Written by user blackrosedrop

Running. Everything starts with running. James and Liv and me, the three of us against the world.

They'd told us to wait; the rescue is going to take place in the courtyard. They'll only wait for a few minutes, hovering over the ground, the sound of the blades thrashing across the sky will draw ever Biter for miles, but that's not a problem. Our rescuers will be from the military, from a section that somehow managed to create order in the initial outbreak. They deal with those things on a daily basis, they'll know how to handle them. They'll have guns. More than the flimsy knife in my pocket.

The rescue plan seemed good enough, until Mr Peters left us.

He has the radio, you see, the radio that is perhaps the only connection in the world we have to our rescuers. Mr Peters told us he'll try to get a better signal by going into the tower block, climbing up onto the third floor. That was ten minutes ago and he hasn't come back.

"He's ditched us," James muttered as we waited inside the classroom. "He's taken it, and he's gotten out of here, leaving us to rot."

Still we waited, until we heard the unmistakable growl of a helicopter cutting directly over the school building. Our rescuers had arrived, and that was a fact, but only a temporary one. Mr Peters on the other hand had as good as abandoned us, and he may be on the helicopter right this second, radio in his hand. Maybe he had planned the whole thing in advance and the time he knew we wouldn't make it, that we'd die in our hope.

It was that, or the Biters have gotten into the school somehow and he's laying dead somewhere, blood oozing out of his neck, making a mess on the floor.

Running was his mistake; I won't make it ours.

The three of us, we're getting out of this dark pit, we're going to survive one way or another and most definitely we are going to get onto that helicopter. It can't leave without us, not when it's our only chance of finding civilisation again.

Now we're running in the darkness, coordinating by pure memory of the last six weeks we've been trapped here. The whites of Jess' eyes flash as she looks behind us, staring at the blackness in pure terror like any moment she'll see a Biter there, sharp teeth glinting in the dark.

We waited and waited but no help came. So here we run, through the shadows, through the earliest part of the night, and I know we'll make it because we have to.

The blood pumps through my ears, filling me with a sense of pure surrealism. It's like this isn't happening, like we're running in a nightmare and at any moment we'll wake up. I'm still convinced the last few months have been just that, a bad dream, but this time we're stuck inside of it and there's no way out.

Nobody is saying a word, but I know we're all straining to hear, soaked in a cold, feverish sweat, just waiting for the helicopters to leave us here in the dark. Then the Biters will tear us apart.

We run this time, not for the athletics team, or for a late class, we run for our lives. There's no telling how much time we have left before they break inside.

I look to my left where James is murmuring something between breaths, his chest rising and falling, puffs of steam coughing from his mouth. He's dressed in only the rags of his old school blazer since all the other clothes were too small for him. Me and Jess had managed to salvage some old scraps of jeans and sweaters.

James is so focused as he runs, his eyes set dead ahead - like he can see through the dark in the corridors. He doesn't look scared but I know he must be, because if he isn't, he's not human.

I turn to my right, at Liv. She's not doing so well, she's panting for air like she can't suck enough into her lungs. Her steps fall clumsily onto the ground like any second now she's going to fall over. I open my mouth to say something to her, but no words fall out. I don't want to lie to her, I don't want to tell her it's going to be okay. Any second now the helicopter might fly up again, taking Mr Peters with it, a million Biters following the noise to this school and getting inside. One small whiff of our scent is all they need and then these last six weeks of darkness will have been for nothing.

There's not long now, just another two long corridors, and then we'll be in the school courtyard. Maybe we have some hope of getting out of this pit of terror after all. Maybe the helicopter will take us to another world, where our parents are still alive and all we have to worry about is getting our homework in on time.

"I have ... To ... Stop ..." Liv breathes, then she stumbles onto the ground before I can stop to catch her.

"Liv," I whisper, pulling her up by the shoulders. "We can't stop now, we have to go." Our voices sound strange in the uninterrupted silence. It's like we're the intruders here.

Liv shakes her head and pulls away, unable to speak. I don't know what to do.

The dread climbs up my throat. We can't stand still, we can't stop. In every passing moment they're getting closer, and we're just as easily waiting for them. The weight of it pulls my clothes down, dragging me down into the ground. My side brushes against it. I found it in the food tech room and it's mine now.

James steps towards us, panting.

"Liv?" he says, sounding like he's ready to strangle her, until he remembers she's our friend too and that we can't leave her behind.

"It's my ... Asthma ..." Liv gasps, clutching at her chest. She lost her inhaler when we got here, and although she's been coughing a lot, she's managed by sitting out for a few minutes. We can't do that now.

"We'll find an inhaler soon, they'll be one where they take us, there has to be. We just have to make it to the helicopter," I say, flinching as something dark flashes against the glass.

