“What are you doing here?” Yelled the girl terrified. It was Marie Alden. Marie always wore the same golden hoops and her hair was short and straight. It was this beautiful caramel color. As for Maries skin color, she was fairly tan.

“Marie! It’s Ruby-May, and Austin! Put the gun down.” I raised my voice slightly praying that I wasn’t as loud as Marie. 

“Oh sorry Ruby-May.” She lowered the gun then asked, “are the monsters chasing you guys too?” She helped me and Austin get up into the treehouse.

“They aren’t really monsters-“ 

“They’re zombies!” Interrupts Austin.

“That’s even worse!” Said Marie, once again extremely loud. Both me and Austin quickly go in to cover her mouth. 

“You have to be quieter Marie, if the zombies hear you we all die.” I warn her.

 “Oh okay… by the way, do you guys have any plans to escape, I mean that bag you have is pretty stuffed.” Marie looked at the bag and then at us.

“That was our original plan but do you have any ideas?” I ask Marie.

“I have a friend who lives in the center of the island, he has a bunker with food and communication to the outside.”

“The zombies could destroy our telephone lines so this might be a good idea”, Austin looked at me with an assuring look.

“How far away is it?” I ask Marie.

“About a 15 minute walk on normal sidewalks but…” she thought for a second. “I have a tiny shortcut and a quad in the garage. With that it’s maybe five minutes.”

“Let’s go then!” I say.

“What about the bag and the-uh-gun?” Asked Austin. 

“We can carry it! Either way the gun is useful.” I look at Austin and he seemed scared. “Austin I can assure we will make it out just fine.” I gave him a soft reassuring smile. 

“Okay…” said Austin quietly.

I get up and go out the door of the treehouse to look out from the big oak. “There’s nobody here, are you guys ready?” I ask, and in return I get nods from them both. “Let’s go then!”

One by one we slowly go down the ladder making as little noise as possible. Once we make it to the bottom, Marie leads us to her garage to get her quad.

“Dammit” said Marie. She turned to look at us. The key is in the house.

“Okay, so let’s go get it.” I tell her.

“That’s the thing, my parents are zombies.” Marie looked at us, her face flushed with fear.

“Give me the key to the house” I put my hand out. 

“No! You might die!” Said Marie yelling in a whisper.

“I’ll be careful, I promise.” I say. Marie hands me the keys. 

“Pinky promise?” Marie puts her pinky out. I lock my pinky with hers. 

“Are you gonna join?” I look at Austin. He puts his pinky into our little knot and I head out.