Sara's borrowed classroom, Clayton State University, Morrow, Clayton County, Georgia. Tuesday, October 22th, 2019. 06:55.
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The girl stretched in her flannel pajamas. She felt accomplished, now that the System draft for the rest of mankind was prepared. She was sure a boatload of trouble would arise from that but she felt adamant on her path. Turn the System into a corporation, and earn her just compensation for setting everything in motion.
Sara felt uncomfortable letting people take the System for granted. She was sure somewhere down the line a religion would spring around the System and she found that abhorrent. Especially when she had firsthand evidence that the divine really existed. The System's origins nonetheless, worshiping the tool was wrong.
She did some stretches, noticing how limber she was. It was like her joints were bound with a rubber band. Remembering the exercises Abby tried to make her do back in Lakeview Apartments, she tried to put her legs behind her head again. With much ease, she crossed both ankles around her nape, then rocked herself.
"I have become a human pretzel," she laughed, feeling no discomfort. "I think I can stretch even more than this, but I ain't kissing my own ass. Just looking at it is enough."
Next, she tried splits, getting into the negatives. She bent her back until her head was between her knees. "This is getting ridiculous."
She finished her morning stretches with exercises for non-snake people.
"I haven't tested the limits of my improved strength. I wonder if they'll let me use the gym." Sara sniffed. "And the showers."
She smelled like chocolate.
After putting on yesterday's clothes and stowing the pajamas for later, Sara got a fresh set and her bath supplies, pondering on the laundry dilemma. With water, electricity, and soap no longer being readily available, when should one do laundry?
*
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Students Activities Center, Fitness Center, Clayton State University, Morrow, Clayton County, Georgia. Tuesday, October 22th, 2019. 07:05.
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It was still dark outside as Sara crossed the bridge over Swan Lake, the days shortened by an hour this late in the year. The door was unlocked and she entered the fitness center, navigating with the help of a flashlight.
Right by the entrance, she found an Olympic swimming pool behind a glass wall. Past it, a basketball court, and then the cardio room. She turned the lights on and looked for a working treadmill. After warming up for a few minutes, she started to increase the speed. Sara easily ran fifteen miles per hour, then increased it to eighteen. She felt her heart rate increase and believed she could sustain that speed for a few minutes. Unfortunately, the treadmill was whining and she slowed down in fear of breaking the now irreplaceable equipment.
Still, eighteen miles per hour at a relatively sustainable pace? That was fucking amazing, she thought. Sara turned the treadmill off and went for a cable crossover machine. She tested several weights and found she could pull eighty-five pounds on the machine before she stopped. That was... about her body weight. This particular machine could go up to two hundred and fifty pounds.
"I wish they had one of those punch machines," Sara wondered.
But what irked her was the realization that she would soon surpass the gym equipment. Sara remembered Abby saying that the Skills improved her performance based on her normal body levels, so if she worked out, she could get even faster and stronger than now. But she would have to do it by herself.
She decided to go take a shower. The girl was delighted they had warm water.
*
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*
I-75 near Jonesboro Road, Morrow, Clayton County, Georgia. Tuesday, October 22th, 2019. 07:30.
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Sara always thought that early morning was the best time to do things unnoticed.
Under the cover of darkness and away from the eyes of their fellow survivors, a secret military operation was underway.
"I want that one, and the three over there" Hainsworth pointed at a ghoul stumbling on the rooftop of crashed cars. "Now, the range on these foam guns is thirty feet. The undead are weaker than when they were alive. You just need to shoot the foam pellet at their feet and legs. Do not aim at torso and head."
Pushing their fears aside, the group of four civilian survivors armed with military-grade riot sticky foam guns walked into the interstate and waited for the undead to approach. The rather large foam cartridges were expelled with a pneumatic bang. Upon contact, it burst thirty times its volume, creating a rapid-expanding foam that hardened and restrained in seconds.
"I got one!" A female survivor cheered.
"Silence!" Hainsworth warned. "Sound travels too far in this dead world."
After pinning down a leg, the woman approached her target and shot at the remaining limbs. With a half-dozen shots, the ghoul was thoroughly restrained. The other survivors also had the same success with their targets. The dead kept trying to move and attack the living, their burnt faces scrunched in hatred and pain.
"Now we wait for the foam to harden, cut off our prizes, and take them to base," Hainsworth meant Fort Gillem.
"They're not that scary when they are like that," another survivor commented.
"Will they turn us into one of them if they bite?" The woman asked.