I squeeze her shoulder and she looks at me, dead in the eye. "Leave me ... I can't ... I'll slow you down."

"You know we'll never do that." I kneel next to her. "Now do what I do, okay? Breathe in ... Breathe out. Breathe in ..." She follows me as I move my arms, showing her. The whole while I feel James' eyes staring behind us, his whole body tensed up like a rock. "Keep looking at me, Liv, we'll get through this. We just have to get outside."

We continue like this for an agonizingly-long moment, until her breathing slows and she leans on the floor, exhausted. She looks so pale she's practically glowing in the dark. What if they don't have an inhaler where they take us? Will she even last that long?

"Guys," says James suddenly, taking one long, slow step forwards. "Do you hear that?"

I'm too scared to follow his gaze, half-expecting to find one of them there, staring at us, blood dripping from its fangs ready to leach into our flesh. But I can't hear anything, no raspy breath, no growling. Only silence.

Screaming silence.

Followed by the sound of glass, shattering. A door creaks open, agonizingly slowly ... Then footsteps thunder down the bare hall - faster than the thumping of my heart.

"They're inside," I breathe, blood turning to pure ice.

James grabs Liv by the wrist and pulls her onto her feet. There's no time now. Half-carrying, half-dragging, we get her to move with us. She's wheezing so loudly, they'll hear us for sure.

"Come on," James hisses, tugging further. We're almost at the end of the corridor now, at the end of the blackness that seems to have taken over everything - a night that just doesn't end, not for as long as those things hunt us.

The thudding behind us is getting louder. I wonder if I could pull out my knife and use it against one of them, drive it into a cold, dead heart. I'd only get one shot and there's only one of me and a world of them.

I'm shaking all over, we all are. Adrenaline is the only thing keeping my body going now. One part of me just wants to stop, to sink into the blackness and let the Biters find me - they're both faster and stronger than we are. It hardly seems fair to fight the inevitable.

Then I think about James and Liv - the two most important people in my world. I don't know where my family are, or if they're still alive, so I don't think about that. James and Liv are alive, though, and I'm not giving up on them. Not while there's breath in my body.

As James helps Liv my hands clasp around the handle at the end of the corridor, and yank open the door. Light bursts through the opening, blinding us for a moment. We haven't been outside since we got here, it's too dangerous. If those things get a sniff of you, you're dead.

It's evening and a chill sweeps through us. That doesn't matter now, what matters is getting out of there before they catch up to us.

There's a rumbling noise in the courtyard, which I realize is the sound of blades cutting through the air.

"The helicopter," I say, running forwards. I can see it by the trees, a massive hunk of black metal ... It's already rising up from the ground.

They can't leave us behind, they can't. That's when I hear the hissing noise, like a rabid snake, coming from inside the school.

I run out in front of the helicopter, yelling for it to stop. The pilot has to see us, but it doesn't stop - it continues rising from the ground until it's above our heads.

James calls out my name but I don't hear him. It doesn't matter if it hits me, we'll be dead anyway once the Biters catch up with us. Time is running out. For a moment I think it is leaving, that is spinning up and away, but it hovers over us for a second like it's assessing us.

Then, like a miracle, the back doors slide open and a man appears, shouting over the noise.

"Grab on."

He holds out his hand. By now James and Liv have caught up, so we push her up first. She stumbles on board, falling onto the inside. She's coughing, but at least she's safe. We've got seconds left now. I hear them panting down the inside of the school corridors, they can probably see us.

"Go," says James. He shoves me forwards before I can tell him otherwise and his arms grip around my waist to pull me up. The man's hands are rough as he pulls me on board.

As he leans over for the final time for James, I look up shoulder and see what we've been running from the entire time. There's five of them, hissing and baring their fangs. They sprint towards us at an inhuman speed, hands curled into claws, nails blackened by dry blood, eyes sharp and frenzied.

It's the eyes that are the worst part, they make you wonder how something so predatory could have ever once belonged to a human.

I grab onto James' other arm and he climbs inside, just as the helicopter rises, knocking us all flat against the ground. We lift up just in time before the Biters reach the door. They stare at us, watch us leaving like a cat watches a mouse in its paws. We're dead, their stony gazes tell us, as if we don't already know.

"Don't look," says the man, placing a hand on my shoulder, wind whipping his hair. He looks a few years older than us, with a shaved head and a tiger-head tattoo on his exposed neck. He smiles grimly as he slams the doors closed. "You don't want to look at those things."

I nod, catching back my breath. I close my eyes as the helicopter pulls us away from the courtyard. The hissing noises fade, and we're jolting through the air. The frame of everything shakes and I feel that at any moment a sharp wind will knock us from the sky and plummet us back to the ground, where they'll find us and they'll rip us apart.

