"Calm the fuck down, Tristen!" Frank fended off the offending hand, peeling the fingers off his throat. "Chill out for a second, Jesus."

Tristen was frothing at the mouth, still clawing and slapping at Frank's face, driven by a momentary lapse into total enraged insanity. His broken arm pendulous at his side, flopping around like a slab of meat.

"You did this!" Tristen growled.

"Look," he grabbed Tristen by the shoulders and forced him back onto his knees. The boy winced and slapped his good hand onto the snapped humerus as though he'd completely forgotten about his injury. "Settle down! This isn't helping anything."

"What do you know about helping?" Tristen seethed.

"Okay. Okay. Fair point." Frank sat back on the floor propping his elbows on his knees, breathing heavily. "You're right. I haven't been much help. Any help. But I intend to change that. Starting now." Frank looked resolute, talking more to himself than Tristen. "There's a solution here. We've just got to find it."

Tristen had calmed a little, taken a few hits from his inhaler and once again tucked his arm across his stomach. He was scared out of his mind. Frank knew this was all too much for him to process but they had no choice. They were in this together and they needed to find a way out. Together.

Frank wished he had something to organize—some magazines to stack or clothes to fold. Instead, he busied himself by standing back up and pacing the cell. The cabin of the airplane had been outfitted with three separate 10x10 holding areas positioned in the center of the fuselage, away from the windows. The third cell, the farthest from the door, had a small cot, the others were empty cages.

"Okay. This is what we do. I'll get the attention of the guards somehow and get them in here, telling them that you need to go to the last cell down there so you can lie down because of your arm. Then, when they come in to get you out, I attack, grab a gun and shoot them in the head. Then we can get the fuck out of this plane and find Jane and get out of here." Frank was biting his lower lip and tapping his foot as he ran the scenario over in his mind.

"That's your plan?" Tristen said.

Frank looked over at Tristen's bewildered and incredulous countenance. "What?"

"I'm only 16 and even I know that's the worst plan in the history of the world. For starters, how would you even get their attention? You gonna rattle a tin plate against the bars? Frank. They're going to eat us—what do they care if I've got a broken arm? This isn't a Nicolas Cage movie. Things don't work out like that in real life."

Frank debated in his head. "Well, shit. You have a better plan?"

Tristen looked at his lap. "I don't know. Hope it's over quick? Pray?"

Just then the suction seal of the airplane door broke the tension in the room. A soldier came in, pulling Jane by the crook of the arm.

"Jane!" Frank blurted.

"Hey Frank," she said.

"Shut up. Both of you," the soldier barked. He tugged Jane's arm roughly, pulling her past Frank and Tristen's cell, skipping the middle one and throwing Jane into the last. She was with the cot.

"Hey, if it's all the same," Frank began, trying to sound diplomatic, "maybe you could put him in that cell." He nodded toward Tristen. "He's got a pretty badly broken arm and could really use that cot."

Tristen shook his head.

"Lie on the floor," the guard said.

"Right, but he could use the pillow to elevate the break and..."

"Shut up, asshole. You're both gonna be food before too long anyway."

Tristen looked up at Frank, his eyes widening in an I-told-you-so way.

Frank exhaled, defeated. "Okay, but... what if we have to use the bathroom?"

"I don't care what you do but you're not getting out of that cage."

"Hey," Jane said. As the soldier had been deliberating with Frank, she'd sat on the cot and managed to slip her bound hands over her ass and down her legs, bringing them to the front of her body. She tugged at the snap buttons, pulling the front open. The soldier turned to see Jane sitting on the cot with her legs spread wide.

The soldier eyed her stoically. "Okay. What? You expecting that to do something for me?"

"It doesn't?" Jane asked feeling slightly hurt and flustered, flashing back to her failed attempt to seduce Roy back at the Fill and Feed.

"I'm gay so..."

"Oh," Jane said, awkwardly closing her dress.

"Maybe you could turn this way," Frank suggested.

"Shut up Frank," both Tristen and Jane said together.

"Look, I appreciate the effort but honestly, I'm still pretty pissed about you breaking that bottle of scotch. I haven't been drunk in like 6 or 7 months. Oh, and also you killed my watch partner."

