*Play Song*

"Helen...if this is one of your cruel tricks, it's not at all funny....." Aphmau accused, although knowing deep down the answer to her own question.

Helen pays little mind to Aphmau's question, as she continues to yell at the pilot and the small crew that came down to Earth with them.

"....how could we have none left?!" Helen exclaims, arms high in the air, her voice even higher.

"Like we said ma'am, a miscalculation occurred when releasing the gas......" One of the workers start, but Helen does not have it.

"....then make some more! I do not want to have these hardworking people have to choose who of their loved ones lives and dies!"

Did she just.....compliment me? Aphmau thought, even though that should have been the last thing on her mind.

"Ma'am, it'll take another few months for the antidote to ferment, and by that time, the walker's bodies will be beyond our help....."

"So you are saying that.....I have to choose?" Aphmau gulps.

Helen doesn't even look her in the eye, most probably because she couldn't. "Yes m'lady, you must choose....."

*

"I'm so so sorry if I knew I...." Teony started, but Aphmau stopped her.

"No Teony it's not your fault, I'm actually glad you chose them, but it doesn't change the fact we still must choose."

"So Teony chose Lucinda, Cadenza, and I, and Nana chose Katelyn, Travis, and Garroth ......." Said Laurence, crossing his arms, his torn clothing looking rather odd on a human, rather than a flesh-eating walker.

Aphmau nodded, but her attention was divided to the rest of the gurneys, out of their cages now, and near one of them, a certain Meifwa was hovering.

"Zane....Zane I'm sorry........I'm so sorry...." Nana whispered under her breath, keeping a reasonable distance from a walker, but an unreasonable distance from her lover.

And as the compulsive need entered her mind, Aphmau swiftly swept up one of the syringes, shocking everyone in the process, stabbing Zane's palish grey forearm with it.

This action had left everyone in disarray, but most of all Nana.

"Aphmau......" She whispered, but before she could finish her sentence, she yelped.

She looked at her forearm, which had a ghostly frail skeletal hand grasping it, which she at first almost slapped off, but then she saw who was grabbing her.

Zane's ragged clothes, which had fallen down on areas of loss bloody body mass, was now tight around a fully intact body, a nugget type one at that.

Everyone unintentionally crowded around the gurney, watching in awe of the transformation.

You could see the grey fading away from Zane's ghostly complexion and explode in pink. The stretched rough skin on his ribs and his other assortment of bones started to soften. The pearls which made up his eyes.....darkened to show pitch black pupils.

Seeing her friend's eyes liven, Aphmau could not help but relate it to another certain being with such memorable eyes.

And that's when Aphmau realized.....and when Garroth says. "So we are left with Crystal......Violet....and Aaron...."

And even Irene herself, could not prepare herself for what was about to happen.

*

And there she stood, Irene herself, a vibrant syringe in each hand, the needle looming over the three undead bodies.

Everyone had backed off, letting Aphmau take the time to make her decision.

With Violet on her gurney to the left, Crystal in the middle, and Aaron the right, Aphmau descended between Crystal and Aaron's gurney, finding herself looming over an all too familiar body.

Even in death, he still maintained his pro fitness status, the grey which laid upon his body mirrored the dullness of his expression and the contrasted with the paleness of his pupils, not that those had changed.

To her surprise, looking at his eye's without direction made herself feel him once again, his presence, also looming over her.

Then, it struck her, what she had to do.

She held the syringe between her fingertips, poising her thumb on the plunger as she prepared to inject.

And with emotion in her heart, she managed out a few words.

"Just a bit more.....than a year ago....I was just a girl in a cafe, serving a guy in a cafe....not knowing that after that moment, my whole life was gonna come tumbling down....."

Aphmau's eyes continue to well with unshed tears, as she continued, getting closer to him. "And for a while, I thought.......it was, I thought I had already lost all that was good in life......until I lost you...."

"Losing you.....losing everyone....it left me empty....an emptiness I begged and prayed, yes me a goddess, and an excuse for one at that, prayed.......that one day that emptiness would be fulfilled once more...."

And as if it were breaking an unspoken law, Aphmau reached for his pale, vein pulsing hand, and she grabbed it. She laced her fingers through his frigid fingers, feeling the coolness of him tinge her nerves as it accelerated her tears.

