“This is all your fault, you know?”

A sharp blow to his rib sent Evan reeling backwards in pain. Violet shot him an irritated glare perceptible even through the layers that covered her face.

The group was staring down at a massive horde of zombies writhing below them. They had stopped migrating a while ago; their horde mentality reaction had diminished after over four hours of a lack of renewed stimulus. While it looked like a staggering mass from above, it was likely nowhere near the amount that must have gathered where they had started.

They had been on the move for almost two hours already, and along the way they stopped only to catch their breath for a moment from all the strenuous building-to-building parkour. Since the undead had mostly evacuated from the nearby buildings to follow the horde, some of them even falling off rooftops and broken windows in the process, then the best way to pass through them would be by traversing the same spaces they have vacated. Progress had thus been mostly easy, but still quite slow. It was not a simple matter to cross buildings, regardless of how it appeared on television. For every jump they had to judge many things, such as the distance of the leap, the stability of the platform they’ll jump to, the likelihood of jumping into where the undead were waiting, among many others. Whenever they judged that it was not possible or too risky to cross where they were, they had to seek alternatives, which involved wasting even more time.

Thus, after all that time they’ve only managed to cross six buildings, with the fastest one taking less than ten minutes and the longest one taking half an hour. Though it was much less than they had intended, it was still quite a distance since one of those buildings was quite long. That was when they encountered their first real obstacle.

Undead distribution had mostly normalized after a certain distance away from where they had come from. They were starting to encounter wandering undead. As an unbroken line of buildings still stretched as far as the darkness allowed them to see, they had started to guess how many of them they’ll have to fight off if they continued travelling on the buildings themselves.

“We should go down to the alleys again later, huh?” he said as more of a declaration than a question. Certainly that would be safer, most of the time. With the undead concentration somewhat pulled apart, there should be a relatively wide area where their numbers are thin. It would also take much less effort even if they had to be cautious of what was above them.

Currently, they were heading to a different direction from where their camp was. As to why, well, they simply followed the direction Io had pointed out earlier. If it was Evan then he would have used that opportunity to make a beeline towards camp using the evacuated buildings they passed through. If there wasn’t a way through, then he’d create just the right scale of diversion somewhere to draw the zombies in an area away, though it would be difficult without the luxury of timed explosives. That was if it was him, though. But at that moment—

“Is she okay?” Evan asked a question he knew was unnecessary. He saw Violet replacing a dirty sheet over a limp body. Further away from them was Frank who stood motionless in front of a staircase acting as a sentry.

“She’s asleep,” Violet replied with an annoyed tone. “Guess we can’t move until Sleeping Beauty wakes up.”

Lying on the hard concrete, breathing labored and utterly exhausted was the girl who saved Evan’s life, Io. Reason? No clue. While they were traversing through the urban jungle she just suddenly doubled over and turned up unconscious. They wouldn’t have noticed it if Frank didn’t look behind him when she did, as Io served as the rearguard that time, and they were already jumping between buildings. Both he and Violet had to jump back, and there they decided to take an unplanned break.

It didn’t look like she was injured anywhere, and a quick body check by Violet confirmed it. Both of them doubted that it was because of all the moving they did. Was she sick? An underlying condition? The only thing on their first aid kits were bandages, gauze and a tourniquet. None of them were medics, so the only thing they could do with their less-than-basic experience in diagnostics was to check her temperature with the back of their hand. Sure enough, it looked like Io had a fever.

One person falling ill in such a situation placed everybody in danger. As she was at that moment, she was basically dead weight. Of course, Evan wouldn’t leave her behind without any urgent need to. Hopefully she would feel better before trouble came their way.

Evan made a mental note to request for better provisions for their kits once he had a chance. Considering the resources available to them in an apocalyptic world, Evan knew better than to expect anything big, but at least he wanted to have some medicine on hand. Even herbs would do.

“Well, since the princess here doesn’t look like she’ll wake up anytime soon… dinner?”

Upon hearing the ‘d’ word, Evan immediately covered his pocket protectively. Though Violet’s face was still hidden with her equipment, he could tell that her left eye narrowed in displeasure. She sighed and shrugged her shoulders; a gesture that didn’t put his heart at ease at all. It was then that he remembered; right, they haven’t eaten anything yet, ever since that time in the shop even. The continuous tension had made them unaware that they had a stomach, even when faced with a veritable hill of supplies. Or would it be more accurate to say that there was simply not enough time?

