Dead But Not Gone

Make Things Right

Derek

Maria asked Xander and I to run down and find some medicines around the leftover stores. We agreed and headed to the closest pharmacy.

I saw a biter limping and snarling around the store. Its eye hung down its face and it used to be a he. Its business clothes were tattered and its arm was bent at an awkward angle. I sneaked up behind it and stabbed it in the back of its skull. Dark red blood stained my blade as I yanked the knife out and the biter dropped to the ground. Xander went behind an elderly lady with an almost 1800-esque dress on and snapped her neck.

We continued into the store and checked around to see if any biters were nearby. When it was clear, we started looting the leftover medicines.

"What do we need to grab again?" I asked as I checked the names of every bottle.

"I don't know, everything!" He shouted from across the aisles.

I listened to him and stuffed everything into our bags. When we finished looting the place, we headed out.

"Where next?" Xander looked around the decrepit town.

"No clue. Let's just continue scavenging around the town til there's nothing else to look for I guess." I shrugged.

Xander nodded and we started our adventure into the unknown lands.

Hazel

After Derek left with Xander to the outskirts, I was tasked with handing out the remaining vaccines to everybody. There was about 200 people in the quarantine zone. Only 120 people remained after the shots were given out. The ones who died and turned were shot in the head before they could attack anybody. The ones that lived were still sick but pulling through. Star remained asleep due to the fact that her immune system was fighting off the sickness with the help of wiz touch. I pulled out my clipboard and marked off the recent ones who died, then separated those who died and those who survived with the vaccine.

I stared down at the paper and was confused. I injected the vaccine into those who weren't basically on the borderline of death. Then, I used the remaining little bit on the people that weren't as bad as the others. However, the data seemed off. It made it look like the vaccine didn't work. I scratched my chin with the tip of the pen and looked at the numbers written in black ink. I gave 100 extremely ill people the vaccine, gave 50 people the remaining dose, then only had 50 in the beginning stage with no need for the shots. The vaccine only managed to save 23 of the super sick people. It saved all of the less sick people. That left me with 123 survivors. Then, 3 people died of unknown causes.

"Do you know what's happening to them?" Stella walked up from behind me with a bottle of water and handed it to me.

I accepted the drink. "I don't know. My best guess is that the vaccine responds differently to the receiver's white blood cells. The leukocytes most likely recognize it as something foreign and assume it is an enemy, attacking the vaccine cells. However, these leukocytes lose the battle and get killed off, making the immune system weaker when it was supposed to assist them. It's really confusing the hell outta me. How am I supposed to save people when everyone's body is different? I can't make different kinds of variations of this so called 'vaccine' and expect to save everybody! We're low on medicine as is and I can't pump more out just for the fuck of it."

I started having a mental breakdown and Stella put her hand on my back.

"It's not your fault. You'll figure something out. I know it." She comforted me.

I looked up at her and smiled with tears in my eyes. She smiled back and walked away. I regained my composure then looked at the data once more.

I can do this. Nobody else will die.

Derek

"Well that looks like that last of them." I said as I yanked my knife out of a biter's skull.

The biter was a man who looked maybe about my age. His face was hanging off like melted cheese on a pizza. He had snuck up on Xander and I while we searched through the last store in the Outskirts.

I tossed the biter to the side then wiped the blood off my knife.

"Ready to head back?" Xander asked.

"Yeah." I agreed. "Lets go."

As we made our way back to Blinkseville we decided to take a shortcut. We walked through the tall plants and then noticed two armored corpses laying in the middle of the road. I looked around the area to make sure there weren't any enemies then proceeded to walk to the bodies.

"Derek wait! This can be a trap!" Xander stopped me and whispered.

"Well I like to live dangerously so I'm gonna go there, get that armor, and we'll head back home." I continued walking to the corpses.

As I got closer, I noticed that the armor was almost like a SWAT set but not quite. The people in the suits were dead so I decided to strip them. Xander joined me and looked disgusted.

"What?" I asked, taking off the dead man's helmet. "They don't have any use for this anymore so fuck it."

"I worry about you sometimes. God damn it fine. Let's just hurry up."

Xander and I continued transferring their armor to our bodies. We finished putting the things on and left the naked bodies in the middle of the street. The helmet was fairly tight but I ignored the pain.

"I feel like a storm trooper from Star Wars. It's heavy as fuck." I commented on the suit.

"Well at least they didn't bitch and moan about the armor that kept them safe. Kind of."

I laughed and we continued walking back home. I worried about Star and her health but remembered I gave her some wiz touch. I thought she'd be fine. Hazel was finding out the cause of the viral outbreak in our camp and was gonna make it better. I didn't think anything would get worse.