I wrote this chapter listening to In The Pines by Janel Drewis from The Walking Dead. It actually inspired the chapter so get the full effect by listening to it while you read?

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Running. That’s all they can do; all they can think about. How they made it through the herd of Walkers in the parking lot without a single bite or scratch is beyond their knowledge. All they know is that they have to run. Run until they can’t run anymore. And with the snow halfway up their shins, running took up a lot of energy.

 

Taeyeon pulls Krystal along as fast as she can, pushing herself to keep going even with her lungs screaming for her to stop. They can’t see a thing in the night as they swerve through the trees in the woods. Farther and farther away they run from the two buildings they considered their safe haven just minutes ago.

 

“Taeyeon…” Krystal gasps as Taeyeon pulls her onward. “Taeyeon wait… I need… a break…” She pulls her hand out of Taeyeon’s grip and doubles over, clutching a knot in her stomach.

 

“Come on, Krystal…” Taeyeon pants. “We need to go!”

 

“Just… a few… seconds…” Krystal waves Taeyeon off.

 

Taeyeon sighs in frustration but crouches down and tries to catch her breath as well. They only have a few seconds of resting time before a Walker comes into view right beside Krystal, whose back is turned to it. Luckily, Taeyeon ses it in time and sinks her shears into its head. When she pulls it back out, one of the blades stays stuck in its skull.

“Come on… we have to keep going.” Taeyeon breathes as she starts running deeper into the woods. Krystal doesn’t object this time and despite the burning in her lungs and the cold tears running down her cheeks, she follows behind Taeyeon. 

 

***

Unlike Taeyeon and Krystal, who chose to go into the woods, Ian leads the larger group down the side of the highway. There are Walkers here and there on the road, but it seemed that most of them were in the Wal-Depot—probably now coming through the back door, which meant they were still in danger. The snow is falling hard and fast, pelting and burning their faces. They walk along the side of the highway for what feels like an hour until they can’t take the cold anymore.

“Ian, w-we -nneed to f-find a p-p-place to stay f-for t-the night.” Jacob shivers. “I don’t th-hink we’re g-going to find a h-house any t-time s-s-soon.”

 

Ian silently shivers and nodds his head. They walk a little farther until David spots a semi-trailer truck. He points toward it. “What about that?” He asks, going toward it. Everyone follows him.

 

“T-this is as good a place as any.”  Ian says as David pulls the trailer open to reveal the container to be nearly empty with only a forklift inside. “A-alright, let’s g-get in everybody, c-come on.”

 

Everyone silently climbs in and David slides the door down. The place is pitch black and they can’t see inches in front of them. The night is silent, though no one can sleep at all. It's a few hours into the night when the crying starts. No one knows who it is, and no one tries to comfort the person either. Aside from the openly crying person, there are more pairs of eyes with tears silently spilling from their faces, allowing the loud crier to let out all of their sobs for them.

 

***

When night slowly starts to turn to day, Taeyeon and Krystal climb out of the blankets of the bed in the solitary wooden cabin and prepare for their journey onward. No sleeping is involved in the night, but neither are talking and that seems to carry on for the morning too. Taeyeon searches the cabin one last time for anything they could use. She opens the closet and finds it filled with clothes.

 

Perfect, she thinks as she pulls out one thick jacket and one light jacket and tosses the thick one to Krystal, who hastily puts it on to help calm her trembling body. Taeyeon pulls hers on too, but the jacket is cold. It would only take a little bit for it to warm up and start warming her up too, but she knows it won’t help much with the snowy world outside. Next, she opens the dresser, digging through all of the piles of clothes for hidden things.

 

“Krystal, see if you can find a backpack. Anything that we can carry stuff in.” Taeyeon says as she closes the last drawer and starts for the kitchen counter. She finds a few eating utensils and pulls out a handful of knives. They could use those if nothing else.

 

“Nothing much...” Krystal says, dropping the mattress. “But I did find this.” Taeyeon turns around to see Krystal holding up a hatchet.

 

“You keep it.” Taeyeon says. “I still have a blade from the shears and you have that,” She points to the cultivator. “which is practically useless.” Krystal nods and opens the nightstand table drawer. She pulls out the only belt in there and puts it on, sliding the hatchet comfortably into the crevice between her jeans and the belt.

“I’ve got some flimsy knives and one decent cooking knife that will be good enough until we find some other weapons.”

 

That's the most they spoke to each other throughout the day. Through the woods they aimlessly walk, not knowing what exactly they should be doing. The Walkers seemed to have all past on during the night, leaving their walk mostly clear. Taeyeon had shut down from the shock of what had happened last night and from the cold air cutting past the jacket and digging into her body. Krystal spends most of her energy trying not to break down crying.

