Time to Survive

There's Not a Safe Place

Chris POV


I watched Ryan and Kelsey suspiciously from across the small camp we'd made, a pitiful excuse for a fire crackling between all of us. we'd surrounded ourselves with the cars, Kuza and Ricky standing guard on both of the gaps at the moment while the rest of us rested.

Kera was curled to herself of course, not saying anything and just staring into the fire.

She was close to Ricky, and I think she would occasionally whisper to him, but for the rest of us she was still pretty quiet.

I doubt any of us would be around long enough for her to get used to us. The only person she'd known with us had... well, Kylie had died and...

I really didn't want to think about her.

I grimaced, looking back at my girlfriend.

Kelsey was sitting beside Ryan, the both of them mumbling softly to each other, his head resting back against the coupe. I think he was trying to ignore her, but Kelsey was a hard person to ignore. Her face was torn between being annoyed and concerned as she looked at him.

He wasn't looking good, even I could see that.

This was starting to be too much for him.

I sighed.

I really wished she wouldn't sit so close to him.

I just didn't want her hurt, she knew that.

And Ryan was... Well, he wasn't stable at the moment.

And Kuza...

I glanced at him, his back to us as he gazed out at the darkness, gun resting at his side.

He hadn't said anything about having to shoot Chris yet. He'd been our friend, I had never expected to see him again.

Really, I hadn't even thought about him.

I'd just figured everyone was dead; there was so many people I hadn't even thought about, hadn't even considered there to be a chance that they would still be alive.

What was the point in torturing myself like that?

I sunk a little lower, stretching my legs.

God they ached.

My entire body hurt from sitting in the SUV for hours.
And where were we even going?

It felt like an endless drive, us just driving trying to get somewhere, anywhere...

Safe.

Because for some reason we kept thinking there might be a place like that left.

"... Base..." I heard Kelsey mutter to Ryan, her voice just loud enough for me to hear. "He kept rambling about it, trying to get there. Do you ---?"

"Think it's still there? I doubt it. And even if it is, if it's not filled with deaders, the people left there are going to shoot first and ask questions later. Or be like the military guys in that British zombie movie."

"Which one?"

"Uh... 28 Days Later I think? Like they took the black chick and wanted to repopulate the earth and shit." Ryan shook his head. "That's not gonna work for us, we'd end up in another fight. You know how protective we are over you girls."

"Yeah right; you used to let me go first in all the buildings." Kelsey snorted, but she squeezed his arm.

Ryan chuckled weakly.

"Well, you're an immune badass, I wasn't risking myself! So, yeah, you went first."

Kelsey smiled, and I frowned as I saw her hand close over his, squeezing lightly, and he gave her a genuine smile.

Since when were those two so close?

It hadn't been that long ago she'd been terrified of him because he'd attacked her in full deader mode again, hurting her. Her neck still had faint lines on it from the injuries he'd inflicted.

So, no, I wasn't happy he was alone with her for several hours at a time.

Hell, I didn't even get any alone time with her!

Fucking hell.

We had to keep moving, always staying on guard; the deaders outnumbered us, and could horde up on us at any moment, so it wasn't like we could sleep soundly either.

The longer the world was like this, the worse it seemed to get.

I sighed, sinking a little lower onto the ground.

This was depressing.

"... Couldn't be that many left. They could have some really good supplies left. Like guns, and that military food that lasts forever."

"It's too dangerous, Kels."

"We need to at least look at it, give it a shot."

"Chris was outta his mind, Kelsey; he had no idea what he was talking about. He shot me, for fucks sake. Just forget about it."

"Ryan ---."

"What are you guys talking about?" I finally asked, both of their eyes flicking across the dying fire to me where I leaned against the SUV, rubbing my face.

Yeah.

I'd been shamelessly listening.

It wasn't like they weren't literally eight feet from me.

Kels sent Ryan a look before turning her green gaze completely on me.

"When that crazy guy had me, he kept mumbling about some military base not too far from here. He and whoever he'd been with were heading there to get someone."

"A military base?" I frowned. "This out of the way ---?"

"There's a bunch of recruitment centers and some coast guard bases," Kuza suddenly said, and I glanced at him as he turned, leaning back against the cars, his gun pressing against his thigh. "Could be one of those Chris was talking about, poor bastard. It's not a bad idea, though. We could use the supplies ---."

"We've plenty of supplies," I grunted, shaking my head. "The SUV is fucking full, we don't need to get greedy and risk our lives in something we don't even know is ---."

"It's not greedy to want to survive, Chris." Kuza frowned at me. "And that shits not gonna last us forever, either, not at the rate were going. We're gonna need at least more weapons and ammo. We hit up those places back on the city; I helped you guys ---."

"We lost all that shit in the fire," I interrupted, getting to my feet slowly. "So none of it did us any good in the long run. We oughta keep moving north, find us somewhere ---."

"Don't say 'safe,'" Ryan groans, shaking his head as he sighs. "I'm so tired of that bullshit word."

Kelsey frowns.

