"Are we in the right place?" Jody asks softly. She casts a glance at Tom, but his eyes are ahead, focused, almost terrifyingly so.

He hums, giving her the smallest of nods. "Visible, but not too visible. Plausible we'd be here on our way to the transmitter. Exmoore Militia allowed us safe passage through their checkpoints, so we've been seen. Let's start running now. We need to look as if we're trying to get to that transmitter."

Jody nods as we start off. I take point. When I look back, she's still wearing that slightly worried look, her bottom lip caught between her teeth.

"And if Sigrid doesn't spot us?"

"Then we'll think of something," Janine replies curtly through the headset. "Runners, keep moving with your steady pace. The Exmoore Militia are beginning their communication with the Minister."

"Uh, yeah," Sam mumbles. "Just a sec. I'll patch you in."

Static crackles in my ears. Hearing it almost sounds like second nature.

"Exmoore?" Sigrid's voice makes me snarl. "Are you receiving me?"

"Loud and clear, Minister," Jules answers, her voice clipped and professional. "What's this you want to talk to us about?"

"First, may I say how much I respect what you've done? With a small force of well-trained operatives, you've cleared an enormous area of zombie threat. You are an inspiration to the country."

"Yes, alright," She responds slowly, clearly not swayed by the flattery. "Now what do you want?"

"Our enmity as pained me for a long time. But I've learned that renegades at Abel Township set us against each other. They used your uniforms to launch attacks on Ministry outposts-a deliberate false flag."

My jaw clenches. Sigrid's not wrong. We have done that, but only because we had to. Her truth isn't what bothers me. It's the self-righteous tone she uses as she says it that makes my blood boil, as if she hasn't done far worse, as if she isn't doing far worse.

'Abel Township is so evil. They pitted us against each other. Blah, blah, blah.' Says the woman who literally wiped out most of the earth's population and is experimenting on babies. Plus, she pitted us against Netrophil when they ended up being the good guys!

"That sounds unlikely," Jules replies.

"I have evidence. I will send it to you via encrypted transmission."

"How do I know it's not fake?"

"Runners, the Exmoore Militia are playing their parts perfectly," Janine says as Sam cuts the transmission for now. Her voice is professional, but I can hear the slight smile in it. "Now it's our turn. Get out of the shadow of the hill and take the path toward transmitter. Go. Run."

We obey without a word, silently running through the hills, letting ourselves be seen by whoever may be watching from this area. I'm sure Sigrid has Ministry soldiers patrolling the area, and we know there are Exmoore scouts about. I'm sure they've probably already reported that we're here.

We keep our gazes ahead, making it seem like we're on a straight path towards the transmitter. It's actually nice, running like this, not really having to run from anything that would most definitely kill us if it happened to catch up. I look around, seeing nothin but grass and trees and bits of metal bound together to make transmission towers and watch posts.

This empty space is quite pretty, actually. The Exmoore's villages are a few miles away, but here there is just... peace. A part of me expects that, if the apocalypse hadn't have happened, this would be a parking lot for a new store or a new highway.

Not that I would ever know. I'd still be in America.

But that's the thing about the apocalypse. As years go by, nature reclaims everything bit by bit. I've seen it happen, although I rarely take the time to acknowledge it. A part of me wonders though, how much progress we could have made in these past seven years had the apocalypse never come. There were so many things that never even got to see the light, masterpieces that will probably never be recognized.

There was a man who was making a musical about Alexander Hamilton. I remember because I found out just after learning about him in history class. The musical was supposed to come out in 2015 on Broadway. A lady from my church was a big musical junky. She probably would have loved it.

Too bad it never got to see the light of day.

But a lot of progress has been made, in a way. AIs like A.N.N.I.E. did exist before the apocalypse, but so very people knew about them. The progress we've made is bringing out things that already existed into the light. Although, with all the trauma that's come with it, maybe it would have been best to leave it in the dark.

"Hey, Sam?" I ask softly, forcing myself to focus back on the mission rather than these fleeting, meaningless thoughts. "Do you think you could patch us back in?"

"You sure you want to hear what Sigrid's saying about us?"

"Couldn't be any worse than what Ian Golightly said about us in his broadcasts."

I hear him shudder. "God, please don't remind me of those."

"Sorry, Jerry."

"Five!" He yells, and I giggle, still having a hard time believing that Ian actually tried to convince people that Sam was head of Netrophil at one point. "Ugh, you can be so mean sometimes, do you know that? Anyway, patching you back in now."

"The dates and times here line up with our information. It looks as though it was Abel Township who stole fuel from you, as well." Jules laughs dryly. "They really have tried to frame us for everything.

