Cass's POV
As we drive along a bumpy country road I get shook awake. I open my eyes and look at Keigen who is turned around looking at me. I smile looking into her beautiful sea foam green eyes, the sun hitting them perfectly. Her shirt curls bounce as we continue down the road.
"Hello, earth to Novak?" She asks giving me an odd look.
"Oh, yea?" I ask snapping back to reality.
"It's your turn to drive." She says as Mick hops out of the driver side and opening the back door.
"Oh okay." I say and get out of the Jeep, walk around the front, and get in the driver seat.
As I close my door I step carefully on the gas moving at a steady pace.
"So Mick where are we?" I ask as we continue down the bumpy road making my stomach uneasy.
"We should be in northern Kansas." Keigen says in stern voice.
I nod and look at the setting sun for a moment. I then look at our surroundings realizing we will not find anywhere to sleep before the sun sets and it becomes completely dark. I decide to drive through the night. About an hour after the sun has set Mick falls asleep peacefully in the backseat. Keigens turns around and looks at the figure and smiles to herself. I look away quickly focusing on the road.
I clear my throat, "So do you trust him?" I ask her and she turns to look at me.
"I don't really know, but then again I don't know if I trust you." She laughs. I hadn't heard laugh before, it was nice.
"Yeah." I say laughing with her, we fall silent.
"So how did you manage by yourself?" I ask.
"What do you mean?" She asks furrowing her eyebrows.
"You know, you are a woman out here alone. Some man could have killed you or worse." I say instantly regretting the words that had left my mouth.
"Well, I managed. Just like how managed without me. Plus the dead are usually more difficult to deal with than men are." She says in a sultry voice.
"Oh, sorry. Didn't mean to offend you."
"It's fine, I did have a couple difficult run ins before with humans, including our previous mishap. You know I honestly don't get how you survived without me though." She says smirking at me.
"Well, I used to have a silencer on my gun, cause I stole it from some store when the apocalypse first started. Then I got robbed and they decided to steal my bullets and silencer. So it wasn't to hard to stay alive until that event. So after that I decided to just avoid the Z's. That's why I didn't hide when I saw you, you looked like you would be a good asset considering the machete wielding." I explain to her and she smiles to herself.
"Huh, why didn't you find a knife or bat?" She asks me playing with a curl.
"I tried to but I couldn't as I wasn't going to rob somebody, that would be like sending somebody to their death." I say thinking back to a night where I had snuck into a small camp and almost stole their weapons.
But decided to only steal some food and water.
"Oh, I guess that makes sense." She says looking out the window.
The conversation is over, I take a quick look back at Mick a man my age with dark brown hair and striking blue eyes. He is laying lazily across the back row. As we drive his snoring gradually becomes loader. We make it through the night and by morning Keigen is driving. I drift off into sleep as Keigen and Mick talk about the best or funniest Z kills.
———
Keigen's POV
"What? No. I saw this man once kill a zombie by pulling a Home Alone trick it. Me and a few friends were upstairs when all of a sudden this man runs up the stairs and pushes a china cabinet down the stairs, killing a Z." I say laughing as I drive down the long stretch of country road.
"Are you serious?" Mick chuckles.
"Yea." I say nodding my head thinking about the distant memory.
"Man, some of the crazy shit people do to kill a Z."
"Hey if it means you live another day, so be it." I say and look ahead carefully as we enter a tightly wooded area.
"This makes me anxious." I whisper.
"Drive faster." Mick says looking out of his window.
"No I don't want to take chance on hitting something. Like a deer, or person, or z. It could mess the Jeep up." I reply gripping the wheel tightly.
"Hold on. Bloody Hell." Mick says looking forward.
Just then a small group of men and woman comes out of both sides of the woods only the small road. One man in particular stands out with a woman by his side. I tall man with dark his and dark looming eyes, the blonde, blue eyed woman at his side smiles mischievously. I start to slow and the men and woman start to approach. Just then I put the Jeep in reverse and look behind me. But to my avail there are more men and woman behind us.
"Shit." I say under my breath.
"What do we do?" Mick asks agitated.
As soon as the words leave his mouth the man motions for us to get out of the vehicle.
"Get out." I say grabbing my backpack from the backseat where Cass is sleeping.
"What? Are you insane?" Mick asks.
"Look, if we don't they are just going to force us out. We are clearly outnumbered, so even if we wanted to fight it would just be like walking up to a Z and letting it eat ya. So we don't really have any good options here." I say turning to him.
"Fine." He says the slowly gets out of the Jeep.
"Cass? Wake up."
"What is it my turn to drive?" Cass says groggily slowly opening his eyes.
"Not really." I say motioning toward the small crowd armored with gun and weapons of all kinds.
"Guess not." Cass says looking out the windshield.
I turn to the door and open it to be greeted by the blonde woman. Just then the man with dark hair begs a to speak.
"Okay you three. Mary is going to check you for guns only. If you resist we will not hesitate to shoot you and take everything. Then we will take you Jeep so I suggest you get personal items only." The man says.
The woman named Mary pats me down then my backpack she The goes over to Mick and Cass doing the same. We all stand there silently as she does so.
"Muck grab your backpack, you to Cass." I say to them when Mary is done and by the dark haired man again. They nod and grab their bags. A man near them then checks their bags and when finished nods to the dark haired man.
"Thank you got your cooperation. Mary go ahead and drive the Jeep back to camp." He says the the blonde woman.
"Okay Ketch, see you tonight." She smiles the walks towards me. I move out of the way so she can open the drivers side door. As she turns the engine over the men and woman go to the side of the road. As she drives away Ketch rolls his eyes.
"Okay she's gone, take their bags." The man named Ketch says and as the a couple men and woman comes toward us to retrieve our bags Cass gives me and Mick a look.
Run! We all nod then the three of us sprint into the trees. Leaves and stuck crunching beneath us we weave out of the way of the tall bare trees. I hear Ketch and his group yell and suddenly twenty feet are running after us.
"Run faster." I say to them as I catch up.
We sprint jump over rump and larger sticks.
"Go right." Cass says and we turn. We make our way out of the woods. The footsteps behind us grow more distant until the fade to only single cracks of sticks every few seconds.
"What the bloody hell are we going to do now." Mick says breathing heavily.
"We walk." Cass then says standing up straight.
"Well we can't go back down that road." I say steadying my breathing.
"Then we back track and take another road." Cass replies.
"Fine. Let's get walking. It'll be dark soon, are there any towns near Keigen?" Mick asks with a hint of fear in his voice.
I take my bag of and rummage through it unable to find the piece of paper that will lead me to my brother. After to looking through it carefully once more I can't find it. I curse myself and look up at the two men beside me.
"It's not here." I say biting my bottom lip.
"What?" Cass asks.
"Bloody hell."