallowed my mouthful of fish. "I saw ten in the hallway being given a tour, and I thought they were new. It has been a while since we had someone new show up."

Kailey nodded as she was eating. We talked about the upcoming graduation ceremony, the state of the kitchen supplies, and other things. They were trying to convince the Raiders to bring back several beehives since we would run out of sugar sometime next summer at the rate we were using it.

The Raiders may be willing to climb into buildings that potentially held zombies, but they were quite resistant when it came to hauling boxes containing a few thousand angry bees... From the sounds of it, the Foragers and Raiders may end up escorting a livestock group to collect as many hives as we could. I hoped they skipped my group for that run.

*        *       *

        The sound of the fire alarms going off woke me up in the middle of the night. Groggily, I stumbled out of bed and scrambled into my clothing in the dark room. I didn't realize I had grabbed shorts instead of pants until I was pulling them up. Too late now. I stuffed a set of pants into my backpack for when I was outside of the burning building.