"Wait, you had scotch?" Frank asked.

"Shut up Frank," both Tristen and Jane said together. Again.

"Just... just sit there and... uh... don't do anything. I don't even know who's in charge anymore. Let me... let me just get things sorted," the soldier said, holding out his hands in an exasperated show of total discombobulation. He turned to exit and saw Emily standing at the door, the AR-15 wedged against her shoulder.

"Do you have the keys?" Emily asked coolly.

"Oh shit! What?" He flinched then froze, his eyes going huge.

"Do you have the keys? To the cells?"

He looked down at his belt at the keyring hanging on a silver carabiner.

"Ye—" he started just as the sound of a single shot filled the cabin and his right eye exploded out the back of his head.

Emily was already moving before he hit the floor. She retrieved the keys and unlocked Jane's cell.

"We gotta move. I'm sure they heard that shot," Emily said, all business as she cut the zip tie cuffs with her knife.

Jane came out of the cell and grabbed the dead soldier's sidearm. Emily handed her the blood bag and rushed over to Frank and Tristen's cell. She unlocked it and they scrambled out. She handed each of them a 9 mm and went back to check the door just as the squeak of boots and angry shouts started to once again echo through the hangar.

"Wait... you had scotch?" Frank asked Jane, this time smiling slyly.

"Shut up Frank," Tristen, Jane and Emily said together.

He let out a little laugh and rushed up to Jane, enveloping her in his arms, lifting her off the ground. She hugged him back, wrapping her legs around his waist. "I thought you were serious for a second there," she said, her voice going soft and sultry.

"I joke when I'm scared," he said, grinning. Then she kissed him hard, pouring everything she had into his hungry mouth. He set her down on her blood-soaked and torn feet. Her eyes were glazed over and dreamy. She parted her lips, eager words dancing on her tongue, just as Tristen walked up, put his gun to her temple and pulled the trigger. Jane's head snapped to the side as a spray of blood and bone erupted from the opposite side of her head. Frank was still holding her, fumbling a little as her body went limp in his arms. The familiar ringing was back in his ears. He looked over at Tristen, aghast, tears already welling in his eyes.

Tristen lowered the gun and looked at Frank. "My dad was one of the doctors at the center. One that she killed."

Frank couldn't say anything. He just stood there holding Jane's dead body—actually dead body—with his mouth hanging open. He could hear the blood splashing on the floor as it cascaded out of the wound.

"Besides," Tristen said. "If she was pregnant... I just saved the world." He smiled with sadness in his eyes, put the barrel of the gun under his chin and fired. The top of his head burst, sending a chunky wash of brain and blood onto the ceiling of the airplane. He slumped to the ground and was still.

Emily was alternating between firing at the approaching soldiers and looking back in on the scene with Frank. "Frank. Frank!" she said. "There's too many."

Frank dropped to his knees still cradling Jane's corpse. He turned her head in his hands, looking at her beautiful, slackened face. She looked so relaxed and peaceful. He kissed her again, dripping tears onto her cheeks. "Jane," he said. There was so much he wanted to say. So much they could have done.

Emily shut the heavy aircraft door and slid the locking mechanism into place. Bullets pinged off the aluminum panels. She ran over to Frank. "They're coming but they don't know Jane's gone so they shouldn't... I don't know... try to blow us up or anything."

Frank looked up at Emily, feeling like his face was peeling itself off his skull as every muscle winced and pulled in agonized horror. His jaw was moving slightly but no sound came out.

"Frank. I'm sorry," Emily said. "But we've got a fuckin' situation here that we're gonna have to address." She brushed the mop of unruly hair off Frank's forehead, smoothing it back as he continued to stare at her. Shock was settling in making him feel lightheaded and drunk.

"Frank. We need to get the fuck out of here," she said sternly.

He was still looking at her as the sounds of shouting started to grow out in the hangar. "I... I can't let her go," he squeaked.

"You can," she said evenly.

"I... I... can't."