“It’s not like I was going to ask for it, you know?” she said. Evan didn’t believe that for a second.

So saying, she grabbed her duffle bag filled to bursting with cans of food and water bottles, and set it down on the ground with the grace of a gorilla. She then pulled a large can and placed it in front of her.

Much to their surprise, Io didn’t mind when they asked if they could take some of her supplies. When they got permission, Violet shamelessly stuffed as many as she could, probably as a test, into her bag yet still Io didn’t even bat an eye. Suspicious behavior though it was, they weren’t the type to look a gift horse in the mouth, so Evan and Frank followed suit.

As Evan was lost in thought, he suddenly noticed that the can was still unopened yet Violet had already stood up. Curious, he looked up to see—

“Hey, what the hell are you doing?” he exclaimed in the most hushed voice he could. It was a stupid question as anybody would know what was about to happen if they saw someone brandishing a sledgehammer.

“Huh? Gonna open the can, duh?” Violet replied with a genuinely confused tone that hit Evan in all the wrong places. He felt a vein pop in his forehead, even.

“With a sledgehammer? Use a can opener like any normal person would.”

“Too slow. One good hit with this and problem solved, right?”

“The only thing you’ll be solving is the lack of food on the floor.”

“Hmm… should I use the halligan, then?”

“—Are you a moron?”

“Who are you calling a moron?”

“You.”

Violet chuckled lightly, giving up the farce. A brief silence blessed their exchange until they started laughing without making a sound.

Normally, when they had those kinds of exchanges they would be met by amused or exasperated reactions from the people around them. It was something they usually did at camp to ease the tension. Of course Violet wasn’t the kind of idiot who would open a can with a sledgehammer. Sure enough he saw Frank’s shoulders relax visibly over yonder. Io, being asleep, had no reaction. Surprisingly it was Violet herself who looked to have calmed down the most.

He took the can from the ground and fished a can opener from a pocket on his chest. Violet sat down and fumbled with the inside of her bag again. She dug into the piles of cans and bottles for a moment before she pulled another thing out.

“Here, open this for her too,” she said, handing him a jar. He didn’t even need any light to know what it was; the appearance even in the dark was distinct from many of the supplies they tended to retrieve after all.

“Honey?”

It was sealed in a glass jar, too.

“Saw them among the cans of beans and packs of grain in those boxes. Figured I should take them as well. Kinda wanted to teach her a lesson about letting strangers take your shit, I suppose, but it looks like she wouldn’t understand.”

They looked at Io’s unconscious form, wrapped in a warm, though dirty blanket, sound asleep. Evan felt the corners of his mouth rise slightly. She looked so defenseless that it was a wonder how just a few hours earlier she was able to cleave an undead in half using a damaged sword. Additionally, he wondered how she could sleep like that when she was surrounded by what were essentially strangers to her. Was she not afraid of being assaulted?

She really didn’t have the proper mindset for those kinds of days. Resources were the most important things in the world at that point. Though fruits and meat were... not that rare in the countryside, processed goods were still valued highly. That was especially so for long-lasting products such as grain, honey, dehydrated food, and others. With a dead civilization whose above-ground infrastructures have all been compromised, processed and manufactured goods have become veritable treasure as time passed. It could be used for negotiation and trade, and the consumables in particular have exorbitant values attached to them.

Evan stared at the large can on his hand with a forlorn expression. He stopped his hand just before the can opener made contact with it. It was just a momentary hesitation brought about by his misgivings. But he quickly shrugged it off and went to work opening it.

A sharp, sweet smell entered his nose as he wrenched the lid open.

It was amazing how far the canned food industry had developed over the years. It was similarly amazing to see it fall apart within just a few months.

“Dried fruit, huh?” Violet noticed. She removed her respirator and sat close to him. Like a savage, she reached into the can with her dirty hand and pulled a small mound from inside. Evan shot a glare to her direction, only to be ignored as she stuffed them inside a water bottle after draining it slightly.

There were quite a lot of them inside the can. It was freshly-opened too, so it was incredibly fragrant. Just the smell stimulated his appetite so much that he had to consciously stop himself from stuffing them into his mouth. He prevailed long enough to pull a large bottle of water from his pack and imitate what Violet did. Then, he took out a second bottle and prepared Frank’s share. He made sure to leave more for Io, who should be famished once she woke up.

