Taeyeon grabbed a chair and placed it in front of her.

“Are you comfortable in those cuffs?”

“Nope.”

“Do you wish to be free of your binds?”

“Yeap.”

“Will you behave?”

“I will.”

“Promise?”

“I’m not a child, Taeyeon.”

“Good,” she said as she released Jessica’s limbs free and the latter stretched and rubbed her sore spots, “I assume you are hungry.”

Taeyeon passed to her a tray of food; bacon, some mashed potatoes, two slices of toast bread and a cup of freshly brewed fragrant coffee that sent delight down Jessica’s nostrils.

“Here, eat.”

“That smells succulent,” Jessica put the tray on her lap and began relieving herself of her famish, “Oh, it tastes even better.”

“Why, thank you,” Taeyeon shrugged niftily, “I was a glorified chef before the apocalypse.”

Jessica murmured indistinguishably through full of food, gobbling down like a beggar who hadn’t ate for days. Her lips were all stained with jam and chilli sauce. Taeyeon watched her eat incessantly until the entire tray was so squeaky clean that they probably did not require cleaning after. Jessica took the cup of coffee and gulped it down on shot like it was a shot of expresso.

“Satisfied?”

“Yeah. Thanks for the food and thanks for watching me eat.”

“Any time,” Taeyeon leaned forward, “Now, is your head pumping yet? Can we get down to business?”

“Why did you take me in? You don’t even know me.”

“Woah, Jessica, I’ll be the one asking here.”

“Why?”

“Wow,” Taeyeon shook her head, “Did you understand a word I just said?”

“Information. You need it. I need it.”

“Now where did you get that idea, I wonder?” Taeyeon mocked oleaginously.

“Let’s trade.”

“Lady, you’re in no position to assert dominion and ask for demands, even if you have such obsequious manners,” she remarked sarcastically to Jessica, “You will cooperate, as I have said, or you’re just making things difficult for yourself.”

“Please.”

Taeyeon folded her arms and gave a quick exasperated sigh.

“You’re not one of them, are you?”

Jessica rose her head up and looked at her.

“No.”

“I had a hunch and it sprouted into truth gloriously,” Taeyeon gritted her teeth, with sarcasm leaking from her very lips, “Fantastic. ing brilliant.”

“I can’t really help you. I have never been inside Novak,” Jessica confessed, “But we have something in common. We both have somebody abducted by them. If we are going towards the same goal, rescuing our loved ones, we should work together. I can be of use to you.”

“How do I know you’re telling the truth?”

“The minute you suspect anything, you’re free to chop my head off.”

They shared an intense moment of silence, trying to get a read on each other. 

“Can I ask you a question, Taeyeon?”

“Fine. It’s not like I can stop you from asking anyway. Shoot.”

“In that burning caravan, was there anybody inside?”

“It’s hard to tell when it’s still on fire, Jessica. Are you going to come clean about you not being alone?”

“I had my sister and my friend with me; three of us. My friend is dead. The Novakians shot her full of arrows and forced me to leave her behind. My sister, however… they probably have her. I have to get her back… and you need to get your friend back. We can help each other. We’ll be fighting a community and we will fail if we separate.”

“Why should I believe you?”

“I won’t play around with this.”

Taeyeon looked at her quietly.

“I already lost one; I lost her right in my arms, right in front me. I couldn’t save her no matter how hard I tried,” Jessica lamented, “Now I have to live with that, but I have one more life that I’m responsible for: the life of my little sister. I wouldn’t gamble her life. Look, I’m sorry for how I acted yesterday but now, if you’re willing to join forces and help each other, I will go all in, I swear to you. Alright? You’re in charge.”

Taeyeon stared into Jessica’s reddened eyes, looking deep inside.

“Do you want me to beg you, Taeyeon?”

“No, that won’t be necessary,” she responded, “If you want to be part of this family, you’ll need to earn your way in.”

“You’ll allow that?”

“We’ll see if you’re a good girl.”

Jessica showed a weak grin.

“Thank you. I wouldn’t have made it if it wasn’t for you people.”

“Finally, some gratitude. You’re very welcome, but I’m warning you, Jessica. If you do anything to threaten what we have here, I will cut you down where you stand.”

“I understand.”

Taeyeon got up and nodded.

“A word of advice, Jessica…”

“What is it?”

“You have to be prepared.”

***

“Hi.”

“H-hey, Jessica… how are you doing?”

“Ah, much better, Seohyun…”

“That’s good…”

“This is a beautiful place.”

“Yeah, it is safe too. The thick trees surrounding the farm keep us out of sight from them walkers and bandits. We y trapped them too.”

Jessica sighed.

“Seohyun, look, I’m sorry about what happened two days ago. I-I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s alright,” Seohyun said with a thin smile, “I understand. I lost both my parents and my brother during the Enigma. My world just crumbled. I didn’t know what to do. I panicked.”

Jessica sat on the couch next to her. She stared out of the living room, into the green meadows, which glowed beautifully under the bright sunlight.

“I’m more worried about the ones still left alive. My sister is still out there, probably terrified and all alone… or worse, she could be held in Novak right now…”

“And we will help you,” Seohyun continued, “But you can’t do anything with the state you are in now. You’ll only injure yourself. Look, promise me you won’t do anything stupid, alright? Yoona patched you up real good and it’ll be a shame if you went suicidal.”

“Yoona?”

“Oh, you haven’t met her. She barely leaves her med shack. You should see her out back. She’s our family doctor.”

“There are four of you?”

“Five. One is in Novak right now, hopefully still breathing… but then again…”

“What is it?”

“Sometimes, like in Novak, it’s better to die fast than to survive torture.”

