Pitch Black

When the doors began being kicked in, I knew what was going to happen. We were going to hide, and the moment the found us, it would be a fight to the death. It always happened that way, when they found us. It was a grueling, disgusting fight, but we had been lucky so far, winning most of them. The only time we had ever lost was when we lost a boy who had been with us for two weeks. That was back before my family met Louis’s group, and the boy wasn’t worth much, anyways.

My heart was hammering in my chest as I leapt into action. “Everyone find a hiding spot,” I barked, shoving Sam towards the closet in the room. She stumbled and looked at me, fear in her eyes but I gave her a hard look. “Sam, I want you to carefully and quietly climb up on the top shelf of that closet and hide behind the blankets.”

If my little sister protested, I didn’t hear her because I was out of the room, my hand firmly grasped around Ashling’s arm, ripping her into a room and shoving her under a bed. She didn’t even have time to know it was me shoving her into hiding before I was out of the room, entering another and closing the door quietly behind me.

Danielle and Liam were no where to be found, but I saw Louis running his knife across the bottom of a mattress. It was mostly hallow except for the springs and he gestured to the other one, telling me without words to do the same.

Ripping a knife, my hands gripped it tight, the banging getting louder. I knew it was vampires by their lack of care for noise. We were close to one of the small cities, so it was unusual for them to be checking abandoned buildings. It made me wonder what had them on the scouting routes again.

The rip in the mattress was just big enough as I laugh on the frame of the bed, letting the heavy mattress fall on me. for a moment I thought it was going to simply squash me, but I wiggled around, sticking my arms and then my body into the slit, becoming a part of the mattress until it lay flat and still on the frame.

My body did not so much as flinch when the door slammed open, the old door frame rattling with protest at the force. My breath hitched and my lungs began the task of holding my breath. I could never breathe when the foul creatures were in the room. Their ears were sensitive, and I didn’t want to risk it.

The footsteps were muted through the mattress, but I heard them walking around. “I smell something over here.” I heard the footsteps next to the mattress and I closed my eyes, the grip on my knife tightening as I pictured how I would attack if they lifted the mattress.

“Nah,” one of the other ones said, his voice a deep baritone. “Dry scent. Must have been squatters from some time ago. There ain’t shit here, let’s go.”

Listening to the sound of retreating footsteps, I slowly and quietly let my breath out. Laying their for a few minutes, I waited until I could hear Louis shift in his spot before I tangled myself trying to get out of my hiding spot. It was harder to get out of than to get in.

Rolling to my feet quietly, I looked at Louis. His blue eyes were on mine, and a silent agreement went between us. Something had caused them to be on the lookout. Something could always be good or bad. It was usually bad.

Walking into the hallway, I saw Liam and Danielle slip from one of the rooms. I assumed one of them had taken the broken fridge and the other the dishwasher. Hiding in odd things like that were always a good way to save yourself, especially because they were good for smell. Hiding under beds was always good too, because the bed blocked the smell of your skin from rising.

“Ash, are you okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Liam’s question to my twin made me look at her as she came out of the bedroom. Her face was indeed blanched but she nodded and mumbled an affirmative before going back to her books. Sam came over to me and I opened my arms as she buried her face in my middle. “Blakely, their on the look out for something.”

My eyes flicked up to Liam and I knew they leapt with fire and warning. He glanced at Sam once before nodding, agreeing to have this conversation later. I would not scare Sam, especially when she was just getting into her third month of sleeping without nightmares.

Settling back into the back and largest bedroom, everyone was silent. Sam lay on the bed next to Ashling, who was scribbling away. The fear was gone from her face, a quizzical look taking over as she searched for answers. She often lost herself in answers. I wish I had that sort of escape, the ability to get lost in something and forget where I was.

Sometimes the hiding was the worst part, when they came, especially for me. Whenever they came, I had to stay my hand, I had to remind myself how lethal they were, and that I could not attack them. But every single time, a moment of rage would run through me and my finger would touch the trigger, or my hand would grip the night tighter.

As night got deeper, we settled into a less tense atmosphere. Danielle curled into Liam’s side and Louis sat next to me, looking at the edge of his knife. He had no comic relief for tonight. None of us did. Sam began to snore quietly, giving Liam the go ahead.

“They were talking about something,” Liam whispered quietly, casting his eyes towards Louis and I. “They were talking about things that had been stolen. It sounds as if medical supplies were stolen. Who would steal that other than humans?”