"Erin," James murmurs. I open my eyes to meet his as he lays beside me. At least with him I don't have to pretend. He smiles. "We made it."

I lean back and sigh. He's right, but that doesn't settle the unease in my stomach.

It's crowded in the back where other people are gathered, maybe ten of fifteen of us - survivors, just like we are. It's a right mix, some of them are barely fazed, while others sit with their arms around their knees. I wonder how so many people can fit into such a tight place.

I scan the faces and my chest collapses. There, right in front of us, is Mr Peters with his broken glasses and his dirty, white suit. He's avoiding my gaze. That man, the man who taught me algebra, had left us for dead. Then he looks up and our eyes meet for a moment, only a fraction, but just long enough for me to see inside him, to see the fear glistening on his brow and the tremor in his shoulders. Then I look away. Mr Peters is dead.

Liv is wheezing badly now, bent over on the floor and spluttering for air. There's not much else I can do. I rub her on the back.

"Hang in there, Liv," I say, leaning forwards and squeezing her hand. She can't die now, it hardly seems fair.

Then the man who pulled us up brings out a first aid kit from behind his back - it's like he's completely prepared for everything. There's tears in Liv's eyes as she takes an inhaler from him and presses it up to her face. I back away and sink against the wall, deflated.

"You lot been out here for a while?" the man asks.

"Since the beginning," I reply. "School got closed off when it started. Most of the other kids went off back to their families, but we stayed. Guess we thought it would all blow over soon."

"That's what we all thought." His tattoo stretched out as he grinned.

"What about you?"

He shrugged. "I was just starting my shift at work, same as usual at the hospital, but there was something weird going on. Calls all over of people undergoing some strange transformation, others bleeding out on the streets with their skin torn off. We couldn't handle all the people coming on, saved as many as we could but, you know." He pauses then sticks out his hand. "Name's Jackson, by the way.

"Erin." I shake his hand. "Thanks for saving us."

He shrugs again. "It's what we're here for. I'm a medic with this group." He pulls out a pen and paper - one with a long list. "Can you tell me your friends' names?"

I tell him, and he writes them down too on his clipboard. "Is that a list of everyone you've found?"

"We're trying to keep some sort of record, to make it easier for people who want to find their family when it's all over."

It'll never be over.

"Can you check the list for someone?" says James suddenly, startling us both.

"Sure," says Jackson, holding up the clipboard to the ceiling, where a single bulb illuminates the space.

"His name is Henrik, same last name as me."

Jackson runs his finger down the list searching for the name.

"Your brother?" I say. James just nods, leaning forwards.

"I'm afraid I don't have it here, mate. But this is just for the last few days on this one helicopter, just you wait until we get to Haven. Your brother might have been picked up from another group."

I look away. Neither of us want to tell James the truth - that his brother is probably dead just like the rest of our families. Still, James wouldn't believe us anyway, he's like that.

"Haven?" I say, testing the name. I haven't heard of it before.

"Yeah," says Jackson. "It's the only safe place around here for a good fifty miles. I was one of the lucky ones who got their first. It's a camp, one of the few the military built before it all went to hell, back when the spread was only in New York." He snorted. "You remember that? It was all over the news, outbreak of some cannibalistic disease - real-life zombies."

"Except it wasn't our flesh they wanted, it was our blood," James finishes.

"Exactly." Jackson snorts. "You'd think we would have seen it coming, that people would have seen Biters out on the streets, walking like us, living like us. And the whole time, they were just waiting to strike."

We nod, not really sure what to say. It's happened and I don't want to think about it any longer than I have to.

It's quiet for a few moments. Jess has gone to sleep with some of the others, her head on Jackson's shoulder. He doesn't seem to notice, he's too busy frowning up the light - which has started to flicker as it knocks about.

A terrible thought crosses my mind. What if the light goes out? I can't imagine being sat in a group of strangers in the darkness. What if the helicopter began to spin too wildly, or run out of fuel?

James' hand crept around mine. It was cold and sweaty, but so was mine. The sound of the helicopter drifts away.

"I have to find my brother, Erin."

"I know." I squeezed his hand tight, turning towards him. His teeth glow in the darkness.

"Get some sleep," he whispers, and slowly pulls my head down against his shoulder. "You'll need it."

I'm too tired to argue. Every muscle in my body weighs a million tonnes. This might be the last and only place we can be where Biters can't get us, up in the air, even if it won't last forever.

I shuffle close to James. We've always been close - me and him. His blazer is rough where it catches in my hair and when I shuffle up to get more comfortable his breathing deepens.

"James?"

He doesn't say anything. His eyes are closed and he's fast asleep.