While Violet spent her alone time lamenting their inability to boil water, Evan went to Frank’s side and joined him in gazing down the deep abyss that loomed beneath them.

Silence was a blessing in that world of walking dead. Though they spoke no words to each other, the cacophony of guttural moans that welled up from the darkness ensured that their ears had no time to rest. That was the reason why they could talk to each other in the first place.

There must be hundreds underneath them. Those undead probably did not react Violet’s shout or to the mass migration of their kin earlier due to the distance. That, or they were sealed inside the building somehow. It was strange, though; why haven’t they spilled over to the rooftop if there were so many? Either way, that meant they needed to be extra cautious about attracting their attention. While they could easily escape on their own by jumping over to the adjacent buildings, having to carry someone unconscious would prevent them from doing so, or at least make it very difficult. Well as long as they kept silent then it wouldn’t be a problem.

He tapped Frank’s shoulder with the bottle. The stoic rifleman received it with thanks and placed it on a broken concrete barrier. As if nothing else could be exchanged between them, Evan turned after observing the lone staircase one last time. Then a hand reached out and grabbed his shoulders lightly. Frank appeared hesitant, lost in thought about something. Three seconds passed, then six, then ten — Frank struggled to form the words that he wanted to say. It was only after what seemed like an entire minute had passed when he finally managed to ask:

“How is she?”

His voice carried none of the warmth his question implied, though it appeared that his concern was genuine. Thinking nothing of it, Evan simply shook his head. At the rate things were going, they might have to stay until dawn. While moving during the day was far better than doing so during the night, they were already hard-pressed for time at that stage. Their operation was supposed to have been quick. They were to run in, retrieve Julyette’s weapon, and run back while picking supplies. While they did take into account meeting Nathan’s mysterious nun, the original plan was to simply ask if she wanted to join them; if she assented, great; if she refused, they were to deal with her somehow. Every second they spent in a zombie-infested city was a risk that should have been the top priority of a team leader to avoid.

Yet there they were, babysitting a sleeping beauty.

Frank lowered his head, immediately understanding the implication. He wordlessly returned to his sentry duty. Evan smiled. At least Frank was easy to understand. Though he felt bad about keeping him in the dark, it was best that he did not know for a while — at least not until he and Violet had any choice.

When he got back to Violet, he found her still staring at the water bottle on her hand. She had not taken a sip nor had she taken a bite, it seemed. Evan knew that she didn’t like vegetables and even fruits, but still—

“You shouldn’t be a picky eater,” he teased. That incited a small giggle from his team leader; a welcome wholesomeness to contrast the ambient sounds of undeath around them. He sat down cross-legged a small distance away from her and started working his water bottle. He did not know if that made rehydrating them faster or not, but it beat doing nothing to distract himself from his stomach.

“I’m not hungry.”

“You haven’t eaten since yesterday noon.”

“I’ll eat it later. When the sun rises. Probably.”

A weight suddenly pressed into the point where his calves met, causing his ankles to dig painfully into the concrete. He looked down and saw Violet had laid her head on his legs. She was still staring at her bottle. They weren’t using any light, so what could have caught her attention inside? Nothing, probably.

Evan sighed and leaned back. He supported himself using his left hand and spun his bottle absentmindedly with the other. The sky was partly cloudy; just the right amount of moonlight passed through to prevent the city from becoming completely engulfed in darkness. It was still dark, though. He had to squint hard just to see the bottle in his hand.

Ten years ago he would never have imagined a city — any kind of city to become so devoid of light — and life. At night there were always people running around with their phones or with their car’s headlights on. Street lights would flood the roads with their eerie, yet assuring cone of illumination. Houses rife with activity lined both sides of the streets while the glow from the city always reached far as if to announce to the world that it civilization was there. Yet now, all that remained was darkness.

The hustle and bustle of a developed nation, replaced by a primal writhing that seemed to have risen from the depths of hell. That was the kind of world it was. It lashed against humanity, dragging everything into ruins. Wherever they tried to establish some semblance of society, the undead were sure to be attracted to it. Forget culture, not even a quiet living was possible anymore.

Even just playing an instrument once again could cost them their lives.

“Useless shit on your head again?” He jumped at the sensation of something touching his earlobes. Following the arm that the hand was attached to, his eyes met with Violet’s own.

“It’s not useless,” he replied defensively. He raised his head to look at the sky as if to take refuge at the fact that it looked as dreary as he felt.

