We Begin Again

Focused

A snarl. A scream. And a gurgle of blood.

Ada's eyes snapped open, disorientated for split second until her eyes adjusted to the darkness and she realised she was safe in her bed, with Zoe sleeping peacefully at her side. Her headphones were still in her ears, but her iPod had died in the night, the wires tangling awkwardly in her hair and around her throat. She clawed them off her, hating the way they felt on her skin, suddenly claustrophobic in the way she was trapped between the wall, her friend, and the tangled duvet. She sat up, crawling to the end of the bed in an attempt to escape, careful not to wake the other two girls. As she slipped out of the door, shaking the memory of the vivid nightmare out of her head, she stumbled through to the bathroom in the darkness. The pipes groaned as she blindly turned on the tap, spluttering out enough water for Ada to splash on her face, the cold shocking her body out of panic mode. Between the water and her forced shaky breaths, Ada managed to wrestle her mind back to the present and fend off any further spiralling.

Through the frosted glass of her bathroom window Ada could make out the dark pre-dawn sky washed with fiery red, waiting for the winter sun to slowly rise. It was morning at least, and she had a reason to not have to try and go back to sleep. She peered at herself in the mirror, the best she could in the darkness, and brushed he fingers through her tangled hair, scraping it on top of her head into a messy knot with the hair tie she kept on her wrist. Ada crept back to her room in hopes of finding something to wear without having to climb over sleeping friends to reach her wardrobe. Usually she would stay in her pyjamas as long as she could, but today she wanted to be ready for whatever time the military would return for them. Luckily Ada had a bad habit of never putting her clean washing away, so managed to rummage through a pile on the floor by her desk, and found a comfortable pair of leggings to wear with a clean, but very creased, T-shirt, and also pulled an oversized hoodie over her head to keep warm. Once dressed, Ada left her two friends sleeping and went in search of anyone else that may have been awake. But her house was quiet and still. None of its usual buzz of many bodies. And Ada suddenly felt a pang of upset in her gut. She missed her siblings so badly. It had hardly been a full day and yet Ada couldn't stand the feeling of them being away from her, especially with no way of knowing if they were okay. So she pulled on her trainers in her hallway and shrugged on her jacket, making her way outside and walking down to the gate to see which one of the adults were dutifully standing on watch to escape the solitary anxiety that she knew would have come with sitting in her bed waiting for Zoe and Layla to wake up. Her breath danced in front of her face as she stepped out into the cold. At least it's not raining, Ada thought gratefully.

Down at the gate, her dad stood on top of the platform with Vinnie at his side, the both of them peering down the road, talking quietly to each other. They turned at the sound of her footsteps, both men instantly motioning for her to stay quiet before beckoning her up the ladder.

"What's going on?" Ada whispered under her breath as she pulled herself to stand next to the men, steadying herself on the chain link fence.

Wordlessly her dad pointed across to where the road bent around a corner to another housing estate, and Ada saw it, hovering aimlessly and snapping at the air.

"Is it infected?" Ada breathed, turning to her dad, memories of the morning before flooding to the front of her mind.

"Yeah, we spotted it about an hour ago." Daniel hushed, not taking his eyes off the monster.

"Yeah, luckily we spotted it before it spotted us." Vinnie steadied Ada with a hand on her shoulder, noticing the way her eyes widened as she looked between the men for reassurance. She didn't want it getting closer. She didn't want it anywhere near her or her friends. "But it's too far away for us to shoot and we don't want to risk the noise trying. The last thing we want to do is attract more. Just have to hope it wonders away."