 

Halfway through the cold day, Taeyeon finds herself scouting the woods, an idea playing in her mind. It takes maybe an hour until they pass by a tree she finds to be perfect.

 

“Hatchet.” She mumbles to Krystal, who hands it to her in silent confusion.

 

Taeyeon examines the tree for a moment, grabbing onto branches and pulling at them before letting go and nodding or shaking her head. When she seems satisfied, she takes hold of the trunk for support before swinging the blade into a thick branch, hacking at it until it finally breaks off. She hands Krystal the hatchet again.

 

No questions asked, Krystal takes the lead this time as they continue to walk in silence, occasionally coming across a stiff that they would kill. Taeyeon works on her new project as she follows behind the younger girl to no target location.

 

***

Snow had started to lightly fall again, as though the world needed more of it, but Ian’s group continued to walk alongside the road. Luckily, most of them had escaped with jackets on, so they weren’t as cold. Linda, Hyoyeon, and Lucas were the unlucky ones. Everyone was shivering, but those three were practically shaking out of their skin. David slowly make way to Hyoyeon.

 

“How are you?” He asks quietly when he's beside her.

 

She quickly wipes her face with the back of hand, getting rid of the tears that were starting to freeze on her cheeks. She clears . “I’m fine…” She barely mumbles. The question was dumb, she thought. How would she be okay? She was just forced out of the place she confided in for safety and her best friend’s sister—who was practically her own sister—was probably dead. Krystal was dead… Taeyeon, Yuri, Malibu, Tommy… Joel… She looks up to the sky to fight back the tears that threaten to fall again.

 

David understands. He knows how stupid the question is. He just didn’t know what else to say. He watches as a wave of shivers attacks Hyoyeon’s body and practically hears her teeth clatter through the wind. He shrugs off his jacket, ignoring the burning in his body from the intensified chill of just having just a light long sleeved shirt on now. He lifts the jacket to Hyoyeon.

 

She eyes it and then eyes him. She shakes her head. “I can’t do that, David… Then you’re going to freeze.”

 

He shrugs. “I’m bigger so I can handle more.”

 

“I can’t take it.” She looks around at the rest of the group and catches sight of the fragile old lady. “Linda doesn’t have one either and she tiny and old. I bet she’d love that thing.”

 

David looks to Linda, who is walking hunched with her arms hugging her small body. He nods and smiles sadly at Hyoyeon before walking toward Linda. Being alone again, Hyoyeon is able to silently weep again.

 

Ailee and Yoona walk together, arms linked together in hopes of sharing body heat and keeping warmer, but also because Yoona’s eyes are so swollen that she can barely see through them due to her crying the night before. Tiffany walks close to Ian but stays quiet. Jessica brings up the rear of the group, avoiding any contact from anyone. Tiffany had tried to get her to join her side earlier with no success. She just wanted to be alone.

 

***

Taeyeon carries the branch around everywhere in search of something; Krystal doesn’t have a single clue what she's looking for. The silence os deep between them; the only things heard are the crunching of snow beneath their feet and the heavy breaths they make from to the cold air. Occasionally, they would come across a Walker in which Krystal, who had the only weapon worth using, would take it out. It seemed that the herd of Walkers had made much distance during the night.

 

The two find themselves at the edge of the woods after a while, walking with the highway in view now. They needed to find a town, or a building of any sort for the night and hopefully find food. But as day turns to night and the sun almost gone, there's still no sign on the road indicating an exit nearby.

 

“Taeyeon…” Krystal croaks, her voice dry and sore and her nose stuffed from silent crying and the cold weather. “We need to put up camp somewhere…”

 

Taeyeon sniffles and stifles a shiver, nodding her head in agreement. She takes Krystal’s hand and drags her back into the woods.

 

***

 

The sun had gone down mostly, draping the surroundings with a pink curtain of light. The larger group had made it to the closest town from their destroyed safe haven. The town seemed to be deserted of Walkers, making it easier for the weak and cold group to find shelter. Silently, Ian chooses a boarded up convenience store to set up camp.

 

The door creaks open loudly in the silent night. They listen to any sign of a Walker and come across nothing but the sound of their own heavy and tired breathing.

 

“Alright,” Ian says, breaking the silence. “We’ll set up here for tonight. Jacob, David and I will go get some wood for a fire. Everyone else search the place for anything that might be useful.”

 

The three men leave and the rest of the group searches the store. No one knows what to say to each other; Jessica and Alex had lost their sister and brother; Jessica and Yoona had lost their loved ones; everyone had lost their family.

 

There aren’t many things they find in the store. Jessica had already raided the place months and months ago. It was one of the first places they had looted. They do, however, find a box of Froot Loops cereal under one of the racks and a single medium sized bucket. They would be sharing that tonight and throughout the next days as they searched for more food.