Hainsworth approached. "Only one way to find out," he then pushed his wrist into the ghoul's mouth. A few seconds later, he removed his arm and showed the bite mark. "Didn't even break skin. No saliva either. The tongue felt like sandpaper," the military man shared his opinion.
The other survivors eyed their boss with suspicion. Hainsworth pointed at a foam gun and the survivor handed it to him. He then moved away and shot both of his feet.
"We'll wait here for half an hour. If I turn, I turn. If not, I'll use the solvent and we'll go on our way."
*
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*
Students Activities Center, Fitness Center, Clayton State University, Morrow, Clayton County, Georgia. Tuesday, October 22th, 2019. 07:45.
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The sky was slowly turning blue, announcing a new dawn.
Sitting in front of a mirror after taking a quick shower, Sara peeled the bandages off her face. The girl sighed in relief as she saw only faint scars underneath, barely visible. Just as Abby promised, her skin felt like she'd just returned from a spa day. She felt stupid for not taking the bandages off before showering but she was so used to them by now that when she noticed it, she left them.
"We can't do it here," she lamented. "People will freak out if they see that black gunk."
Sara sneered and poked her tongue at the mirror. She was sure Abby was tapping into her sensory input and felt a bit of schadenfreude at the thought that the System Core had felt her menstrual woes last time. She went to her bag and put on fresh clothes.
Sara gathered her things and went back to Mr. Brown's classroom. She spent the rest of the morning working kinks out of the System's EULA agreement.
*
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*
Lakeside Dining Hall, Clayton State University, Morrow, Clayton County, Georgia. Tuesday, October 22th, 2019. 12:30
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Sara felt the gaze of several survivors sting her skin as she walked into the cafeteria, following the smell of food. Not because the smell was delicious or anything, but because it was savory and she was sick of eating candy despite her sweet tooth.
Though it was something commonplace for her and she considered her skin quite thick, that kind of veiled hostility was not something a person can get used to. Inured to being an outsider anywhere she went, the girl filed that as just business as usual.
Veiled whispers drifted in the air. Her ears were considered part of her skin and they too were 44% better. she heard it all.
"Who's that girl?"
"Isn't that the drug..."
"What is she doing here?"
"Does she have pot to sell?"
"Shh. She'll hear you!"
"She looks so young. Reminds me of..."
It still hurt. The girl's gut reaction was to just walk away but that would be a "walk of shame". Sara wasn't about to give the nasty ones that kind of satisfaction. She had zero fucks to give and the only way to face bullies was head-on. You may take a beating, but Georgia was a "stand your ground" state last time she checked. She could give as good as she took. Sara stopped and met each of their gazes. Many flinched away bashfully. She recognized the smoking woman from before among those who glared back. She was oddly familiar and Sara knew she'd seen that woman before the Apocalypse. But she was irrelevant.
What mattered was to gain respect. Sara was tired of scuttling around on the edge of society, trying to not be noticed. She met a Seraph at the end of the world and was tasked with some dubious mission of relative importance. She still thought she was being misled or outright lied to by both Verachiel and Abby but she had no evidence. Regardless, she was a faction of one against all these lazy-ass survivors. Who knew how long before they started to claim her stuff? Or try to gang-press her into some job she didn't want to do?
Right now she had a comfortable position but Sara had four years of survivorship over all these people. She knew how friendly faces could turn grim and then turn on her. It had happened in Seattle but she was too slippery to be tied down.
So, back to these survivors. She wasn't going to back down or slip through social cracks. The girl was going to show them Sara meant business.
Without breaking eye contact, she walked towards the one she internally dubbed Smoking Woman. She was responsible for leaving a crippled man alone for hours waiting for rescue and cursing at Sara's back.
"What do you want, kid? I don't want to buy drugs," Smoking Woman scoffed.
Sara's glare intensified. All conversations in the cafeteria stopped. Some even took their phones to record. She was certain then that she had no social anxiety and she was just freaking out because the world fucking ended and almost everyone got cooked by Mana and people's souls had nowhere to go and it was her goddamned job to clean up Armageddon's mess.
She felt in control. She felt powerful. Her muscles coiled under her skin like snakes ready to strike. For the first time, she felt like the main character. Take that, Klein. Sara chuckled as she reminded herself of a parody of a popular anime show she saw on YouTube. The woman mistook her mirth for sarcasm.
