"Alright, everyone out," Nick said, smashing the truck window into pieces.

"Sorry about that," I said, glancing at Nick.

"It's alright, just put the pistol to my head next time. It'll be a lot quicker," he responded, sarcastically. "Is everyone else ok?"

Everyone responded and luckily no one was hurt. One by one we crawled out of the truck. The food and supplies we collected where all over the road, along with that cannibal that died in the back of the truck. Without speaking another word to anyone, I began to walk toward the person I had hit. I knew he was dead, there was no way he could've survived that accident, I was driving too fast. I jogged to the ditch where I thought he landed. I peered at the panting, slender, dark haired man as it rested on its back, though he was no longer a man, he was one of them. Both of its legs were broke, so it could move as quickly as the rest of them. When its glowing brown eyes spotted me it began to crawl toward me. I walked away from it and headed back toward my father's damaged truck. It was impossible for it to catch me, it moved too slowly.

"Everyone get your stuff, we're walking the rest of the way," I advised. Jeremy crawled back into the truck to get our backpacks and guns.

"Can I have my revolver back now?" Tabitha asked. I nodded, pulled it out of my pocket, then gave it to her. She smirked at me and shook her head.

"POW!"

Nick had shot the cannibal crawling toward in the head with the Glock I had giving him.

"What the hell you do that for?" I snapped.

"He would've got to us before Jeremy could get everything out of the truck."

I sighed and shook my head. "I would've had Tabitha use her bow. Did you ever think that there could be—?"

"AWWHH!"

Before I could finish, I heard them moaning and running toward us. I knew there were probably a few that didn't hear us, until Nick had shot.

"Hurry up! Everyone get your stuff and let's go!" I yelled.

"What about the food?" Tabitha asked.

"Forget it! If they catch us, you'll never eat again," I said, as I ran for my life. Jeremy stay in my peripheral vision, if he tripped or stumbled I planned to stop immediately to help him. The others ran beside us, expect Tabitha, she was a few paces behind. We heard their footsteps gaining on us, no matter how fast or hard we ran it seemed as if out running those cannibals was nearly impossible. I couldn't let one of those things get to him. I saw Jeremy's panicking face as he looked back a few times. I felt tears making their way to my eyes, I hoped it wouldn't end like this.

"Don't look back guys! Keep running!" Nick yelled.

"HAAAHHH!"

I didn't have to look back. Everyone knew they were getting closer. They couldn't be more than twenty feet away, if that. The faster we ran the louder their panting, moaning, and breathing sounded.

"POP!" "POP!" "POP!" "POP!"

When I heard gunshot, I looked back immediatly and saw Tabitha shooting.

"They're too fast! Shoot!" she yelled. "There isn't a lot of them!"

I stopped running away and ran toward Tabitha, so did Nick. There were six of them, Tabitha killed two. I swung Pa's rifle from my back to my chest and aimed. I shot one in the head and another in the chest, it fell briefly, then got up quickly continuing toward us.

"POP!" "POP!" "POP!" "POP!" "POP!"

Jeremy stood next to me shooting at them also. He missed every shot he attempt.

"Stop shooting and stand behind me," I said demandingly, as I pulled his shirt, forcing him to stand behind me.

"POP!" "POP!" "POP!"

Nick shot nervously, but managed to kill two of them, there was only one left. Tabitha aimed, focused, and shot it in the head less than four feet away from us. She stepped to the side as it fell in front of her feet. She smiled at us and gave us the thumbs up. I was starting to like her little more. She was definitely capable of taking care of herself.

"Alright guys, let's get out of here before more of them come," I said, leading us down the street. We continued to run down the street headed toward Houston. After ten minutes of constant running, we began to slow down to a jogging pace. Everyone was tired, sweat cover our forehead and faces, we breath heavily, and exhaustion showed on our faces. I checked Pa's watch for the time, it was 4:43 in the morning. Our eyes were puffy from rest, our bodies were feeling weak from hunger and we feared for our lives every second of the way. Though if it wasn't for fear we may have given up by now. None of us were ready to give our lives up, we knew we had to get to Houston no matter.

