"Bri," Shawn was already hurrying towards me in the darkened cafeteria.

"I saw it." I whispered back, clambering off of the chair.

"Go wake everyone up. Make sure they stay quiet," he took up a position watching out my window.

Careful not to bump into anything, I hurried into the office. The door to the next room was open and I could see the shapes of sleeping people on the floor. The room was not that large, and floor space was basically nonexistent with so many bodies stretched out in there.

I hissed through the doorway, "Get up!"

It didn't take much to rouse everyone after living on the edge like we had been. My second whispered hiss had everyone coming to attention.

"What's wrong?" Fallon shoved her hair from her face as she sat up on the couch.

"I don't know, but something's not right."

They all struggled to their feet, weapons coming out from where they had stashed them. The new group seemed particularly on edge, reminding me that they had been on the road for a lot longer than I had been.

Maya began stuffing her backpack with everything she could get her hands on. It took me a second to realize that she was preparing to have to run. It had happened to them before, and I suddenly felt ill prepared if we did have to leave the camp. Grabbing Shawn's backpack from where he had left it on the desk, I started stuffing bottles of water and the last of the food in it.

Everyone else had crept from the office by the time Maya and I had filled the two bags. Zipping mine closed, I followed Maya through the door.

The thought of having to leave the camp was terrifying. At first, this place had been creepy, but we had started to settle in here. I knew that being out on the road had to be worse.

Everyone had crowded around a few windows near the door. Tension crackled in the air as they watched outside.

I climbed back on my chair. The night outside was still too silent.

It couldn't have been much more than a minute, maybe two, since that deer charged from the gloom. Now, as we all watched, something else moved in the darkness.

A lot of something else's.

Zombies emerged from the fog by the dozen. They stumbled over fallen branches, got tangled in thick briar bushes, and limped along on damaged and rotting limbs. A few still moved with the fluid, fast movements that most of the zombies I'd seen before used, but most of them now more closely resembled the zombie that had managed to break into the cafeteria. I shuddered at the sheer number of them.

I don't know who gasped to my right, but I could only imagine that whoever it was, was as terrified as I was. We all froze in place, afraid that the smallest movement would give us away to the horde.

They wandered into the clearing, meandering along, clearly with no destination in mind. The silence was more unnerving than anything else. I had gotten used to the screams and snarls that always seemed to announce their presence. For whatever reason, the zombies outside made none of those noises. A few low growls made it through the walls, but that was all.

I didn't even want to think of the implications if the zombies became silent predators.

One uncoordinated zombie tripped over her own feet and crashed onto the hood of the jeep. The noise seemed to stir the others up a bit, and their movements collectively became more hurried. One zombie who still zipped around the clearing with speed, screeched.

In a domino effect, more growling and screams began to sound. The zombies movements became frenzied as they milled around, disappearing and reappearing in the thick fog.

"This is bad," Devon breathed so lowly I wasn't sure for a second that I'd heard him.

"If they hit that door, they're going to get in," Shawn whispered to the group. "It didn't stop a single zombie when it wasn't broken."

"Is there a back door?"

"Yes, but it's locked." I answered Maya. The narrow hallway that led past the kitchen and past a pair of bathrooms ended with a door out. A chain and lock kept that door closed, something that originally I had been pleased with because it made me feel safer. I was reevaluating my position on the lock now, though.

"There has to be a key."

I pulled my gaze away from the window to look at her, "We haven't found it."

At that moment, a zombie stumbled it's way up onto the tiny front porch. It clattered around out there, gently bumping into the door and causing it to rattle in it's broken frame. The resigned expression on Maya's face was highlighted by the moonlight coming in through the window.

"It's time to go." She looked away from the building chaos outside, towards the big man who had been silently watching next to her.

He nodded slowly. "Yeah, it's time."

Their group backed away from the windows and melted into the darkness further into the building. Fallon, Shawn, and I were left staring at each other with wide eyes. I was not happy to think about going outside with so many of the undead there. Clearly, I wasn't the only one.

"Should we go?" I had no idea what was the right decision. Going outside seemed suicidal. But if we became trapped inside by this many zombies, we were as good as dead, too.

"I don't want to go out there."

"I think we need to go."

They answered me at the same time. I looked back and forth between them, my head spinning with possibilities. I opened my mouth, but no sound came out.

A harder thump rattled the door and the zombie on the porch snarled.

My mind was made up instantly. The zombies seemed intent on hanging around the camp. It was only a matter of time before they got in. Even if they never got inside, with so many of them prowling the area, going out for food and water would be dangerous.

Maya had been right. It was time to go.

I said so and turned to follow their retreat. Shawn immediately fell into step beside me. A second later, Fallon's booted steps sounded behind us. Unhappy as she was about going outside, I had no doubt that she was more afraid of being alone again.

It became pitch black as we got further from the windows, slowing us down. I held a hand out in front of me, afraid of running into something in the darkness. By the time we made it down the narrow hallway, I was feeling along the wall to keep oriented.

A whisper of noise ahead of me stood the hair up on the back of my neck, images of just what could be lurking ahead in mind. Suddenly, a bright light turned on directly in my face.

"Thank God, it's you. I wasn't sure." Carrie turned the blinding light away from me and toward where the rest of her group was crowded around the chained door.

"Can you pick it?" Maya whispered to Bill.

He looked at the lock intently for several long seconds before answering. "I don't know. Maybe."

Maya produced something from her pack that I couldn't see in the crush of bodies, and he took it and went to work on the lock.

I had no idea what exactly it took to pick a lock, but their group seemed like this was something that they had done before. I kept quiet and worried about what would happen if he couldn't get the lock open. And I worried about what would happen if he could.

The door was solid, giving no way to look outside before it was opened. What if the zombies had found their way around to the back of the building? We would run outside and straight into them. I gripped my knife a little harder and looked nervously behind me. The glow from the flashlight didn't reach that far, and I couldn't see my friends.

A familiar hand reached out to settle lightly on my shoulder, making a little of the anxiety ease up. Shawn must have noticed my building panic.

An excited murmur ahead was followed by the rattle of chains being removed from their place on the door.

They'd done it. The back door was unlocked.

"Is everyone ready?" Bill looked around to each of us. When no one objected, Carrie switched off the flashlight. "Ok."

The door opened silently, something I would be eternally grateful for, and moonlight spilled into the hallway. At the front, Bill hesitated, peering out into the night cautiously. He had just taken his first step outside when a crash from out in the cafeteria told us that the zombies had made it inside.

"Go!" Fallon hissed from behind me, and we all surged out into the night.

The air was heavy with moisture and the stench of so many rotting corpses was like a slap in the face. I felt like I was too close to hyperventilating as I crept along behind Carrie. The fog made it impossible to see more than a few feet away. I didn't want to lose sight of anyone, afraid I'd never see them again.

Out of the shifting white curtain, to my right, a shuffling zombie materialized. It was already upon us by the time we saw it and I gasped as it set it's sights on Devon. The zombie growled as it reached for him. I watched, horrified, sure he was going to be bit. Then the zombie slumped to the ground in a heap.

Blinking rapidly, I had to stare for a second to be sure that my eyes weren't playing a cruel trick on me.

Carrie leaned over the zombie, tugging to release a machete from where she had sunk it into the zombies skull.