"See? I told you. This kid is a drug dealer and is up to no good. She—"
"Oh, shut the fuck up, bitch," Sara made her opening move. She put her Alacrity score to work and skipped right in front of the woman's face. "Eww, you reek of stale ashtrays. I never did drugs, but I bet a lot of people could use some relaxing weed right now," She glanced to the sides and caught a few nods. Sara rapid-fired like a derby jockey, to give the woman no time for a rebuttal. "But I'm as clean as a newborn. You, on the other hand, are so lazy you left a CRIPPLED MAN baking in the sun a whole afternoon next to a plane crash because you didn't bother to tell anyone because you were too busy getting lung cancer and bitching about other people's lives. Seriously, people's working their butts off to survive after the world went to shit, and here you are, getting high on your holier than thou act. Who needs drugs when they are high on their own Cool-aid, right? Get your shit together, woman!"
Shouting on annoying people's faces was exhilarating. One could get addicted to that.
Enraged, Smoking Woman became beet red like she'd sunbathed in Florida's summer for way too long. She jumped and brought her arm in a wide arc, ready to slap Sara in the face.
The girl's eyes narrowed and she leaped back with cat-like grace landing softly like a ballerina and putting her hand over the hilt of her knife. She froze for a moment as she considered the consequences of drawing a weapon.
"Not gonna happen," she told herself slowly and straightened up, standing tall despite being the shortest person in the cafeteria. "Wake up and smell the cadaverine, bitch."
"She's got a gun," a man noticed.
"Not gonna happen," she repeated to the man, who seemed a bit dismayed. Sara ignored him afterward. Everyone was a bit unhinged after the world went to shit.
But she was not done yet. Sara stretched both her hands to the sides in a halt signal. It was also a gesture to show she was unarmed and unwilling to draw. As she spoke her piece, the girl looked around, meeting each survivor's eyes and nodding to get their attention and sympathy. Sara had no idea what led her to do that, but it was her Presence Skill at work.
"I'll make it clear. I never touched an illegal controlled substance in my life, much less commercialize or use any. I know there's nothing more American than getting your fat nosy ass into people's lives and slandering them like it's your business to judge them for their shortcomings, but I won't take any shit from losers whose only delight in life is to drag good people down," she met Smoking Woman's eyes at this point.
"You have food, you have electricity, but how much of it was thanks to your efforts in particular? I didn't see any of you at the supermarket where we were dodging bullets back and forth. Did you see the bandages on my face? Do you want to know how I got these scars?" She made her best Heath Ledger impression." It was not by leaning against a fence and smoking cigarettes while talking shit, no, sir.
"So the next time you have the idea of slandering a hard-working honest person, please, shove that idea back where it came from. Your ass."
Sara stared Smoking Woman down until the older female started to cry. "Why? Why did you survive and my precious little snowflake died? Why?"
The girl finally recognized the woman. Sara took a step back.
"Mrs. Wilson?" Sara gasped. "You're Andrew Wilson's mother, aren't you?" A bit of remorse struck her. "Damn, Andrew was a fine guy. Polite, smart, funny. Not like the other assholes of the football team." She wiped a tear and changed her stance. "We weren't friends but I respected him. Everyone at school respected him. I'm sorry for your loss, ma'am."
How a Karen like her could've raised such a fine gentleman like Andrew, she had no idea. But it was none of Sara's business.
But the mood in the cafeteria did a hundred-eighty. Through Andrew, both women connected. They made eye contact, and Sara could see the regret on Mrs. Wilson's face.
"He was going to Yale!" Mrs. Wilson bawled. "With a sports scholarship!"
She could imagine an adult Andrew playing for the NFL. The girl nodded along sympathetically. "I'm sorry for your loss, ma'am. We all lost everyone," she looked away and cursed in a low voice, "Damned Armageddon."
"Did you know my son?" The woman almost begged for a yes.
Sara laid a hand on Mrs. Wilson's shoulder. "We were not close, but I can tell you a story about him if you want."
Still crying, Mrs. Wilson nodded, "I'd appreciate that."
The bystanders also nodded. It was everyone's favorite morsel, gossip.
"He was dating Christine Appleby," Sara confided.
Gasps like one would expect in a soap opera. Mrs. Wilson did a double-take. "Really?"
"Christine herself told me," Sara shared like it was a hidden secret. "She was quite smitten with him. Did Andrew keep it a secret from you?"
"I had no idea," Mrs. Wilson said. She was clearly proud of her boy, though. Christine Appleby was right next to Pamela in the polls for who would be Prom Queen that year. The Appleby family was quite renowned in their community.