 

The men come back with handfuls of wood to find the group spread out around the convenience store. It seemed as though they hadn’t spoken the entire time. They look at each other and shake their heads sadly before they set the wood down near a corner of the building. With no matches, the fire takes some time to start, but when it does, it quickly starts warming the room up. The men take turns keeping an eye on the fire to make sure it doesn’t go out or get uncontrollable. The group join together around the fire quietly as they share the box of Froot Loops, but soon after, they move to their own spots again. David fills the bucket with snow.

 

Ailee and Tiffany sit huddled together, silently mourning the loss of their two members. The four of them had worked and survived together for so long, and just like that, there are only two left. Ailee doen’t understand how the two girls that made it out alive were the two sitting side by side now. She and Tiffany always said that Yuri and Taeyeon would be the ones to survive, but the tables had turned a complete one-eighty. She blinks away the tears that threaten to spill from her eyes. She had done enough of that today.

 

It's a weird time to do so, but Ailee feels the silence is too thick. She clears her unused throat softly and opens , drawing a slow breath first before starting.

 

 

A few eyes fall to her when she first starts singing. Her voice is harder than usual, adding on to the chilling lyrics that are to come.

 

 

Taeyeon and Krystal huddle together in the snow covered woods, under a fort of branches. Krystal’s eyes are screwed shut as she tries to fight off the cold and sleep. Taeyeon’s eyes are wide open, watching the woods with the light of the small flames that start illuminating their surroundings as she holds the shaking red head to keep them both from freezing to death.

 

 

Yoona sits in the corner of the convenient store sobbing quietly. Her crying, the crackling of the fire, and Ailee’s eerie song are all the sounds in the room. No one offers any conversation.

 

Jessica sits by the covered window, staring out into the black streets through a gap between two wooden boards. Silent tears roll down her cheeks, but she doesn’t care to wipe them away.

 

 

Taeyeon can’t help when her mind wanders. She remembers the pained screams in the Wal-Depot; the way the entire shelf fell on top of Yuri and the Walkers; Yuri telling her to go without her… And she did… She left without her… She did it to save herself; to save Krystal… Yuri understood or else she wouldn’t have told her to leave. Yuri saved them…

 

Hot tears escape Taeyeon’s eyes finally. She’d been refusing them all day long, but with Krystal finally asleep in her lap, she allows it.

 

 

Jessica’s chest heaves. Her heart aches and her body hurts. She fighst hard to control her emotions; she’d only allow herself to shed tears, but she refused to cry noisily like Yoona. Yoona was weak for crying so freely in front of everyone. Alex was weak for stifling his cries in the office room away from everyone. She wouldn’t let herself do such things. She wouldn’t…

 

 

Taeyeon’s head is lightly layered from fallen snow, but she doesn’t care. Her whole body feels numb; her eyes burn, her lungs burn, her skin burns. She fights the cold and focuses on the little bit of heat coming from Krystal’s body against hers. She tries to put her mind on anything other than the cold or last night. Any sound in the woods, any odd howl of the wind. She thinks of the red head beside her. Krystal is all she had left…

 

 

It's too much for her. The first sob i forced out of her like vomit and once she starts it doesn't let loose. Jessica bows her head into her lap and cries hard, matching Yoona’s. She misses Krystal… Her little sister, whom she had promised to protect through and through. They were supposed to survive through everything together and she failed… She misses Taeyeon… She was so stupid for everything she did to that girl; all the fighting and the drama. She couldn’t even say I love you to her… And now she’s gone… And she’ll never know just how much Jessica does love her…

 

 

Taeyeon can’t believe she and Krystal are the only two that made it out alive… How was it possible for something to crash and burn so quickly? There were seventeen of them, and now there was only two… She didn’t get to say good bye to anyone… Not Yuri, not Tiffany, not Ailee, or Yoona, Daivd, Linda… Not Jessica…

 

She only had Krystal now. And she would make sure nothing happened to the younger girl.

 

 

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​It's been like 2 months since I've updated any story, huh? I'm sorry guys, I've been very busy. I haven't been able to update Guardian Angel because I've got major writers block for it, but I hope to write something for it soon. As for this story, I'd hoped to have written a lot of it before I actually started updating it, but I haven't been able to. Like I said, I've been really busy. Actually, I'm going through a break up with my girl now... Been for a few days so it's still very fresh. I love her and she says she still loves me but she still left me and I'm just so heart broken so there might still be a bit of a wait on my updates... I'm sorry guys.. But I hope you enjoyed this first chapter of Up In Flames :)

​I haven't been able to go through to check for errors so it might be a little rough right now. Lemme know what you thought and how you think book two is going to go down!