She lets out a groan as her eyes flicker open. She brings her hand up to her face, rubbing her eyes feeling the scratching of something soft on her face. She lifts her hand away from her face and takes a look at her hand only to see gauze wrapped around it, circular blood stain on her palm. Letting out another groan, she forces herself up into a sitting position. She rubs her face with both hands trying to understand what happened, not having the memory of falling asleep or being wrapped up in her mind. Her hands slide down her face uncovering her eyes allowing her get a good look of the broken window.

     Her gaze lowers down to her legs and she sees gauze wrapped around her right thigh with lining of dried blood. She runs her hand over the injured area hoping the memory of getting it would come to her any minute. It doesn't. The only thing that runs through her head was a man screaming at her like a drill sergeant. She pulls her shoulders back to stretch and get a knot out of her back but instead her spine cracks; one by one a single cracking noise comes from her spine racing down the bone the further she pulls back. It wasn't what she wanted but it helped with the knot in her upper right part of her back.

     She looks around her turning her head to the right first just to see a pair of legs lying there not moving. She moves her gaze up only to see the owner of the legs is Tyler, who was on his stomach asleep using his arms as a pillow. She looks away from him, rubs her face once more just to wake her up even more before she tries to get up.

     "Hey." A soft voice is heard along with a soft thud coming from her left, "Hey. Hey. Hey."

    A hand is placed gently on her back and another gently gripping her arm. The warmth of the hand sent chills down her back with goose bumps going through her whole body. She knew that feeling and knew the only person with warmth like that is Chad. A knee is place next to her leg when she rubs her forehead.

      "Here drink some." Chad softly told her opening up a bottle of water he got from a backpack closer to him and handed it to her.

     She takes it putting it to her lips and allowing the cool liquid to rush down her throat sending more shivers through her body. She pulls it away and looks down at the bottle before handing it back.

     Chad took it from her, puts back on the cap and sets it down next to him, "Are you okay?" He asks with much concern lasing through his voice.

      She nods with her eyes closed, slowly lifts her head and opens up her eyes to see him looking at her with his soft hazel eyes, "Where's Madison?" Her voice slightly cracked, "Tyler's right here."

      "She's fine. May have a slight bump on her head but still fine." He informs her, "She's helping Richie find some cabs and stuff to lock the door to the staircase shut."

     "Where'd she get a bump?" Adira asks looking at him confused.

     Chad starts, "Tyler..." He sighs, "Madison- We in countered a monster near the door and it went after Tyler so he, Tyler, pushed Madison from behind him and I guess she hit her head when she fell."

     "Are you sure she's fine?" She asks.

     "Yeah she passed out but when she woke all she had were a headache and a bump." Chad shrugged, "She didn't seem to have vision problems or any cuts or any serious injuries that we saw or knew about."

     "Oh." Was her only reply, "What about Tyler?" She turns to look at him.

     "Nothing." Chad answered, "He carried Madison all the way up here when he thought you might be dead or something. He's fine. He just got tired and wanted to stay here just in case you woke up." He explains, "Guess he got tired and passed out. Don't blame him though." He let out a yawn.

     "Why?" She asks looking up at him, "Are you tired?"

     He slightly nods, "Yeah."

     "Lay down." She tells him as she slowly stands up trying her best not to get dizzy, "Go to sleep."

     His eyes widen playfulness in his eyes, a smile creeps up on his face as he shakes his head and stands up, "Yeah not happening, Jeff."

     The name causes her to smile a little and laugh from her nose, "Darn. Worth a try." She shrugs as she stretched cracking a lot of her joints.

     He lets out a soft laugh as she limps by him, "I think I'll be more safer out there than in here with you." He jokes as they walk into the hall way side by side.

     She hums and acts as if she's thinking before shaking her head, "No. No you would not."

     He shrugs as they stop right behind Madison, who was standing in front of Richie and Dan watching them tie all sorts of cable wires to the door and another door knob to keep it close. When they finally finish tying the wires together and make sure it stay together, they let out a sigh before turning around and finally noticing Chad and Adira's presence.

     "Hey, guys." Richie greets, "Are you okay?" He asks Adira.

     Everyone looks at her, "Yeah." She answers, "Just a little sore but I'll be fine. Thanks." She gives him a gentle smile, which she receives a nod back, before turning her attention to Madison, "Hey, are you okay? I heard you hit your head."

