The sharp crack of Lilly's fist connecting with James' face yanked me back to reality. "Dipshit!" she snarled, eyes blazing with fury.

"Damn it, Lil!" James winced, clutching his face, blood seeping between his fingers and stumbling to the side. "What was that for?"

"Because you're a dipshit!" Her fist coiled one more time, ready for another assault.

"Fuck you, bitch!"

"Hey!" I interjected, stepping between the fiery siblings, my arms spread to keep them apart. "Calm down, both of you! Enough!"

Lilly's icy glare pierced through me before she retreated, her chest laboring under raw emotion. James gingerly probed his split lip with shaky fingers.

We'd escaped into the outskirts headed into the woods, but a spat between the two was going to draw attention to us. Their fiery tempers were often oblivious to the dangers lurking in every shadow.

"Alright," I said, eyeing James. "What the hell happened to you guys?"

James spat a mouthful of blood onto the cracked pavement. "The fuck you think happened? We got ambushed by the Turned, that's what." His voice trembled with pain and anger. "They had to know we were in the area and I guess they knew we'd be looking for food. We didn't have a choice but to use ammo but as soon as those first shots went off... It was like a fucking dinner bell. You saw how many there were. We were barely able to make it here and bolt ourselves in." He lifted his arm, and I again noted the strap around his shoulder and the blood dripping from his hip. "I took a hit, bad."

"Is everyone okay?" I asked trying to steady my trembling voice. The huddled group before me was like an oil painting of despair: James nursing his wounds - Mathis with his stoic resolve - Ron heavy with guilt - Kenzie and Stali nursing their private fears. Almost all accounted for, but two faces were devastatingly absent. A visceral dread coiled within me like a venomous snake.

Frantically scanning the area, I demanded, "Where are Jairo and Esther?" My eyes darted around, searching for any sign of them as if they would miraculously appear from behind a pile of rubble.

James grimaced and looked away, his hand clutching at his wounded side. "Jairo... he didn't make it." He forced out the words as if they burned him.

The world seemed to shrink around us, the walls closing in. "Driller got him," Ron murmured solemnly. "I didn't let him suffer... though he deserved more than a bullet... As for Esther..." He didn't finish - he didn't need to.

"Damn it!" I slammed my fist into a tree. Pain bloomed in my hand as my knuckles split, but was drowned by the storm raging in my heart. Two more lives snuffed out.

Mathis stepped forward, his once-handsome face now marred by deep cuts and bruises. "Our gear is still at the supermarket," he stated, trying to keep his voice steady. "And our ride too," he added with a nervous glance towards the others. He swallowed hard. "It's back into that hell or head back empty handed and down a car."

Kenzie's sobs engulfed her as she threw herself into my arms, her tears soaking through my shirt. Lilly glared a hole into Kenzie's back as she did so, and I shot her a look, mouthing, "Knock it off." She sniffed and looked at the ceiling.

I held Kenz tightly, feeling the weight of her despair in every tremble of her body. "We tried, Alec," she choked out between sobs. "We really did. But we were overwhelmed and we had to run."

My chest tightened at her words, torn between anger and grief. I wanted to scream and sob myself, but instead, I held Kenzie close and fought back the urge to break down.

"It's not your fault," I pulled back as Kenzie broke away from our embrace and looked around the group. "You did everything you could. I should have been here with you."

"No, we decided you should stay home. We all did," James interjected forcefully, his own voice shaking with emotion. "We made that decision together, and we stand by it. This is my fault."

He winced in pain and patted me on the shoulder. "I can live with it; I can, I promise," he muttered. "I fucked up. It's okay."

I nodded silently, unable to find any words to comfort him or myself. Instead, I asked with a heavy heart, "Do we know where their bodies are?" A heavy and solemn silence hung in the air, the only answer needed for my question. We all knew the fate that awaited our fallen friends. They had gone to the supermarket in search of food, only to become meals themselves. Closing my eyes, I allowed myself a moment to mourn – for Jairo's terrible jokes, and Esther's unwavering optimism.

"We can't stay here," I said. "We need to regroup and figure out our next move," I urged, my voice tinged with desperation.

The vehicle was our lifeline, our last sliver of hope in this hellish nightmare. "If we can find them... we should bring them home." The reality was grim - without transportation, we'd be signing our own death warrants. It was a brutal truth none of us could escape.