Several miles later, our attitudes and tempers were high. No one spoke and everyone looked angry, until we reached a large city sign that read Welcome to Needinville, Texas. It wasn't much bigger than our town but it looked just as damaged. The buildings were covered in dust and dirt and their windows were busted. The cars weren't turned over but there weren't many cars here anyway. It appeared as most of the people in this town had evacuated. We continued pass the city limit sign toward the town. The street lights were standing, some were bent, but none were on. We walked through the dark town passing vacant homes, churches, resturants, and gas stations. I noticed as we walked, we were nearly shoulder to shoulder, we were to scared to be to far apart from each other. A cannibal could've dart at us from anywhere.

"I'm tired and sleepy. Can we take a break?" Jeremy asked.

"No," I answered agressively. Right after I answered Jeremy I noticed a sign on the sidewalk. "Houston 20 miles." I pointed at it so everyone could see. It seemed as if no one cared or they were too tired to care. We continued to hike through the quiet town's main street, staying on the sidewalk the entire time, until Maci noticed something.

"It's a grocery store!" she exulted. "Let's go see if they have some food or water."

The white large grocery store sat in a parking lot by itself, no stores on the side, no cars, just a store and an empty lot. I suspected something fishy immediately. Food and water could've been this easy to get. I wanted to express my concerns with the others, instead I kept my thoughts to myself. The others didn't care how suspicious it looked, they were weak, tired, hungry, and thirsty. This grocery store was the closest thing to heaven since this epicdemic started. Nick started walked to the grocery store without saying anything to anyone. Tabitha followed, then Maci and Jeremy.

"So I guess we're not going to talk about it?" I asked, following behind Jeremy. Surprisingly the windows weren't damaged. The automatic doors were shut and did not open automatically, however they weren't locked. Nick and I pulled the doors open, allowing the others to walked into the grocery store first. As I entered the grocery store, I noticed how clean and neat it was. It looked as if the grocery store was the only thing that hadn't been effected by what was going on. Everyone became excited as their eyes scanned the store. Nick couldn't hope back his laughs and chuckles. Maci clapped her hands and jumped up and down like a school, honestly, I wanted to do the same. Foods I hadn't seen in weeks and thought I would never have again were here. I felt relieved finally seeing something I could eat, but the horrors of the new world lived in wouldn't escape my mind. Before I could give any warnings or directions, everyone ran off in different directions and aisles, picking up food and drinks. It seemed like I was the only one worried about this place being too normal and well stocked. Something just didn't sit right with me and this small heaven. Why would anyone leave this place untouched?

"Are you guy's crazy? Those things could be in here," I yelled.

"We'll deal with them if we see them. Right now I'm thirsty," Nick replied.

"Everyone fill your backpacks and stuff your shirts!" Maci yelled.

"Like you always do, huh?" Nick shouted.

"Shut up Nick!" she exclaimed. I shook my head and strolled to the isle where the bottled waters were. I grabbed as much water as I could and stuffed it in my backpack, along with some energy drinks. I couldn't believe all this stuff was here and no one bothered taking it. Maybe this was just a good time or we were just lucky. I mean looking back how far me had made it so far, it had to be something.

"Click." "Clack."

Someone behind me cocked their gun.

"Don't move boy or your brains will be all over these beverages," a man whispered in a sinister tone. I stood still and raised my hands, I was nervous, but I wasn't scared. I felt more aggravated than anything else. I listened to hear if any of the others were in a struggle. I heard nothing beside a few refrigerators running and this man's breathing. Since I hadn't heard a gunshot I didn't assume the worst. The man squeezed me by the back of my neck and pushed the barrel of his pistol to middle of my back, forcing me to walk toward the front where the checkout lanes were. Tabitha, Maci, Nick and Jeremy were knelling in front the cash registers with their hands up, while more men stood in front of them. The man clinching my neck pushed me toward the others.

