I sat up immediately with my heart racing. I expected to wake up at the bar with a zombie gnawing on my arm or something, but I was laid on a couch with the rest of the girls either sleeping or walking around the bar. I had fallen asleep during my watch.

“You practically fainted.” a voice said from behind me.

I jumped and turned, seeing Heehyun still sat by the bar with Somi sitting besides her.

“When was the last time you got some proper sleep?”

“Never.” I replied, causing Heehyun to chuckle. I rubbed the back of my head, already feeling a headache coming on. “Is it morning?”

“Afternoon, I think.” Heehyun said.

“.” I got up from the couch quickly and hurried over to the windows, lifting the rug enough for me to peek outside. Through the dark grey clouds I could see that the sun was barely rising, which confused me for a moment, Then I realized I was being teased.

I turned around and glared at Heehyun.

Somi giggled at the interaction, which surprised me considering I thought she hated Heehyun’s guts, before getting up. “I’ll wake the others.”

Still a bit annoyed (but kind of glad that Somi had a laugh out of it) at Heehyun’s antics, I walked over to the bar and sat down. I noticed the small box next to the pistol I had found hours earlier.

“Somi managed to find this hidden in some liquor box.”

I opened it and found a couple magazines and extra bullets, nodding my head.

“This is good. We’ll have to be scarce with the shots.” My eyes travelled over down to the end of the bar counter and I raised an eyebrow at the pile of jackets and blankets.

“I found those in the closet. Guess nobody thought they needed to keep warm in the apocalypse.” she said.

“Oh, well, good job.” I nodded. “We’re going to need it.”

“We are? Aren’t we going to set up base here? In this town?” Heehyun asked.

I took a deep breath, thinking about it for a moment. “I don’t know if I like being so close to the gang. What if one day they decide to visit the man that I… killed, and they find us?”

“So, where to next?” Heehyun questioned. “The forest?”

“Not much choice, is there?” I replied. Heehyun hummed and I heard Doyeon cursing at Somi in the background. I lowered my voice. “Do you know about the highway that intersects the forest?”

Heehyun raised an eyebrow. “The one with all the backed up cars and rotting corpses? Of course. My ex-gang hated going there because of all the hidden infected under the cars. Why? Do you plan on going there?”

“Maybe.” I said. “The highway would lead to more towns and cities. My thinking is that we can follow it to find new shelter. We’ve come so far to get away from our old home that it’s just not fair to basically backtrack and go towards it.”

“Your call.” Heehyun shrugged just as Chaeyeon groggily walked up, face still riddled with sleep and the medkit weakly grasped in her hands.

“Your… bandage…” Chaeyeon grumbled out, yawning after saying the two words. She sat down on the stool in front of Heehyun with her eyes closed. Heehyun shot me an amused look and I smiled at her, taking the two guns on the bar and heading off to find Sejeong.

The girl sat next to Sohye, who was still asleep.

“Hey.” I greeted her quietly. She immediately noticed the new gun in my left hand and widened her eyes.

“Where the hell did you find that?” she asked in surprise, taking it from my hands gingerly.

“Underneath the bar.” I answered. “I’m surprised nobody found it before me. Bars usually have weapons hidden around.”

“Smart.” Sejeong grinned, handing it back to me. “What about ammo?”

“Somi found a small box of some.”

“And who’s going to be the one to keep this one?” Sejeong questioned. “You have your revolver and all.”

“I haven’t thought about that yet.” I replied honestly. The question waded around in my brain for a few moments. “I think we should let Heehyun use it.”

Sejeong’s eyes widened and I stopped her from talking by continuing to speak.

“She has the most experience using guns. It makes the most sense.”

“You know what other type of experience she has?” Sejeong hissed under her breath. “Gang experience.”

“She’s been fine to us so far.” I frowned at Sejeong’s accusing tone. She almost sounded like Yeonjung.

“Look, you can’t blame me for not being fully trusting towards her. I mean, look at what she did to Yeonjung in the past.”

“Then who do I give it to? Who knows how to load and unload a magazine from this quick enough when we’re in a sticky situation? She does. She’s literally been trained to.”

“How about giving it to Yeonjung? You know, since she’s been trained to do this, too?” Sejeong then sighed. “Whatever. It’s up to you.” she snapped.

The words unexpectedly stung. Yes, I’m the leader, but when Sejeong said it like that, it was like I’m doing things without thinking about the others.

