Living Monsters

Chapter 19

Even if she wasn't the one driving, Lana still felt for Caleb. Even if the van didn't belong to any of the five.

She guessed she was really something.

The stammering of the tires happened only for a brief two seconds, but Lana couldn't remove the sound from her ears. They were beginning to become too sensitive for her liking.

"He must've put the wrong fuel in," announced Caleb with his mouth hanging downwards when he came back in the van following his inspection of the gas tank.

Penny possessed a stone in her chest, and it rendered her ability to swallow useless.

No. She couldn't believe that Nigel had bad intentions. Maybe the people he associated with, if they were still alive, weren't the nicest, sure, but he would never commit purposeful sabotage against the van. That was a silly idea.

Something entered through the gates of Penny's conscience. Even if it was accidental, the van wouldn't have gotten far at all if it was running on faulty gas for so long.

"Someone poured in the wrong gas can when we were in the house. It wasn't Nigel. If it was him, he would have been here begging for help if he was still alive," she exclaimed, not wasting a second. They still understood what she said. Did someone do this in order to keep the group in the town? It was equivalent to walls closing in, with nowhere to hide. She was struggling to breathe unconsciously, and the suffocating process hadn't even begun.

Caleb deeply growled like a lion from the back of his throat, allowing the others to access his frustration and Nina to cringe. Why did he have so much trouble with vehicles lately? First, his cargo truck that he ended up keeping was stolen because of a crazy woman. Then, in order to keep the van, he had to stay behind and then walk. And now that happened.

"You know what, Lana?" he came to a conclusion, unfastening his bag of supplies and changing the position of the mirror.

A small smile was forced onto her face and her muscles would not allow her to take it off.

This was a time of destruction and war, where someone was purposefully attacking them, and Lana was called on.

"I want to give you your chainsaw back. It ended up with me. What you said back there? You did the right thing. It was to save her life. I could've sworn she was too close to them just before we left to get you back at first. She just - wasn't appreciative."

She kept her composure and maintained her expression, even if she didn't want to. Then do it! We're being screwed over!

Lana's peripheral vision detected eyes leering at her. More specifically, her other pair of jeans. She had only changed one time - in the office bathroom with Nina. She soon found out the reason why. It was almost entirely stained with a deep shade of crimson.

"I don't know about this," Aarav pointed out. Lana scoffed. That was a dumb thing to be afraid of.

"Don't worry, it's normal to be afraid of a little blood. Not," she whispered in his ear. On second thought, she meant well and would never intentionally harm any of the group.

Penny was sure at that point about her knowledge about what was right and what was wrong. But there was one thing that irked her brain, keeping it active before it was too late. She didn't bother to talk to anyone about any of her decisions.

"Lana, you really need to consult everyone else before you do something. I know going somewhere without someone in the first place is dumb, but in the future? Can you just?" The group of sentences was the loudest she heard Penny speak.

That was the moment when Caleb snapped and exited out of the necessity that was quickly granted and quickly taken away from the survivors.

The remaining four observed him repeatedly hollering through the window, just like Aarav did with the infected he drew towards Lana's car.

Everyone made mistakes. Again, there wasn't any point in playing the blame game.

Before he wandered off out of sight, Penny opened and shut the door, swiftly using the handle. She didn't care that she unintentionally twisted her hand to catch him like he did to Isabelle, taking her bat with her. Footsteps were faintly heard, but they occurred not at a steady pace. She didn't bother turning around to see if it was Lana.

The repetitive chirping of the birds that took a break every so often lined up with her beating heart. There was no sense of time, even though Penny had it to put on her watch right after Lana stole the van.

She sprinted around the corner of the home like an athlete to find a stranger crouching down, moving his head to inspect her. They were dressed in all black with a mask covering their face, making their hazel rectangles for eyes visible, like something out of an animation.

That was the first thing she saw. The second thing was a pink bruise on his head that wasn't feet above ground. His eyes were blinking so that only glimpses of his beautiful gleam could be sighted. It was natural. He was a natural beauty.

The final thing was a baseball bat in the person's hands. A wooden one.

She ran towards the kit like her life depended on it.