“Fuck yeah it is. You’ve had the same thoughts for so many years now. Where did that get you?” she laughed. Her voice, despite having a mocking tone, had an uncharacteristic tenderness to it that anybody who didn’t know her well enough would be surprised to notice. “Still here looting cities and corpses instead of playing music, right?”

Violet always had a way of getting into somebody’s nerves. It was a sad thing to get used to, but after a long time being under her, Evan depressingly belonged to the depressing category of depressed people who did. All he could do at that point was sigh.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Still, she made a good point. Evan wasn’t in a position to argue. He should just quietly be grateful that he was still alive, even though every second was spent in lamentation and regret. No amount of thinking would change reality. And even if he could act, what could he do?

His mood plummeted once again. He hated having time to think about himself. Free time only brought disappointing topics to his mind. As much as he disliked it, having to constantly be wary of the undead beat sinking into pessimistic thoughts. More than a quarter of his life had been spent among zombies and in the end he had thought of it as nothing more than an underpaying job. Sure his life was always in danger, but something broke in him after ten whole years.

He sighed again at that thought, and once again when he realized that sighing had become a habit.

“You’re right,” he finally said. “That’s pretty mature of you, leader.”

“Easy. For someone who claims to be so rational, you’re pretty emotional yourself. It doesn’t take a set of eyes to see that.”

As she declared so, she pointed at her long bangs that hid the right side of her face. Due to the almost complete lack of illumination, he could barely make out any details, but he managed to recognize a bit of the characteristic scarring she hid there. Meanwhile, her left eye stared at his own pair intently, its power piercing through the darkness.

They stayed like that for a while before Evan, slightly flustered, broke their eye contact first. Violet chuckled in response.

“... I want to take that girl into the team. No matter what it takes. That’s why we’re here.”

“Even if you were to put all of us in danger? Well... I never doubted your decision in the first place.”

“Yeah, but you were set on leaving her behind if ever those bastards below found us, right?”

He sighed for the fifth time that night and turned his gaze back to Violet. More than her eye, his attention lingered at the dark red cloth around her neck. It had originally been white before. He felt his blood rise to his head for a moment until he noticed that Violet’s mouth was curved into a smile. He tutted and raised his arms. As expected of her, really.

“You got me. Care to tell me why, though?”

“Hmm… She’s strong? Isn’t that enough of a reason?”

“What do y—ow ow! What are you doing?!”

Before he could finish his question, Violet’s hands found their way to his ears once again. She pulled at it with enough strength to make him yelp in pain. He hurriedly pulled her hands off and leaned back to a distance where she couldn’t do any more damage. But while he rubbed his aching earlobes, he noticed that Violet was holding a strangely familiar rectangular object in her hand. It was then that he realized that one of his pockets felt strangely lighter. Specifically, it was that pocket, the one he tried his utmost to protect when the subject of dinner came about.

“You—”

A small piece of rock hit his head. It stunned him a good deal. He turned to look at where it came from only to see Frank with his back to the wall looking quite irate. Frank, predictably, gestured to them to quiet down. They’d made a lot of noise. Both of them concentrated their attention at the door, struggling to find even the faintest indication that they had disturbed the status quo downstairs. It took them two whole minutes of relative silence before they managed to calm down again. Their shoulders relaxed; a great load off its shoulders.

“Thanks for the meal, pal.”

And it was just enough time for Violet to completely down his ration.

----------------------------------------

Dawn came without any more incidents. They finalized their rotation quickly with Violet being in charge of the final shift. She also promised to not open a can with a sledgehammer, but Evan knew better than to completely trust her with it. That was why before he turned in to rest, he asked Frank to keep an eye on her as the only person between them who managed to get some sleep in before everything. Even if in the end his worries had been misplaced, it was still a necessary measure for him to be able to sleep soundly.

Evan woke up to the smell of food being cooked; a welcome reprieve from the scent of rot that had become an everyday thing. He rubbed his eyes open to see Violet sitting on top of a barricade of debris that had been erected to block the door while he was sleeping. A good distance away was Frank who was heating a few cans over a fire; safe already as the light would no longer attract the attention of wayward undead due to the sun.

He turned his head to the side and saw Io, still unconscious. At least her breathing had stabilized. But the thought of having to continue waiting for her soured his mood. A bottle full of fruit water and a jar of honey lay untouched to her side.

