Do You Want Me, Undead?

I keep saying the same three words until they don't make sense anymore. "That wasn't them. That wasn't them. That wasn't them." But of course it was, of course those were my parents that the bus just ran over. This shouldn't have happened to them, they were supposed to be out of town. They should've been safe.

I feel hands on my shoulders shaking me, but my eyes can't seem to focus on who they belong to. I vaguely hear the word 'slap' and then shortly after, I feel a stinging blow to my cheek. My eyes start to water and I look up to see Alex standing in front of me, a pained expression on his face.

"I'm so sorry Lucy, but I had to get you to snap out of it." He averts his eyes from mine. "We need you to show us how to get to the gun store..I'm sorry about your parents.."

I look at his apologetic face and try to swallow the lump that had formed in my throat again. I walk to the front of the bus without a word and guide Colussy to the gun store. When we pull up to to it, I see the big sign that says 'Ralph's Gun Store'. There are no lights on inside, so hopefully this Ralph has moved on by now. I'd hate to come face to face with a frightened gun store owner. Colussy turns the bus off and we all grab our weapons, preparing ourselves.

"I'll check around and see if the coast is clear." Jeff volunteers, gripping his crowbar tightly.

"I'll go with you." Evan steps forward and taps his bat against the floor.

The two of them go silently, and do a quick walk around of the small store, then head for the front door. I see Jeff shine a flashlight inside through the barred glass window on the door. He turns around and gives us a thumbs up. I tighten my grip on my bat and take a deep breath. I feel a gentle squeeze on my shoulder and turn my head to see Alex giving me a tight-lipped smile, guitar in hand.

"Let's go get us some real weapons." Jack says, wielding his guitar over his shoulder.

When I step off the bus, the cold hits my face and I shiver inside the jacket I'd put on. The front door is locked, so Jeff takes his crowbar and uses it to pry it open. I expect an alarm system to perhaps go off when we step in, but nothing happens. Someone flips on a few lights. The inside of the store looks so much bigger than the outside, almost all the wall space covered in an assortment of weapons.

"Alright guys, find some guns and grab whatever else you can carry, don't forget ammo. Next stop is Walmart." Flyzik instructs. The guys' faces light up and they split up to find their ideal weapon of choice.

"I'm gonna try to find a bathroom." I mumble to Alex, he nods and watches me walk away. I turn a corner and go down a hall that leads to a small, unoccupied office with an old wooden desk and a lone chair. There's a door that says restroom on it and I sigh in relief.

As I finish washing my hands, reality comes down like a brick wall and hits me hard in the gut. I realize what's happening out there beyond these walls. I realize that my best friend was torn apart and died before my eyes. I also realize what I was trying to deny earlier. Those were my parents, and they're now dead. I clutch at my mom's necklace and squeeze my eyes shut.

"I can't take this, I can't handle something like this. How am I supposed to survive a damn zombie apocalypse?" I whisper as the tears spill down my cheeks. After a few minutes the tears become sobs and I sink down to the floor. I try to muffle my cries but give up easily. "This can't be happening, I think to myself. Things like this don't happen.

I don't hear the door open, but I feel the arms circle around me, holding me together. "Shhh it's alright, you gotta stay strong okay?" Alex's voice is calm and soothing. "I wish you hadn't seen that, you didn't need to see that."

I look up at him slowly, tears continuing to dribble down my cheeks. "They were supposed to be out of town Alex, not here. Why were they here?" I whisper, finally getting a hold of myself.

His thick eyebrows knit together anxiously and he shakes his head. "I don't know Lucy. Maybe the same thing was happening where they were at and they came back for you. I have no idea." He wipes the remaining tears off my cheeks with his thumb and I lean into his chest, heaving a shaky breath.

"I can't think about it anymore right now. I have to keep my head straight, panicking now won't help me."

I feel Alex nod. "You're right, we all do." He pulls back and looks at my tear-stained face. "We haven't come this far to die on the first day." He says with a rueful smile. He stands up and grabs my hand, pulling me to my feet.

Driven by a sudden impulse, I hug him tightly. "Thank you Alex." I say quietly, resting my head on his shoulder.

He hugs me back and simply whispers, "Anytime." His warm breath tickles my ear. Then he puts his arm around my shoulders and leads me back out to the guns.

"Does anyone here even know how to shoot a gun?" I ask worriedly, looking at all the young men with dangerous weapons in their hands. Jack hears this and looks up.

"How hard can it be?" he asks.

Rian gives Jack a patronizing look. "Well, you kinda need to know how to aim it." He says, wielding his own gun in his hands.

The boys bicker it out while I scan the room for a gun of my own. A few of them I recognize, from years of video game playing I used to do, plus from when my grandpa took me shooting sometimes when he was alive. My eyes stop on a large black gun that I instantly recognize; an assault rifle. I get up on one of the counters and pluck it off the wall, feeling the weight of it in my hands. I look around until I find what I'm looking for, a gun strap. I attach it, and sling the gun over my back. I keep scanning the guns until my eyes roam over another familiar sight. I go to grab it but it's just out of my reach.