My frown deepened. “I’m not ignoring your reasoning. I know why you don’t trust her yet. I’m just saying that she has the most experience, even if Yeonjung has experience, too. I’ll take your advice, though. I’ll let Yeonjung have it.”

The aggravation in Sejeong’s eyes lessened as her eyes met mine. “I know.” she nodded in understanding. “I didn’t mean to be rude when I said that. Things have just been a little out of hand recently, with Sohye and all.”

“Yeah.” I responded, gulping. “You should wake Sohye up. We’ll hand out rations and then move out.”

“We don’t have much food left.” Sejeong stated with a worried frown.

“We can share.” I assured her, though it did little in easing her worry.

I stood from the couch and walked to the duffel bag which contained most of our food and water. Sejeong wasn’t kidding when she said we barely had anything left. I waited for the rest of the girls to wake up before handing out the rations, one ration per two persons. No one complained, in which I was thankful for. I’m not sure I could be able to take hearing complaints when there was nothing I could do to help.

I ate my half of the ration quickly and gave the other half to Heehyun. I made my way towards the bags jumbled in the corner of the bar and sorted them out, counting each and making sure we had everything we needed before we left.

I jumped when I felt a hand tap my waist.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.” Sejeong apologized. “The girls are finished eating.”

“Okay.” I nodded. Sejeong went to walk away but I quickly grabbed hold of her wrist. “I have a question.”

“About…?” Sejeong quirked an eyebrow.

“Where we - the group - should go next.”

“I thought we said the forest?” Sejeong said.

“Yeah, we did.” I nodded. “But that’s not a permanent home and we both know that.”

“Nothing is going to be a permanent home, Nayoung.” Sejeong sighed.

“Look,” I murmured, lowering my voice so the other girls wouldn’t hear. “I want to follow the highway.”

“You’re kidding.” Sejeong frowned. “The highway? Remember what happened last time? With Mina?”

“Please don’t remind me.” I grumbled.

“Well, it happened.” Sejeong said firmly. “That place is a disaster waiting to happen.”

“We don’t have to walk inside the highway. We could stay outside the guard rails and follow the highway that way. If need be, a couple of us can get supplies from the cars.”

“Are you sure about this?” Sejeong asked.

“No.” I replied. “That’s why I’m asking you.”

Sejeong gave me a small smile. “I think you are sure about this but you just need some confirmation that it’s a good idea.” she said, which was the truth. “I think it’s a ty idea but I also think it’s the best bet we have in finding a new ‘home’.”

“Okay.” I sighed. “Start packing up, I suppose.”

“Wait.” Sejeong said. “I’m really sorry for the way I spoke to you earlier. I feel really bad about it now.”

“It’s okay.” I replied. “We’re all tired and grumpy.”

“No hard feelings?” Sejeong grinned.

“Of course not.”

She gave me a bright smile and squeezed my hand. She called the girls over and they came at once, each picking up their own bags as well as a coat/blanket from the pile.

Mina untied Sohye in order to get the backpack on the bitten girl’s back before tying her wrists again. I didn’t miss the small ‘I’m sorry’ that she whispered to the girl as she knotted the cloth. I turned my attention away and spotted Yeonjung.

She was speaking to Doyeon and Yoojung when I walked over to her.

“Yeonjung.” I called out, making my presence known. The three girls looked at me and I held out the pistol to Yeonjung. “We found another gun and I think it’s best that you get to use it.”

Yeonjung took the gun from me with the slightest bit of hesitance.

“Use it for emergencies only.” I told her. “Otherwise you should still use your little screwdriver, okay?”

“Yeah.” Yeonjung nodded. “Thanks.”

I hummed, not knowing what else to say.

“And, for the record,” Yeonjung began, “my little screwdriver has saved our asses so many times.”

I chuckled at that and nodded. “That’s right. Extra bullets are on the counter. Don’t forget to take it.”

Yeonjung gave me a smile and a nod.

“Is everyone ready?” I asked out loud.

Everyone replied with variations of ‘yes’ and I headed towards the door.

The rain had stopped but the grey clouds up above made me think that it wasn’t going to stop for long. As we walked through the town, my knuckles throbbed. When we walked by what was left of his dead body, I kept my eyes straight ahead.

“Damn.” Heehyun whispered.

It wasn’t long before we were out of the small town and faced with the big hill we had seen a couple weeks earlier.

