if we survive

t w e n t y

a s h

I felt like my brain was bulging and pushing against my skull. I was moving, but not by my own will. I peeped my eyes open slightly and saw the backside of someone. I was being carried over someone's shoulder like a sack of potatoes. I made a low groaning noise to signal that I was awake. The person carrying me stopped walking and I was carefully sat on the ground. The people around me were fuzzy but it didn't take me long to figure out who they were and where I was. I sighed in relief that none of them were my brother. Adrian kneeled beside me while Maven and Colman stood at my feet. I lifted my hand to my head and felt a liquid running down the side of my face. My fingers were red when I pulled them away. Adrian held his left hand over his chest as if protecting it while he looked through his bag for some type of medicine.

"Can you stand?" Adrian asked softly. I was still dazed but with the help of Adrian I was on my feet in no time. My ankle ached from Holden pulling me to the ground with it. Maven wrapped her arms around my waist and dug her face in my chest. I hugged her back and she held my weight so I didn't fall over.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen, I just wanted to help." She whispered to where only I could hear her.

"It's okay." I whispered back. She pulled away from the hug but kept an arm around me to help me stay upright.

"How far are we from your camp?" Colman asked Adrian.

"It's just through the trees, Adam won't be expecting us back this early but he'll take care of Ashton's wounds. He'll welcome you." Adrian replied to Colman confidently.

"His sword! Shit, he's gonna be pissed that I lost it." I mumbled and pinched the bridge of my nose.

"I don't think he'll care about the sword after he sees you bleeding and my broken wrist." Adrian shrugged. My eyes widened when I finally realized why he held his hand awkwardly against his chest and immediately examined Adrian's left arm. It was swollen to half the size of his right and green and purple bruises were formed.

"Did Holden do that?" I asked. Adrian shrugged at first but ended up nodding. It took everything I had not to turn around and murder Holden with my bare hands.

"It's not a big deal. We're alive and we have Colman, that's what we planned." Adrian shrugged and started walking ahead. I let go of Maven and wrapped my arm around Colman for support instead. Maven walked ahead, knowing I wanted to speak to Colman alone, and caught up with Adrian. Colman patiently walked at my pace.

"I didn't expect to see you again." She said just above a whisper.

"You didn't seriously think I'd just abandon you, right?" I asked, and continued before she could get a reply in. "As soon as Maven told me that your people weren't the good guys, I convinced Adam to let me find you."

Colman bit her bottom lip in thought. After a few seconds of silence she spoke, "I didn't think you would just leave us. I did, however, think they might've kidnapped you. I just knew that you wouldn't have let yourself die when you knew we needed you."

"I don't think I'd call it a kidnapping, more like protective custody." I said. "They're really good people, I promise you'll like it there."

Colman nodded "I feel like a terrible person." She mumbled. I could see that the words slipped out of her mouth before she had the chance to catch them.

"What, because you didn't come find me? It's okay Colman, I came to you." I replied and watched her drag her feet.

"I'm not talking about that, I've done some shitty things since you've been gone." She reluctantly looked up to meet my eyes but immediately looked back down. Guilt of something was killing her from the inside out and I didn't know how I could help her and that was killing me.

"I've done shitty things too." Was all I could think to say. Ahead of us, Adrian and Maven stopped walking. Through the trees I could see about thirty lurkers scratching at the gates of our camp desperate to get inside. The four of us shared a look, silently asking each other if we should fight through them or wait it out. There were just as many dangers in the woods as there were at the gates, we'd have to defend ourselves either way. Maven and I were weaponless, I had a twisted ankle, and Adrian had a broken wrist, we didn't have leverage here. The only advantage we had was beating hearts and the ability to walk above one mile an hour.

A long groan behind us brought me out of my thoughts. I turned and came face to face with an elderly lurker with black eyes. I stumbled backwards, tripping over my own feet, falling to the ground with the lurker snapping right in front my my face with his saliva dripping onto my cheeks. I heard Adrian cry out in shock beside me and a loud thud as something fell to the ground. It took all my strength to focus on my life instead of his and keep the lurker far enough away. Suddenly, with a loud disgusting cracking sound the lurker's head was smashed from the side with a rock and his black blood poured into my face as he fell onto my chest, dead for the second time. I jumped up and saw Maven breathing hard holding a stone bigger than her own head. I heard another grunt from Adrian and turned seeing him holding Colman behind him backing against a tree while four lurkers were snapping at them, he pushed them back with his one good hand. I grabbed the stone from Maven's hands and swung at one of the lurkers, it fell over in a puddle of black blood. The stone was difficult to grip because of the slippery black liquid. I held it as tight as I could and swung at another one, the stone slipped from my grasp but crushed its third lurker's skull. Finally, Adrian was able to take hold of his screwdriver and stab one lurkers neck while Colman pulled out an arrow and dug it into the last one's skull. We all stood in silence panting and watching each other. The lurker blood dripped down my neck and down my shirt, I felt disgusting and probably looked the same as I felt.

"We've got more coming." Colman said and placed an arrow into her bow. She looked at me and pulled out a gun in pants line and handed it to me. "I don't know how many bullets there are."

I nodded to her and stood in front of Maven who's only defense was a slippery stone that she could barely lift above her head. I limped when I walked and pain would randomly shoot through my ankle but I didn't let it slow me down. Adrian used his good hand to grip his screwdriver and stood back to back with Colman. Beside me, Maven smashed the head of a lurker that was gaining up on us. I shot one between the eyes that was a few feet away from Colman. There weren't many, but enough to make us cautious about moving. The apocalypse in my story is different than how you'd see on tv. We don't encounter a hoard and run to leave the injured to die, we protect them. We don't fear the undead, we kill them. Lurkers aren't as dangerous as the television shows you, as long as you're alert death by lurkers is usually rare.

An arrow whistled passed my ear and stuck into a lurker skull directly behind me. To my left, I heard Maven struggling with her stone, when I turned, a lurker was right up on her. Her fingers kept slipping from the stone so she couldn't lift it enough to protect herself. I raised my gun and pulled the trigger, it clicked but a bullet never left the barrel. I cursed under my breath, who in their right mind keeps a gun with only one bullet? I pulled Maven closer to me and tried to pistol whip the lurker, but, it's rotten hand caught my wrist. I cried out when they jerked me forward, away from Maven and threw me on the ground. I couldn't tell if the lurker/human was male or female but I protected myself the only way I could and brought my knee up to their groin.  They fell to the ground coughing in pain and I scrambled to my feet. I turned around to face my friends and saw that all three were being held with knives at their throats.

"You've got to be kidding me." I mumbled and turned to face the one that attacked me. They were on their feet glaring daggers at me and I could see the glint of silver in their hand. I backed away slowly, searching my surroundings for some type of weapon. To my left, I spotted a lurker with an arrow in its skull but it was out of my reach. Any sudden movements could cost me my life. So, I lifted my hands in surrender and screamed.