"And as much, as I want to........As much, as I want to plunge this....flu shot looking thing into you.....I can't....."

"Because as much as I want to, as much as I need to.....you weren't the only one that day that made a sacrifice......and you got to avenge your family and fulfill your destiny....at least I think..."

"So I'm sorry......I'd have picked you yesterday, tomorrow, in the past, or any time in the future......but not today....."

So as Aphmau started to transition over to the two fangirls, something happened that caught Aphmau in such a shock that whatever happened, was over before it even began.

Okay that didn't make sense, but you get the picture.

Two arms leaped out for the syringes dangling in Aphmau's fingers, and plunged them into Aaron and Violet's arms, and whatever that was left of the orange fluid was gone.

And from afar, the group murmured "Did she just...."

"It can't be....."

"Not possible....."

Helen crossed her arms casually but was a bit thrown off as well. "Did your dead friend just...."

Oh yes Aphmau thought, she "just".

Crystal's arms were still hovering with the empty syringes still in hand, her mouth ajar as she looked around, everyone waiting for her to engage in the usual walker behavior.

But she didn't, Crystal merely winked at Aphmau, mouthing a few words, before she fell back down again on the gurney, her body motionless, the syringes leaving her fingers and exploding on impact as they hit the stone cold floor.

Aphmau's mouth was more than ajar, her body slightly shaking, everyone crowding up behind her, moving rather slowly.

Aphmau didn't even have that ability at the moment.

And there she stood, staring at the fangirl's limp body, limper than she was before, her arms hanging off the side of the gurney dramatically.

"What.....just happened?" Zane asks, speaking for the whole group.

Aphmau was still tearing, though her expression was blank.

"She said something....right before she...." Cadenza stated, trying to manage out some understandable words.

"Aph......what did she say?"

Aphmau must have been standing there longer than she thought because she hadn't realized the two who had awoken.

And even though turning around to engulf the two in a hug was probably what she wanted to do most in the world at the moment, she just shuffled slowly over to the foot of Crystal's gurney, resting her fingertips on the edge of it, trying to blink away the emotion.

"What were the words, she said to you, Irene?"

Aphmau's awestruck stare did not waver. ".....A life for a life..."

She just scoffed. "What kind of truth is that?"

"C'mon Crystal, answer it. Don't be a sissy--, wait are you like an international crime lord or something?" Lucinda questioned.

Crystal merely shook her head, her expression unreadable.

"What was the worst thing you've ever done? It's simple!"

Crystal stared out the window. "It is not just one thing I did, it was a collection of things......I've made people cry......"

"Pfttt that's not that bad, I make Travis cry loads of times...." Katelyn remarks.

"It's not the fact I have made them cry, it's how I did it......and the worst part is......I enjoy doing it......it just feels one day it will soon be my turn....."

We would always ask "her turn to do what?" Aphmau thought until today, she knew.

"So is she really.....dead....how!? That doesn't make any sense!" Violet cries out, mourning her fellow sister.

"It's...that since she gave Aaron and you the antidote....she was the last walker on earth......and that makes her......a goddess of some sort......."

Everyone listens to Aphmau's explaination.

"When Aaron fought the beady-eyed monster......and I guess he won, he achieved the monster's status of a zombie god.....and since Crystal stabbed Aaron in a way, and gave him life......his form had to give her something in exchange......and it's a never-ending cycle......"

"So she used the last of her strength to fight the sedation, cure Aaron and Violet, then.....then......she proceeded to end the Apocalypse....by ending herself."

Aphmau felt a palm rest on her shoulder, sending reassurance through her, as she finally collapsed into Aaron's arms, his warm body sending waves of overwhelming joy throughout her tiny one.

"Wait....you're giving up? No, you can't, you just can't......Aphmau, I mean you're Irene right, you can do something and bring her back.......please...." Violet pleaded, her eyes welling.

Without looking at her, Aphmau answered within Aaron's embrace. "She paid a debt, I cannot break the deals of karma between her and her demons......"

And as they crowded around the late fangirl, knowing just a minute ago, she was within their grasp.....and now she was gone.

Though a distant voice rings out.

"......finally.....someone avenged my Lilith....."

This is the end.

Spot the references?

So this chapter may be a bit confusing to understand at first, but I hope you guys can understand the significance.

Have a nice day my crystals!