In the Very End: Book One

Chapter 3

A monotone voice sounded through speakers that were at every angle of the room, "Hello, guests. Welcome."

He gave us a sympathetic look. "I'm all that's left. I'm sorry."

___

We had all given blood and Andrea was the last one.

"What's the point?" she asked. "If we were all infected we'd be running a fever."

"I've already broken every rule in the book by letting you in here. At least let me be thorough," Jenner reasoned. "All done," he said, taking the needle out.

Andrea winced as she stood and almost fell over. Jacqui, being the closest to her, caught her.

"You okay?" Jenner asked.

"She hasn't eaten in days," Jacqui replied for Andrea. "None of us have."

Jenner paused for a moment before a smiled danced across his lips.

___

Mostly everyone sat around a circular table, but some of us were standing or sitting on the counters. We were laughing and happy.

"You know, in Italy, the children have a little bit of wine with dinner, and in France," Dale informed.

"Yeah, well when Carl is in France or Italy he can have some then," Lori notified, covering Carl's glass with her hand.

"What's it gonna hurt? Come on," Rick persuaded.

Lori took a sip of her wine and stared at him.

He laughed. "C'mon."

There was a moment of awkward silence before we all laughed and she shrugged, taking her hand away. Dale took the glass and poured a little bit of wine.

"Here you are, young lad," he said as he handed the glass to Carl.

The room got quiet while Carl took a sip.

"Eww," he said, making a disgusted face and setting the glass back down on the table.

We all laughed as Lori said, "That's my boy."

"Stick to soda pop, kid," Shane said quietly.

"Not you, Glenn," Daryl spoke up.

"What?" Glenn asked, smiling.

"Keep drinkin', little man. I wanna see how red your face can get."

I laughed, while the group 'oohed'.

Rick tapped his glass with a butter knife, gathering everyone's attention, and stood. "It seems to me we haven't thanked our host properly."

"He is more than just our host," T-dog said.

"Yeah, yeah," people added in with notes of joy and happiness.

"Booyah!" Daryl said, holding his bottle up.

"Booyah," I repeated, doing the same.

The group echoed.

"So when are you gonna tell us what the hell happened here, doc?" Shane said, emotionless. "All the other doctors that were supposed to be figurin' out what happened...where are they?"

The group got quiet and Jenner looked really surprised at how neutral Shane's facial expressions were.

"We're celebrating, Shane...no need to do this now," Rick said, a note of annoyance in his voice.

"Whoa, wait a second. This is why we're here, right? This was your move; supposed to find all the answers. Instead, we—we found him." Shane laughed stiffly. "Found one man. Why?"