White Noise

The hike back to the factory was too loud. Ryland was talking to me nonstop, having been impressed with my quick takedown of Gabe. By the time we were halfway back to the factory, I was so drained and exhausted, I snapped at him to please just shut up. He did. For about ten minutes. When he opened his mouth again, Logan shot him a glare to rival my own.

Finally, we made it back to the factory, where the only person to be seen was the guard at the back door. She nodded at us as we headed inside. Holland and Lila were asleep together on his cot. Peter sat nearby, looking clean and decked out in new clothes. Just like everyone in this apocalypse, including myself, he had a plaid shirt on over his t-shirt. He nodded at me as I walked in, hopping up and meeting me halfway.

Logan squeezed my forearm, and headed in another direction.

“Did you find him?” Peter inquired as he stopped beside me. I simply nodded, too weary to speak. “Where is he?”

I shrugged. “Killed him.” Peter looked astonished for half a second, before he remembered this was the fucking apocalypse and this kind of shit happened daily. I was numb to killing humans and zombies alike. Is that fucked up, I wonder. To get numb to killing people? I didn’t care.

“Good. He didn’t deserve to live after what he did to Trudy. After what he wanted to do to the baby and to Lila and Baby Ryan.”

All I could muster was another nod.

“Scar, you okay?”

I glanced up and shook my head. “Nope. But, it’s the apocalypse. If I ever say yes, then you should be worried.”

Peter laughed. “Okay, fair enough. Just try to get some rest now.” He patted my arm, and headed back to his post by Hol and Lila.

After grabbing my bags, I dragged myself upstairs, ready to sleep for two days. Logan had told me I could sleep on the other bed in her room. She said people rarely bothered her when she was in there. They knew better, she said with a laugh.

Like a typical scene from any show or movie ever, I walked into Logan’s room to see her standing in a bra, changing into more comfortable clothes. Unable to think of anything except how ridiculously cliché this was, I burst into hysterical laughter. Logan looked up to the door, noticing me and probably thinking that I was losing it. She looked between me and her half naked torso, before it dawned on her why I was laughing. She joined me in my hysterics.

After I had calmed down, I wiped the tears from my eyes. “I am so sorry.” I took deep breaths. “That was so stupidly cliché.”

Logan smiled, tugging a shirt over her head. “It’s totally okay. It was very cliché! Normally it’d be a guy walking in on a girl, so maybe it doesn’t make it quite as cliché.”

I shrugged, knowing my bisexual ass was fully there for a half-naked girl. “Anyways, you said I could crash up here?”

“Yeah!” She enthused. “Feel free to. I don’t mind sharing. I’ve been lucky enough to have my own space, so I’m down for sharing with you.”

“Thanks, Logan.”

With a nod, she turned to show me her room. It was big enough to fit two cots, two bookshelves, and two small sets of drawers. It seemed like she had been grabbing small décor items to make it more like home. She had a couple posters, fake succulents, and one of those alarm clocks that has the giant bells on top. The shelves were filled with books, trinkets, and boxes of who knows what.

On top of one of the dressers was a duffle bag and two backpacks. At the foot of her cot was a small duffle bag and a hiking backpack. They both looked like they were ready to grab and go in an emergency. In the front corner of the room was a folding table covered in weapons and cleaning supplies. Her cot had two cot mattresses stacked on top of each other.

I dropped my bags at the foot of my cot, and laid down. Flat on my back, knees pulled up, arm over face. The way you lay when you are dead tired. Or undead tired. Scarlett, shut up. Everything hurt the way it does when you have a fever and try to walk to the fridge to get a Gatorade.

Everything started to get processed by my brain. The new scenery, New York, Holland argument, Trudy, Lila, Gabe, the horde. Logan. By the time I passed out, I had told my brain to leave it all alone twelve times. I needed it all to just give me one thing at a time.

***

I was running. But I wasn’t running fast enough. The horde was closing in on me. As they gained on me, my nose started bleeding. My head spun and I collapsed to the ground. Zombies flooded my vision, tearing into me. My insides hung from their teeth, and I blacked out.