"Shit," Emily said to herself. She turned and walked back to the door looking through the deep-set, small oval window. There was a group of soldiers out there, clearly having a heated debate about their next move. They knew they couldn't risk losing their one chance to keep the B.4 zombies going but they were also fuming and going crazy about knowing Emily had somehow returned undetected and killed four additional zombies as she made her way to the plane. "Shit," she said again.

Frank had started sobbing, his whole body wracked with a tortured energy. Through his tears, he stared into Jane's face, memorizing every line, crease and pore. Though he couldn't fathom the idea in the moment, he knew, at some point, he'd have to let her go and he didn't want any detail to deteriorate in his memory. He needed every inch of her to be organized, catalogued and filed into his brain—he needed every strand of her perfect hair brushed straight, every eyelash, every tiny vein at the corners of her eyes, every shadow, every blemish, every crease in her dried lips. He stared at her, hearing Emily shuffling around somewhere in the background, as though at the end of a long tunnel.

He continued staring at Jane, knowing she was his whole world.

Jane had made life worth living.

A dead girl had given his life purpose.

And now she was gone.

Maybe it was never meant to be. Maybe it wouldn't have worked. She was a zombie after all. And he was just a worthless piece of shit with an uncanny knack for cracking jokes at the exact wrong time.

"It's okay Jane," he said, running his hand across her cheek. "We're just in one of my dreams. See? We're on a plane and the world is burning. Don't worry. I'll wake up soon and you'll be there giving me some awkward, knowing look. You know me. You know me better than anyone ever has. This is just a stupid dream. Wake up." He kissed her forehead. "Wake up." He kissed her left eye. "Wake up." He kissed her right eye. "Come on Frank... wake up."

Jane's blood pooled around him. The patches of her skin that weren't covered in blood and grime were ghostly white.

"You can't do this Jane. You can't leave me here. I need my zombie hottie. I need my dead girl to know I'm alive. I love you Jane. I love you." He hugged her tightly, squeezing a death rattle out of her dead lungs. He blanched for a second, watching a brief glimmer of hope fade and die. "Goddamnit. I need you to come back now. I can't do this alone. Come on, wake up. Wake up. Wake up!"

"Frank!" Emily screamed. She was standing a few feet away. "Come on! I have an idea."

Frank looked up at Emily. She looked like a character in an adult graphic novel. Too skinny and perfectly proportioned to be real. Cut off jean shorts, what amounted to a dirty bra, taut, flat stomach, cute belly button winking with every breath, completely covered in dirt and blood, combat boots with guns and the accoutrements of war festooned across her perfect body. Her hair hanging in wonderfully symmetrical clumps, framing her chiseled features and high cheek bones and beautiful deep green eyes. She had green eyes. Like Jane.

"Seriously, fucker. You need to get the fuck up," she said, sharply motioning with her hand. "You have to let her go and come with me. Now!"

Frank was transfixed. Emily was so much like Jane. A little younger... a little rough around the edges, but they could easily have been sisters. So much like Jane... only breathing. And he'd already been with Emily, he reasoned. He couldn't remember any of it, but in that moment, he was sure they'd had sex. They'd bonded in a way he never had with Jane.

Frank's brain was churning, filling in gaps, rationalizing.

He slowly released his grip on Jane's body, gently laying her out on the floor. Emily was right. Jane was gone. He didn't have a zombie girlfriend anymore.

"Good. Thank you. Okay, I found a fuckin' hatch or whatever in the cockpit. It leads down into the luggage area. I think we can get out that way."

Frank was getting to his feet slowly with an unnerving fluidity.

"Frank?" Emily said, looking at his strained face. "What are you doing?"

Frank had Jane's gun in his hand.

"Say cockpit again. But slower this time," he said, sounding crazed.

"Frank. Fuckin' calm down a second."

"I want you to stay just the way you are right now... forever." He raised the gun, leveling the muzzle at her heart.

"Frank! Stop fucking around!"

Frank briefly had a vision of when he killed Bill Bonzi. He knew how much to move the gun. He knew exactly where the bullet would connect. He knew his aim was true. He'd always been an excellent shot.

"Frank!" Emily screamed.

He pulled the trigger.