The End of Us

by D, Hannah

  “Sarah said she’s okay with it, Sophia has nothing to worry about” Zoe said.

  “We know that and she knows that but she’s still embarrassed. She’ll come out her room when shes ready” Simone said to them both.

  “Yeah, you’re right” Zoe said as she accepted a bowl of food from Alice.

  “Porridge, not had this in years” Zoe said as she tucked into it.

  “Can’t go wrong with some porridge, it’ll keep you full for longer” Alice told her.

  Zoe listened in on Simone and Alice talking about what was happening with everyone so far in the day. They were both in here, making plans for the next week for who would be going out on another food and other supplies run, they needed more weapons.

  John was out on watch with Sarah. Sarah had been sat there since she took over from Zoe early hours this morning, she liked sitting in the sun. She had only been over to Chris grave once so far today, am improvement for Sarah.

  Sophia was still in her room with Arthur. Arthur had a bit of a spring in his step. Looks like he was managing himself okay after seeing Sophia after finding out about her having split personality.

  Mike and Sue were spending some quality time together both outside and inside. Apparently, according to Simone, there were very loving sounds coming from their room. You didn’t have to be a genius to figure out that they were having a sex filled quality time. Zoe didn’t want to even think of them having sex, they were the mum and dad figures of the group, it was just cringed and eww to think of them having sex.

  Jeff was outside playing football with Alex. Simone said they had been out there the whole morning, stopping only for a rest every now and then and for some quick food and something to drink.

  “They have so much energy, I have no idea where they store it all” Alice said.

  “They’re boys, they’ll always find the energy for football” Simone said.

  Zoe laughed and went to wash her bowl. Since there were no plans or tasks set for Zoe or anyone that day, Zoe decided that she would go outside to sit in the sun, maybe top up that tan a little.

  Zoe walked outside and went to sit beside Sarah and John. They were both laughing about something when Zoe sat down.

  “Oh John that hilarious you have to tell Zoe” Sarah said when Zoe sat down.

  “Tell me what?” Zoe asked John.

  “Well, see one day at work there was this guy..” John started to say.

  Zoe didn’t hear the rest of the story because at that precise moment she spotted Jeff not that far down from where she was sitting and Jeff had taken off his t shirt. Zoe felt herself start to sweat and it wasn’t from the heat. She also felt her heart start to race, her stomach get butterflies and her palms sweat.

  ‘Holy hell, if I wasn’t attracted to him before then I most certainly would be now’ Zoe thought.

  “Earth to Zoe? You in there?” John asked as he waved his hand in front of her face.

  “Huh? What?” Zoe asked him.

  “Too busy staring at hotty over there to listen to my story?” John asked her.

  “I wasn’t staring at him, I was looking for skin eaters” Zoe said to John.

  “Yeah because I’m sure you drool over skin eaters” John said with a laugh.

  Zoe reached up and felt a bit of drool coming from her mouth. Sarah and John started to laugh.

  ‘Shit! I’m drooling over him like I’m the skin eater wanting to eat him’ Zoe thought.

  Jeff turned his attention to them all at the sound of John and Sarah’s laughter and waved at them. Zoe gave Jeff an embarrassed wave back.

  ‘This can’t be happening, I can’t believe I was actually drooling over him!” Zoe thought to herself.

  The laughter eventually stopped from John and Sarah and the taunting soon stopped after a good half an hour but Zoe knew she would never live this down.

  They had all relaxed into the sun and heat, eyes closed. No one was really watching and looking out for any sign of trouble. It wasn’t until they heard distant shouts that they all sat up to attention.

  “Did you hear that?” Sarah asked them.

  “We did. Where the hell did it come from?” John asked.

  “Pick up your weapons, we may need them” Zoe told them.

  Jeff and Alex had stopped playing football, they must’ve heard the shouts as well. Jeff had began to put his t shirt back on when Zoe, Sarah and John had walked up to him and Alex.