****

The supermarket loomed ahead, dark and foreboding, the lot teeming with the grotesque forms of the Turned. Their jerky movements, like unnatural marionettes, sent a shiver up my spine. Raw fear mingled with adrenaline, and my heart pounded a frantic rhythm. Beside me, Lilly tensed as we crept closer, crouching low behind a lineup of rusted cars.

"Okay," I exhaled in a hushed whisper, "we need a distraction." My fingers drummed nervously against the cool metal of my gun. "I've got five shells left."

Lilly's knuckles were white as she gripped her machete, determination etched on her face. "I've got this," she said firmly. "What's your plan?"

"We'll have the others make a break for the vehicle while we draw the Turned away," I explained quickly, running through tactics in my mind. "Mathis, Kenzie, Stali – they all still have some ammo left. They can provide cover if necessary. Once they're gone with the car, they'll prep the camp for battle. We'll run back to our bikes as fast as we fucking can."

Lilly nodded in agreement. We relayed the plan to the rest of the group through a series of hand motions. The thinly veiled terror in their eyes told me that they, too, knew the odds against us.

As we readied ourselves for the risky maneuver, James suddenly let out a pained gasp and collapsed onto the pavement. Blood stained his side and seeped onto the ground beneath him. "Shit, James!" Lilly cried out, starting to move towards him, but I grabbed her arm firmly.

"Focus," I urged her sternly. My voice was colder than I'd intended. "Whiskey will patch him up when we get back to camp."

A single tear trickled down Lilly's cheek, but she quickly wiped it away and resumed her ready stance. I tapped Mathis on his bent knee and jerked my head towards James. With a swift movement, he knelt and hoisted James over his shoulder in a fireman's carry.

"Go!" I shouted, and our desperate gambit began.

Lilly and I surged forward, charging at the Turned with grim determination. We were the distractions, the fools dancing in front of death while the others scrambled for the getaway vehicle. Irony burnt bitter on my tongue.

"Come on, you ugly bastards!" I roared, pumping a shell into one of the Turned from behind, Its blue-violet ichor spattered across my face, its death stench choking me. Lilly danced on my hip with lethal grace, limbs flowing like water as her machete carved bloody paths through the gray flesh of our enemies.

But our valiant efforts were not without cost. Ron tripped and fell and was instantly overrun by a pack. They tore into him with savage glee, ripping him in half as we watched in horror. Entrails spewed across the ground as his torso twisted grotesquely through the air, his eyes wide with surprise – a silent epitaph frozen in time and in my guilty conscience.

"RON!" I screamed, but there was no time to mourn. I heard a rumble and a roar, and glancing over my shoulder, I saw that the others had managed to reach the vehicle and start it up.

They careened down the street, leaving Lilly and I to fend for ourselves.

A pit opened in the pit of my stomach—it wasn't supposed to be this way—or was it? My mind screamed betrayal even as logic whispered that this had been our plan all along.

"Lilly," Her name fell softly from my trembling lips, her wide gaze snapping to meet mine over the racket of our impending doom. She nodded sharply despite the tears glistening unshed in her eyes and yanked me forward, forcing me back into the fray.

Together, we sprinted through the decimated town, debris flying around us as we neared our only hope of escape – our dirt bike and ATV at the Rec center.

My chest burned, each breath a fight in itself. My grip on my gun faltered, my hands slick with sweat and blood—but I couldn't stop. Together, we sprinted through the husk of the town, past remnants of shattered lives and lost futures – fragments of 'before.' The scent of Lilly's old lavender perfume clung stubbornly to her clothes, a ghostly echo of a world we barely remembered.

"Stay close," I wheezed, throat raw and bloody from shouting - screaming.

Her lips twitched in a small, heart-wrenching smile. "Always."

She thought I kept her close to keep her safe. In truth, I kept her close for more selfish reasons- so that when the end inevitably came, her face might be the last thing I saw.

As my heart pounded against my ribs and adrenaline coursed through my veins, the utter hopelessness of our situation pressed in from all sides. Yet, as always in these moments where it was just she and I - I felt more alive than ever before.

"Let's go," I shouted, my hand tangling with hers – her fingers tightened around mine, offering a silent vow that I thought rang louder than any words ever possibly could.

"Together."

I had thought wrong.