     She touches Madison's head trying to find the bump while Madison replies, "Yeah. My headache went away not too long ago."

     "Okay." Adira says as she gets done checking her head, "How about you go get some rest? I'll help them now."

     "Nah- I'm not tired yet." Madison tells her.

     "Fine then go check on your brother." Adira pushes her into the direction of the room Tyler is in.

     "Okay." She simply agrees and walks into the room.

     Adira turns her attention back to Richie and Dan, "Are you guys okay?" She nods in their direction, "I heard you got attacked."

     Richie nods, "Yeah apparently two infected people fell from the sky and landed right in front of her." This caused Adira to look back at the window remembering when she was tackled by two infected people and one dragged her out the window; Adira brought her attention back on Richie when he spoke again, "One didn't die like the other one though." Confusion wraps his voice.

     "What do you mean it didn't die?" Adira asks confused, "Nothing would be able to survive a five story fall."

     "I know." Richie agreed, "I didn't see that part only Madison, Tyler and Chad did."

     "Oh." She replied.

     At that moment Madison's tiny voice rang through the hall, "Did you tell her about it?" She asks.

     "About what?" Adira turns to look at Richie in question.

     "The thing was still alive." Richie told her.

     "All of them are still alive, Rich." She rolled her eyes at him.

     "No this one... He – his..." He was struggling to tell her, not knowing the right words, "The head- It – it was... missing."

     "Missing?"

     "It didn't have a head!" Richie practically shouted, "It was headless." He cringed in disgust.

     Adira look over her shoulder and looks over at the room that sat at the end of the hall staring at the shattered glass when Madison starts to speak.

     "I was walking around and the thing-" Madison's voice slowly faded away as the memory of what happened before Adira fainted came rushing back to her.

     She looked down and watched as the infected that attacked her plummet to the street below. She was dangling out the window both hands holding on to the window frame with her feet gently swinging back and forth. She was shaking not from the fear of falling, not from fear of dying but from the pain she was enduring with the dislocation of her shoulder and the strength it took to not let go. A tingling, firing sensation of pain came rushing through her hand up her forearm causing her to wince. Something tickling her arm caused her to look up.

     She saw blood running down her arm and knew she most likely cut her hand or a glass was jabbed in her palm. A deep soft voice echoed through her head as she tried to pull herself but failed and just stopped trying.

     "Come on, Adira, get up!" The voice echoed in her head multiple times.

     Come on!

          Come on, Adira!

     "Come on, Adira..." Adira told herself, "Get up."

     With that she tried to pull herself up and successes at it. She lifts her knee up and placed it on the edge of the frame just enough to push herself up with her knee and get her other leg on the frame. When she attempted to stand up her foot slipped off the edge causing Adira to fall to her knees her palms flat on the floor trying to keep steady. The slip had caused her thigh to get cut on the same piece of glass her hand was once on making a slit into her thigh. When she took a few breathes she got up again but slowly this time.

When she was safely on the frame where she knew she wasn't going to fall off the edge, she stood up straight, lifting her hands off the floor. Her right hand slide up and off the sharp glass piece, blood smearing all over it but Adira had too much adrenaline and was paying too much attention to getting away from the window to notice the stinging sensation in her hand.

     She walks away from the window, out of the room and into the room looking for to wash her hand up from the blood pouring out. She stood out in the hall trying to examine her injured hand but a hiss and stomping causes her to snap her head up just in time to see the infected that she smashed with the door to the stairs coming after her. The headless infected freaked her out and gawked at it as it inched closer and closer with every step it took. Eventually she came out of her state of shock and sprinted to the room next door putting her hand on door frame just to push her in the room a lot faster. The infected ran right past the room she ran in to but eventually turned around and went into the correct room.

     The infected slips on a piece of paper falling forward and takes hold of Adira's heel making her fall forward too. Adira starts grabbing anything close to her and either throws it at the infected or continuously smacking the infected with it. When it doesn't help, she starts thrashing her legs around kicking the stomp of its neck and getting its hands away from grabbing her. Eventually, she's capable of crawling away from the infected and getting back on her feet with the infected following her move. She grabs a pen off the floor, holds it in front of her and rushes the infected.

     She stabbed the headless monster in the chest. Forcing the pen even more in just to try and do some damage to it. Adira watches as the monster before her stumbles a bit with the pen in his heart. She took note in the swaying and the hesitation on the monsters part and quickly picks up even more office utensils such as: pens, pencils, mechanical pencils, etc. She started stabbing the utensils into the infected body; one by one pen, pencil after pencils and pens all being shoved into its body forcing the infected to take a step back.