“Up or around?” Sejeong asked me from the front.

“Around.” I replied, looking around and spotting minimal infected. I wasn’t taking the chance of getting spotted by people from the other side.

I heard a grunt come from Sejeong as she jabbed the machete into an infected’s mouth, slicing its face in half. Yeonjung was quick to stab another incoming infected with her screwdriver, her pistol stuck between the waistband of her pants.

I looked around for any more infected and only saw a small group behind us, huddled around a corpse. We kept going and made it around the large hill just as it was midday. The forest looked more intimidating than it already did considering the dark clouds making everything gloomy.

“Keep your eyes sharp.” I said to the group. “They’re gonna be harder to see because of the darkness.”

The branches and leaves crunched under our feet, the colors of the leaves a dark brown because of the lighting. We end up sneaking by a few infected that were a few meters ahead of us. I kept a careful eye on them as we passed by, making sure they didn’t turn their attention to us (and if they did, I made sure they were no danger to us).

Jieqiong got her foot stuck in a particularly wet patch of mud, squeaking when she tripped forwards. Doyeon and Yoojung were quick to get her back up before I got the chance to and we all continued forward, not before Jieqiong shot me a quick smile over her shoulder.

“Let’s stop here.” Sejeong called out from the front of the line. “I can barely see in front of me even with the flashlights on.”

Mina looked up at the dark sky covered by treetops with a frown on her lips. “What happens if it rains tonight?”

“Then we get to take a shower.” Yeonjung grumbled, already setting her stuff down and pulling out a blanket from her bag.

Heehyun snorted at this, which didn’t go unnoticed by Yeonjung. I looked around the small area. There were trees all around us (duh, it’s a forest) and not a big enough space to escape if need be. Worry creeped up on me as I shone my flashlight around, looking for any possible movements.

“Who’s taking first watch?” Sejeong asked.

“I will.” I offered in a mumble, walking around the space in which the girls were beginning to lay down in.

“Buddy system.” Jieqiong spoke up. “I’ll stay up, too.”

“Okay.” Sejeong nodded, sparkling eyes meeting mine. I spotted the smirk on her face and looked away, continuing to scan the area for any infected. I found one crawling with its two demented arms with its lower body missing.

Jieqiong appeared beside me and handed me the baseball bat. “Here.”

“Thanks.” I said, switching the flashlight for the bat and walking towards the thing with Jieqiong behind me.

It wasn’t hard to bash its head in because the skin was rotten and mushy. Disgusting, I know.

“Hey, aren’t you cold?”

The question caught me off guard because who asks that right after seeing me literally smash a skull with a baseball bat? but it’s Jieqiong, so I let it slide.

“Not really.” I answered as we walked back towards the group after making sure the thing was truly dead.

I took a set against one of the trees a little bit distanced from the group, so I could keep an eye out on all of them, and Jieqiong went to rummage through a bag. She pulled out a dirty woven blanket and walked over to where I was, tossing it down onto my body.

I set the baseball bat aside and watched as she plopped down next to me, the wet mud causing a squish sound as her body made contact with it. Jieqiong pulled the blanket and set it so it was laying across both of our laps.

“There.” she said, seeming quite proud of herself for something so simple as to laying a blanket on me.

“Thanks, but if we need to get out of here in a hurry, this isn’t going to help.”

“Always the optimist, aren’t you?” Jieqiong drawled sarcastically, a playful scowl on her face.

“Your skin is so cold.” she gasped, her warm thigh pressing against mine with the way we were sitting.

“And yours is so warm.” I grumbled, taking the flashlight from her and moving it around the area as my other hand went to pull out my revolver with my left hand.

“Opposites attract, don’t they?” she murmured under her breath, pulling her knees up to her chest.

I glanced at her and nodded. “Yeah, they do.”

There’s a soft pressure on my right shoulder as she leaned her head on me. I felt her fingers curl around my arm, pulling the hand with the flashlight down enough for her to interlace her fingers with mine, the two of us holding the tool together now.

I woke up to a piercing scream which was followed by more screams. I immediately scrambled up from the damp forest floor and spotted Sejeong rushing to Mina as Yeonjung stabbed an infected laid next to her. I barely made out the bite on Mina’s hand before Heehyun yelled something to Yeonjung, something about stopping the infection from spreading, and then Yeonjung grabbed the machete from Sejeong.

She sliced off Mina’s hand.

