I woke slowly and my mind was foggy with sleep. Every breath was full of pain. I was on the ground, but I was outside the fence. What had happened? I opened my eyes and blinked rapidly at the bright light as I tried to look around, wincing at the pain in my neck. I was rewarded with a view of branches. It looked like I had crawled under a thorn bush.

I reached to grab my backpack, and pain exploded down my arm as a thorny branch snagged some injury on my wrist. With a gasp of pain, I instantly pulled my hand back. I cradled the injured hand and saw an angry-red bite mark. Memories from the night before flooded through my mind. The screams, the blood, the zombie trying to pull me through the window, the bite, Kailey, Evan, the Swift, running...

I tried to control my breathing to keep the panic at bay. I was a ticking time bomb.

I used my other arm to grab my backpack. My muscles were burning with a pain I had never felt before. Even breathing was painful. I managed to pull one of my water canteens out of my pack, thankful that I hadn't drank it all yesterday.

I hoped the water might help hydrate my body and ease the pain. After emptying the canteen, I lay on my back, hoping the pain would subside. From the position of the sun, it was early afternoon. I had slept well into the day.

And I was still alive.

How long did I have? Despite the fiery pain in my muscles, I didn't have a headache. My mind wandered a bit, trying to escape the agonizing pain and still-lingering grief. The bite didn't go deep, and I was healthy. It may take the full seven days. But I had burned a lot of energy fighting and running myself into exhaustion. I had no clue.

It wasn't something they had ever covered in Zombie Training. We were just told to get anyone who was bitten to a safe distance if we could and, if possible, put a helmet on them so that they weren't a threat. No one wanted to kill a friend, but as I had learned, the second someone fell into the seizures, all rules were gone.

With some difficulty, I pulled a bandage out of my backpack and crudely wrapped it around the bite mark in the limited space under the branches, hoping that the covering would keep things from brushing against the painful injury.

I lay there for several more hours. At this point, I doubted I could even walk due to the pain. I was starting to regret running so hard for so long; my body was loudly objecting to what I had done to it last night. The pain was not abating. In fact, it was getting worse.

I had to bite my lip to keep from making any noise. I had never felt pain this bad, and neither had my entire body hurt at one time. Every single muscle ached and burned. Every beat of my heart was painful.

       Time is variable.

Every second was a gift, every second was a curse. I was still alive – and on the verge of death, life seems incredibly precious. I had fought this long to live.

Every second spent in the pain and knowledge that I had less than six days left to live was a curse.

Then the situation got worse. I heard the familiar moaning sound of a zombie. It was approaching and obviously able to smell my pain-induced sweat. I had to move. I may be on death's short notice memo, but being eaten alive by a zombie was not on my bucket list.

I crawled out from under the thorny bushes slowly; each movement felt like torture. The pain was almost unbearable. I wanted to drop into a ball and curl up to wait out the pain. There was no way I would be able to go far. Was there a tree I could climb? I had the hammock in my backpack...

I stood up with immense difficulty as my muscles felt like they were being burned with a hot poker. I finally got a good look at where I was, but I didn't recognize this field with its numerous blackberry patches.

To my dismay, the nearest patch of trees was about a kilometer away, and there was a barbed wire fence along the treeline. The zombie was about half that distance away and heading in my direction faster now that she could see me. Her dirty clothing looked fancy, and her blonde hair had likely been beautiful when it had been properly cared for.

I had to get away. The pain made me wish I had died overnight, but I had no desire to be a zombie's late lunch. Any movement hurt. For the first hundred meters, the zombie gained on me. As I kept moving, my muscles loosened up and were not quite so painful. Slowly, my pace picked up. The zombie was not that far behind me when I finally got close to the trees. If I had stood still, she would have reached me within a minute by the time I reached the fence.

The barbed-wire fence along the edge of the field caused me almost as much trouble as it would cause the zombie. Awkwardly, I climbed over it as my stiff muscles protested. One of the barbs snagged the hem of my shirt, ripping it in the process. I stumbled a bit and kept moving. I looked back to see that the zombie was unable to get over the fence. All I could feel was relief at having evaded it.

My muscles still hurt, but not as badly as they had before. The pain must have been from pushing them so hard yesterday, and then they must have stiffened up during the cool of the night. I went a bit further into the trees and kept going until I could no longer hear or see the zombie. At that point, I finally climbed a tree for some rest. I had no idea how I lasted on the ground all night long.

I sat on a big branch and dug through my backpack, discovering that two of my three canteens still had some water inside. I greedily drank the cool liquid in one, wishing that I had refilled them at night instead of topping them up in the morning.