"It's not bullshit." she says after a moment, tugging nervously on an errant string attached to her t shirt. "Well find it again, one day."

"We thought the house was safe," Ryan shook his head. "And Balz died there. There's no such thing as safe, Kelsey. You gotta know that by now."

She scowled at him, and he hissed as she pinched him.

"Don't be an asshole, Ryan."

"Don't be naive."

"How the hell am I being naive?"

"The base is a fucking fairy tale; it's either overrun or the people left there are too shitty to fuck with. They'll be the same kind of guys we had to fucking kill to make sure they didn't get you or her and rape and beat you ---."

"Ryan!" I hissed, bristling as I saw Kera flinch and Kelsey glare.

"--- and kill all of us! After the run of luck we've had, why the hell would you want to even attempt anything like that? Risk what few of us are left? Don't you get it!? Don't any of you get it!?" Ryan was almost shouting now, slowly rising to his feet, his hand pressed against his wounded shoulder. "I'm fucked! I don't have long left, and I don't wanna hang around you fuckers and watch all of you die or throw yourselves right into the deaders grasp!"

"Ryan, we're not ---."

"No fucking military base! Even if it's empty, best case scenario we get shit from it, then WHAT? would any of you wanna stay there, try to make it SAFE? Because that's what you'd try to do, you can't say you fucking wouldn't!"

I stared at him, my mouth open to speak but nothing coming out.

Where had all this come from?

It hadn't even occurred to me that we could stay there, make it our own; our numbers were small, we probably couldn't hold it no matter how many weapons we had.

So Ryan had a point.

But he was freaking out.

And ---.

"OW!" Ryan squawked.

"Kelsey, what the fuck!?" I gasped.

"Shut the fuck up, Ryan!" Kelsey snarled, on her feet and glowing at him; her smack across the face had caught all of our attention. "Is this your giving up speech? Because it fucking sucks and you can do a lot better then that, fuck face! And no one has agreed on anything to do with that place, it was just a suggestion. So calm your fucking sagging tits!"

Ryan actually looked offended.

"My tits aren't sagging!"

"Jesus Christ," Kuza sighed. "All of you are fucking impossible. I don't know how any of us are still alive right now."

I did.

My eyes flicked to Kelsey.

She'd saved all of us.

Many times.

She glanced at me, as if feeling my gaze, before looking at Ryan again, annoyed. She wasn't taking any of his shit, no matter his condition.

I knew she felt guilty over it.

I knew she felt like she should have just let him go, let him die instead of trying to help him.

Maybe she felt that way about him getting shot, too, I dunno.

I just knew I needed to protect her, a lot better then I had been lately --- I would go wherever she went.

Even if it meant splitting from my friends.

And the mere thought of that made my chest ache.

This was my family, the only people I had left.

My band.

My friends.

"Let's take a vote," Kuza suddenly says, glancing at everyone. "On whether we check out this base or not. And it's just checking it out, we're not gonna rush in gung ho or anything. All in favor?"

Jesus.

I grimaced.

Kelsey, Kuza, and Ricky.

I crossed my arms, shaking my head.

It was too dangerous.

We had enough to do us for the time being, we needed to keep moving while we could.

I knew without a doubt Ryan was against it.

Kelsey frowned at me when she saw I didn't agree.

And I knew, at the moment, Ricky would agree with anything Kuza said because he knew he was on Kuzas bad side.

Majority vote.

"So it's settled then," Kuza nodded. "We go to the base and ---."
"We don't even know where it is!" Ryan snapped, scowling. "It could be miles out of our way!"

"Out of the way to where?" Kuza challenged him. "Where the hell are we going!? We don't exactly have anything set destination!"

True.

Right now, we were nomads.

We were just... Wandering.

Trying to find somewhere safe.

I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose.

"Let's just sleep on it," I muttered before there was another apocalypse right in front of me. "It's late and it's been a long fucking day. We're stressed. Well sleep on it and in the morning well make a decision, okay? Sound good to everyone?"

Well, no one argued.

So I took it as agreement.

I stretched my arms, and then offered my hand to Kelsey, wanting to stay as close to her as possible; I wanted her sleeping close to me, in the SUV where she would be safest.
I doubted I would even sleep tonight.

She took it almost automatically, her fingers closing around mine.

I didn't really give two shits where we went, so long as we stayed together. I figured I wouldn't last forever in this world or die of old age, I'd probably get shot by someone or die by the deaders. So one of us was going to go before the other.
Which meant we really had to treasure the time we had left together.

So if she wanted to go traipsing around inside a fallen military base, then fine, but I would be going with her, and we wouldn't be separating. I had the depressing hope that I would go before she did, because I knew even if I went early, she would be able to survive without me.

She dealt with grief better then I did.

She survived it.

Some people let it consume them.

Like Devin.

He hadn't been able be to go on.

And I didn't want either of us to go out like that.

"Cmon," I mumbled, squeezing her hand as I pulled her to my side. "Let's get some sleep before watch."

"Chris ---."

"Sleep, Kelsey."

I was just too tired.

She sighed.

Apparently she wasn't going to argue either.

That was a first.