"We've had a brief discussion here about what you've told us. We can't promise to become allies, Minister, but we are willing to parley."

Sigrid hums in approval. "As a show of good faith, I have a shipment of the cure at your northern border now. Parksdale crossing. I am willing to share it. I only have one thing to request."

"Go on?" She asks in interest. Her acting is amazing.

"You have allowed Abel Township to build a transmitter in your territory. There are several senior Abel runners in your territory running toward it. Capture them for me. We will exchange it for vials of the cure, and I very much hope this will be the beginning of a mutually satisfactory trading relationship."

Sam sucks in a sharp breath as he cuts the transmission once more. "Do you think Sigrid bought it, Janine?"

I don't hear Janine's answer, because there's a sudden woosh of air as something blurry flies by my face, lodging itself into a tree with a thud. I stumble, looking at the crossbow bolt that's now stuck in the tree.

"Looks like the Exmoore Militia are doing their bit to sell it," Jody says with wide eyes. "Tom, Five, we've got to play our part too. Come on. Run!"

With how close that arrow was to lodging itself into my brain instead of that tree, I don't hesitate. I run as fast as I can, more bolts flying towards us. None of them are wide shots, but none of them were as close to hitting something vital as that first one was. They still like to cut it close, though.

"God, Jody, did you give them lessons on shooting?" I ask, but she laughs.

"If I did, they wouldn't miss."

"Even if they're supposed to be missing?"

She shrugs. "None of them have hit us yet, not even a flesh wound. They're just sellin' it well. Sigrid's probably watchin' us now."

"She's probably sitting back and laughing," Sam grumbles. "If she knew that we knew we were listening in, then she'd probably be taunting us."

"Why do you say that?" Tom asks, quirking a brow, gracefully ducking down to avoid getting hit by a crossbow bolt.

"Because that's what she did when she had that zombie chase and bite Five." The bitterness in his voice is obvious.

"Do you think that's the reason she asked Exmoore to capture us instead of kill us?" Jody asks. "Because she saw Five's with us?"

Tom hums. "It's quite possible. She needs Five to bring back Moonchild, and she doesn't know Five's found a way to silence Moonchild. I think she wouldn't bother with the taunts if she could hack into the transmission, Sam. She'd probably just play the tones to get Five to come to her willingly."

"Oh, yes, that makes me feel so much better," He says sarcastically, and I can picture him rolling his eyes. I almost smile at him being worried for me.

"But still, do they have to shoot so close?" I ask, yelping as I twist to avoid getting hit again. The arrow was centimeters from ripping my clothes and slicing through my right side.

"Again, you haven't been hit yet," Jody replies. "Keep dodgin'. We can't have you gettin' hurt and needin' stitches. That'll probably feel really uncomfortable in your weddin' dress."

"Yeah..." I say, drawing out the word, and I can feel Tom's stare burning into my back, and I'm sure Sam's waiting with baited breath to see if he'll say anything.

He doesn't, thankfully.

Jody gasps as a bolt skims her hand, making a small cut. I look back see the thin trail of blood that starts to well up and run down her fingers as pain registers in her eyes.

"Bloody hell!" She winces. "If I hadn't moved, it would've gone through my hand."

"Are we sure the Exmoore Militia knows this isn't real?" I ask, my worry beginning to mount.

"They have to make it look real," Tom says, but I can see the anger simmering in his eyes as he keeps a calm voice. He's like Janine in that way-at least, he is when he's in his right mind. The silent rage he holds is more terrifying that him screaming could ever be. "If Sigrid suspects for a second that this isn't real, then it's all over."

"Yeah, we need those vials of the cure," Sam says. "If we have it, Veronica can try to work out where she went wrong, and how to synthesize it ourselves. The Exmoore Militia is the only ally important enough for Sigrid to send this large of a shipment. We have to convince her that the Exmoore has turned against us."

I roll my eyes at his stating of the obvious. "Well, they're starting to convince me. How much farther away are we from the transmitter?"

At the mention of it, Jody's face darkens, and she sighs. "I can't believe we only got the final bits of that transmitter a few weeks ago, and now we have to give it to Sigrid!"

She looks angry, hurt. She put most of the work in building this transmitter. When Janine was gone, Jody took over everything, including all technical necessities, teaching herself how to build them, with the help of Tom. I can understand why this is upsetting for her.

"Better territory than people, that's what we decided," Tom replies, but he still gives her a sympathetic look.

She nods. "Yeah. It just feels like we're givin' up a lot to her right now, you know? That feelin' when your choices get narrower and narrower, smaller and smaller."