After a while, my muscles started to stiffen up again, causing the pain to increase. I climbed down and kept moving at a slow walk, more alert now.

If I was where I thought I was, then there should be a creek in the direction I was heading. My mind was no longer hazy, although my muscles were still a bit sore from the abuse I had heaped upon them. My skin was also a bit too warm to the touch.

   

      An hour later, I found the creek and filled all three of my water containers without bothering to boil it. There was no point when a far deadlier infection was working its way through my body.

 For lack of a better idea, I decided to follow the creek and munched on berries as I went. I kept tabs on any large, easily-climbable trees while also keeping an eye out for company. The rest of the day was uneventful. By nightfall, the pain had mostly disappeared. Close to dusk, I hung my hammock high in a tree and slept.

I awoke the next morning to a growling noise. I was still in the tree, right? Yes. I glanced down but didn't see anything. My stomach once more announced to the world with a loud growl that it was hungry. I shook my head as I finally realized the source of the noise.

I carefully sat up and stretched. My muscles had stiffened up during the night and were still somewhat painful, but not nearly as bad as yesterday. I stretched as I tried to loosen them up while ensuring that nothing lurked below.

Eventually, I climbed out of the hammock and put it back in my pack. I climbed out of the tree without too much difficulty. Breakfast was a bun that I had discovered in my pack this morning. I forgot that I had left that there. Some wild greens also helped to silence my stomach.

I got a drink from the stream and sat down on a log to take a better look at my injuries. I winced as I unwrapped the bite mark. It wasn't as inflamed as it had been yesterday, but it was still puffy and red. I pulled out my small first aid kit so I could give it a decent cleaning.

I struggled to see it as an inconsequential injury instead of something that was about to turn my life upside down. The cool water of the creek actually felt good on the wound as I let the clear liquid slowly flow over it. I gently rinsed it off and dabbed it dry. I refused to consider using the disinfectant. The pain wasn't worth it, and I didn't really have to worry about infection when I had less than six days left.

Once my hand was bandaged up to my satisfaction, I regarded my badly-skinned knees. My walking had kept cracking parts of the scabs open, and the dried trickles of blood trailing down my legs looked pretty gruesome. The scabs still contained tiny rocks, dirt, and grit from when I had fallen during the fight.

As much as I loathed bothering the scabs, I knew it would feel better if I could get the grit out of the wound. I wiped down my legs to get rid of the dried blood on the undamaged skin since that was the easiest way to start this cleanup job. It took a lot of patience while a wet rag soaked the scabs into something softer, but I eventually managed to gently wipe away the masses of dried blood and dirt.

By the time I finally picked the last tiny rock out of my knees, my back was stiff and sore. I straightened my back with a sigh and grabbed my first aid kit again. I dug through it for some salve and slathered a generous amount of it on my knees. The moisturizing cream would keep the scabs from getting hard and painfully cracking.

My knees were throbbing from the cleaning, but I was pretty sure that it would make an improvement in how they felt down the road. I lightly bandaged them and sat up to gaze around me. My first aid kit was much emptier, but I didn't spot any other injuries that needed tending.

I was still alive. The best thing I could do would be to keep moving away from the Fort. Hopefully, my zombie self would be unable to find its way back to my remaining friends.

       Four days later, I munched on an apple as I examined my glasses, turning them over while inspecting them from all angles. I didn't see any damage other than a few scratches and scuffs, nor did anything seem out of place. But even when I was wearing my glasses, my sight was slightly blurry.

My glasses weren't dirty either. The blurriness had been so bad that I had actually forgone wearing my glasses the last two days. I could see up close without them, but anything further was a blur, although it was a blur that didn't give me a headache from eye strain. I was relying on my hearing a lot more since I couldn't see well. I had learned more about bird alarm calls over the last two days than I did in the four hours of actual classes.

My muscles had mostly recovered, although the pain and stiffness were present in the morning to greet me. I was having problems sleeping for more than six hours since the pain would wake me up. It mostly disappeared once I had walked for ten minutes, but I didn't like walking around on the ground while it was still dark out.

I had discovered that if I jogged for an hour before setting up camp, it kept the pain at bay for longer, which was a welcome reprieve. It was almost as if my T-cells had decided to work overtime, using aches and pains instead of pins and needles.

I finished the apple and jumped down from the tree, wincing slightly as my knees protested. The pain wasn't too bad, but I was once more reminded that I should be more careful. I hadn't peeked at my injuries since I had bandaged them up, mostly because I didn't have any more bandages left in my first aid kit.

I started walking alongside the gravel road, ready to duck into the trees if anyone appeared. I kept heading northeast since there wasn't supposed to be anything in that direction. My days were ticking down, and I was determined to keep moving.