Jessica stared at Seohyun, speechless.

“What does that mean?”

“You don’t know the things that they do to their prisoners? It’s horrifying.”

“Alright,” she cleared , “I- I better go see Yoona.”

Jessica got up and paced away from Seohyun, thinking about what she had just said.

***

“Yoona, is it?”

“Pass me the bandage over there, will you?”

“Wh-?” Jessica muttered, a little taken aback by her reply.

“Over there, just by the blue container.”

Jessica glanced over to where she pointed and walked towards the messy wooden table, filled with torn open packets of cotton wools, syringes and other medical mumbo-jumbos. It was an absolute mess. She grabbed the roll of gauze bandage, buried beneath a pack of BurnShield and passed it to her. What on earth was she doing here, using all these things?

“How are you feeling?”

“Better, thank you.”

“You know, I had to rip open your skin to take out the arrows because the head was carved in such a way for maximum goddamn difficulty to excise out of the body. Since I could never find an artery forceps after the world literally shat on itself, I had to use paper clips and it was bloody difficult when your blood was pumping out like a fountain. I had to suction out all the blood from your peritoneum too or you’d have died of infection by now. Great waterworks by the way, and it wasn’t even Chinese New Year.”

“I-I’m sorry. Was I supposed to get that?”

“No. I just wanted you to know how hard it was,” Yoona looked at her slyly.

“Well, you did a pretty good job. Thank you.”

“You do know all the odds were against you at that time? Saving you, it was blind luck… and partly thanks to my ridiculously gifted skills,” Yoona gave a twisted grin, “I hope you are not planning to show off your insides again.”

“Well, no. I plan to keep my insides the way it is, thanks,” Jessica returned the mischievous smirk.

“I like you. We’ll get along just fine,” the doctor nodded at her.

“Well, I did just open up my insides to you, literally. You should know me better than anyone now. All of my deep dark secrets.”

“Somehow, cracking open your ribcage is not my way of breaking the ice.”

“You sure do have a lot of wisecracks for a doctor.”

“I didn’t know I stitched up at stereotype,” Yoona said, shaking her head, “I knew I should have cut open your brains too.”

“I’m watching you. If one day, I wake up feeling funny, thinking funny, I’ll know who to blame,” Jessica narrowed her eyes at the tall girl.

Yoona replied with a funny face before continuing with her work.

“What are you doing?” Jessica asked curiously.

She edged closer to the medical workbench. She touched a pinkish looking blob which made a weird squishing sound when she poked it.

“That, my princess, is a walker’s brain.”

Jessica snapped her fingers back. She was gagging.

“What the hell? Yuck! Where’s the sink!?”

“Over there,” Yoona pointed out once more, “I was finding out how are these walkers still standing, and are they actually alive at all.”

“Well?” Jessica scrubbed her hands hard, “What did you find out?”

“They are dead. Their natural biological archetype has long shut down. Their hearts, liver, lungs, basically everything except the brain, spine and eyes had rot when I did the autopsy on a fresh walker. That’s the interesting part. The Walker Parasite is a marvel in microbial evolution. It is able to sustain just enough of the host for locomotion and feeding.”

“How?”

“The brain and spinal cord is infested with the Walker Parasite, but their primary site is the spinal cord. The walkers move based on spinal reflexes, what we call the spinal reflex arc. They skip the brain for faster interpretation of stimulus and the firing of the effector muscles. This is what the Parasite holds on to for manoeuvring. The brain is almost not needed, except for two main things, the production of cerebrospinal fluid which nourishes the spinal cord and keeps them going. The other one was keeping the occipital lobe alive for vision, which includes keeping the eyes working too of course.”

“Yeah… nah, my science isn’t the best.”

“Well, this is complicated for the laymen. I only understood it because I took the medical course,” Yoona shrugged, “Simply put, the Parasite hijacks the human body, killing everything that it didn’t need, rendering the host nothing but a walking carcass.”

“So, is there a cure?”

Yoona chuckled and looked at Jessica.

“No,” Yoona shook her head, “You can’t cure death. These Walkers are already dead, through and through. There’s nothing we can do for them, except putting them down.”

“Man, that is sobering.”

“We could still work on a serum that grants immunity to those who are still not infected. That’s a long way off though. We still don’t know what makes the Parasite tick. There are a lot of factors to consider.”

Jessica just kept quiet, thinking.

“Alright come on,” Yoona removed her gloves and washed her hands, “It’s getting late. Taeyeon’s probably done with dinner. We should go.”

Yoona pushed the front door of the wooden shack open and went out, holding it open for Jessica. ‘Wooden shack’ seemed harsh; it was more like a fancy premium chalet, in the middle of the jungle, if that made sense. The lighting looked expertly wired along the grooves of the wooden panels, giving rise to a very authentic suburban ambience. Their slippers clacked against the solid wooden flooring as they paced together across the veranda and walked down a flight of steps to ground level. Yoona flicked a switch mounted on a gargantuan tree just adjacent and the lights went out.

Jessica walked with Yoona under the night sky back to the house. There were a myriad of stars up in the sky, with some gusts of air blowing the clouds high above towards east, turning the azure into a dynamic canvass of beauty. The night was quiet and peaceful, something that was soothing to their tortured souls. Jessica found herself lost in admiration of the celestial peacefulness, so far away from the chaos on earth. Maybe one day she could transcend to an eternal oneness with the empyrean, but today was not that day. She was not done with the matters back on the ground.

“Yoona, what do you know about the Novakians?”

Even in the dark, she could see the doctor’s change in expression.

“Well,” she stared on the ground as she walked, “I know they are a group of brutal and ruthless maniacs. I’m sorry that yo