I heard the hope in his voice. We all shifted at the mention of other humans. There had to be others. Somewhere. “Even if it was,” I said slowly, looking at him an trying not to squash his hope. “We cannot hope that they will be so kind. You know it’s not like it used to be. Humans are too savage now. We are too savage. No one can afford to lose supplies, so they attack each other.”

Everyone was very quiet at that. I felt Louis agree silently next to me. We often agreed on many things, but as for Liam… we viewed violence very differently. I saw it as a necessity, he saw it as just one option of many. “Would you really attack another group of humans?” Danielle whispered, her light brown eyes scanning up to meet my own. They did not hold judgment, but Liam’s did. “If we came across them?”

“If it meant survival? Yes.”

A heavy silence fell in the air. Ashling’s pencil stopped moving across the pad of paper. I never realized how much noise the scratching of her pencil made. It’s absence was terrifying. Louis broke the silence, murmuring, “If it meant living, I would do anything.”

“But humans…”

My eyes met Liam’s. His were hopeful, mine were not. “There is no such thing as ‘humans’ anymore. Just survivors.”

*

Pale grey light filtered through the dust windows of the bedroom. My eyes focused on the small dust motes floating through the air like snow flakes. I knew we were no where close to snow, and it was no where close to winter. It was some time in the summer, and we were somewhere in the middle of Illinois.

Leaning against the wall, I saw as Louis’s eyes fluttered open, revealing their blue expanse. The first time I had ever seen him, I thought I was in love with him. It was the way he seemed to be the leader of his small group the way he made jokes. I quickly learned that he wasn’t my type, and I was content with that.

What Liam and Danielle had, leaning their against that wall, tangled in each others arms, was special. It was not frequent that someone in this desolate planet could find someone to love. There were no such things as soul mates anymore. They were all killed off, either together or separately.

Standing quietly, Louis came to my post where I sat with the rifle in my hands. I had not let go of it all night, and my eyes had only closed periodically. Leaning against the wall, he murmured quietly, “You can’t keep doing this to yourself.”

Glancing at him, I gave him a quizzical look. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yeah, that’s fucking bullshit.” We were trying to be quiet, the others still asleep. Ashling had a single arm wrapped around Sam, her other hand under her pillow, probably grasping a knife. “Blakely, you will kill yourself trying to lead us the way you do. You throw yourself into danger to save us, and you make yourself sick trying to make sure we’re safe. But we’re not, we never will be.”

My lip twitched in annoyance. “I don’t make myself sick. It’s what I was born to do. And I will do it with my dying breath. They will not touch you- any of you.”

Knowing it was pointless to argue, he nodded, falling silent. By unspoken agreement, Louis and I co-ran our small family the best we could. No one had ever elected us and we had never suggested it; it just happened. Somewhere down the line, we started calling shots and making sure certain things were carried out.

“Did you mean what you said last night?” he asked me, his eyes focusing on the rays of light that were slowly turning gold. “About attacking humans, I mean?”

“You know I did.”

Louis nodded. “I’m glad we’re in agreement. Those leeches weren’t here for nothing last night, someone’s bit them in the ass and I’ll bet it’s humans. They may not be so nice.”

“They might not get the chance to be.”

When we decided everyone had slept enough, we gently began waking everyone up. It was fairly simple, since most of them started like wild animals when we touched them. The only one who didn’t, was Ashling. She was calm and collected, like she always was. I wish I had that calming gene, the one that made her go to her place of peace when she worked equations. Our parents used to call us fire and ice, and I knew which element was which.

Our breakfast consisted of eating granola bars and fruit that we had left over. We still had a good amount of food, but I knew that it would only last a few days. Thinking over my options, I wanted to find somewhere we could stay for at least a week or two.

When everyone was done eating, we gathered our wrappers together, popping up a loose floorboard and shoving them underneath before placing the wood where it belonged. We were leaving no tracks. Everything was just as it was before, and we moved out of the abandoned complex very quietly, and with fingers on our triggers.

Walking through the ghost town was creepy enough to send shivers down my spine. Something about the place was too alive, to touched. I wondered if this had been one of the last places to go, since everything seemed generally new. That, or people made the mistake of coming here often.

An hour after we left the apartment behind, we were coming to the outskirt of the town. Sam was walking between Danielle and I as we walked when I heard the sound. It was faint, so faint that I thought I imagined it. It was the sound of dirt crunching beneath shoes.