Everyone gasped as Mina shrieked in pain and terror. Heehyun quickly hobbled towards the girl with the help of Chaeyeon, whose face was paler than usual.

“Oh my God.” Sejeong whispered, keeping Mina upright with one hand and her other hand covering in shock.

“We need to stop the bleeding.” Heehyun said, looking around. “I need a cloth, hurry!”

Yeonjung ran towards one of the blankets, cutting off a long enough piece for Heehyun to work with.

“Here.” she held it out to Heehyun, who was keeping pressure on the area that was once connected to her hand.

Mina was crying, horribly so, and I felt so helpless.

“I need someone to--” Heehyun didn’t even get to finish her sentence when I stepped forward. She nodded at me. “Keep pressure on the wound as I try to figure out the correct way to bandage her.”

I gulped and stared at the positions of her hands, mimicking it as Heehyun began to work.

Mina whimpered as I pressed down and I felt my own eyes well up. Heehyun tied one cloth tightly near Mina’s elbow before using the rest of it to wrap around the actual problem area.

“We need to get her somewhere with actual equipment.” Heehyun said, tying the knots together tightly as Mina yelled with each tighten. Sejeong tried to calm her but to no avail.

“There’s no place like that around here, Heehyun.” I told her.

She shook her head. “There is. There’s my ex-gang’s territory. We have a hospital down there.”

“No.” Yeonjung growled. “We’re not going there.”

“Your friend is going to die!” Heehyun pointed to Mina with a bloody finger. “She needs a professional, and they have one!”

I stepped between the heated duo and stared at Heehyun. “You told us that those people are no better than the infected.” I said with a low voice. “What makes you think they’ll help us out?”

“Easy.” Heehyun huffed. “You have something they want; me.”

-

Yeonjung had been on the run for about a week now and her initial happiness to freedom has deteriorated. She’s had way too many close calls to be happy.

The one thing she missed was being around others, just for the protection factor, but she’d never admit it. If Yeonjung would describe herself she’d describe herself as a loner. Not in the bad way, the ‘I’m lonely’ way, she’s a loner in the way that she’d prefer to be alone.

Being around others only brought worry and fear and attachment. She didn’t need those things - not in this world. She had enough to worry about.

She stomped a zombie’s head in as it tried to reach for her ankle, shoving another one back with her backpack as it lunged for her. The thing tore a hole in her back after getting a good bite on it and Yeonjung cursed. She smacked the zombie with a fallen branch she had picked up earlier, knocking it onto the ground. She could see more of the herd coming towards her and she scrambled to pick up some of her supplies before taking off.

She exited the forest and ran into the backyard of a small house. Yeonjung jumped the fence with ease and ignored the dead zombies sprawled across the grass, heading straight to the backdoor.

The glass door slid open and she breathed heavily, closing it behind her.

She fell to the floor.

When Yeonjung came to, she heard voices that sounded distorted and muffled. She opened her eyes.

“Holy crap, she’s alive.” a voice called out. Yeonjung made out about four faces staring at her.

“Told you we shouldn’t bash her head in.” another girl added in.

“Hey, are you okay?” another voice joined.

Yeonjung frowned and sat up, backing away from the group of girls that were staring at her like she was a hurt puppy.

“We’re not going to hurt you.” a soft voice spoke. The girl stood next to a taller girl, the tallest of their group. “We were trying to find shelter from the herd and you just so happened to be doing the same. We didn’t know whether to wake you or not.”

“What’s your name?” the taller girl asked.

“It’s none of your business.” Yeonjung replied with a frown, not liking the attention that was being given to her. “Stop staring at me like that.”

“Well, ‘it’s none of your business’, the herd hasn’t passed quite yet so we’re going to be stuck together.” the smaller one replied with a smile on her face. Yeonjung sneered.

“Okay.”

“You know, we could always use more people.” another girl, also tall but not as tall as the monotonous one, spoke up.

“Somi.” Nayoung chided.

“I wouldn’t want to join your group, anyway.”

“And why is that?” Somi asked.

“I do better on my own.”

“That explains the cut on your ankle.” a voice from the kitchen area called out. Yeonjung’s sneer tripled in its bitterness.

“What’s really your name?” Nayoung tried again. “I’m Nayoung.”

Yeonjung crossed her sore arms over her chest and turned her head to the side, looking away from the rest of the girls.

“Yoo Yeonjung.”