"I have no idea which one of the two was the luckiest, but it was a pairing made in heaven," Sara said with a wistful sigh. Many onlookers nodded as if they knew the couple. "But they had my vote for prom Queen and King."
Mrs. Wilson sobbed and clapped Sara's shoulder. "Thank you."
The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
Someone attempted to start clapping hands. That person was quickly hushed by the people who rightly sensed Sara wasn't over yet.
"I shouldn't share this but..." Sara approached Mrs. Wilson's ear. "Christine told me your son was an awesome lover. She was on cloud nine when she told me she had him on her bed. I felt jealous of them."
Mrs. Wilson had a proud grin. "He did? My boy..."
Sara hugged the woman. "I'm really sorry for your loss, ma'am."
Mrs. Wilson cried again. Sara endured it. People d'awwed and cooed. The slow-clap person tried to start it again but was slapped shut.
"I had the wrong idea about you, Sara. Sorry!"
"I'm sorry too for not recognizing you earlier, Mrs. Wilson. I had to defend myself, I hope you understand. I can't let people say what they want about me, especially if it's slander, ma'am. I really hope you understand," she repeated.
Mrs. Wilson nodded and they let go of each other. Sara spun around, addressing the audience. "The name is Sara, left my last name behind in the world that was. I don't do drugs, sorry to disappoint all of you. It's a pleasure to meet all of you."
The apparently out-of-character charade was due to the power of her Social Skills. Just like her physical Skills empowered her muscles, skin, and bone with Mana to perform better, so too Presence and Flattery overcharged her brain to better navigate social situations. She tossed a few white lies in the mix but Sara hadn't blatantly lied to Mrs. Wilson.
Yet she cringed inside after delivering the last sentence. Sara didn't have the time to soul search as someone clapped their hands behind her.
"Well said, Miss Sara," a booming and commanding voice rang from a few meters behind her. Sara turned and saw a tall powerful middle-aged man with a hirsute well-groomed beard that she thought made him look like a pirate, well-styled hair, and a piercing gaze. He was none other than Hainsworth, the alleged leader of this survivor camp. This man was the leader of this tribe of survivors. She was impressed with his movie character aura. He was in plain clothes but his build and body language placed him in the military before the world ended.
"Sara, well met. My name is Hainsworth, I'm pleased to meet you," Before she could form a coherent sentence, the man had already approached and offered his hand. She shook it. He didn't squeeze. Hainsworth turned as he addressed the gathered survivors.
"Sara may look young but she has survived on her own for two weeks and worked hard for that," he said as he cast his gaze around. "You guys should know her from Officer Keynes's story about the pitch girl. We assume she was using some sort of paint or grease as camouflage to hide from the..." Hainsworth hesitated before using the moniker, "Necropolis King's minions. If she hadn't done that, this young lady might've been another one of their victims," Hainsworth made a respectful face as he paused his speech.
Many women, Mrs. Wilson included, flinched and shielded their bodies. Everyone knew they were sexually abused by the paramilitary group that took over Fort Gillem. Sara stared at the ground as she briefly thought about what she would feel if she too was taken by them. It made her feel bad for antagonizing Mrs. Wilson.
Hainsworth continued, "Detective Keynes and I looked into Sara's school records a couple days ago, and found not only she was an honor student but also that she was under the protection of the US Marshals. Even if she wanted to buy, use or sell drugs, I believe the Marshals would've caught the dealer trying to sell drugs through her. Let me make it clear. Sara has never dealt with illegal substances. I hope this is the end of these bad rumors about her."
Mrs. Wilson grabbed Sara's hand and smiled at her as a show of support. Many survivors nodded in agreement. Sara was moderately embarrassed by all the attention.
Sometime before Hainsworth's speech ended, the four college students led by Amanda had entered the cafeteria. Only then did the girl notice them. Kelly nodded at her and left her group. Hainsworth went to a group of survivors as people broke into groups to eat and talk. The air was flooded with the usual droning of overlapping voices one would find in any cafeteria before Armageddon.
As Kelly approached, Mrs. Wilson left to join her group of double survivor women.
"Hey, how're you doing? We heard something was going on here but we were late. Sorry for leaving you alone," The bubbly woman said as she wrapped an arm around Sara's shoulder.
"Hey, mummy girl! Oh, never mind, the bandages came off."
Sara didn't miss Amanda's sneer but decided to ignore her. She smiled and hugged Kelly back, "It was nothing I couldn't handle on my own."