Alex is there and grabs it down for me, looking at it curiously. "It's an AK-47 right?" He asks and I nod. "Pretty good gun I think."

He hands it to me and I run my hand along the length of the gun. "It served me well in video games. I just recognized it."

Alex laughs. "A gamer huh? That's pretty cute." He grabs one of the guns for himself and scans the walls for another gun. I find another gun strap and go up near the front counter and see Jack examining a variety of pistols, two guns also slung across his back.

"Hey kiddo how you feeling?" He asks, looking down at me with those big brown eyes.

"I've been better. I'm just not going to think about it anymore. I have to think about staying alive you know?" I take a deep breath and he steps forward to give me a tight but comforting hug.

"It'll be okay. Let's find us some nice handguns, yea?"

I smile at his lispy voice. "Thanks Jack, sounds good."

My eyes scan the rows of handguns, reading the labels, having an idea of what I'm looking for. When I see it, I use the butt of one of my guns to break the glass.

"Badass girl!" Jack comments, making me laugh. I reach into the broken cabinet carefully and pull out a lethal looking pistol.

"Oh that's a Magnum! Those are nice, used to use them in video games." Jack says, grabbing one as well.

"We'd better grab two, double pistol could be great for close combat." He nods and we both pick up a second gun.

I examine the pistol and happen to look back at the wall behind the counter. "Oh hell yea." I walk around the counter and reach up to grab a katana off it's rack. The handle is wrapped in purple silk and has a tassel hanging off the end. "This is fabulous." I say, grabbing the sheath and sticking the sword inside.

"Now you'll be a ninja princess!" Jack laughs.

I wave the sword around a little to humor him, and then I start looking around for a gun belt.

"Looking for one of these?" Alex asks, holding up a couple leather gun belts. He hands one to me and one to Jack. Then he picks out two pistols for himself, the guns on his back clunking together, and put them in him own gun belt, which actually looks really sexy on him. Jack and I do the same.

Everyone spends about half an hour gathering guns and as many boxes of ammo as possible and loading their weapons, we all have at least two guns and two handguns. I see that Danny has chosen a deadly look crossbow.

"Alright guys, are we ready to go?" Colussy asks, looking around at all the guys, and me. Nobody objects so he nods and gestures to the door. "Then let's pack our shit and get out of here."

We all grab a few extra guns from around the store and start taking our plunder out to the bus. We keep as quiet as we can as we pack the guns and ammo into storage. I check my useless cell phone and see that it's 12:47, and this makes me yawn involuntarily. It feels like an eternity has passed since Alex and I first spoke at the meet and greet, but it's only been a few hours.

I step onto the idling bus give myself both a mental and physical shake, we still have to get into Walmart and I need to be alert. When everyone finally boards the bus, Colussy gets us out of there. I guide him to the store, feeling a little better than earlier after crying things out and having Alex comfort me.

"Damn, that's a big Walmart." I hear Jack comment from behind me.

"Well, it is a Super Walmart." I reply with a grin.

"Shit, I'd say."

I see that all the lights in the store are off, which is the spookiest thing to see, considering they're always on. The front entrances look normal though, no signs of any forced entry, which is good. The parking lot is frighteningly barren, except for a few abandoned vehicles and one overturned burnt-out truck that seems to have previously exploded. There are also a couple of stray zombies wandering aimlessly through the rows, turning slowly towards the sound of the bus. Colussy just runs them over.

"Maybe we should go around to the back, to the loading area. Might be an electrical room with a generator, we could get the lights going again." Flyzik suggests. "Jeff, you've dealt with generators before right?" Jeff nods.

I decide to speak up. "Maybe we could spend the night here? I mean, it's getting late and I don't know about you guys but I don't think I'll be able to fight zombies well if I'm exhausted." My stomach gives an audible gurgle. "Plus I'm starving."

A few of the guys laugh lightly at my dry humor, and my newly established confidence. I'm sure they're all tired and hungry too, how could they not be.

"You have a good point. We'll camp out for the night and get moving in the morning. We'll decide where to go later." Flyzik says.

"Sounds like a plan." Colussy turns a corner that brings us to the loading dock and he pulls up as close as he can. Thankfully the area is devoid of any loading trucks so we have plenty of room. We grab the flashlights and Colussy shuts off the bus.

"Alright guys, we gotta stay close together and be on high alert for any of those bastards. Try not to use the guns, the sound might attract a bunch of them." Everyone nods and we exit the bus, taking anything we might need with us; clothes, personal items, guns and ammo. I find my blanket from my house and stuff it in my backpack. Anything else I need I can find in the store.

"There better be an unlocked door, otherwise, Zack you'll be knocking down a door my friend." I hear Jack whisper.

We find the back doors to the store and big surprise, they're locked. Zack steps forward and instead of attempting to knock it down, he simply raises one of his guns and brings the butt of it down hard onto the handle, breaking it off. We hear a metallic click and the door slides open a little. Zack just shrugs as we all raise our eyebrows at him. Flyzik opens the door and shines his flashlight inside the black room, confirming its emptiness.

