Undead School

Nineteen, nineteen, na-na-na-nineteen

Rae bent down over an unmoving Lydia. She searched for the bullet holes to see where she had been hit. I stared down at her body in a daze, still mourning over the loss of Evan and my chance to kill Erik.

"She's dead." Rae said finally, standing back up, "Lydia was shot right in the heart, and is already gone." More loss, more death... Jason helped me shakily sit down on the pavement for the time being.

Drake rushed out of one of the buildings with Will in his arms. On the side of Will's head a bullet hole with stick blood was moving down his head. "Rae, Will was shot in the head!" He yelled and laid him down in front of Rae, who was beginning to panic.

I saw the grief and worry in her face, but she set to work. "Evelyn are you okay?" Carmen asked me, but I didn't move or make a sound. "Evelyn... talk to us!"

"I'm fine." I said emptily. I watched Rae struggle with Will but I was done caring. Long past caring what happens.

Carmen slapped me hard across the face. "Damn it Evelyn, snap out of it. We need you." The jolt of pain caught me off guard, but successfully pulled me out of my head.

I stood up, but pain sharpened out of my side. I lifted my shirt and realized I had been grazed by a bullet. Down at my legs, another grazing, and a bullet sticking right out of my leg. I ignored the pain. Rae needed to save Will right now. I would be fine.

"We need to have a few funerals before we leave. And do something about all the bodies." I said, leaning against a crumbling wall. "Lydia, Evan, and Kiera all deserve our respect. They were our friends and comrades at one point, and we should honor them."

"I'm not honoring a traitor!" Drake yelled out, but I just waved him off.

"She died in the field of battle like the rest of them. She deserves a proper send off." I looked down at Will. Rae had managed to get the bullet out and was working to stop the bleeding.

"Is he going to be okay?" I asked, crouching down. I remembered Will's shoulder wound on the first day. I was so squeamish back then that it seemed like years ago. Not just nine days. Rae didn't respond. She was too focused, and I just backed off.

"How are you holding up, Jason?" I asked, turning towards where he was sitting. He just gave me one of his smug smiles.

"If you think that a bunch of idiots like that would actually get to me, then you are crazy, sweetheart." Jason said it so normally, but I could see in his eyes that something had broken while he away. Something he wasn't going to admit to.

Rae finished up patching up Will and put him in the van. There was a chance that he would be okay, but he wouldn't be waking up for a long while. The rest of us gathered first around Evan for the first of the funerals that we would be performing.

I pulled out a single match and struck it. Looking from face to face with tears in my eyes. "Evan Alexander Archer was only eleven when he was struck down by Black Cobra soldiers earlier today. Evan was always smiling and happy no matter what..." My voice broke and tears fell down my face. I dropped the match on the body and watched him burn.

Everyone said sorry. Jason apologized for not helping him, but it wasn't any of their faults. It was mine. I should have done what Erik told me to. Sure, I would have been captured, but at least Evan would have been alive.

We stood in silence for a few minutes, and moved on to the next body. Lydia. I pulled out another match. "Lydia Jane Austen. Fourteen. Also killed by Black Cobra soldiers during the combat. I did not have the pleasure of knowing her before the apocalypse started, but she was the one who gave me hope in Evan being alive again. We all should remember her for her positive attitude and bravery." Another matched dropped, another body burning. More tears.