8 8

Tristan gets into bed and turns over to face me. "We can figure all of this out tomorrow, Hazel. Right now it's important that you go to sleep, alright?" He turns the lamp off and I sigh, lying back down. My body begs me to just go to sleep but my mind actively replays everything that happened this night. I worry that they're still out there, searching for us and that we'll be found any moment now. That's ridiculous, I remind myself. Turning over to my side, I close my eyes, trying to ignore the unsettling feeling in my stomach. I fail.

"Tristan?" I call out in the dark, then immediately feel bad that I might have disturbed him.

"Yeah?" To my relief, he sounds pretty awake as well and I think of telling him everything that's on my mind, but then hesitate and decide against it. We can figure all of this out tomorrow, Hazel, I think, repeating his words in my head.

"Goodnight," I say.

"Night."

I lie there staring at the ceiling, making a mental list of what I had accomplished. Finish the day without doing something stupid. Check. Start living inside a zombie-like reality and survive a day. Check. Wow, now that's what you call accomplishing something. Sighing, I shut my eyes and am ushered into a deep sleep, like the ones you have when you don't dream.

* * *

I'm jerked awake and my eyes open to see Tristan standing over me, his face concerned.

"Hazel," he says. "You're awake. Come on."

With a tremendous amount of effort, I sit up and rub my hands over my face, groaning. Where?

"We need to leave. Now. It's not safe here," he continues impatiently, offering me his hand.

I don't take it. Frustrated, I lean back against the bed and look up at him. He is already dressed. "What is it?" There's nothing more I want right now than to just go back to sleep.

Tristan stares out the window. "You might wanna take a look at this." His eyes flicker back to me. As if on cue, I hear screams ring out from outside.

The uncomfortable feeling from last night night returns and forces me to get out of bed. This could be our fault. I walk over to my window and peek outside through the curtains. My eyes widen as I see some of the houses' windows broken and blood on the street. To my horror, I see a woman being dragged out of her house and shot on the spot multiple times by a brawny man. I squint and see her corpse slowly turn a shade of grey. The man then hops into his van along with the rest of his group. A limping figure with sick-looking skin follows them and he shoots it as they drive off.

I look back at Tristan and his eyes reflect the fear in my own. "Something's very wrong."

He nods. "That could have been us. We should leave while we can."

Goddamn it, to where? I want to ask, but don't need to.

"We could go across the town," Tristan suggests.

I grow uneasy as I realize that it really could be that bad. "But we don't even know what's going on," I say. "Besides, it doesn't look too safe outside."

He shakes his head. "I don't have all the answers either, Hazel. But I don't think being holed up in one place is the best idea."

"Okay," I say, nodding. I have no choice but to trust him on this. "I'll be ready in a few."

Tristan exits the room, leaving me to myself. I head to the bathroom to wash up then change into some jeans. My eyes glance at the clock on my nightstand, which shows that it's 9:43 AM. Wow. Almost a good five hours of sleep. I wonder how on Earth I slept through everything. After tying my hair up, I pick up Tristan's jackknife from the table and slip it into my pocket. Then I turn and leave as well, shutting the door behind me.

I meet Tristan downstairs, who's waiting for me by the door. There's still nobody home and from what I'd seen outside, that would make sense. I put on a pair of combat boots and throw on a jacket as well, grabbing my car keys.

"We can't take the car," Tristan says. I turn to him. "It's too loud. Besides, I'm pretty sure we're low on gas."

I frown. "How else do we get to wherever you want to go?" I ask, even though I know that he has a point. "We won't survive a minute."

He shrugs. "We'll find some other one. Just hop into any."

I still refuse to leave my Skyline behind. "I just need a couple of hours; I can replace the exhaust silencer," I tell him, then pause, realizing how petty I'm being.

"We don't have a couple of hours, Hazel," he answers, opening the door. "Let's go."

I shake my head and step outside, waiting for Tristan as he locks the doors.

"What do you think happened" I ask him as we make our way down the steps. My gaze lingers on my car as we pass by.

"I don't know. But I think it's definitely something to do with whatever we must have let out last night," Tristan replies.

We continue walking and I constantly keep an eye around, even though it's just my sense of paranoia getting the better of me. Everything looks worn-out and old, like a scene from a post-apocalyptic movie. I stop as we reach the street corner, studying the last house.

"Damn," I say. Its windows are broken as well and there's dried blood on the front door, which is still halfway open. My gaze returns to Tristan and he looks back at me.

"Should we go see inside?" he says, voicing the question in my head.

"Yeah," I say after a moment of hesitation. Suddenly remembering the knife in my pocket, I reach in and hand it to him. "Here."

He nods. "Thanks." He walks around the black Chevy on the driveway, checking all the doors. "Do you think this is some sort of pandemic?"

I shake my head. "Maybe. All I know is that it's very serious." I notice then that the trunk is slightly open and walk over, lifting it. It's dusty and smells odd.

"Hold up," Tristan says and I step back. He feels for something on the inside of the trunk door that's lifted up. "Bingo." He finds the emergency cord and gives it a solid tug. I watch as the back seat of the car unlocks and falls completely flat after Tristan pushes it forward. He crawls in and manually unlocks the doors, then steps out through the passenger door like normal. "Ta-da."

I shake my head, even though I'm a little amused. "We still can't start it," I say, hoping we give up and just decide to take my car.

Instead, Tristan smiles. "No, you can't start it."

He gets into the driver's seat and looks for screws under the steering wheel. Pulling out the jackknife, he gingerly uses it to loosen them. Once he has removed the plastic cover, Tristan takes the particular bundle of wires that lead straight up the steering column. I look on in awe as he takes two red ones and strips the endings with the knife, carefully twisting them together.

Suddenly a gunshot goes out from inside the house and I freeze. Tristan looks up at me from inside the car. I slowly walk over to get a view through the open door. I'm about to call him when something inside the house catches my eye. It looks like a body on the floor with a pistol still in the person's hand.

"What is it?" Tristan asks, wires still in hand.

I flash a look inside the house then back at him. "I don't know. Looks like someone just shot themselves for some reason." I carefully make my way inside and the first thing I do is cough multiple times. With my arm covering half of my face, I walk around the dead body, taking a closer look. My chest tightens as I realize that it's beginning to turn the same shade of grey as the woman's body earlier. It must be some kind of sickness.

Suddenly I hear footsteps and I instantly look up to see an old man slowly making his way towards me. Except it's not just any old man. His skin looks sickly pale and there's blood dripping from his neck. My heart stops for a moment as I realize that he has the same eyes as that staff member I saw last night.