Sam was shoved behind Danielle so quickly that she stumbled, my body whirling and clicking the safety of the rifle. Everyone was on hi alert now, weapons in hands as we stood in a circle, facing all angels with Sam in the middle of us, motionless and eyes scanning back and forth.

We were met with silence. Then from behind a building, a boy stepped out, his blonde-brown hair dirty and unruly. He had a gun trained on us as well, making my finger go even closer to the trigger as I snarled out, “Who the hell are you?”

It was obvious he wasn’t a vamp. He didn’t vaporize in the sun like they normally did, so he was human. But it didn’t matter what he was, as long as he had a gun trained on Louis, who was closest to him.

“Look,” he said calmly, looking at me. “Neither one of us can afford the sound of a gun shot. So how about we all put them down, okay? You out number me.”

“Blake-"

“How do I know you don’t have people in hiding? No offense but I’m not buying the bullshit. Now why don’t you put the gun down, since you’re right: you’re out numbered.”

“Orrr,” he said, looking at me with serious eyes. “You can try trusting me and we all put the guns down. One shot and you know the wind will carry the sound to that city.”

My eyes narrowed. “Fine. Everyone guns down, slowly.”

Our group slowly bent down, setting guns on the floor, and the boy did the same. Slowly he approached Louis and I, holding his hands out as he did so. He looked tired, and I noticed a bag on the floor where he had come from, bulging. So he had been raiding.

When he was close enough, he said, “My name is-"

The boy never finished the word as I darted from the circle, taking him by surprise and tackling him. Though he was much taller, he was too startled to do anything with my weight on top of him. In seconds my knife was at his throat, pressing hard enough to draw a bead of blood. “Knives are quiet. So if you have friends, tell them to back off.”

There was fear in his eyes. “There’s no one, I swear.”

“Blakely.” It was Ashling’s voice, but I was glaring into the boy’s face. He was giving me a look that rang honesty, but there were too many conflicting emotions running through me. No one disturbed our strange position. “Blakely, enough.”

Licking my lips, I relented, rolling off of my victim and standing. The boy sat up, touching his neck faintly as the small cut bled. He glared at me. “That’s real great, the last thing I need to be doing in a vampire apocalypse is fucking bleed.”

“Watch the language,” I muttered, wiping my knife with a cloth. Reaching in my back, I tossed him gaze and a treatment to stop blood. “We have a kid.”

“Yeah,” he snorted, taking the supplies and going to word on his neck as he sat on the floor. “You were real worried about her when you were going to kill me in front of her.”

“Look, who are you? And what are you doing here?”

“The name is Niall.” He didn’t seem particularly interested in answering my questions, but seeing as he was surrounded, he didn’t really have an option. “And I was hear stealing medical supplies for one of the people in my group. But the vamps caught wind of me two days ago so I had to hide out in the city until they stopped so I could travel in the open. And then I heard you and didn’t know who you were, so I hid. Turns out your worse than vamps.”

Ashling snickered slightly behind me and I turned to her, giving her a glare. She looked at me with innocent eyes, shrugging. “You did hold a knife to his neck.”

“I’m about to hold a knife to yours.”

When Niall finished fixing his cut, Liam offered a hand to help him stand. Niall gave him an appreciative nod and smile. Turning back to me, his smile lessoned. “I have to admit, this isn’t the way I thought meeting other humans would go.” His eyes scanned us. “You have six. So do I.”

“Where are they?” Danielle asked, looking him up and down. I could tell she was trying to figure him out, like I was. “Six is a bit to have. We struggle as it is. Harder to hide in numbers.”

He nodded, his eyes on Ash. He was looking at her with an expression I was unfamiliar with, a small smile on his lips. I didn’t like it, so I stepped in front of her, Louis doing the same exact thing. He noticed the motion, looking between us both. “That’s why I came here on my own, too search for medicine. Our group is staying in a down a days walk from here. It’s close, but it works. For now. We have plenty of supplies… and Harry and Zayn would surely like to meet you.”

“Or kill us,” Louis muttered, looking at me. I bit my lip and looked at my group. We needed another place to stay. And the hope that was lighting their faces was stabbing me in the heart. I couldn’t do this to them, I couldn’t deny them what they wanted. Turning to Louis, I nodded a fraction. “Well. It looks like you’re either going to welcome us with open arms or gunfire. Lead the way, Neil.”

“Niall.”

“Whatever.”