Kelly squealed and bumped Sara's hips with her own before squeezing the girl. "My, what a resourceful girl," she delivered with a smirk and guided Sara to the serving area. "I still can't believe you came for a bite after eating all... that."
"I told you I have a separate stomach for sweets," Sara deadpanned.
Kelly took a soda can and placed it on Sara's tray, "Well, enjoy your free cold cola. I have no idea when or if they'll make more."
"We're doomed. Cola, pizza... coffee. There's no coffee anymore, Kelly. It's not grown in America."
"They do," the cheerful student replied as she filled her own tray with food. "In California."
"Did," Sara bemoaned. "And California is weeks, maybe months away, now that nobody can fly a damn plane. I doubt you can find an intact road leading there.
"Not that they had any before the end of the world," Brett quipped.
"You were there at the plane crash, right?" Kelly asked.
"It was horrifying," Sara reminisced. "The plane was clearly not safe to fly, I can only imagine how desperate people were to try and take off on that."
"We had a suicide two days ago," Amanda butted in. People in the line flinched away.
"So, what's your major?" Sara asked, ignoring Amanda.
"CS!" Brett promptly replied.
"Philosophy," a deep voice replied. Sara did a double-take. Peterson actually replied. She nodded at him, and he nodded back. Amanda sputtered, drawing attention to herself.
"Dental Hygiene," Amanda replied right away.
Sara thought Amanda's major was totally fitting. Amanda would be great at guilt-tripping people for not flossing enough. She turned to Kelly.
"Music," Kelly shared.
They stopped talking as they each filled their trays. With a decent serving of food each, the youngsters went to find a table for five.
"I'm so glad they reopened the kitchen," Brett said. "I was getting sick of eating army meals."
"The food here used to be amazing back in the day," Kelly wistfully remarked. "And cheap too. Nine-fifty for a meal, not bad."
"It was subsidized to attract students," Sara remarked. "You paid the remainder with debt."
"Well, at least we don't owe our student loans anymore," Brett remarked with a chuckle.
"Don't, just don't," Amanda growled with rejection. "Don't give this..." she awkwardly waved her hands, "whatever happened to the world a silver lining."
Peterson just stoically watched people talk. He nodded here and there, mostly to support Amanda's ramblings. He also often exchanged some touches with Amanda. But Sara had no idea what his voice sounded like even though she thought she already heard him talking.
"Anyway," Amanda continued as she directed a question to Sara. "How long were you out after the world ended?"
Sara had to wait until she finished chewing before doing a double-take. "I beg your pardon?"
"Yes, I was curious too," Kelly joined in. "Most people were out for a whole week."
"A few woke up earlier," Brett remarked as he sent a look Hainsworth's way.
"Oh, you mean when everyone was rendered unconscious in the seventh," Sara said.
"Can you believe it? We spent days unconscious, we should've all died of dehydration!" Kelly continued.
"We did wake up almost dying of thirst," Amanda wistfully recalled.
"I was so desperate when I woke up, I almost drank straight from the toilet," Brett jested, drawing a chuckle from the table.
"Hello? Trying to eat here!" Amanda snapped at Brett.
Sara was stupefied. She wasn't aware of that. A week-long nap would be fine by her, compared to what she went through.
Abby was right. "I stayed out for three days," Sara lied. "When I came back to my senses, people were exchanging hot lead across Jonesboro."
Amanda clicked her tongue, "The evilest people woke up the day after."
Everyone at the table ignored her remark.
"So, what do you think happened, Sara?" Brett probed.
"Not this again," Amanda whined under her breath and rolled her eyes.
"Sorry? What are you talking about?" The girl asked.
"This. The end of the world. People being cooked where they stand. The endless train of crashed vehicles. The dead rising. What caused all of this?"
Sara assumed a defensive stance instinctively. Was he onto her or something like that? She tried to misdirect. "Why would I know?"
"Nobody knows," Brett cluelessly whined. "Was it a virus? It wouldn't explain why people burned. Was it a nuclear bomb? Why did it burn only people? I mean, the animals are fine. A neutron bomb? Nobody would've survived. Where did the meteor shower come from? Why didn't NASA track them?"
The girl decided to play along and assumed the Gendo Ikari pose as she quoted a famous writer. "When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."
"Damn, girl, you gave me the chills!"
Brett jokingly flinched away, making a noise with his chair and drawing some attention to their table. Kelly giggled and Amanda rolled her eyes. Peterson squeezed her hand over the table and the woman swooned.