"Trapped feeling. I know."

"I don't like lettin' her think she's winnin'," She growls, and I can picture Sigrid watching smugly now that she believes the Exmoore has turned against us. "Where to now, Sam?"

"The plan says..." He flips through the binder, "along that cliff path, and then across the metal footbridge."

I squint, seeing the footbridge. I don't like how deep the valley below it seems to be, but if I don't look down, I should be okay. It's not super large and it would only take us maybe twelve minutes to run the length of it. The assured smile that was making its way on my face stops when I see thin little... somethings flying toward it.

"Are those more arrows-"

I'm cut off when the arrows make impact, letting off an explosive sound. The force is so great it causes the massive bridge to shake, the suspension cables straining as metal groans.

"Oh, come on!" I yell. "Was this in the plan? I don't remember it being in the plan."

"I think it is, but I can check again if you'd like," Sam says in a wavering voice. "I think they're expecting you to make it look real too. And you have to make it, because that bridge is the only way out of Exmoore territory in ten miles. Run!"

•

More arrows hit the bridge, making it creak and groan under my feet. Jody stumbles behind me, just barely managing to stay upright.

"Whoa!" She grasps onto Tom's arm for support. "This thing's unsteady."

"That's three of eight suspension cables they've taken out," Tom says. He sounds the most stable out of all of us, but there's still a strain there.

"This is starting to feel very real," I state. "Sam, are we sure they're not angry with us for impersonating them those times we attacked Sigrid?"

"Uh, well, I mean, we talked about it with them. They laughed and said they appreciated the tactics, if not the strategy." He doesn't really sound confident in his answer, and my stomach churns.

"As someone who lived in a base where passive aggressiveness and hidden meanings thrived, that really, really sounds the kind of thing that might mean, 'We're still secretly kind of annoyed.'"

I let out a squawk as the bridge jerks. A loud snap and a groan reaches my ears as I fall to my knees. The second I do, Tom's hands are grabbing my arms and pulling me upright, pushing me forward until I'm running ahead of them again.

"Four cables gone." He lets out a shaky breath, and I can see his composure slipping just slightly as he looks at Jody. "Any more and we go slamming into that cliff. Not a fun way to go."

"Is there any actual good way to go?" I ask.

"That's a conversation me, you and Peter can have sometime after this. Sam, worth double checking mission parameters?"

Sam swallows. "Uh, yeah. Yeah, just a sec. Uh, yeah.... oh. The Exmoores are talking to Sigrid on a closed channel... No, they keep changing the frequency. Let me see if I can just tap into it. Yeah, there we go."

I welcome the static that fills my hears. It distracts me from the horrible sound of groaning metal.

"There's nothing else we want that you have, I'm afraid, Minister," Jules says, calm as ever.

"I think there's one thing. I don't have it yet, but I will."

There's a sour taste in my mouth from hearing the smugness in her voice.

"Empty promises neither impress nor frighten me, Minster."

"I can contact the Undaunted."

I blanch. Shit.

"That's what you want, isn't it?" She asks, baiting her. "Your husbands and wives on that nuclear submarine, returned home safely? That's what you've been trying to accomplish all these years. I'm certain I can find the information in the wreckage of government to contact them. Or is that not interesting to you?"

"No," Jules says quickly, and for the first time in a long time, I hear desperation in her voice. "That's interesting to us."

Static cuts the conversation off.

"Damn it!" Sam curses. "I've lost the signal."

"Oh, shit. Oh, shit, shit, shit!" I grab at my invisible backpack strap. "If there's one thing that might really make the Exmoores turn on us, it's that."

Tom sighs. "Trapped feeling."

"We'll find a way out of this," Jody says, but she sounds more desperate than confident.

There's a loud snap as the fifth cable breaks, and I feel gravity begin to take hold as we begin to fall forward.

"Everyone, all out sprint! If the Exmoore Militia are turning on us, then we're not dying on this bridge today!" He yells, and I run.

I can feel us beginning to fall forward. My heart hammers in my chest with each unstable step I take. Wind whips my ponytail around, and each inhale burns like acid down my throat. Adrenaline kicks in, the only thing on my mind is making it out, surviving.

I can hear Sam breathing heavily in the coms shack. He's probably a nervous wreck, shaking and worried and unable to do anything but watch and pray we're fast enough to make it and-

And where the hell is Janine?! We need her!

I can feel the grip of my shoes start to slip as the bridge starts to become more vertical than horizontal, and I take in a gasping lungful of air and sprint with all my might. We're falling, and every muscle in my body seems to be fighting between the response of fleeing or freezing.

