Dead Head

                      Chapter One:
                      The Grieving
The Grieving was one of many things to happen on a Sunday night for Tabitha and her crew.
It consisted of everyone gathering wood and creating a bonfire that would burn for hours if they where Lucky.
They would sit around and warm their hands and feet, or perhaps they would dry their wet clothes after washing the blood or dirt off of them in the river.
Whilst warming up everyone would share something they missed and why.
"Well" Tabitha clasped her hands together as she sat on the dead grass.
"Who's first?" She shrugged as she eyed the faces of her group members.
There were five in total:
Tabitha, Who they though of as their 'Leader'.
Alfreda, who had just skipped over the border from Mexico as the outbreak began, good job she did too, Mexico was crawling within five days of the infection.
Max, He was crafty, he could make a slingshot from two twigs and a rock and was able to hit a 'dead man' from 12 feet away.
Kipper, Who was twelve and not really good at anything, they just picked him up for sympathys sake, if they didn't he would have been devoured in minutes, he was in the middle of a 'dead man' hoard and was squealing at the top of his lungs in hopes of some nearby rescuers hearing him.
And Ida, a good girl gone bad, People say it was the toxins that changed her but others say it was because she realised that the world wasn't the she thought it would be.
"I'll start" Kipper spoke up, which wasn't something he usually did.
"Go ahead" Tabitha prompted him as he raised a bowl of soup to her lips before passing it to Max.
"I miss my dog" he sighed sadly.
"Jesus, We hear about this dog every week!" Ida spoke loudly as the bowl of cooling soup was passed to her.
"Ida, let him speak!" Tabitha defended the young boy.
Ida piped down at her superiors voice, she knew that if she kept speaking she would get tonight's watch, which wasn't a good thing.
"I miss my dog, Sadie" He huffed with a shaky voice.
"She was beautiful, Her coat was golden and fluffy" He breathed out.
He stopped himself from speaking when his young voice began to break.
"I'll go next" Max ran a hand through is fiery hair and flicked the ash debrees from his fingers.
"I miss Liam" He said shamelessly.
"Liam, your son?" Tabitha asked him with a comforting voice as she patted his shoulder with her fingerless,leather glove.
"Yeah" He nodded.
Max spoke of his son who had died at the start of the outbreak.
His girlfriend, Claudia had been holding him in her arms when a Dead man crawled into their kitchen through the cat-flap.
She died also.
Although he spoke about his own baby dying, Max wasn't sad, in fact he seemed rather happy.
There was a reason for his emotion, whenever he thought of his son, he thought of how lucky he was to be a dad and how lucky he was to have Liam as his child.
It made his heart feel warm and his cheeks flushed with red.
"I Miss Mí Familia" Alfreda spoke with a thick Mexican accent.
"I miss Mí Madre the most" She spoke with softness in her voice.
She felt guilt flush through her when she thought of her family.
She had managed to escape Mexico while they were still in it.
Of course, it wasn't her fault and she did suggest that they come with her but she couldn't help but feel guilty, Especially when she thought of her younger sister, Maru.
"What about you, Ida?" Tabitha asked when the tanned girl silenced herself.
"What do you miss?" She tried to act like she cared.
"I miss being able to sleep without fucking dead people crawling in and trying to chew my ankles" Ida crossed her arms at Tabitha.
"I'm serious, what do you miss?" Tabitha asked her again, this time with a wide smile.
"I told you, I miss being able to sleep without people trying burst in and bite my face off!" Ida raised her voice.
"Shhh!" Tabitha shushed her fiercely as they all knew that noise would attract the zombies.
Ida rolled her eyes and lowered her voice to a whisper-shout.
"It's none of your business what I miss so stop trying to act like you fucking care" She hissed at Tabitha, who she hated.
"You know what I miss?" Tabitha backed off of asking Ida as she knew the outcome would only be violent.
The group turned their heads to face her.
"I miss my arm" She smirked as she moved the amputated nub of where her arm formerly was.
She had been bitten in the arm and thought that losing the limb would stop the infection, or at least slow it down briefly.
Either way she was going to die.
Either from not being fluent in using one arm or by being infected and turning.
She had a back up plan, if she ever turned one of the group members would shoot her and save themselves, it was only fair that they save the living instead of fearing the dead.
"Alf, You're on watch" Max read a crumpled paper list and through the Foreigner a wood-chopping axe.
"What? No way!" Ida called as she looked over his shoulder onto the list.
"It says Kipper is next!" She argued.
Max turned to her with a furrowed brow and a grim expression.
"He's eleven, Ida" He looked at her.
"Yeah, but he's not blind and he knows how to use an axe" She smirked as she blew a tuft of hair from her face.
"He's a kid" Max argued.
"He's not stupid!" Ida pointed a finger in the young boys direction.
"He'll die!" Max growled.
"Then it'll be easier to feed all of us then!"
"IDA!" Both Max and Ida silenced themselves when Tabitha's voice ruled over their own.
"You're on watch" She looked at Ida with an implanted disgusted emotion glued to her face.
"What? Why?!" Ida shook her head.
"Oh I don't know, maybe Because you scared the shit out of Kipper!" Max's words shot out of his mouth like a bullet.
"Why's it always meeeeee" Ida dragged the word on with her tongue and teeth.
"Come on, Kipper, lets go to bed" Tabitha motioned for kipper to climb the rusty ladder onto the roof of the gas station where they had been camping out.
A pungent smell of gas was stuck to the insides of their noses.
The boy climbed the small ladder and made his way to the blue sleeping bags they had laid out.
There were five but one was always empty as someone had to sit on the edge of the roof to make sure no Dead Men got to them.
It was a job no one wanted to do but sadly it had to be done.