Ascension

'That'd be my bet. What do we do?'

So far no gunfire was being directed at them, the only activity was between Ruben and Javier and some zombie out of Max's line of sight around the corner of the hotel.

'We won't have any cover here, we need to move away from the front of the building so they can't fire directly down on top of us.'

'Now?' asked Stewart.

'Before they start firing on us, yeah. Unless you wanna get pinned under the truck?'

'I'll go first. I will get to that line of cars and the ditch between here and the road. Once I get into place I will cover you if someone starts firing.' said Stewart.

'Perfect. I am going to run over to Ruben then we will join you at the ditch. I sure wish we had been given a case or two of hand grenades, they might've been useful after all.' The group had debated the usefulness of the small explosives versus their weight and discarded carrying even a small supply because the shrapnel generally didn't kill the zombies they hit.

'Yeah stupid us.' With that Stewart rose from her crouched position and ran across the parking lot towards the ditch.

A moment later Bill ran toward Ruben and Javier, when he was within twenty feet of them he yelled, 'Get to the ditch, we got Jenners with guns on the second floor of the hotel!' then he too veered to the ditch that ran between the highway and the parking lot.

Ruben stared at Bill momentarily, then at Max as he broke and ran to the ditch. Gunfire blew out a window on the second floor as a zombie there open fired. Javier took one last shot at the zombie who had been trading fire with them and announced, 'Got him sarg! Let's go!'

Ruben, however, didn't move, he mouthed the words, 'What the fuck' while he stared at Max high tailing away from the truck. The truck where their gear was. The truck where the nuclear bomb was sitting, left by everyone as they fled.

Chapter 14 — Katie

'How did they fucking survive so long?' Katie asked herself. The grieving half of the duo, Robert, had wandered into a zombie almost as soon as they made it into the housing development. Kent and Katie were walking ahead of the other three, who were still crying and in shock, when the zombie lurched out of an open garage and surprised the man. When the zombie bit into Robert he decided it was time to fight. By then, however, it was too late, he was already infected. His daughter, Jess, clubbed the zombie in the head, hitting it so hard she bent the barrel of her rifle. That hadn't saved Robert though. The four of them gathered around the sobbing man as his blood spurted out onto the driveway and made a rivulet down to the gutter.

Katie backed off and watched for more activity while the others bandaged the man up and tried to get him to his feet. He ignored them and sobbed. 'They took our baby Kent! Our little Sammy!'

Kent bent over and hugged Robert, 'I know Rob, I know. But we have other kids to live for, other kids to help, we have to move on, get them safe, we have to. C'mon, get up. We can't stay here.'

'I can't go. You know I can't go with you. Not with this!' he held up his bandaged arm, the white gauze was already drenched in bright red blood.

'You are not dead, we'll find someone to take care of you, we'll get it…' Kent's voice trailed off and he too started to sob.

The crying was painful to Katie's ears, she had compartmentalized her grief at losing Randy, put it away in a small little room buried deep within her brain. She had locked the door and turned the painful, numbing grief that threatened to destroy her into a cold anger for revenge. She would go through what Robert was suffering….but later, not now. A single tear appeared at the corner of her eye and she wiped it away angrily, turning before the group behind her could see her weakness.

'What do we do?' Kent's voice asked her, 'What do we do?' he repeated when she didn't answer him. 'Hey, military woman! I am talking to you! What can we do?'

Katie looked at Kent, then at the blood, which continued to drop out of Robert's arm. She then looked up and down the street, not seeing any activity she crouched down and set her gun on the ground, pointed towards the bleeding man.

'He is bleeding a lot. Maybe he bled out the infection.'

'You don't sound very convincing.' Kent said.

'You want convincing? What do you expect? He got bit, he is going to die. He is going to come back as one of them, same as Sam. I am not a doctor.' she pointed at Robert and shrugged, 'He bled a lot, maybe the infection didn't get inside him, like it did with my partner. Maybe he will recover. If he doesn't bleed to death.'

'I can feel it in me.' Robert said through his sob.

'That's blood loss, I doubt you feel the infection.' Katie said. Her voice was doubtful though, she recalled Randy saying the same thing.

'You've seen this before.' Kent accused.

Katie nodded.

'What did you try?'

'There wasn't much to try, we washed him up real good, we had antibiotics, we had bandages, and we were in the field. He died.' Katie looked away 'What the fuck does he want from me?'

'Shoot me.'

'Shut up, Robert, you don't know what you are saying.'

'No, you shoot me, Kent. I would do it for you.'

'You aren't even dead! You're being unreasonable.'

'I can't do it myself. I am not that strong.'

'How could you ask me to do that? I wouldn't ask you to do it! Not while there is a chance.'

'You heard her!' Robert screamed, 'There is no chance!'

'We don't even know who she is, she could be lying.'

Katie shrugged, this little gathering reminded her of her own family all too much, the constant bickering, leading to screaming, then someone yelling at someone else to kill them. She smiled bitterly at her dark sense of humor, Randy would have got it. The two men continued to argue until Katie got tired of it, she picked up her shotgun, stood up and walked across the street.

'Where are you going?' Robert yelled when he saw her walking away.

'Over there.' Katie said without looking back while as she pointed to the house in front of her. It was a home just like any other on the block, except it was all buttoned up. She hoped that meant there was a car in the garage and keys somewhere inside.

'You can't leave us!' Robert said.

Katie half turned and answered over her shoulder, 'I'm not. I'm just going into the house. When you get done calling every zombie around us down on our heads, I will come back out.' muttering under her breath she continued, 'Or I will just drive away in a nice Suburban by myself.'

The kids looked embarrassed and torn, half wanting to go with Katie, half wanting their dads to stop bickering. Family loyalty won out and they stayed in the street to watch the two men argue. Katie approached the door and banged on it, calling out, 'Anybody alive in there?' She waited a full count of sixty, then banged again, 'I am coming in, if you are in there and don't want your door broken down, you have about ten seconds to open up.' Nothing. Katie turned sideways and slammed into the door, it only took two tries to break the frame holding it shut.

'Surprising, how easy it is to break into a house if you don't care that other people can see the damage.' Inside the shades were drawn shut, with only a little light seeping into the front room from the kitchen.