We're falling. We're falling. We're falling!

WE'RE FALLING!

Tears of fear sting my eyes, memories of situations just like this ringing in my head, each one stronger and more vivid than the last.

And when my feet finally touch solid ground, I nearly collapse. It's more from relief and fear instead of exhaustion, but Tom and Jody don't let me. They're smart, using the rational parts of their brains to realize that the beams that hold this bridge into the ground will most likely take a good portion of the cliffside with it when the entire bridge falls, and it's about a minute away from doing so.

Our footsteps echo into my ears, my heart pounding as the screeching of metal overpowers all my senses. I hear I loud rip followed by a crash as the bridge collapses completely, taking a chunk of the cliff with it. I feel the tremors of earth beneath my feet, but none of the dirt under me shifts or crumbles. We're safe.

Relatively safe.

Jody looks back, her eyes wide. "There goes the bridge. If we'd been any slower, we'd be dead. Sam, anything more from Exmoore?"

"No, they're not responding to coms," He answers, sounding distressed.

She nods, squaring her shoulders. "Tom, Five, we might be in a hostile situation here. Everyone's got a price, or a breaking point. The Exmoore Militia has been working for years to try and contact that nuclear sub, the Undaunted."

"What if Sigrid threatened to tell them to scuttle the ship?" I ask shakily, and she grits her teeth.

"Ugh! I really want to smack her in her stupid face! Even though that won't solve anythin', I still want to!"

"The Exmoores might not go for it anyway." Tom's brows furrow in thought. "They know the women and men on that vessel wouldn't want to be used as bargaining chips."

"We've ended up doing a lot of things we didn't want to," I reply. "I mean, we all have-weighed the losses, compromised morals."

Jody nods. "Sigrid forces your hand over and over again until you lose sight of what you were doin' in the first place. That's her whole thing. Muddle us up until her way seems like the only way."

Fear and anger eat away at me. When it comes to the people you love, you do things that you normally wouldn't. I killed almost everyone who was with me at the start of the apocalypse to protect Katelyn. I was twelve years old. The closest thing I ever came to violence before that was hunting with my dad, and I barely ever did that! The people in the Exmoore Militia have killed people before, have hurt people before. I'm certain they'd do whatever necessary to get their people back.

"Yeah, on the subject of being muddled up, what was the next part of the plan?" Sam asks, trying to go through his papers. I think he might have knocked the binder off his desk while watching the terrifying scene of us run for our lives, and because of it lost his place.

"After we cross the bridge, they appear on horses and chase us," Jody replies.

"Y-Yeah, um, that's what I have written here, but..."

"But?" I press, my stomach sinking.

"Well, are you saying that you didn't change it last minute so they appear in Jeeps and chase you east? Because that's what they're doing."

Tom makes a pained face. "Cutting us off from the safe path out of Exmoore territory."

"We've got to get across that field," Jody says desperately. "Yes! I can see it's a perimeter defense. Zombies, mantraps, zombies in mantraps. But if we want to get out of here, we run through that field. Single file, as fast as you can. Everyone, run."

They let me take point again, mostly because I have my axe. I grab it from off my back, swinging it at the first zombie that comes towards us. A satisfying but equally disgusting sound comes from it when the blade makes impact. I swing again, and again, chopping through zombies and hopping over any areas I can't easily see, since I don't want to accidentally step into any traps that they've laid down. From the number of zombies with missing feet, I can assume bear traps were used more than anything.

I keep swinging, one zombie after another falling. Tom and Jody stay a few steps behind me to make sure I don't accidentally cut them when I rear back and prepare to swing again. My arms are still shaky from nearly falling to my death, but each swing is strong and smooth enough to keep the kills clean. Well, as clean as they can be.

There's a lot of zombies. The Exmoore wanted to keep their defenses strong, and that meant there couldn't just be a few zoms mulling around. The minutes that pass by as I keep hacking through the zoms do not pass me. I know how much time this is taking, every second I spend fighting through is a second closer the Exmoores get. My shoulders burn, pants leaving my parted lips as I swing again and again, my body going on autopilot. I've done this so many times, it's like second nature, but that doesn't mean I like the pain that comes with doing it after a while.

But after countless swings and stepping over zombie's corpses and hidden traps, I see it. The sun's light reflects the gleam of the metal fence. It's got barbed wire, but we can hoist each other up and over, and I don't mind getting a few scratches.

"There it is," Jody all but sighs in relief. "Fence into Golton territory. We're nearly out."

As if on cue, a jeep pulls up, coming to a stop right in front of us and forcing us to come to a screeching halt. I see Jules, calm and collected as ever. She steps out of the jeep, along with two other women. Both wear stone cold faces.