"Get down boy, but keep your hands up," the man said. I did as he demanded. I looked up and counted eight dirty men, only two had guns. The man, who grabbed me, had his pistol pointed at my head and another had a pistol pointed at Nick's head. The putrid smell of these dirty men should've caught my attention before they caught me. The black dried blood on their filty clothing was one of the cause for the smell, besides that their breaths smelled barbaric, and their hair looked as if they never washed it. They must have encountered cannibals or killed humans. I didn't understand why the men appeared so awful, especially having so much here. There was certainly enough here for them to survive, even with us, but I knew after that day with Ma and Pa, this world would never be the same and these men didn't see us as harmless children. And in that instant, as I glared in the eyes of the man, who pointed his gun at my head, I no longer view myself as child nor teenager either. There was slight feeling of anger raging inside of me, over that anger was fear. I feared losing my life and little brother here in this grocery store by the hands of disgraceful men.

"Well lookie here. Got a couple punks trying to steal our food and water," one of the men said.

Jeremey swiftly stood up. "It wasn't like that. We were—"

"SMACK!"

One of the men slapped Jeremy before he could finish speaking. My fear vanished instantly and anger filled my heart rapidly. No one ever laid a hand on my brother and got away with it. I was ready to kill that man. Enraged, I stood up and clinched my fist. "You sick bastard, if you ever—"

"BOMP!"

The man pointing the gun at me had punched me in the face, knocking me to the ground. I put my hand over my nose as a tiny stream of blood began to pour out of it. I kept my eyes on the man who punched my brother even after I was struck. I wanted him dead, but I couldn't think of way out of this situation without getting myself killed.

"They have guns," one of the men murmured.

"If you kids be respectful, we just might let you live," the man pointing the gun at me said.

"In exchange for your lives, we're going to take your guns. We're also going to take our food back," said the man pointing the gun at Nick.

This situation was getting worse by the second, we needed our guns if we were going to survive out there. We couldn't fight those cannibals without them, however if they killed us here we wouldn't have to worry about guns or anything else as of matter of fact. I was being forced to choose between two bad choices. I glared at the asshole pointing his gun at me. He knew we would die out there once we left this place.

"So what do you say? Do we have a deal?" the man pointing the pistol at me asked.

"Oh, one more thing. The girls stay too," said one of the men in the middle.

I glanced at Maci and Tabitha. Maci looked scared, Tabitha looked as if she was just as angry I was. Next I glanced at Nick, his eyes were facing the ground, he looked angry but not as angry as Tabitha. Last I glanced at Jeremy, he was cried silently with his eyes close as he faced the grond. I became angrier seeing him like this. Suddenly, I came up with a decision. I had to remind myself that I was here to protect Jeremy nothing more, nothing less. Without guns Jeremy would die and if we didn't give them our guns Jeremy would die, however we would at least have a fighting chance if he lived now. I closed my eyes briefly, then deeply inhaled and exhaled. I looked up at the filthy men and negotiated.

"Alright. The guns, goods and girls are yours, just don't kill us."

One of men chuckled. "Good choice kid."

"Are you serious you asshole!?" Tabitha cursed.

"Justin, how could you?" Maci murmured.

"You two shut up. Wise choice boy," the man pointing his gun at me said. "Now take everything off slowly."

Slowly, I took off my backpack, rifle, unholstered the Glock, and shotgun, then I sat it all on the floor, directly in front of my feet. The men shared a laugh as I returned to the knelling position. The sloppy man, who pointed his gun at me lowered his weapon and stepped toward the guns I had just sat on the floor. He knelled in front me and the guns, looked me in eyes and smiled as if we had a duel and he was the victor. His glare pissed me off.