A Future To Die For || Nano 13

10

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Chapter Ten

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It's been a week. Every night, we have managed to smuggle our way into an abandoned house or barn. We have worked our way through forests and fields. Crossing roads as quiet as possible and avoiding towns. We even cross through a swamp, the water a frozen sludge that sunk into our boots and almost convinced me my feet would fall off.

In my opinion, we have been making progress. Even if we have no idea where we are. When we left our last night house, a yellow brick farm house with a white picket fence, it was 8:34. We stopped to have some of those 101 calorie live healthy packets around 11:20. We have been walking till now.

Maybe 20 miles?

Let's go with that. 5 miles away from the farm house, we had ran into a cluster of zombies on the road we had started to follow. That's when Blake called the road quits. It was too big of a risk. So we returned to the damp forests that coated the land of north Ontario. We had to take the long way around several small lakes and bays. That really slowed down our progress. 

We had been stuck in this one forest for a considerably long time, it was 6:32 according to Sam's watch. I was still leading the group, with the help of Blake. He had his knife out, chopping at some thin branches that were weaved together and blocking our path. 

We have heard lots of screams over the course of the week, but none this loud. None this familiar and bone chilling. Blake spun around, his knife tip missing me by inches. My fingers itched for the pistol, sitting empty in the bottom of my backpack.

"Sam!" Nate said as he bolted to his brother's side.  The blonde was laying fast first on the ground, his leg twisted at an unnatural angle. Uncontrollable whimpers escaped him.

"What happened?" Erin asked.

"I fell in a hole, like a burrow," Sam managed through gritted teeth. His voice was muffled. "My leg," he added with a groan. "Oh fuck, my leg. Something happened to my leg!" Erin leaned forward and rolled Sam over, no sorrow or care thrown into her actions. Sam screamed in agony, and Erin muffled it with her sleeve. Tears soaks Sam's cheeks which were a bright red from the cold. 

"Stop drawing attention," She hissed. I looked towards Sam's leg and if I hadn't seen so many zombies, I would have puked over it. A stick stuck out of his flesh and through the fabric. 

"We have to rip the stick out," Erin explained slowly. Sam started to nod, but Erin refused to give him time to prepare himself. She shoved her tiny fist into Sam's mouth in what she probably called 'sound prevention' and yanked the stick out with her free hand. She didn't yank it overly straight, if you ask me, but no time to be nitpicky.

"Take his pants off," I ordered, getting into the catastrophe and opening the survival bag for the first aid kit. I found it and ripped it open, careful to drop nothing in the snow as I went to pull out a bandage.

"That's what she said!" Cole teased from the sidelines. Everyone ignored him, probably for the best. All of a sudden, Erin stopped working when she had the pant leg pulled up.

"What is this?" she stared Sam dead on in the eye. The older boy looked away, his face a mixture of pain and grief. Nate crawled over, his own expression a mixture of his brothers. I felt the need to comfort him as he started blubbering nonsense.

"You know what it is," Sam said softly, unable to full out tell the truth. I was interested in what was happening. I didn't bother to move in fright that I would make matters worse, if it was possible. Nate's mouth opened wide in shock and he raised the cuff of his jacket to his lips, biting gently on his fist.