"So," Sara continued. "Let's examine the possibilities. It was not a virus because no virus can make people so feverish they burn. Not a bomb. Whatever killed those people must've come with the meteors."
"I dig you," Brett said and motioned for her to continue.
"The meteors didn't come from space, otherwise the space agencies would've known. They used to track golf-ball-sized debris in orbit, they would've seen the massive meteor shower coming months before."
"Where did they come from then?" Kelly asked with genuine interest and a bit of worry.
"I'm trying to eat here," Amanda complained.
Peterson hummed in agreement and nodded. Then he took another bite of his bland food. It was nothing to write home about. If 'home' was still a thing. The other three ignored the woman.
"A parallel dimension. Do you know string theory?" She asked Brett, whose jaw immediately dropped as he nodded enthusiastically.
"I do! Damn, I can feel we are getting somewhere now!"
"Then there's the ghouls. Seriously, did you see them?" Sara rambled. "They aren't alive. Some even have holes in their chest or exposed fractures."
"Thanks for helping me with my diet, darling," Amanda sarcastically stated as she pushed her half-eaten dish away. Peterson collected it and stood up. "We're taking a walk around the lake," he said with a rumbling voice.
Sara knew why he refused to speak. It was like that Marvel character who lived on the moon. He could damage hearts with that deep baritone. Yet, he was taken so she focused on guiding Brett to reach the answer without her saying it straight out. She also noticed that several survivors were paying a lot of attention to their conversation.
"Forget everything you know about zombie movies. Shooting them in the head or even fighting gets you killed. They do not infect you with bites. I've seen a group of twelve people shooting from the top of a trailer, and they all died. Ask anyone who was at the overpass yesterday."
"What is making the zombies move, then?" Brett asked.
"You're the science guy," She rebutted. "Tell me what you think."
"Not a virus," he stated and Sara nodded. "Damn. Magic? Necromancy?"
"Something filled the interstate with crashed cars. Even if it was rush hour, they weren't riding bumper to bumper. Where did all these cars come from?"
"How would I know," Brett slammed his fork on the plate.
"Dude, chill," Sara advised. "If you were a magician, how would you make the interstate appear crowded like that?"
He snapped his fingers. "Mirrors! Are you telling me something is going on? Like the Jim Carey movie? We're in a bubble?"
"It's not done with mirrors. The cars are actually there."
"Is it magic again?" Kelly wondered.
"Magic," one of the survivors scoffed. When he saw he had Sara's attention, he grinned at her, "Girl, if you have something to sell, I'd give you my left kidney for a joint."
"I don't sell drugs!" Sara protested to him.
The man laughed, "I know, just pulling on your leg. My name is Taylor Smith. A pleasure to meet you." Taylor tipped an imaginary hat before going away.
"Magic. That's absurd," Brett resumed their conversation.
"Is it? Are we really going back to the medieval times where people got so stuck in their beliefs they tried to hang Galileo for saying the Sun didn't spin around the Earth?"
"Magic does not exist," Brett retorted.
Sara threw her arms up, "Yes, you are right. Magic does not exist, and we don't have an explanation for everything that happened. Maybe we should look for it in the Bible. Maybe the terms Apocalypse and Armageddon are very suitable for what's happening here."
Brett shied away. "Girl, you sounded downright scary. I haven't read the Revelations. What happens next?"
She stood up and doomsayed, "You have no idea. I've seen great many things that can tear a man's heart asunder."
"Just stop! You'll give Brett a heart attack," Kelly said in jest.
Sara shrugged and picked up her plate. "I'm done here anyway. Where do I leave these?"
"Wait, I'm coming with you!" Kelly hurriedly finished her lunch.
*
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Lake Swan, Clayton State University, Morrow, Clayton County, Georgia. Tuesday, October 22th, 2019. 15:00
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Kelly took Sara on a tour of the campus, this time by daylight. She dragged the girl up and down, telling all she knew about the university. It was a lovely place, a perfect spot for the new community the survivors were trying to create. But Sara was itching to go out and find more ghosts.
"Is there any more around here?" She asked Abby under her breath.
"What is it again, dear?" Kelly leaned in front of Sara, putting their lips too close for comfort.
Startled, Sara pulled her head away. "What?" She thought Kelly was one of those persons with the power to ignore personal space. The girl's danger sense failed to recognize Kelly.
"Did you say something?"
"Oh, what's that building on the other side of the lake?'
"That's the library."
Sara smiled, "Can we go there? I love books."
