Speechless

Chapter five

There's a long path that we walk down, looking for any life at all. Mainly food to eat like deer, rabbit, squirrel, anything. But even a decent human would be nice. Well, one that wasn't going to try to kill us, one that would help us or show us that we aren't the only ones still alive. I don't believe it, I can't believe it. That would mean giving up hope, and I can't do that. Neither of us can.

"Hey," starts Jason. He points off into the trees. But it's not the tree he's pointing at, it's the rabbit nibbling on a fallen leaf.

"I got it, you watch for any Gone," I say. He nods and looks to his left and then his right and stays behind when I slowly walk forward, closer to the rabbit. I pull my knife out from my sheath and stare at the rabbit, how it lies there peacefully and just eating that leaf, content and happy. I almost forget about the worries I should have right now. But I don't fully forget them, because I still launch my knife from my hand and let it pierce the rabbit in the neck, and I slowly watch him tumble to the ground, squashing some leafs he was nibbling on. I walk over and see his limp body lying there and pull my knife out of his neck and pick up a leaf and remove the access blood from my knife onto the leaf before putting the knife back in my sheath. I then grab the rabbit by its neck and walk back to Jason, who was constantly looking every direction. "It's ok," I start. "You don't have to be so paranoid, I don't see any Gone. I also caught the rabbit," I then hold up the rabbit like a prize.

"I heard something," he explains, still cautiously looking in all directions.

"Maybe there's more rabbits," I reply, pulling my knife out once more. Then, at the worst moment, we hear moans.

We are close to The Gone. Lord knows how many of them are here.

"Aubrey, run. Now," Jason says to me under his breath so The Gone don't hear him. I nod and turn my back from Jason and run, rabbit in hand, from the opposing direction of the moans. I hear Jason's footsteps behind me, which is reassuring. I don't think I could tackle this alone. Even if I thought I could, I don't want to. I can't be alone. I can't.

I'm running faster than I ever had before. Even though The Gone are slow, if there's a herd of them they become like a pack of wolves. They seem faster when with others. That might just be my imagination, but I don't care, I'm not risking it. I then see a figure ahead of me, a tall women. She has short brown hair curving around her chin, a blue sweater with a grey shirt underneath, ripped jeans, and old, worm out tennis shoes.

Except for the fact that she's dead. And there's many more of The Gone behind her, almost like follow the leader. "No," I start. "No, no, NO! This can't be it! We can't be trapped!" I scream as I turn around toward Jason. Behind him are the herd of The Gone that we spotted back where I caught the rabbit. Jason then points to his right, to the woods.

"Through there!" He yells to speak over the moans. I see trees on both sides of me and then The Gone in front and behind me. I don't even respond, I just run I to the woods without a thought about it. It's our best chance. I run so fast I feel like with every step I will fall to the ground and that will be it, that will be the end. But I never fall, I just fling my legs in front of me with no grace but a high speed. Jason runs next to me, sometimes a little ahead, but I manage to catch up. Branches and leaves run along my face while I run through the forest. I feel blood, I feel it running down my cheek like a red river, gushing out constantly. A large branch had whipped me on my face, many had, but this one was bigger with more impact. I feel the burn of the cut to the right of my nose, right below my eye. I consider myself lucky, I few centimeters up and I could be blind. But, I just have a cut that could be easily infected. I'm not sure which option would be worse, blind during the apocalypse or dead during the apocalypse. I don't have time to think of that now because I feel the cut and the blood and soon taste the blood from my body drip into my mouth from my upper lip. Focus, I tell me myself, focus on the task at hand, getting away from The Gone. I can do it, I can do it, I can- then my thoughts were interrupted by a scream. A scream belonging to Jason.

"JASON!" I yell. I only realize now how much faster I had ran, not concentrating on my surroundings made me run faster, leaving guilt settling in my stomach for leaving Jason behind. I then hear another cry for help from Jason and sprint in that same direction. I see the same branch that hit my cheek. I know it's this branch because there's blood right where my cheek collided with it and a piece of my brown, cotton jacket attached to a branch very close to that same branch. I know I'm close, I hear Jason fighting The Gone off. I turn a short corner to my left and see many Gone lying motionless on the ground and fallen leaves and one coming after Jason. I see Jason on his back pushing himself backward, away from The Gone, with his feet and palms. "Hey!" I scream, knife ready in hand. I lost the rabbit on the way back to find Jason; it wasn't exactly my main focus at the moment. After I scream for The Gone's attention, it looked up at me. I saw its cold, dead green eyes. Help me, I hear. I turn to Jason and see him looking at The Gone that's looking at me. "What are you doing, Aubrey? Throw the knife!" He yells, not taking his eyes from The Gone. I heard something, I know I did. I heard a voice, but it didn't sound like Jason. It sounded raspy and like the voice was almost out of tune, like it hadn't been used in a while. "What?" I ask to myself. The Gone takes a step toward me, I'm sorry, I hear again. I almost think it's The Gone in front of me, but it's mouth doesn't move. Then, it comes toward me with a motion I've never seen before. When it gets close enough, I slam the knife into its skull, making it fall before me with no more motion, no more voices in my head.

I have to take a few steps backwards and lean on a tree to keep my balance, to keep stable physically and mentally. "What the hell was that?" Asks Jason as he gets up off the ground, patting the dirt from his clothes.

"You heard it too?" I ask, anxious to learn maybe I'm not so crazy after all.

"I only heard the moans and the falling of The Gone's body. What'd you hear?" He asks me. I look down, trying to avoid his question. How do I answer that without sounding like a lunatic? I'm not even sure how to answer it at all since I'm not totally sure what happened. I look up at him and change the subject,

"Are you alright? I heard you scream," I say. He looks at his bicep,

"Son of bitch tried to scratch me," he says, pulling up the short sleeve on his T-shirt to get a better look at it. I feel my hands get even more clammy than they already were, my heart beating faster and harder than it already was. I'm scared The Gone drew blood, because if so, he's as good as gone. I walk up to him and examine his arm with him. No blood, the scratch was barely noticeable. We look up at each other and I hug him so tight I even become winded.

"You scared me, Jason. Please don't do that again, I need you," I say. I feel him nod and he rubs his hands through my hair, I blink away some tears and we just stand there, glad we both are alive. Even though I'm not sure what happened back there with The Gone.

I feel like there's something I haven't figured out yet.