After The Fall

Split Up

After a week, Mark realized it wasn't going to be as easy as he initially thought. It was becoming harder and harder for Stephanie to move around on her own, and Mary-Jane was just too full of energy for Mark to keep track of. The young child was always running around or trying to play and talk with Nate or Stephanie, even Mark, too. He wished he knew how Ken kept her so calm all the time, maybe he should have asked. Late into the night, Mark sits on the couch in the darkened living room, the only one still awake. He stares out a small gap in one of the boarded up windows and sighs softly, wishing he could have gone with the others. Home-making really wasn't for him. It doesn't help that he worries a lot, too, as the group had never split up like this before.

He doesn't like it one bit, he hates not being able to check in with them the most. Knowing this was his idea, he can't really complain, but he doesn't have to like the situation. He sighs again, rubbing his tired eyes. It's the third night in a row he's kept watch, and he gets up early to help with Nate and Stephanie before Mary-Jane usually wakes up. Needless to say, he doesn't miss being leader, and he doesn't like it right now. Sure, he doesn't mind watching over his friends, he cares for them deeply after all, but he's never been one to like being depended on to such a degree as this. It was different when there were more of them, he wasn't the only one that kept an eye on their friends.

I hope they come back soon, Mark continues to stare out the window, a small block of moonlight shining through. He's woken in the early morning, pale sunlight filtering through the boarded windows, by Mary-Jane's urgent shaking of Mark's shoulder. He sit up quickly, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, with one hand, and reaching for his knife he left under his pillow with the other, "What's wrong?!"

"Stephanie's having her baby!" Mary-Jane replies, looking freaked out, "She's hurt, too, she's crying! Her and Nate told me to come get you!"

Mark stands up a little fast, feeling dizzy for a moment. He shakes it off and runs down to the room Stephanie claimed. Mary-Jane runs after him and when they get there, Mark sees Stephanie lying on the bed with Nate standing beside her, holding her hand. She's crying, as Mary-Jane said she was, gripping the sheet lied over her tightly with her free hand. She's also tied a pillow case around the lower half of her head, biting the fabric to try and stifle her pained cries. Mark runs over to the side of the bed, eyes wide and hands shaking a little. He has no idea what to do, and they're all looking at him for direction. I can't afford to mess this up, he swallows, looking around the room quickly as he tries to remember anything he was ever told about child bearing.

...

The little mart was silent once morning came and the Infected had been dealt with. Jack sighs, wiping sweat from his brow with the back of his shirt sleeve. He's shivering from the cold, and yet moving the dead bodies was making him work up a sweat. For some reason, he found that funny. He grins, letting out a soft chuckle with a shake of his head as he gets back to work. Ken and Felix were gathering supplies, so Jack was moving the dead they had already took down upon finding this place just a few hours before. They were all three tired from the walk, but that didn't stop them from doing what had to be done. Not too long after Jack finishes moving the dead outside, Felix approaches him.

Jack turns and gives him a tired smile, "Find anything good?"

Felix grins, though looking tired himself, as he holds up a small generator in grease-covered hands, "Swiped this from the office, apparently some of the dead weren't dead too long ago."

He stops grinning after that statement, "Sorry, that was insensitive."

Jack shrugs, "That's just how it is. If we didn't find it, someone else would have."

Felix nods, "And our track record with the few living people we met wasn't good."

Jack shakes his head, remembering the little town that tried to kill them. He shivers, but not from the cold this time. He hopes they've gotten far enough away not to have to deal with those people ever again. Felix sets the generator down in an abandoned shopping cart and Jack raises an eyebrow, "We're taking that home with us?"

"The cart?" Felix muses, "How else are we gonna lug all our stuff back? That generator alone won't fit in any of our backpacks."

"True," Jack stretches his arms over his head, letting out a yawn. Ken comes out of the store a moment later, his backpack is stuffed full of whatever he had found, and he's carrying a few sheets of wooden boards in his arms awkwardly. Jack and Felix help Ken situate the wooden boards in the cart so they wouldn't fall out too easily, and the three of them continue down the road. So far, they're trip was going well, and their luck was getting better as a town wasn't too far away from where they already were. 

Ken smiles, "I'd say another week at most and we'll be back home."

"I can live with that," Felix chuckles, "I'm so ready to just relax for a bit."

"Me, too." Jack sighs, smiling fondly.

Ken laughs softly, "Don't get too dreamy-eyed for comfort yet, we still got more scavenging and travel to do."

Jack and Felix laugh and for the moment, the world seems better than it has been. But they had yet to realize they weren't alone in their journey, that someone's been following them and still is. Stepping out from behind the mart, watching the three friends walk away with their scavenged supplies, stands a young man in dark clothing with dark brown hair and deep green eyes. He holds up a walkie-talkie to his lips, clicking the button on the side, he speaks lowly, "I still got eyes on our travelers. You find their camp yet?"

A feminine voice replies soon after, "I've got eyes on it. It's just a little house. They're a little group it looks like."

"Eyes on the child?" he asks, walking towards the road now that Ken, Felix, and Jack are far enough away not to see him.

"No, the windows are covered." she states, then asks, "What do you want me to do?"

"Find my daughter." he commands before putting the walkie-talker back on his belt.