The room was covered in blood and guts. Ian, Natalie’s brother, everyone we had lost. Ryan. Trudy. Everyone I had failed. They all stood in a circle around me. Lila, Holland, Sasha, everyone still living, pushed their way through. My dad appeared in front of me. “You failed them all. You failed them, Scarlett.” He shriveled until he was nothing.

A tug on my shirt. Shaking, I looked down. Henry. Covered in blood, a chunk of his neck missing. A sob wracked my chest. “Aunt Lettie, why didn’t you come?” He pointed at the sky. I looked up, everyone was pointing at the sky. I followed their fingers. A missile was whizzing towards us.

My world exploded into fire and darkness.

***

I woke up with a start, fighting the urge to scream as I rocketed upwards. After a moment, I laid back down, breathing deep and pushing my fingers into my eyes. In. Out. In. Out. In. Out.

A cold hand on my arm startled me as I lay there hyperventilating. I jerked, eyes flying open. Logan was kneeling beside my cot, worry all over her face. I groaned. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

She shrugged. “I was up.” She was lying, but it was sweet. “Are you okay?”

I let out a deep breath in a huff. “Yeah, I’m good.”

Logan narrowed her eyes. “You can talk to me, you know.” She squeezed my arm and gave me a small smile.

Rolling over onto my side, I buried my face into the blankets. “It was just a nightmare.”

“What do you think it stemmed from?”

“I mean, there’s a massive zombie horde that I have no idea what to do about, a pregnant lady was brutally murdered, and my nephew might have been caught in the New York bombing. So probably one of those.”

She smiled sympathetically and squeezed my arm. “Do you want to head towards New York?”

I ran a hand through my hair. “Of course I do. But it’s just not practical right now. Lila and Holland are too catatonic to go anywhere. And there’s that fucking horde, and I have no idea how to avoid it. There’s no way to know how big it is.”

“Let’s talk to Sasha and Darren in the morning.” Logan suggested. I bet they both want to get you there. We can make a plan.”

“Thank you, Logan.” I turned, laying my head down to look at her. She smiled at me warmly. Before I backed down, I scooted over till my back was against the wall. “Want to come up?”

“I thought you’d never ask.” She said sarcastically, but without dropping the smile. She climbed up on the mattress, and we fell asleep facing each other.

***

I woke up to shouting on the first floor. Good god, the apocalypse brought out the dramatic in plaid clad people. In the night Logan and I had become tangled within the others limbs. We had both woken with the shouting, so we unwrapped ourselves and headed onto the walkway.

The factory group had surrounded my friends, who formed a barricade around Lila and Crissy.

“Are you fucking serious?” I yelled. They all whirled around, searching for me. I stomped my feet angrily and they turned to me. “Are you guys seriously fucking arguing about the Gabe shit right now? I’m trying to get some fucking sleep!”

“We have to turn them over to protect the majority!” One of Logan’s group shouted up to me.

“Turn them over to who, exactly?” I threw my arms in the air. “Gabe and Jason are dead!”

This made the group erupt in chatter. Apparently, no one had caught them up to last night’s happenings.

“So, leave the mothers the fuck alone, and shut the fuck up!” I bellowed, then turned and stomped back into the bedroom. Logan stayed on the walkway to make sure they dispersed, and I laid back on my bed, face down.

I was woken a while later to Logan talking softly to someone in the room. She was sitting against the wall at the head of my bed, and I had moved in my sleep to have my head on her lap. Sasha and Darren’s voices were in the room as well.

“We worked out a plan with some of your group in case the horde heads this way. One for each possible scenario. After that, Darren and I discussed ways to get Scar to New York. So, don’t worry.” I could hear the mother in Sasha. “We’re going to get her there. We know how important it is to her to find out what happened to Henry.”

Logan started stroking my hair. “Good. I’m so glad. There is one thing, though…”

“What is it?” Darren rumbled quietly.

“I want to come with you.”