“Still, huh?” he voiced to nobody in particular. It was then that he noticed another bottle of water near his feet, still full of water and discolored slices of fruit. Obviously, it wasn’t his, as he had consumed most of it when he was still awake. Frank wasn’t one to waste food either. That left him with—

“Did you not eat at all?” he asked Violet as he walked over to her with her bottle in hand. The only reply he got was an exaggerated shrug with a smug grin on her face.

He wanted to throw the bottle at her face, but he managed to hold himself back splendidly. As his own bottle was nearly empty, the thought of taking her bottle for himself crossed his mind, but in the end he decided against it. With any luck, breakfast should be fulfilling for all of them considering their earlier haul. Then again, that also implied something else.

“It’s just a feeling, but it doesn’t hurt acting on a suspicion if it lets us get back alive, right?” was what Violet replied to his hunch with. Both of them stared at the general direction of the rising sun, bathing in its warm light as much as they possibly could before the clouds hid it once again. While they could huddle around the small fire Frank made, what they were doing just felt like the right thing.

He stretched his arms and contemplated on washing his face with the sweetened water. Discouraging sounds came out of his spine as he leaned back on his usual routine. It was loud enough that Violet heard it, which elicited from her a wide, mocking grin. For the sake of his own pride, he ignored her and finished with kicking the sleep out of his feet. The cold weather did a number on his old bones and it seemed like every joint cried out in fatigue with every movement he did. If his muscles had started to fail him too then it would be a good time to consider retirement.

Yeah, right.

“So, leader, what’s the plan?”

“Wait until she wakes up.”

“That’s it?”

“Yep.”

That didn’t sound like a plan at all. Though he knew that Violet wasn’t the kind of person to do something without a plan, she was also very honest, for better or worse. The thought of it made Evan’s temples ache.

“What if she doesn’t wake up?”

“She will.”

The way she declared it as if she was absolutely sure that Io would regain consciousness took him by surprise. Surely, the thought that maybe she collapsed due to some illness or condition occurred to her, right? For all they knew she might have slipped into a coma, and they wouldn’t realize it until it was too late. In addition, they technically did have a schedule.

Though… he didn’t want to leave her either, especially after she made such a memorable impression on them last night.

“For you to just faint like that after all you did; not cool at all.”

He looked to the sky and took comfort at the fact that it looked as dismal as what he was feeling.

They had their breakfast soon after that. Among the many supplies they managed to take, there were packs of beans, new-type bread and grains. The latter made for especially good keeping, as they were still quite edible after a decade. All it took was a few minutes in boiling water, and they would have a good amount of carbohydrates to last for the day. Of course, they didn’t taste good after so long, but it was better than starving. In a way, Evan was more excited about eating rations. They were, in many ways, much better to eat than old canned food. However, canned goods were valued not for their taste, but for their relative rarity. Some could be exchanged for quite a significant amount of ammunition, for example. Since Io was still asleep at that time, they put aside more food for her in addition to the fruits and honey.

At that point she would be waking up to a breakfast in bed. Quite luxurious.

It was a meal spent in relative calm. That was despite several undead spotting them on the surrounding buildings, only to fall to the ground as they tried in vain to cross the large gap with their less-than-admirable speed. It was unavoidable at that point so all they could do was thank the fact that it was incredibly unlikely for these zombies to get up for a while after taking that kind of fall. And once they did, they would probably forget about them at that point anyway. The only thing they shouldn’t do was to stand on the edge of the building in plain sight of the undead below them.

Then, as Frank was about to take another bite from his stale bread, he suddenly froze. His food dropped from his hand at the same time as his jaw. With wide-open eyes he struggled to say something and failed miserably. Baffled, Violet and Evan looked back to where he was gawking. They, as experienced runners, were rarely genuinely surprised by anything. Their job was running through hell and back. Their wisdom showed in their unconscious decision to reach for their weapons. But as both of them processed what their eyes saw, Evan and Violet couldn’t help but drop their own food in a similar manner.

Io was awake, which was great, but the issue was the state in which she spent her waking moment. She stood a safe distance away from the edge of the building whilst facing the sun. Her hands were clasped in a strange manner to her chest. The way her hair danced behind her as the wind caught it gave her an otherworldly appearance. Despite the exaggerated curve her back was bent at, the way she had her head bowed in quiet serenity made her look like a saint. Yes, it was as if she was praying—

“Don’t look, hey! Moron! Frank, close your eyes too!”