  “I have no idea where about those shouts are coming from” Jeff said to them.

  The shouts were a little louder down where Jeff and Alex had been playing football. There were multiple people shouting. No one from inside the bus depot building had come out, looks like they couldn’t hear from inside.

  They were all looking around them, trying to see if they could see anything.

  “Up there, coming up the hill!” John shouted as he was pointing at someone who was running up the hill.

  “There are no skin eaters following whoever it is, what are they running from?” Jeff asked.

  “I have no idea but whoever it is is coming right for us” Zoe said.

  “What do we do?” John asked.

  “Keep your weapons at the ready just in case. We see what this person wants and if it’s help then we see if we can trust the person enough to help them” Zoe said to them.

  “Okay, it’s a plan” Sarah said.

  “Alex, bud, go back inside” Jeff told him.

  “Okay” Alex said as he made his way back to the building.

  They all turned around and made their way to the gate to meet the person running up towards them. As the person got closer Zoe noticed it was a female. She looked like she had been in a fight, she had cuts and bruises over her arms and face. Her bottom lip had been burst open. She looked frightened and kept looking over her shoulder. It didn’t look like she was carrying any weapons.

  ‘Where has she came from if she has managed to survive from the skin eaters for so long without a weapon’ Zoe thought.

  The girl got to the gate, trying to catch her breath and staring at them all. She looked about the same age as Zoe, little shorter in height compared to Zoe but not much of a difference between them.

  “Please help me!” She pleaded with them.

  “What are you running from? Are there skin eaters following you?” Jeff asked her.

  “Skin eaters? You mean those dead, zombie things?” The girl asked him.

  “Yes, those. We call them skin eaters. So are you running from them?” Jeff asked her.

  “No, much worse. The living. They’re going nuts out there. I’ve had the shit beaten out of me from the group I was with for not bringing enough food back. I managed to make a run for it but they followed me. Lost them for a bit down the hill but I can hear them shouting for me. I can’t run for much long, please let me in so I can hide from them?” The girl asked them.

  Zoe could still hear the shouts which were coming from this group this girl was running from. They all looked at each other, wondering whether to invite this girl in and help her but also inviting trouble to come from this other group. Zoe knew her decision.

  “Let her in. Go hide in that building there behind us. Sarah you go with her, explain to the others what’s going on. Tell them to keep an eye on me, Jeff and John in case we need back up if this group comes here and asks for trouble. We need to look like we’re not ready for a fight so they don’t suspect that she’s here. What’s your name?” Zoe asked as Jeff went to unlock the gates to let her in.

  “It’s Colleen” She said.

  “Nice to meet you, now follow Sarah and go hide and don’t show your face out here or at a window until we give the okay. Got it?” Zoe asked her.

  “Yeah I got it, thank you so much” Colleen said as she came into the depot lot and followed Sarah to the building to hide.

  Jeff locked the gate and came back to stand beside Zoe and John

  “You sure that was a good idea? Letting her in?” Jeff asked Zoe.
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  “I wasn’t going to leave her out there to get killed by the living. We are not that cruel” Zoe said to him.

  “Agreed” John said.

  Zoe began to see the first sign of the group that had followed Colleen. Zoe counted ten of them. They looked to be carrying baseball bats and machetes. Zoe thought they would be able to handle them if they started to try fight them.

  “Hold on, does he actually have a gun!?” John gasped.

  “No way not possible! There are barely any guns you can be able to just grab in Scotland” Jeff said.

  As this group got closer, it became clear to Zoe that one of them did in fact have a gun.

  “No way” Zoe whispered.

  The gun just had to be fake, there was nowhere that this guy could’ve got it, unless he got it off the black market before the epidemic started. It must be the only explanation.

  “Alright guys. Names Brian. Looking for a girl who may have ran past here. Look a bit like you actually” Brian said as he pointed at Zoe.

  Zoe instantly hated him.

  ‘Seems like such an asshole’ Zoe thought. She couldn’t help the dirty look that she gave him.