"I kind of wanted to show you the music hall first," Kelly complained, then shifted, "But okay, it is your tour, I'm only the guide. Let's go to the library."
They went around Swan Lake, crossed the bridge, and entered the library.
"A lot of dead students were here," Kelly regretfully remarked as they entered.
The place still smelled faintly of dead people and bleach. Sara could recognize some body fat stains where the dead lay for over a week. It was clean, showing how much effort the survivors put into cleaning the university. Maybe she was too harsh with them back at the dining hall.
"Where should I look first?" Sara asked Abby.
"What are you looking for?" Kelly asked back.
"Oh, a book on gardening," Sara lied. "I got some seeds I intend to plant next Spring."
They entered and Sara saw the librarian waving at her from the circulation desk. The air was stuffy, stale, and had a funky odor of old rotten meat. Sara noticed the AC was turned off. She did nothing because Kelly behaved like they were alone, proving the woman was the ghost.
"Welcome, Sara! I'm so sad the world ended and you won't become a student here at Clayton!"
Only ghosts behave so intimately with her on the first meeting. Not even Kelly with all her social ease managed to act like she knew Sara for as long as she was alive.
Sara leaned on the desk. "Kelly, would you go find the book for me? I think I ate too much today."
"Seriously? You can't use the restrooms here. They are clogged and nobody fixed it yet."
"No, I'm fine. Just a bit under the weather. Maybe it's the sun."
"Now that you mentioned, you do look like all the chocolate you ate went straight to your skin."
Sara chuckled. "That's not the case. I tan super easily! I've been working under direct sunlight for quite a few days already. I can show you my tan lines if—"
The librarian leaned next to Sara, appearing to be very interested in her tan marks. Kelly broke into a sultry smirk.
"Maybe later, I'd love to see your tan marks. I can fetch the books for you, no problem. Do you want a chair to go with them?"
"The chair first, then."
"Okay."
Kelly vanished behind the shelves, and the librarian sprung to action.
*
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Library, Clayton State University, Morrow, Clayton County, Georgia. Tuesday, October 22th, 2019. 15:20
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"Do you want to buy a Canadian goose plushie?" The librarian asked after Kelly went away. "We don't usually sell them, though. Anyways, the world ended, and Sara is here!"
"Is this the library mascot or something?" Sara asked in the faintest whisper she could muster.
"Indeed!"
"I'll give ya all the money on me for it."
"Deal!"
Sara found a crumpled five-dollar bill. She put the goose on the counter and moved Sara's money to the drawer. What a bargain!
"I don't have much time. What's your last wish?" Sara figuratively went straight for the throat.
The librarian sighed, then poked at the bridge of her nose. "I lost my glasses. I'm terribly sorry," She sniffled, losing all the enthusiasm from before. "My husband kept scolding me that I put my stuff anywhere. In his words, once an item lost its momentary usefulness, I ditched it anywhere."
"Your husband sounds like an —"
"No, he was a lovely man. I guess he got poked in the ribs by my glasses, phone, books, and hair pins too many times. I did have a penchant for putting them on his side of the bed."
"Like every night, I assume," Sara guessed.
The librarian squealed, "Yes! So true! So that's it. I can't move on unless I find my glasses!"
Sara nodded. "Where did you die?"
"In the break room. it's the second door to the right past the employees' only door."
The girl slipped away before Kelly could return. The stale stench of the dead was stronger in the employee area probably because it hadn't been ventilated as much if any. She regretted not taking her backpack with her. The respirator would be very helpful here. She entered the break room and looked around. A grease stain in the rough shape of a person marred the floorboards. The body had been moved away and a few bugs crawled on the stain. She looked around but saw no pair of glasses whatsoever. While searching, Sara felt a faint scent of old coffee and looked at the pot, which was laying on the counter, outside the coffee maker. It was caked on the inside with a cracked brown film.
After searching a bit more and going through the cabinets, Sara wondered if the glasses were taken out with the trash. The bin was empty and without a bag.
"What should I do if the ghost's request is impossible?" She asked Abby.
Hitting the nice librarian ghost was not on her to-do list. "What happens to the ghosts after they are finished? Do they pass on?"
"The what?"
"Okay," she said without truly understanding the mythological place. To Sara, just the knowledge that dead souls would reincarnate and no new souls are coming from Heaven was enough.
Sara was about to give up her search when she decided to look inside the coffee pot. She thought it was out of place. Unless the last person in here was messing with the... There it was. The glasses were inside the coffee pot. Why? How? She theorized that the librarian had the glasses in her hand, then dropped them inside the coffee when she died. Truly enough, the glasses were covered in dried coffee as well. The girl fished the object and went back to the circulation desk.