A pair of hands clasped over Evan’s eyes forcefully, almost making him fall back on his head. But though he was swallowed by an unwanted darkness, it was too late. His brain had already engraved the image into his memory and made several hundreds of backups for posterity and science.

Io was definitely, surely, completely naked.

“I’ll go get her some clothes. Don’t you dare open your eyes!”

What choice did they have? Evan was quite sure that if Violet saw him ogling at her then a taser baton would fly his way in a beautiful arc across the sky. The resulting pain would likely make him scream loud enough for every zombie within the next few blocks to hear, so he should try avoiding that scenario. Besides, he doesn’t need to open his eyes anymore. He could simply access the part of the brain men always reserved for just such a sight.

But of course he had a very good reason for doing so. It’s not because he wanted to stare at Io’s sculpted body straight out of fantasy, with a large set of breasts, narrow waist, slender legs, a tight ass, and perfectly-toned muscles; basically a body that would make a top model feel suicidal for not having it, definitely not. It’s because he saw something that felt familiar — ah, yes.

—Because there was a giant mark that almost completely covered her back. Due to the distance between themselves and her facing the sun, he wasn’t able to make out exactly what it was. But it was striking enough that it made an impression as strong as the otherworldly perfection of her body, if not stronger. There were other marks on her body, but they were incomparably smaller than the one on her back.

If he was being honest, the more he knew about Io, the more suspicious she seemed. Though it was an unwritten law in the group to leave the final decision of recruitment to Violet, Evan doubting her choices was as natural as the sun rising from the east. And this was by far the most questionable decision she’s made. He could still remember Io’s answers the night before when they questioned her. As a precaution, they sent Frank to sleep just in case she said something that would get her shot. Logically speaking that was a stupid move; having a gun pointed at a suspicious person could only be beneficial for them. But Violet insisted on giving way to the quiet girl with the static-like voice, even going so far as to stop him from retaliating when she drew the team leader's blood. She could have died! But Violet absolutely insisted; recruiting Io should be made the top priority of the mission. Her fierce, almost animalistic eyes forcefully made Evan understand that she did not even care if she returned to camp with no supplies at all. The only question was if she was willing to sacrifice him or Frank if it meant completing that objective.

Maybe Evan was becoming senile, but perhaps Io hypnotized them at some point? All the irrationalities of everything that had happened caused him a splitting headache.

“You can open your eyes now,” Violet’s exhausted voice came, which caused him to unwillingly stagger back to reality. When he did, the pleasing appearance of Io, clad only in a loose shirt, pants and boots, made him thankful for being alive.

“The shirt’s bulging—”

He slapped both his cheeks, earning him a look of confusion and a look of disgust from the two women in front of him; which person had which face need not be said.

“Here, breakfast is served,” said Violet cheerfully. She handed Io a can completely filled with oats boiled with dried fruit and a bit of honey. Normally speaking that would be quite a delicacy in a world where taste was the last thing on everybody’s head when eating. But the face Io made as she took her first bite spoke volumes on what she thought of it.

“It sucks, huh? Well, nothing we can do about that.”

Violet shared her gripe as she took another bite from her tasteless hardtack. Evan and Frank both looked at their own cans, similar in size to Io’s but only half-filled with a lonely mix of oats and salt, and smiled tiredly. They wanted to save up on supplies, so they elected to only consume a bit of the rolled oats they found with some of the bread they found with Io’s supplies as well as the salt they kept with them, leaving the leftover dried fruit slices and honey for emergencies. During their operations they prioritized the intake of calories and liquids over taste. It wasn’t much different from when they were traveling in relative safety, but in general nothing ever tasted well enough to brag.

As if realizing that, Io’s gaze lowered and her shoulders dropped as if she was apologetic. That action earned amused reactions from everybody around her.

“Don’t worry about it. Just eat!”

Violet tried her best to keep Io’s mood up. Everyone did their best to accommodate her, so the least she could do was look happy about it. Both Evan and Frank were already so used to tasteless, or unpalatable, unappetizing food that they’ve grown numb to displays of slight extravagance, so they really didn’t mind. Violet didn’t like to eat in general, so it was obvious what she thought. Nodding, Io went back to eating from her can while she forced a grateful smile on her face. Frankly speaking, she looked precious doing it. At least she felt human in that regard.