     Some pencils broke in half while others pierce the muscles below the skin and refused to let go. When she ran out of utensils she shoved the monster back with full force, making it fall back. With all sorts of pens and pencils jabbed into its body, the monster lied there on the floor limbs slowly moving up and down along with its legs giving Adira signs it's trying to get back up. She quickly flips a right side up table in the room on the office utensil covered monster. Her breath was heavy as she bent over, hands on her knees trying to catch her breath.

     She looked up at the table to see it slightly shaking from side to side as if the infected was trying to get out from underneath it but unfortunately for it Adira wasn't going to have that. She carefully got on top of the flipped table and started jumping. More and more force was put into it every time she jump; eventually, it became more about releasing anger than making sure a once human being trying to kill her and make a feast out of her. She continued to release the anger by unconsciously stomping even harder with even more force.

     Why was this happening?

          This shouldn't even be possible?

               How does one survive injuries like that? Survive being headless?

          Who the hell started this nightmare virus?

     By the time she was finished, she hasn't realized she squished the infected like a bug and completely flattened it to the point where it was hardly noticeable that an infected was under there. Her breathing quickened and her legs gave out from under her forcing her to fall to her knees. Her hands pressed gently against the table and that's when she noticed it. Not only was the headless infected completely flattened but the dark liquid poured from underneath the table and rolled further and further away from it.

     A sudden scream made her head jolt up looking at the window.

     "How do we kill it?" The voice screamed again.

     Even when she was out of breath and weak, she got off the flipped table and stumbled over to the window. Below her she saw an infected on top of one of the boys and two just standing there one with their gun out. She looked around the room for anything that can help them out and there. Against the back wall in the middle she saw a huge printer. She quickly made her way over to it and started to push the machine with all her might. She did every possible pushing position to get the thing over to the window not planning on stopping until the infected was dead and her people were alive. As the printer hit the window, it breaks, Adira turns around, placing her hands against the side of the printer and pushed one final time before the printer falls out the window.

      She watched as the machine smashed into pieces once it hit the concrete floor. She stood there, seeing if Tyler would move from his spot on the floor, concern clearly in her face. A few minutes passed by when she sees Tyler pick his head up then move his body. She lets out a sigh of relief, glad she didn't harm him with her plan. Once she saw Tyler with Madison in his hands and Dan walk up to Chad and Richie.

      Her concerns now were off of Tyler and on the unconscious little girl in Tyler's arms. She quickly turns around trying to get out of room and downstairs as quick as possible but her body wasn't letting her. Every step she took she became weaker and more exhausted. She tried to fight it but she had no more energy left, her body became weak and she was mentally and physically exhausted. She took one more step and her legs just couldn't take it. They collapsed on her.

     She tried to grab on to the closest table to help keep her up but the table just ended up coming down with her. She was already unconscious by the time her body hit the floor.

     "- I didn't really see because I hit my head on the building wall when Tyler pushed me." Madison's girly kid voice brought Adira back.

     She looks at the little girl before her finish speaking as the last word fell out of her mouth and she looks up at Adira, who has shock written all across her face. Madison's face fell from being slightly excited and relaxed to being guilty and sad. The way Adira was looking at her made Madison feel as if she did something wrong or said something that upset her.

     "What?" Madison asks Adira, "Did I say something?" She holds her hands up to her mouth.

      The concern and sadness in her voice shakes Adira out of whatever she was thinking about, "Oh.." She shakes her head, "No. No, it's just..." She looks over at Chad, "I ran into one too."

     "Wait- what?" The three boys say in sync all having shock covering their voice.

     "Yeah." She whisper and nodding her head slowly, "I- I smashed an employee's head in with the door. When I got out of that room..." She pointed to the last door at the end of the hall, "I saw it. I was gonna find supplies to wrap myself up but that headless thing ran after me."

     "How did you kill it?" Richie asks her taking a step closer.

     "Did you kill it?" Dan asks the second Richie finishes.

      "Screw that!" Chad slightly yells, "Is there any other injuries I should know about? Are you sure your okay?"