Kelly was waiting for her. The librarian was next to the woman, trying to take the books out of Kelly's hands to probably check them out. Somehow, the ghost couldn't interact with Kelly or the books around her.
"Where did you go?"
"Just exploring the employee area. Seeing if any hidden treasure like the goose were hidden in there."
"We actually have a box of plush geese in there if you are interested. They're... five dollars each," the librarian lady offered.
Sara ignored the ghost. "Are these the books you got?"
She placed the coffee-stained glasses on the counter. Kelly followed the object with her eyes.
"What's that?"
"Coffee-stained glasses. I suppose the librarian dropped them in the coffee pot when she died."
"That's correct, my dear! Oh, thank you for retrieving them. Now my husband won't scold me again for having to buy me yet another set of glasses." These things could get expensive, especially if you went for brand-name frames. As soon as the librarian touched the glasses, she started to fade. "Goodbye, Sara!"
> > You gained 2 free Skill Points.
Yay, freebies.
"That's the treasure you got?" Kelly asked.
"Nah. It's a box of plush geese. I assume this is the library's mascot? Do you want one?"
Kelly broke into a cat-like grin. "I didn't take you to be the plush zoo kind of girl."
"I'm not," Sara replied straight away. "In fact, this is the first plush animal I got in years. Bouncing from foster house to foster house tends to make one carry very few things. I was in foster care before Armageddon hit us."
"That's okay," Kelly grabbed Sara's hand, which surprised Sara because she didn't feel bothered by it. "Look, books!" An embarrassed Kelly withdrew her hand and pushed the pile of books forward. "There's a catch, though. We decided to not let anyone take the books out of the library."
"May I at least read them in a well-ventilated area? Like by the door, outside?"
"I guess that's fair," Kelly sighed. They moved a table and chairs to the front of the building and set up there. It had a nice shade since it faced East.
While Sara idly flipped through the gardening books, they made small talk. "They're trying to connect the university to the landfill solar plant, if they do, we can turn the AC on all buildings. Brett is quite excited with the prospect of turning the computers back on."
"Nice. Maybe we can get some WiFi too."
"There's no internet."
"I bet Brett can set a local DNS and serve local pages. We'll be back to the nineties' internet. At a very local scale."
"Nice. How about we set you up at a table outside? You can read all you want until it's time to get an assignment."
"A what?"
"Keynes and Hainsworth decided to post the required tasks for tomorrow during dinner, and we are supposed to take whatever we feel comfortable doing."
Sara frowned. "I'm not really joining you. I just came for Ca... to pay my respects to Mr. Brown's last wish. I'm probably leaving tomorrow,"
she declared as Kelly stared in disbelief. "No. Why would you—"
"So I don't have to hear Amanda bitch. Or bang on my door because she feels entitled to your time. Or deal with survivor drama. I'll show up every now and then, but I have private business to attend."
"Like trying to resurrect the Medellin Cartel? Miss Escobar," she teased.
"Nah, it's too late to plant coke or cannabis now. They're warm-weather plants," Sara said with a straight face.
"You almost fooled me," Kelly remarked with her usual friendly smile.
They heard a series of shrill chirps. Sara stood up and ran to the open street, staring at the sky. A small flight of maybe a dozen swallows flew over them, heading south.
"Birds! Birds!" Sara squealed in delight. These were the first she's seen since Armageddon.
Kelly looked up, "That's a tiny flock. Swallows migrate in bands of thousands."
"They're the first birds I see in two weeks. Since... you know," Sara kept following the birds with her eyes. "I'm glad they're not extinct. Close, but maybe they'll survive."
"What about us?" Kelly wondered.
"We're fucked. Modern humans are too dumb to survive. Look at us, about half of the survivors in our area died this month. And we were spared the meteor shower."
"I wonder why," Kelly asked innocently. Sara froze anyway. "Do you think other pockets of untouched land exist elsewhere?"
"We might be the last generation of humans," Sara mused. "Maybe it ends with us."
"Why? Not that I like the idea, but between you and me, we can birth about thirty kids."
"Eww. Gross."
"Boys are yucky," Kelly mocked Sara.
"Shut up!" Sara playfully pushed Kelly away. "Oh, the swallows are gone." The girl stood and faced south. She cupped her hands over her mouth and yelled, "GOOD LUCK!"