Legs burning and lungs constricting so tight I could scream, I fall to my butt at the base of a dead tree and hunch forward, propping myself up with my hands. I gulp in air, panting loudly like a dog. Jasper’s right hand is gripping a tree branch tightly, no doubt holding him up. Strands of his honey hair fall into his eyes and others stick up in every direction. His face is angled away from mine, so I can’t see his expression, but the tension in his shoulders and his clenched fist tell me he’s still pretty angry with me. 

Monique has plopped down in the middle of our mini-clearing, chest heaving as she struggles to catch her breath. 

Sebastian is the only one not out of breath. He leans against another tree, arms folded across his chest, a sour look on his face. 

“How…how far…how far have we come?” Monique gasps. 

Sebastian’s steely eyes shift my way. I groan loudly. I knew I’d regret showing him my awesome climbing abilities. “Let me catch my breath.” I can still hear my heart pounding wildly in my chest –it pounds behind my ears at an uncomfortable volume. 

We lapse into an uncomfortable silence, only our ragged breaths and racing heartbeats thump through the air like a stereo blasting. After a couple of minutes, the branch Jasper holds snaps. 

I jump and Monique yelps, sitting up hastily. Sebastian merely looks over. 

“Sorry.” Jasper grunts and throws the branch into the trees. 

I watch him for a few moments. His jaw is clenched so tightly I’m afraid it’ll break. He stares after the branch, as if he wants to go retrieve it and throw it again,  his hands clenching and unclenching into tight fists. 

And this is my fault; I shouldn’t have overreacted…

Standing hastily, I whip around and grab the tree behind me. I refuse to allow myself to think like that. It is bad enough I have to apologize. The tree screams beneath my weight, but I ignore it. Let it break. Let me fall to my death. Then maybe I won’t have to apologize. I won’t ever have to deal with stupid Jasper again. 

He won’t ever make me feel this way again. 

I scramble up the tree, all the way to the top. The tree bends and hisses. I stop -a surge of panic rushing through me. 

Okay, I lied; I really don’t want to die. 

Luckily, the tree doesn’t snap. Hugging the trunk tightly, I look out over the tops of the other trees. It’s another sheet of gray - of death - and it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. I don’t see the small sliver of light; the trick. And my stomach sinks through my feet. 

“I don’t know where we are.” I announce, feet thumping against the ground. 

“Wonderful.” Monique lies back down. She spreads her arms out wide, like she’s making a snow angel in the dirt. 

Sebastian says nothing and neither does Jasper, both not looking particularly happy. Jasper takes in a deep breath and rolls his shoulders back, trying to release the tension. I watch him as he walks around, taking a few steps in one direction and then backtracking. 

Pacing, he is pacing. I want to bang my forehead against the tree. Did I seriously expect him to be happy again once I climbed down? I’m so stupid. 

“Alright then,” Sebastian kicks away from his tree and takes a couple strides forward, “Let’s make a camp. Night’s going to hit soon and we need firewood.”

“I went yesterday.” I say hastily, glaring at anybody who looks as if they are about to object. 

Luckily, no one seems to really care. Monique stands and lifts one shoulder in a half shrug, the strap to her quiver sliding down her other shoulder, and disappears into the woods. Jasper quickly moves after her, ducking to avoid a leafless branch. 

Sebastian’s shifty eyes flicker my way. 

I stare right back. 

He’s not one to start up a conversation; I learned that much last night. But when spoken to, he’ll comply and answer. Which just means I have to come up with a nifty little conversation starter. 

“So how long have you known Monique?” 

That was probably not the best thing to start off with, judging from the sudden sharp flash in his charcoal colored eyes. Sebastian stares at me for a few moments and then glances away slowly, gaze travelling around the forest. You wouldn’t think there would be much cover in this dead, barren forest, but the sun is hidden behind a never ending cloud of gray. 

I’m thankful for that, because I don’t have to squint to see, and if I had, I might’ve missed Sebastian’s answer. 

He closes his eyes. His shoulders roll back and it’s like he’s trying hard not to cry. And that brings a strange feeling of anxiety because he doesn’t seem like the type to cry, or show emotion –ever. 

“Since we were babies,” The words are so soft; I have to strain to hear them. 

“Babies?” My eyes widen. 

He still doesn’t look at me. “My mom knew her mom.” 

That’s one more word than before. I can foresee a painful process ahead but we’re slowly, slowly getting there. “Wow, so you guys were friends growing up?” I continue to press on. 

His jaw clenches tightly; it’s as if the skin is being stretched over the muscles to his jaw. “Yeah,” He grunts softly. His head is bowed, angled away from mine, but I can still see the small flicker of emotion dart across his face. 

I frown. Now we’re back down to one worded answers, and emotion. I should probably stop and leave it at that, he obviously doesn’t want to talk about it. But my stomach twists thinking about it. I’m not sure why I want him to talk so much. Maybe it’s because he hardly talks, and he does have a nice voice. 