The rest of the meal was spent with small talk as each one of them, save for Violet, consumed everything they were given. There, they learned that Io was indeed praying, and that she prayed thrice a day. Evan had no idea what religion survived after the apocalypse, and he honestly wasn’t interested. He just thought it was interesting for such a pious woman to survive through all of it. Why did she have to pray completely naked, though?

“I have to,” she said. Evan wasn’t going to lie to himself; that was perfectly fine for him. In fact, he welcomed the idea. Definitely.

After they finished, Frank rinsed the insides of the cans with a bit of their precious water and kept them in his bag — one could never know when they could be of use, after all. Empty cans could be used to keep food items in bags or thrown somewhere to create noise. Everything had its use in a pinch.

While Evan surveyed the area, Violet checked up on Io to see if she was well enough to fight. He was mainly interested in the western direction, towards their camp, but he did not neglect to consider other paths as well. When they entered the city, they mainly headed towards their destination following an east-southeast trajectory. When they first encountered Io and ran to her base, if Evan remembered correctly, they headed to the northeast. If he factored in the time they spent running and the distance they covered, Evan guessed that they needed to head directly west for a day and a half or so to reach camp. However, if he guessed correctly that direction would take them right into the edge of a massive group of zombies that had been attracted by Violet’s scream the day before. And since a long time had already passed since then, they would have occupied the nearby buildings as well unless they were thoroughly sealed. In order to avoid them, then they would need to head slightly north as well, and adjust themselves accordingly.

That seemed like the best plan, Evan thought. But that was only if Io wasn’t going to lead them in another direction. Considering Violet’s thoughts on the matter, he had already resigned himself to running around in circles. Engaging himself in thinking of rational solutions to their current predicament was one of his means of escape, besides simply covering his ears. It would really be great if they could just start to head back already. At least doing so would make it far more bearable than having to head somewhere on what might just be a wild goose chase.

Sure enough, after a while Violet and Io came to where Evan was standing. Violet had a huge, annoyingly smug grin on her face like she had just won a race. He could already guess what she was about to say.

“Io decided to join us—”

That’s great, he thought.

“—but only after we do her a favor.”

Not so great. Evan’s eyes narrowed. Technically, they still owe her a lot. First, she saved his life. Then she allowed them to use her base, and lastly she willingly parted with her supplies which she earned through Nathan’s negligence. Sure, they stayed with her through the night when she was completely defenseless, but that was it. Even the food they ‘gave’ to her for breakfast technically counted as just returning what originally belonged to her.

On the negotiation table, she held the advantage. That was why Evan could only show a displeased face. Violet wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer, anyway. Ultimately he acquiesced to the condition. His team leader’s smile widened to the point where he was shocked that it didn’t tear through her cheeks.

She gave the floor to Io, who stared directly at Evan with her bright green eyes. Before he found himself lost in them, she spoke with the same static-like voice that still somehow sounded pleasant.

“I have: things. Need to get them… Will get them. Then join you.”

That was it.

… Somehow that was more normal than what he thought she would ask. He half-expected her to make them fight a horde of undead somewhere. She needed to get her stuff first? Well of course, if she had personal belongings then simply leaving it behind as she grouped up with a bunch of strangers was the opposite of a great idea. In all likelihood she might have more weapons to defend herself with just in case they were bad people.

Very rational. He liked it, despite it going against his plans of going back to camp early.

“Alright, that shouldn't be too much of an issue. So where is it?” he asked. Io then pointed towards the northwestern direction; a bearing well within Evan’s general idea of ‘towards camp’. That made him even more relieved. He would have lost most of his motivation if she had pointed anywhere east. Surely Violet understood what he felt. Frank would be happy to hear about it as well.

"Big stone building. Roof gone... lots of glass. Broken."

He had no idea what she was talking about. Basically every building around them fit her description except perhaps the roof being missing. He made a mental note to look for that particular feature.

And with that, with fresh faces and renewed vigor, they planned their route towards the northwest. If fortune was on their side, then they might reach camp before they had to spend their third or fourth night outside. The hope of finally being able to take a bath on a river pleased Frank in particular. Evan, on the other hand was simply happy that they were at least getting closer to camp. Violet, well everybody knew why she was all smiles.

Io stood behind Evan, pretending to participate, but stayed well away from the sight of everybody else. She was smiling, too, just like everybody else was as well. However, her face wasn’t that of someone who had finally found a group to journey along with.

It was nothing so wholesome like that.