"I'm afraid I can't let you do that," Jules says calmly, tucking some of her white hair behind her ear.

"Jules, we know what Sigrid's promised you, but she won't help you. She'll betray you just like she's betrayed everyone else. You can't let her use the Undaunted against you." Jody pleads desperately, but Jules's face remains stoic. "That's against what we stand for!"

She grabs a gun from inside the jeep, and I flinch when she cocks it. "We stand for bringing our people home, and she's our best chance of finding the Undaunted. All three of you, stand where you are." She fires at my feet when she sees me shift, and I jump like a scared cat. "I said stand where you are!"

"Alright," Tom says quickly, holding up his hands in surrender, and we do the same. "You're the boss."

"Which of you has the key to the transmitter? You, Five?" She stares at me for a long time, and I sigh. I put my ax back on my back and reach into the side pocket of my backpack, grabbing the keys and then tossing them to her. "There. It's just a transmitter. It's not a lot to swap for the cure to the zombie plague, is it? We never betray out allies, but I don't know if you ever really were our allies at all."

"We would never have turned on you like this, no matter what she promised us, Jules," I say. "You might not know that's who we are, but it is... What are you going to do with us?"

"The Minister asked us to hand you over. She seemed quite interested in your capture in particular, Runner Five. I'm leaving Lydia and Anne here to guard you until the Minister's soldiers show up. I'll take this key to the Minister." Jules stares at us for a small moment. "I'm not going to apologize to you. We've all done what we needed to."

She hops into the jeep, turning the engine on and driving off, leaving us with the two woman. The taller one, her nametag saying Anne, has a gun. Lydia does not.

"Guys, Ministry soldiers are coming at you from the south," Sam states, his voice strained. "If you're going to do something, do it now-bloody hell!"

He barely even finishes before Jody kicks her foot up, hitting Anne's hand and sending the gun flying upward before hitting the ground. Lydia tries to come forward, but I slam my shoulder into her chest, ducking to avoid her swing and then slamming my fist into her jaw. I turn around and dive for the gun that's been dropped. When I grab it, I point it at Anne, ready to shoot.

It feels lighter than normal.

I hear Sam curse under his breath, too stunned to say anything.

"Lydia, Anne, sorry about this," Tom says, although he really doesn't sound all that sorry. "We're not going to wait here for the Minister. We'll be heading to Golton territory now."

Jody nods. "My thoughts exactly. Five, you lead the way. Let's go."

•

"Bloody hell, Janine, you've missed a lot of excitement," Sam huffs.

"Oh?" She questions. "I was consulting Miss McShell on what we'll do with our first shipment of the cure."

"Yeah, well, that's the excitement you missed," He explains. "Because Sigrid promised the Exmoores that she'd help them find the Undaunted, but only if they turned on us, and they did!"

"That was one of the options we considered, Mr. Yao." She doesn't sound surprised at all, and I scrunch up my face, perplexed.

"Didn't you read the briefing notes, Sam?" Jody asks with a small smile.

"Well, did you? What, did you actually read Janine's whole briefing? All seventy pages?"

She frowns. "Seventy?"

"Yeah, seventy," I add, just as confused as Sam. "I read the whole thing-so ha, Sam, I win-
but there was nothing in there about this."

"Mr. Yao, let me see your binder," Janine says, before clicking her tongue. "See these rips? The reason neither of you knew about this is because you... somehow managed to misplace exactly 100 pages that were supposed to come after this."

"...Oh," Sam and I both say in embarrassment.

"And I did read all 170 pages," Jody says, emphasizing the one hundred. She giggles as I turn red. "I've uh, I've sort of got to enjoy them. This was on page 110, wasn't it?"

"I believe it was 112," Tom corrects. "Exigencies in Case the Minister Offers Further Emoluments."

"Yeah, see, I'm not sure it would have helped me to read it, honestly," Sam mutters. He's probably blushing just as bad as I am.

"Only Jules had a real gun," Jody says. "Anne's gun was a fake. Good enough to convince Ministry soldiers from a distance."

"That's why it felt lighter," I mumble, cursing myself for not figuring it out before. "No bullets."

She nods. "I didn't actually know that for sure until I saw them."

"Our ruse has worked," Janine says proudly. "The Minister's convinced the Militia are allied with her. The shipment of the cure has been delivered. Now Miss McShell can begin work on it. Our plans begin to bear fruit."

A/N: Here you go, guys! I hope you enjoyed this chapter! I dedicate it to HDGamer123 Please be sure to vote and comment. Thank you and have a blessed day!