  “Nope, not seen anyone go past here” Jeff said to Brian.

  “You sure? There’s not really anywhere else she could’ve ran to, not exactly much up this way” Brian asked then.

  “Completely sure. We’re out here because we heard shouting. I’m guessing those shouts were coming from you guys?” John asked.

  “Ah yeah, that would’ve been us” Brian said to them.

  “Can attract a lot of those things that want to eat us you know. We don’t need that here” Jeff said to them.

  “We do apologise for that, we don’t want to cause any trouble. We’re just really worried about that girl. She’s our dear friend and we don’t want her killed so we need to find her” Brian said to them.

  Zoe knew he was lying through his teeth. He was a sleaze. He would probably end up killing Colleen. Zoe hadn’t managed to say on word to Brian. She knew she would end up spitting on him if she even attempted to open her mouth.

  “Well we haven’t seen her, sorry” Jeff said to him.

  Zoe had a feeling this Brian didn’t believe them. He kept looking at each of them like he was trying to figure them out.

  “Bummer, we’ll keep looking then. Nice setup you have here though, much biter activity go on here?” Brian asked them.

  Looks like the skin eaters had another name to go by.

  “More than we like, not much places offer great protection, this ones pretty shit. Few break ins by the biters as you call them, killed one of our own” Jeff told Brian.

  “Shame that. Well we’ll be on our way to look for our friend. We might stop by again soon if you’re still here, to say hello. Friendly neighbour sort of thing” Brian said to them with a wink and with that they all walked off.

  “Why did you lie about how safe this place is?” John asked Jeff.

  “They seem like the type of people who force people out of their safe zones, maybe even kill them for it, better I lie to them to make them not want to come stay here” Jeff said.

  “Good idea, I never would’ve thought of that” John said.

  Jeff turned to look at Zoe who was still scowling after Brian and his group. Her lip was curled up and her eyes were narrowed. She didn’t like this group, not one bit and she especially hated Brian. Zoe knew that Brian didn’t believe them that they hadn’t seen Colleen go past here. Zoe knew that they would be back here soon.

  “Zoe you okay?” Jeff asked her, placing his hand on her arm.

  Zoe blinked and looked at Jeff. She felt her anger lessen a bit as she looked at Jeff.

  “We need to go speak to Colleen about this group. We need to find out as much about as we can get” Zoe said to them.

  “Why? They walked away” John said.

  “They’re be back. That Brian didn’t believe us when we said we hadn’t seen Colleen” Zoe said.

  “Yeah there was something dangerously off about him” John said.

  “Let’s go speak to Colleen” Jeff said.

  Zoe, Jeff and John walked back to the building to speak to Colleen. Zoe prayed they had enough time to prepare themselves if Brians group came here to attack them. Zoe also prayed that Colleen had spent enough time with this group to know how they operated. Jeff let Zoe and John into the building first before locking the door behind them.

  They walked into the office where everyone was hiding, even Sophia and Arthur were sitting there.

  “Sue, keep watch out the window for any sign of people coming back to the fence. It’s not safe to be outside alone right now” Zoe said to Sue.

  “No problem” Sue said as she went to stand by the window.

  Zoe turned and spotted where Simone was tending to Colleen burst lip.

  “Colleen I need to know everything about this group you were with. Anything you can give us, especially about that Brian” Zoe asked Colleen.

  Colleen looked at Zoe and nodded her head.

  “Sure. It’s not pretty but I’ll tell you everything I know” Colleen said to Zoe.

  Everyone turned to look at Colleen and to hear about this new group and what they were capable of doing.

  “I ran into this group about two days after the skin eaters as you call them took over the world. Brian helped me take down the skin eaters that had followed me and by doing that it seemed that I know owed him, everything” Colleen started off saying.

  “Owed him everything?” Zoe asked.