"We need to find a generator, I know they would have one here." Jeff says.

My hand reaches for Alex's as we cross the threshold, he grips my hand back tightly. We wander around in the dark, searching, relying on our beams of light to guide us. I find being in the back of the store to be very unnerving, though its probably just the darkness making me feel that way. Nobody speaks and only our footsteps echo softly through the air. A light is shined on the wall on a sign that warns of high voltage danger.

"Found it." I hear Jeff announce triumphantly. We come across a large machine and all lights are directed to the spot so Jeff can go to work. After about five minutes, he actually gets the generator to start up and we can almost feel the store come back to life as we're thrown into light.

"Thank god." I sigh in relief, but Alex doesn't let go of my hand. Everyone pats Jeff on the back and praises him, he deserves it. Then we head for the tall doors that lead to the store.

"Alright guys here's the deal. We don't know if there's anyone else in the store so be cautious.
We need to barricade the doors first, then we'll look for supplies." Mother Flyzik instructs.

"Then we can eat and go the fuck to sleep." Jack says.

We do a walk around of the store and find that it's empty, which is a relief because I don't know if I'm ready to kill one of these things yet. Sure I have the means to do it, but do I have it in me? We barricade the doors with furniture and other heavy objects, making sure every exit is secured. Nothing was getting inside here.

"The generator will probably last for a few says, maybe even a week. Evan and I checked the water system too and it's working as well." Jeff says to everyone as we finish securing things.

Evan nods. "Yea, so actually we could probably stay here for a while. There's shitloads of food and clothes, I mean, why not just stay where it's safe?" I see many nods and no one objects.

"Good, because I don't think I'm ready to go back out there and face those things yet.." Flyzik says sheepishly, letting his calm facade slip a little. Who can blame him?

"Amen to that." Zack says.

"So does this mean we could perhaps have some fun?" Jack says devilishly, wiggling his eyebrows.

"Yea, I could use a beer." Vinny agrees, letting out an exasperated sigh. Everyone laughs and agrees.

"Not too much fun," Flyzik says with a reluctant grin. "Gotta keep our wits about us."

"Yes Mom." Jack replies, rolling his eyes but smiling.

From there on, the tension in the air diminishes and is replaced with a feeling of at ease. We plunder about the store, going down almost every aisle picking up things we want and putting them in shopping carts. Halfway down one of the frozen aisles, Alex and Jack lift me up and put me in one of the carts. Then together they push me down the rest of the aisle, running as fast they can. We laugh carelessly, momentarily forgetting the horrors outside the store.

After a while, we take our spoils to the back of the store, where Flyzik told us all to meet back at. We lay out tons of comforters, blankets, and pillows, making one giant bed. Someone had found a microwave and plugged it in.

"Fabulous! No frozen food for us!" Jack exclaims happily. We eat well and by 2:50 everyone is ready to sleep.

"Hmm maybe we can drink tomorrow night, I'm so damn tired." Vinny says with a yawn while everyone more or less agrees.

"Wait, what about the lights?" Grieco asks. "I don't know how any of us could sleep when they're all on like this."

Flyzik frowns. "You're right, I can't sleep like this." He gestures to Jeff. "You and Evan come with me to find the fuse box. I'm sure some of these lights can be shut off."

The trio jogs off and leaves the rest of us to wait. Meanwhile, I find my part of the bed to be right next to Alex, with Jack on my other side. Not too bad of an arrangement, despite the hardness of the floor underneath the comforters. But that's when I really take a look at their clothes, all the guys' clothes, spotted with blood not belonging to them. Alex notices me staring at him and he looks down at himself, frowning.

"I'm gonna go change." He says, giving me an apologetic look.

"Ew, yea me too." Jack agrees, and they jog off to the clothing department. Many of the boys look down at themselves then, and mimic Alex and Jack. I'm left with Rian, whose clothes seem unscathed and face looking more than a little lost in thought. He's laying on his makeshift bed, staring up at the ceiling.

"Why is this happening?" He asks, more to himself than to me I think. I leave him to his thoughts, but stray away from my own. I can't afford to lose it again. I need to be strong and completely put aside my grief and fears. This is no longer the time to dwell on those I've lost, I have to concentrate on those I have. They're my family now.

The boys get back in fresh clothes just as more than half the lights in the store turn off, including the ones directly above us, making the lighting suitable to sleep in.

"'Atta boys." Vinny says with a smile, fluffing his pillow to prepare for sleep.

Alex and Jack take their places again on either side of me as the other three jog back, receiving many thank yous.

"Now this I can sleep with." Jack says, gesturing to the ceiling by spreading his arms.

I smile at him, and then at Alex who is already looking at me with those warm brown eyes. We lay there like that for a few minutes, eyes locked, neither of us able to look away. Eventually he reaches out for one of my hands, twining his fingers through mine. It comforts me, makes me feel safe. Without looking away from Alex, I use my free hand to reach for one of Jack's. He takes my hand and gives it a reassuring squeeze. I pull both their hands closer to me and finally close my eyes, content enough to drift off into a dreamless sleep.