AM13 Outbreak Shorts

One Year On - Thirty Seven (Benji)

Benji

"I'm tripping, I have to be tripping." My fingers knot up in my hair and I tug hard, trying to drag my senses back to life. "This can't be happening. It just can't."

I pace around the shadow hanging around at my feet trying to work out what even happened. It's all such a blur. I definitely took too many pills this time around, that high was...well, it was something else and not in a good was. I was completely off my face, I didn't know what I was doing, and now...

"God."

I grab onto my knees and let the pathetic stream of vomit dribble passed my lips. I'm too weak for this, I can't handle it, I want to run. I need to run.

This is my fault.

"No". I stagger backwards, arguing with my brain. "No, this isn't..."

This is my fault.

My head falls into my hands, despair overcomes me, a sensation which is probably well deserved. Why wouldn't it be? Since this is all my fault...

A loud shriek shakes me from my shock. I haven't run, I'm frozen to the spot, at the scene of the crime and now I'm about to be discovered.

Discovered with a dead girl.

"What the hell happened?" A woman yanks me back, taking me away from the body but not from my guilt. That isn't going anywhere. "This poor girl, what happened? Who is she?"

I could answer, if I could speak. I don't know much about this person, but her identity is something I could confirm...but my jaw is locked tight.

"She's foaming at the mouth. What happened?" The woman looks to me for answers but all I can give her was a one-shouldered shrug. "This looks like some sort of overdose or something. Had she taken something? Do you know? Were you with her?"

"I...I..." I rasp, so desperate to say something, anything. Even knowing that I might end up blamed for killing her doesn't get my words out. And why should it? After all, this is all my fault.

My drugs weren't supposed to cause this, it was all for a good time, all for a way out of our personal hell. This new world, this so-called sanctuary, drove us all to find a way out.

And now it's drove this poor girl to her death.

No, not this place. Me. I gave her drugs. I drove her to death.

"Was she bit? Hey, idiot!" Oh God, she's screaming now. "We need to know if she's a threat."

We haven't had that inside these walls for so long that people have forgotten what a virus victim looks like. If she had any memory at all, she'd know this isn't the AM13 virus. This is something else entirely.

"Pardon?" She slides closer to me, making me realize my lips are moving. I'm saying something without even noticing. "What did you say? What do you know?"

"R...Rachael," I finally manage to erupt. "Her name is Rachael."

Rachael...that's the name of the person I killed.

That's a name which will always stay with me.