  “Yes, everything. He wanted us to go out scavenging in shops to get as much food and supplies as we could get and then he’d take them all and say it was for the whole group but really it was all just for himself and his closest groupies, he didn’t care if he left the rest of us to starve or be defenceless.”

  “So that’s why you had no weapon when you came here” Jeff pointed out.

  “Exactly. I managed to get out of a couple of close calls with the skin eaters, more luck than anything. Someone must be looking out for me.”

  “Yeah someone must be. How did you manage to get away from them? There seemed to be quite a lot of them” Zoe asked Colleen.

  “Well, I just ran. One of Brians groupies, Daniel, is a bit lax when watching the perimeter and doesn’t notice a lot of things so I slipped out the side. I would’ve gotten away with it if it wasn’t for little miss princess Ellie coming back from a scavenge and noticing me and blabbing to Brian” Colleen rolled her eyes.

  “Where about are they based? Where’s their safe zone they’ve mapped out for themselves?” John asked her.

  “About half an hour from here I would say. It’s the zoo, they managed to secure the zoo.” Colleen said.

  “No way, how did they manage that!?” Arthur asked.

  “Well, it was overrun with skin eaters and Brian and his groupies and their slaves which was me, managed to take out the skin eaters and secure the doors. Most of the animals are still alive but some of the skin eaters managed to get and eat. Animals don’t seem to come back as the skin eaters, they just die” Colleen told them.

  “How long have they been at the zoo?” Zoe asked her.

  “Hmm, about a week and a half” Colleen said.

  “What else should we know about them?” Jeff asked.

  “They’re dangerous. They’re settled in a safe place now which means they no longer kill or seriously hurt people for their safe places..”

  “Wait a minute, they kill people!? Human people!?” Mike asked.

  “Yes, for what they have. They want to be superior. Jeff has all this power that’s went right to his head, he’s power mad” Colleen told them.

  “Do they kill or seriously hurt people for the food and supplies they have?” Zoe asked her.

  “Yes. That’ll be what they’ll be doing now. They will come back here and they’ll bring more than just ten people. They know you’re here now and they’ll want whatever you might have” Colleen s
aid to them.

  “How many are there in this group altogether?” Zoe asked her warily.

  “Fifty. There are fifty of them” Colleen said.

  “Fifty! How can there be fifty of them! We’re only a small group of ten, well eleven now that you’re here. We’ll never be able to take them if they want a fight!” Sue said horrified.

  “Brian grabbed anyone that he could when he seen stragglers, he’s built his army as he calls it and is going to keep on adding to it” Colleen said as she looked at them.

  “You brought them here to us! We were doing great here and now we have a mad man drunk with power wanting to come after us and what we have!” Sue yelled.

  “I didn’t know you were even here! I was just running from that mad man and ran into you lot. I needed help or I was going to run out of breath and be killed by Brian or be killed by a skin eater. I hoped not all humans were evil now” Colleen said to Sue.

  “You’re right. Sorry, I worry and say the wrong thing” Sue said to her.

  Colleen nodded her head to Sue. The group was all looking at each other, trying to figure out what to do. Do they leave this place and try and find another safe place or do they stay and take their chances against Brians group?

  “You should act as normal as you can but keep your guard up” Colleen said to them.

  “Why do we need to act normal? Are they going to be watching us?” Alice asked with a small, forced laugh.

  “Yes, they will be. I bet three of them stayed behind and are hiding watching this place right now. It’s what they do, scope out the place they want to attack before they move in” Colleen said to them.

  “Good god, why have people became so cruel!” Simone said.

  “Not all people, just some who want to try and rule a world run by skin eaters” John said.

  “Are you all going to make me leave now?” Colleen asked them.

  She looked terrified that they might throw her out. Zoe wasn’t that cruel and neither were the rest of them.

  “No, you can stay” Zoe told her.

  Colleen breathed a sigh of relief. So much tension and worry seemed to just drift off of her.

  “I’ll show you were to shower and then you can bunk in here with me” Simone said to her.