The Wilderness Within: A Fanfiction (Draft)

Chapter 5

The stranger must have left his rifle upstairs since he came down empty handed. He had a neatly trimmed beard and salt and pepper hair to match. His camo clothing reminded me of something one would go hunting in.

"Are any of you infected?" he asked sternly.

I shook my head.

Alex spoke, "We don't think so, sir. At least, none of us were bit."

The man nodded. He extended his hand to Alex, who warily shook it, then to Kami, then me. "Welcome to my home. Feel free to stay as long as you like. I'm sure we'll have a better chance at survival if we stick together."

Kami carefully spoke up. "Thank you, sir, but we don't have anything to give in return. We don't have any supplies, and I don't think we necessarily have any valuable skills either."

The man shook his head. "It's not a problem. I couldn't help my grandkids, but I'm more than happy to help anyone else that stumbles by, especially if that means killing every one of those damn zombies. I have enough food and water for four to last well over a month anyway."

I blinked. "Thank you," I said. "I'm Georgia. This is Alex and Kami."

"I'm Jon," the man responded. He stepped closer, and noticed my foot propped up on the couch. "What happened to your leg?"

I straightened, pulling my leg slightly closer. "I tripped."

He didn't press any further. "I have some medical supplies over there if you want to clean it up."

"Thank you," I said again, watching him as he walked away out of the room.

Alex settled down next to me. "What now? We're stranded."

"Why are you asking me? I'm the injured one. I can't do anything."

Kami crossed her legs and sat on a nearby loveseat. "Because you got hurt letting us get away. You're pushing us to make a move. If you hadn't, we might have just kept standing around and we could be dead by now."

I rubbed the sleeve of my jacket. "Maybe we should just stay put and rest. Today has been ridiculously stupid."

Alex lowered his voice. "But what about this guy? We don't know who he is, and it's kind of weird to just pull some random people off the street."

I didn't say anything.

Kami ducked her head. "I don't know. It seems like he has a lot more reason to be hurt now than we do. He knows what happened to his family. I don't."

"My Gran!" Alex said suddenly. He stood up. "I should try to call her. Kami, can I borrow your phone?"

Kami held it out for him, and he took it, tapping the screen as he tried to remember the number. He held it up to his ear and looked at me.

"You hardly got any sleep last night, I really think you should try to take a nap."

"Yes," Kami agreed. "I'll help clean up your leg and then we can look around and keep watch, if that makes you feel better."

After changing my bandage I leaned back into the cushion and closed my eyes. Sleep came much easier than I expected.

When I awoke, Kami was asleep on the loveseat. I heard movement behind me and looked over the couch. Alex was shuffling through cupboards in the kitchen. He saw me and smiled lightly.

"Oh good, you're awake."

Groggily, I rubbed my eyes, "What time is it?"

Alex glanced at his watch. "About 10:20. You slept like 20 hours straight. I was getting worried."

"What about Kami?"

"She should be getting up soon. We were up all afternoon, but she took the night watch so I got up early."

I shook my head disbelievingly. "What did you do all that time?"

"Without you?" Alex chuckled. "Not much. Mostly played cards and snooped. I was checking the kitchen, and there's still some milk left and some normal groceries, but Jon has about a bazillion MREs stocked up around here. About half of them are in the garage, he told me."

I rolled off the couch and stretched. "Is there any cereal?"

"How about some eggs too?" Alex grinned and opened the fridge.

I sat at the breakfast bar and watched him cook.

There was a sudden crack from upstairs. Alex and I tensed, but he soon relaxed. "It's probably just Jon picking off some zombies again." He put a plate of steaming scrambled eggs beside my small cereal bowl.

I shoveled food into my mouth. "He seems to have some wires loose, don't you think?" I said quietly.

Another crack. This time it made Kami shoot up off the couch. Her shoulders went slack when she saw us sitting in the kitchen. "Good morning."

"Mornin'," I said around a mouthful of food. Alex set another plate of food out beside mine for Kami.

We ate in relative peace, except for the occasional gunshot.

"It's all wrong," Kami said thoughtfully.

I regarded her, her dark hair illuminated by thin stripes of light from the boarded up windows. "What is?"

She put down her fork. "Everything. What's even wrong with all these people? Why can't we be safe at our own home?" She glanced at the ceiling. "Now I'm not saying I'm sympathizing with these zombies, but it's not their fault they're sick. I don't know if it's right to just shoot them in the head."

"Then what?" Alex asked. "We're lucky Jon has such good aim, or we'd be dead already for sure."

I stared at the rest of my plate, the squishy eggs making me feel a little sick, but I pushed myself to finish. I had noticed that there hadn't been a gunshot for about ten minutes, and wasn't entirely surprised when I heard Jon's heavy footsteps going down the stairs.

He entered the front room and silently acknowledged each of us. Alex spoke up, "I have the rest of the eggs here if you want 'em." He held out a plate, and Jon took it.

He ate at the dining room table, facing us. "How's your leg?" He asked me.

"Much better now. Thank you for letting us stay here."

"You're very welcome. Have any of you heard anything about what's going on out there?"

"No," I admitted.

"There should be a little radio in one of those drawers," he pointed into the kitchen with his fork. Alex opened a few drawers and soon set a basic radio on the counter. He adjusted the dials until we could make out voices through the static.

Just like the articles from yesterday, everything was the same, if just repeated in a slightly different order, except today there was a list of the nearby major cities that were affected, as well as a segment about the U.N. being decimated and helpless, just like the rest of the world. Just like us.