Haisley's Virus

Chapter Nine

     Go to it.

Don't tell me twice.

     Was that a threat or an agreement?
     I jog outside, and scan the street for any Zombies. Eight. I can make it.
So I run, and I feel the wind my hair, and the road beneath my feet, but only for a minute before I reach a field.
     I close I eyes and injoy the wind, then run face first into a tree.
     HAHAHA I'M DYING! YOU'RE SO CLUMSY.
Am not.
     I blink several times before checking the air, then I head to flame. "What's are you doing here!?"
     I spin around, and see Curls, the girl that broke into my house.
     Curls?

Yes.
     I scratch my neck. "Uh . . . Investigating?"
     Wooow smooth.
     "Investigating." She echoes.
"Yes," I stand tall. "What are you doing?"
     "Well," she shifts her footing, and I notice a box of matches held loosely in her left hand.
     A lefty, eh?
     "I'm burning . . . Dead bodies." Her face flushes.
     "Dead Bodies?" I raise an eyebrow. Yes, I'm that talented.
     You're talented? No. I'm talented.
     "Yeah, you know, so they don't . . . Come back to life." She scratches her neck.
     Hey! That's our thing!

What? Since when?

Since now.
I nod slowly.
     "How did you get here?"
     "I . . . Ran."
     "You ran?" She puts her hands on her hips.
     "Yeah, I'm a fast runner. Used to run everyday." I nod to myself as I say this, it wasn't a full lie, at least. She nods, then starts walking away. "Where are you going?" I call.
She stops walking, but doesn't turn around.
     "Base."
     "Base?" I echo.
     "Yep!"
     "Can I-"
     "Nope, sorry." She starts jogging Eastwards, and I sit down.
     Since when did you know which way was East?

Doesn't the sun set in the West?

     Yeah.

Well, she's heading away from the sun, so that's East.

     Okay.

The sun's setting.

     Yeah, it is.
     I turn, and look just to the left of the sun, as not to damage my eyes, and watch as it sets. It's pretty.

                     ~~~~~~~~~~~

     I awake to the sight of a full moon, high in the sky, and for a moment, forget that the world is ending.
Then I remember.

     I bolt to my feet, and look around. I then remember my shoulder, and look at it, peeling back the ripped fabric. There's still dried blood, and I wrinkle  my nose again. I should clean that.
     Grimacing, I tentatively scratch the caked blood off. Surprisingly, it doesn't hurt. Deciding to test my theory, I use the edge of my sleeve to wipe the remaining blood off. I blink I surprise. The slash is completely healed.
     Weird. . . Oh well!

     I decide to shrug the odd phenomenon off, and examine my surroundings. I'm in a huge almost empty field, and a pile of burnt is a few meters to the left. I wrinkle my nose at the sight.

     I feel a hunger in my stomach, but it's different then the normal pains you get while hungry. What is this?

     You're H-U-N-G-R-Y.

I know that, but for what?

     Food?
     I start to wander around the field, looking for something to eat.
     Really? It's not like a squirrel is gonna pop up out of nowhere.

     After a couple minutes of wandering around, I see a tree.
     No. No squirrels, got it?

     I take a quick look around myself, and notice more trees, but they're all full of crab apples. Yuck.

      I grin as I notice red berries on the branches of the first tree I spotted, and walk to it.

      I attempt to pluck a few berries from a low branch, but can't reach. I open my hand slightly, and jump, attempting to grab the branch. That fails too.

  Hah. You're short.

No, the tree is just tall.

     I grumble in frustration, and glare at the branch. Now what? I sigh, inspecting the tree. All the branches are too high up to grab, but there's one of those swirly hole-type things, that are great for footholds. It's perfect.
     I carefully place my foot into the hole, and jump up, successfully grabbing the branch. I grin.
     I coulda done that.

I could have done that, you mean.

     Mmhm.

     I pluck a berry in my mouth and chew. Mhmm so good.
     Eh, could be better.

Someone's picky.

     Whatever.

     I hop off the foot hole and look around. There's maybe about 20 other trees around me, the road I came from looks like a dot, and the pile of burnt is around 60 meters behind me.
     Wow, you ran far.

Yeah.

     I put my hand on my hips, thinking. I could go home, but the risk of running out of food is high. I could try to find that curly head girl and her base, or a convenience store.

     I ponder these thoughts for a moment. Finding that base could be helpful, they most definitely have stuff there, else why wouldn't she let me go with her? On the other hand, the convenience store would serve as a great shelter, but it could be looted.

     Although people did turn pretty fast. . . There can't be that many survivors.
     Just go to the base, it can't be that far away.

You do have a point, but how do we get there?

     Follow the girl, she only started walking like 30 minutes ago.

Eastwards it is then.