     Adira tries to continue remembering even when a headache begins, "Yeah." She nods, "I'm fine, just a dislocated shoulder." She puts her hand on her shoulder and carefully rubs it hoping to remember more, "Yeah... Yeah I killed it. I-" she shakes her head, "I ran into this room." She walks to the room where she was once lying in and points down to the table that Tyler once noticed when he walked in, "I squished him." She grabs one of the metal legs, lifts the table and pushed the table off to reveal to the others the flattened headless male infected.

     They all looked at each other in shock some of them covering their mouths at the sight of it. That moment Tyler came walking up to the group not noticing the infected at first. But as soon as he gets next Adira and Madison his eyes caught a glance at the flattened infected. Almost immediately he made a gagging sound, put his hand over his mouth and ran out of the room. From the room they were standing in, they could hear gagging and other noises showing everyone Tyler had a weak stomach. Madison cringes at the though and the noise so she closes her ears and eyes exactly what Adira was doing, both trying to keep themselves from coughing the last thing they ate.

     Throughout that process Chad had made his way next to Adira, putting his hand on her back and rubbing his hand in gently soft slow motion trying to easy her while Richie covers Madison's ears and pulls her in hoping she doesn't throw up as well.

     Inhale and exhale Adira thought to herself Inhale. Exhale She used the technique she taught herself to stop from getting an upset stomach when she figured out that she was easily grossed out. She did exactly what she told herself to do and slowly her stomach along with her gagging reflex coming to a halt. It's the exact same moment Tyler made an appearance. He leans against the door frame, slightly bent over and his hand on his stomach.

     "I couldn't throw up." Tyler announces, "Nothing came out just me gagging the whole process."

     "That was really irrelevant." Adira spoke sounding as if she's holding her breath.

     "T.M.I too." Madison muffles through Richie.

     "Sorry." Tyler huffs out.

     Adira let out a slight chuckle as Tyler leaning against the door frame sent memories of the whole family at a 24 hour all you can eat buffet flush through her mind. Everyone just stared at her like she became crazy. It didn't stop her though. The memory flashes through her head and the images go through her mind as if her mind was a movie and a funny part was stuck on replay.

     Adira remembers when she was 13 seeing half of her family sitting at the large stretched table as the others were somewhere around the buffet going to get second some, like Tyler, going for thirds just like Adira's older brothers, Matt and Steve. For the second serving Tyler had the usual 10 pieces of BBQ ribs while her brothers just got finished with a Steak, Macaroni and Cheese and Mash Potatoes. Tyler had been over full and running around, which was the biggest mistake he ever made. He couldn't wait till he got to the table to dig into his ribs so he helped himself to his ribs as he looked for more food to fill his plate.

      Adira remembered her looking around the restaurant just to keep her eyes occupied but for some reason she turned to her right only to see a kid around the age of 9 to 10 years-old hunched over, holding his stomach as he ran in the direction of the bathroom. As he was releasing all of his recent dinner all over the newly cleaned white tile floor. A few moments went by before Adira's older sister, Darla, came up to the table announcing Tyler was sick and throwing up in the bathroom so she thought it was better to leave. Adira sat there as she listened to her family ask about what happened to Tyler, all of them full of concern. She lets out a half gasp half chuckle as her sister told her family member and her that he over did himself with the ribs he had and threw up all over the floor because he couldn't get to the toilet on time.

     "That was Tyler I saw running to the bathroom and throwing up at the same time?" She remembered questioning with a sound of humor, fun and concern in her voice.

     Darla only nodded and told them maybe it was time to go and the family all agreed.

     That was the last thing she remembered before she return to reality, shook her head and laughs.

     "Don't laugh at me." Tyler growls at her as he walks by glaring at her as he went to go lay down.

     She laughs even more because she swears if looks could kill her face would be stabbed with daggers from Tyler's glare. The look on his face reminds her of the next morning after the accident with Tyler and his over filled stomach when Tyler came downstairs and Adira was laughing at him. Of course he was grumpy at first but soon fell in sync with Adira's laugh as they kept joking about it.

     As if Madison was reading her mind, she let a smile form on her lips knowing what she was thinking.

     "Well at least it's the end of the world." Madison calls out to Tyler.

      "And our stomachs are empty." Adira added.

     Tyler grumbles something under his breath as he lay down on the floor,where he was laying before, turns his back to him so they won't see the smile that is creeping on his face. He could hear the echo of Adira's and Madison'slaughter as it fills the room. That was what he fell asleep to. Is their laughter that was filled with warmth, comfort and slight humiliation.