Demi

The following time it was almost like things were back to normal. The five of us hung out at Ben's house, played some card games, and every day one of us prepared dinner for everyone. We rotated shifts keeping watch on the balcony, to make sure we were safe. Victor and I really seemed to click, forming a friendship, and even Nick became more tolerable. I was really happy with the extra clothes I had brought from my home, as was Olivia, and the guys borrowed some of Ben's. We were completely shielded from the outside world.

If I hadn't known any better it must have looked like a group of friends, or roommates, spending quality time together.

But then the electricity stopped working. At first we started used candles, which had sort of a romantic effect, but soon we started to fear the dark. Who knew what was out there, what we couldn't see. And without news about the situation we all started to get a little paranoid. How bad would it be down there? How close were we to solving the situation?

Everything changed, that one night Ben was keeping watch on one of his balconies. I was the one who had to take over his shift for a couple of hours, so he could get some sleep. We hadn't directly spoken to one another since our last encounter, we had mostly avoided each other, and I wasn't looking forward to be alone with him again. I found him sitting on his balcony, smoking. Our eyes met, and for a second I thought he was about to smile at me, but he didn't.

"I, eh, you can go to sleep, if you want." He gave me a doubtful look.

"It's just a cigarette, you know. You can breathe again." He averted his gaze again.

I rolled my eyes at him. "Honestly, I couldn't care less. I have better things to do with my time now than worrying about you and your petty behavior." He didn't respond. Instead he stood up abruptly, got his binoculars, and started scanning the area around his house. "I... What are you –"

"Sshh," he hushed me. I was about to open my mouth to bitch at him, when he spoke.

"I think I see one."

"You, what?" I stared at him in disbelief. "One of those things? Up here?"

He handed me the binoculars, and I looked through them but didn't see anything. "A little further to the right, Demi. Next to the river." Ben put his hands over mine and shifted me in the right direction. His hands on mine made me blush, remembering old times. He must have felt the same, because suddenly he let go. "I, eh, well, you see?"

I blinked a few times, but then I saw it. A man, staggering on the road. It was obvious he belonged to them. I looked a little harder, but it was hard to spot anything in the dark. Ben and I exchanged looks.

"What do we do now? Should we warn the others?" I returned the binoculars to Ben and he used them again.

"Uhh, Demi?" His voice trembled.

I did not like the sound of this. "What?"

"It's not just one."

I snatched the binoculars from him and affirmed my gaze on the spot where I last spotted the creature. What I saw made me take a step back.

It weren't just a few creatures. It were dozens of them. And this was just the beginning.

"What in the... How? Why are they coming up?" I gasped for air as I sat down. Ben regained himself before I did.

"We have to warn the others. We have to blow out all of the candles, make sure the doors are shut. They can't see us. If they see us, we're doomed." He quietly walked to the balcony door, motioning me to walk through it first. He softly closed the door behind me, locking it. I started to feel a little sick. He was right. If they'd spot us, they would come banging on our doors, and only more of them would follow. And with no way out of the house we would certainly perish.

I followed him to the living room, where the others were. Olivia was sound asleep on the sofa while Victor and Nick were playing a card game. As soon as they noticed us, they knew something serious was about to go down.

"Vic, blow out the candles, and Nick, please go check if all the doors are locked." They stopped laughing.

"What's the matter, Ben? You look white as a sheet. Is everything alright?" He quickly shook his head. "They're coming. They're coming, and they can't see us. If they spot us... We're dead."

Olivia, woken up from all the fuss, yawned and looked at us. "What's going on, guys? Why are you all looking like that?"

Victor rose from the table and speeded to the candles, blowing all of them out. Nick went to check the front door, and Ben and I went to check the windows. Olivia looked outside the window in astonishment.

"Everyone, get under the table, hide yourself. They absolutely can't see us." Ben and I hid under the kitchen table while the others hid themselves in the living room. I held my breath, too afraid to make a sound. My heart was beating in my throat and numerous thoughts flashed through my mind.

I glanced at Ben and noticed he was holding his breath as well. His hair was wet from sweating, and little drops ran down his face. Our eyes crossed, but neither one of us said something.

I moved my hand and accidentally put mine on his. I blushed and immediately drew my hand back. The both of us stared to the ground. We sat like that for a while, not daring to move, afraid we'd trigger a reaction in the undead. I could see them slowly passing by through the window from where we were sitting. After a while I noticed there were no new things passing us.