Okay, it’s official. I’m losing my mind. What am I thinking?! 

He does not have a nice voice. He is not good looking, or even remotely boyfriend material. This way of thinking is unhealthy for my sanity and my well-being. 

“What was it like?” I inquire anyways, despite the tension in the air. 

He takes another deep, long breath. “I’d rather not talk about it.” 

Alright, I can handle that. I nod slightly and slowly slide down against my climbing tree, dead bark digging into my back. A twig snaps to my right. 

Both our heads snap to the side, watching as Jasper and Monique stalk back into camp. They both carry maybe five or six twigs, some charred at the ends, some a bright, sun-bleached yellow. They drop them on the ground in a pile and Sebastian steps forward, the stones he used earlier to make fire in his hands. I watch as he strikes them together with enough friction to create a spark. 

I sigh softly. “So what’s for dinner?” 

No one looks my way. 

Nobody looks at each other. 

There is no answer to my question. Save for zombies and fish, there’s nothing in this forest that’s edible –nothing that we’ve found, anyways. I can’t believe none of us thought to stick close to the water. Even if the fish are infected, we can still eat the good ones. 

“Stupid!” My palm hits my forehead. “Stupid, stupid, stupid!” 

Night settles over us quickly, washing over the land like a dark, ebony black wave. Stars poke out behind clouds, shimmering against the darkness. They make me sick. 

I hug my knees to my chest and bury my face into my kneecaps. Dad once showed me all the constellations, back when I was younger. He also told me that the stars are all the lost souls in the world, those who died. It’s the spirits’ way of watching over their loved ones. 

Stars remind me of Mom.

A loud blast explodes, right beside my left ear. I jump and fall to the side, hand reaching up automatically to clamp over my ear. I look up, eyes wide, and see the smoking barrel of Jasper’s gun. 

“What the hell!?” I scream at him, but my voice sounds so far away. 

Fingers curl around my right arm. I shriek and look over, just in time to see the determined look on Sebastian’s face. He wrenches me up off the ground and takes off towards the others. I don’t even think my feet touch the ground. 

At first, I think that it is his way of getting revenge for me flipping out on him, but I really underestimated him -even if what I did wasn’t really anything to get that mad over. 

I look back, over Sebastian’s shoulder, to see what Jasper fired at. 

And my entire body chills.

The smoldering pile of rotten flesh sits at the base of the tree, inches from where I’d been sitting. Its jaw is slack, as if it had been about to chomp into me when it was shot. A stark shiver tears through my body. 

“Oh god,” I begin to whimper. It had been so close. Just a few more moments and I would’ve been dead, “Oh god!” 

“Calm down, Scar.” Sebastian grunts, “Save it for later!” 

That’s when I hear the sounds of feet clumping against the ground behind us. I glance back again, eyes landing on the fast-moving army of corpses that run full speed at us. My lips part into a silent scream, but not a sound bubbles out. 

More shots rip through the air. 

I can almost hear the bullets as they slice through the air, as if they were centimeters away from my ears, and watch as they sink into each zombie’s head, their throats, anything. Monique lets out a shrill cry, several fumbling arrows spearing through the air after the bullets. 

“We need to go back to back!” My voice finally comes back, coarse and weak. “We need to group together with our backs to each other. We need to kill them all! They’re catching up!” 

They continue running, and for a few moments, I get pissed because I think they ignored me. But then my feet touch the ground and we whip around to face the zombies. My fingers curl around the hilt of my sword, unsheathing it in a fraction of a millisecond, and I bring the blade down forcibly -splitting a zombie’s head in half. Monique stands at my left, shooting arrow after arrow at the zombies attacking from her angle, while Sebastian stands to my right, lashing out with his mace. 

My feet are glued to the ground. I can’t move, even if I want too. Fear and adrenaline completely replace my blood, sizzling through my veins like acid. 

The zombie in front of me lets out a loud anguished cry as I lop its head off. 

One uses the zombie in front of it to leap high into the air. 

My eyes widen. I have one zombie coming at me from above and another inches away from stepping into my swinging range ahead of me. If I swipe at either one, the other will kill me. I can’t get both. 

Before I can scream however, a bullet tears through zombie above me and it falls into a mangled lump beside Sebastian, who kicks it away with his foot. I don’t think zombies come back to life once we destroy them -it would cost more nanobots to fix the wounds and injuries the corpse sustains. So I don’t worry about the ones I slice through. 

After several more minutes of endless fighting, the zombies retreat. 

I pant heavily. Shoulders sagging, I step back slightly and my fingers tighten around the hilt of my sword even tighter. 

“They’re leaving.” Monique gasps for air. 

“I never thought I’d see a prettier sight.” Jasper’s gun clicks and he slides it back into the holster. 

