The Last Alive

Chapter Twenty-Eight - The End of Emma?

Chapter Twenty-eight

The End of Emma?

As the zombie's teeth sank further into my arm, I screamed. The pain was excruciating, and I knew what it meant. I was going to be one of them. I wasn't going to survive. The tears flowed as I focused on Nathan. I couldn't look down. I couldn't think about it. I didn't want to think about it.

"No! No, Emma!" Nathan yelled.

"Emma!" Liz shouted.

A shot rang out and gooey, black blood spattered on my face. The undead's grip on me loosened as it fell, dead again. I reached to my arm and held the wound. I could feel the slimy zombie drool mixed with my own sticky blood.

I was infected.

"Get in here, Emma!"

I shook my head. "I can't. It-it bit me."

"She's infected," someone else shouted.

"Leave her!" someone else yelled.

The words stung, but they were true. I could never be around anyone else again. Of course, in a few short hours I'd be trying to eat their brains.

"We're not leaving her," Nathan said.

"She can't come in here," George retorted.

"Backup. Now!" Taz held his weapon in the man's face. "I swear I will shoot you."

"Shut up, George. We have isolation containment for a reason, you ninny. Now let her in."

"Isolation?" a few asked.

"You must be joking! What do you think happens to those who are bit but before they're turned?"

"We shoot them," Art said.

"Nobody is shooting my daughter," Dad screamed.

I sank to my knees sobbing for the second time in years.

"After they turn. And we do it in isolation containment. You all really don't know anything that goes on around here."

Nathan slipped through the gate and ran to me. Grabbing my hand, he yanked me to my feet.

"Let's go."

"I can't. I was bit."

"Then you'll go in isolation until you turn." He held my arm examining the bit quickly. "You still have at least two hours."

"Then what, Nathan? You'll shoot me between the eyes?" I looked down at my wound as more tears welled in my eyes.

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, let's get somewhere safe."

"If I'm there it won't be safe," I replied through tears.

"Emma, stop being so fucking emotional! Shit, I think I preferred it when you were an emotionally hardened basket case. At least you were logical then."

"What?" I sniffled.

"You're being ridiculous. Stop it."

I glowered at the man, stunned and embarrassed he was being so careless. I didn't argue anymore. It was pointless. He grabbed my hand and dragged me inside. The men who stood near the gate quickly backed away raising their guns.

"Knock it off, she hasn't turned yet." Nathan smacked a barrel of one of the guns pointed at me.

"Can't be too careful," an older man with a death grip on his shotgun said, pointing it at my head.