Victor entered the kitchen, causing me to move away from Ben and come up from under the table. Victor helped me up, and we carefully approached the window, but there was nothing in sight. I let out a relieved sigh.

"I think the herd has passed. Still, we have to be careful. And we have to start thinking about relocating, maybe. It's not safe here." Ben's eyes widened in disbelief. "Leaving the house, our only safe harbor up until now?"

Victor placed his hand on Ben's shoulder. "Demi is right, though. The undead have found their way up your street now, and we don't have anything here to protect us with in case things go south. That cop we encountered when we went to get Demi's stuff said something about a camp. It might be safer than staying here. "

Ben shook his head in denial. "I'm not leaving my house. We don't even know where that camp is, and whether it's still there. What if it got overrun?"

"We'll find another one. But we gotta leave the house one day. We are running out of food. You sure are a lazy shopper, Ben." That last remark made him laugh.

"Well, sorry I didn't shop in advance of the frickin' apocalypse."

I gave the both of them an encouraging smile. "Maybe it would be good to join a camp. It could increase our chances of survival until all of this dies down again."

"By exposing ourselves to go out there?" He responded annoyed, raising his eyebrow. "You two became awfully unanimous, all of a sudden. Even if we would go search for that camp, chances are we get bitten or eaten by these things. We don't have the equipment to protect ourselves well enough. You guys can go, but I'm not leaving. I'm staying." He crossed his arms and gave us a firm look, while Victor looked helpless.

"Let's discuss matters with the others first. Maybe they'll come up with an alternative." Victor tried to smile, but he and I both knew leaving to find a camp was our best chance in the long run. A camp, somewhere high up in the mountains, near a lake or something, shielded from the main road. Though Ben's house was already up in the mountains and the street where he lived was pretty secluded, it was still in sight and easy enough to reach, or so today had proven to us.

The opinions of where to go ranged from staying to leaving. Victor and I wanted to leave before things would get any worse and we'd be trapped, but Ben wanted to stay. Nick wanted to search for a camp and if it wasn't like we expected we could always come back, according to him. Olivia wanted neither, not able to make up her mind. She was terrified to leave, not knowing what we would find, but realized staying also had its cons.

I don't know if it was a blessing or a curse, that that choice was made for us.

*

It was past noon, and I was keeping watch on the balcony when I heard distant chattering. I sat up straight on the chair I had been dozing in, and tried to determine where it came from. The past couple of days I had spotted some undead creatures passing by, never more than two or three at the same time, but not people. Most people around here had probably been evacuated or had flown, while others had been killed. As far as I knew the undead couldn't speak, so the chattering must have come from the living.

I closed my eyes, listening if I could make anything out of it. It were multiple voices, two or three men, and one woman, and they were approaching Ben's house. They were close enough now for me to overhear parts of their conversation. I didn't make a move, afraid they would discover me. I knew they couldn't spot me from where I was sitting.

"I don't know... Good idea." The woman's voice quietly spoke. A man scolded her, and another man hissed at the both of them, trying to shush them down. The woman started speaking more frantically now.

"Don't... Hurt... Nobody." I pricked up my ears and held my breath, not liking where this was going. The group seemed to be having an argument now, but I wasn't sure what it was about. All of a sudden it stopped.

Did they pass us by? I still didn't dare to look over the edge, afraid to be seen.

Then I heard a firm knock, making my heart skip a beat. They were at Ben's front door.

Another knock followed, and it became obvious my friends didn't open the door, because suddenly I heard a voice getting raised. "Open the damn door, I know there's people in there." I crouched down to the ground and held my breath. How in the world did they know it was occupied? Had they been observing us, or somehow seen me sitting here, in the distance? We had tried to be invisible from the outside.

"Let us in, or else we will have to force a way in, and you don't want that to happen, do you?" Another man called out. Inside I heard stumbling. Were they really gonna open the door for these people?

"What do you want?" That was Ben's voice.

"We're on the run for the undead, and we just need shelter, that's all." A female voice was added to the conversation, sounding a little frantic. "It's just for the night. Please, sir. They're closing in on us!"

That was bullshit. I hadn't seen one creature all day, and I was pretty sure they weren't being chased. I wanted to yell at Ben, warn him, but then I heard the creaking of the door. Ben had opened the door for these people. I was too late.

The group was inside the house.