I scowl at them all. “I don’t think I can hear out of my left ear.” 

Sebastian huffs. “Alright, we’ll have time to figure out casualties later. Come on, before they come back!” 

I sheathe my sword. We all break into a run. My arms swing loosely at my sides, bent into ninety degree angles, and my hair, red strands tangled with sweat, slaps me in the back with every step. 

We run until we can run no more. 

My legs give out- ankle twisting painfully- and my back hits the dead ground with a dull thud.

All the air whooshes out of my lungs with an audible hiss. I gasp for air like a fish gasps for water, chest heaving unsteadily. Pain splinters up my calf, cells tingling with agony, and I roll over, clutching my leg. My ankle screams in protest. Monique hits the ground beside me, sending a cloud of dirt into the air. Jasper slumps back against a tree while Sebastian, the forever stoic one, pants softly and leans against a tree -one leg propped up. 

“I can’t see anything.” Monique rasps after a few moments of pure silence. 

“It’s too dark to go looking for firewood.” Sebastian snaps irritably. 

I inhale in a large gulp of air, trying to breathe around the pain, “We need to rest.”

“I’m not sleeping alone.” Monique retorts almost immediately. “Not without firelight. Not while we’re in a zombie infested forest. That is so not happening.” 

“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of the dark.” Jasper muses. 

“Shut up.” Monique snaps at him and climbs shakily to her feet. She trudges over to Sebastian and leans into the tree beside him, hand lightly touching his bicep. 

“I call Sebastian,” Her eyes meet mine, flashing, “Scar, you get Jasper.” 

“Wonderful.” I huff, eyes closing. 

Jasper doesn’t respond, nor does Sebastian. I roll over onto my stomach and carefully push myself up into a sitting position. Slowly, I climb to my feet, but my knees automatically buckle in response to the sharp pain that resonates up my leg. I shift all my weight to one foot and grab a branch to keep myself up.  

I peer around in the darkness for Jasper. When that fails, I whisper, “Jasper?” 

“Right here.” 

I follow the sound of his voice, arms outstretched like a zombie in one of those old horror movies –I even limp sloppily like one. My palm presses flat against something hard and firm, but warm and beating. I gasp softly in surprise and fingers curl around my wrist, holding my hand still. 

“Scar?” His voice is really, really close. 

I reach up with my free hand and find his face. My hand cups the side of his narrow jaw, the smooth skin twitching with the contact. “That’s you, right?” I whisper back. 

The face nods. 

A sigh of relief bristles past my lips. I hop forward on one leg, wrist wrenching free of his grasp, and coil my arms tightly around his torso. He gasps softly in surprise, chest jumping with the sound, and his palm lightly presses against the back of my head. I bury my face into his chest, breathing in his delicious scent, and my fingers clench around the material of his shirt tightly. 

“You scared the crap out of me!” I shudder. 

“Sorry?” He pats my head awkwardly, his other arm curling loosely around my body. 

I release him, looking up, carefully balanced on one leg. His bright blue orbs sparkle in the moonlight, staring down at me in confusion. I sigh. “That was also to make up for me yelling at you earlier.” I duck my head in shame and stare at the ground. “I know it wasn’t your fault…I’m,” I swallow thickly, “sorry.” 

Something soft curls around my chin, jerking my face upwards. 

A small curve of glinting white stands out within the darkness surrounding it. I blink, terrified for a few moments until I realize that Jasper is smiling. “It’s okay.” 

I huff and push his fingers away from my face. Reaching around him, my fingers lightly scrape against the dead tree behind him and I move around him to lean against it. I slide down and my butt hits the ground with a soft thump. I exhale slowly and close my eyes. 

Jasper joins me, our shoulders pressed tightly together. 

“This sucks.” I whisper softly, leaning my head against his shoulder. He glances over and nods. 

“Yeah.” 

I can only catch the word because my deaf ear is pressed against his shoulder, the other angled upwards. Something curls around my shoulder and my heart leaps in my chest, a small yelp ripping past my lips. 

Jasper chuckles lowly and squeezes my shoulders. “Relax, it’s just me.” 

Jaw clenching tightly, I resist a scowl and lean into his chest. 

I hear a muted click and look to my right. Jasper’s gun rests in his hand, fingers curled around the trigger, barrel angled towards the woods around us. At first, I think he’s found one, and I reach for my sword. But he squeezes me tightly again. 

“Cautionary.” He whispers softly. 

So there is no zombie. What does he think he’s doing? Does he seriously plan to stay up all night? 

I frown, but the thought makes me feel intensely safe; that coupled with Jasper’s arm that curls tightly around me, hugging me into his chest. I sigh softly and my eyes flutter shut. 

This story is so old. I finished it years ago, so I figured I'd go ahead and upload it all. If you do happen to read this, I hope you enjoy it.