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I was running. I was running ******** hard. I was tired as s**t, and it wasn’t doing me any good. I reached the edge and looked off. I was far. I was peering off the edge of a building. It looked to be about three stories tall. A building? I looked back, I there were hundreds of zombies in the distance I saw only the blue sky. I looked over the edge in front of me now. There was nothing below, just concrete. Immediately in front of me was another building. There were people on it. They were yelling at me, but I heard nothing. All I could hear were the zombies behind me. They were close now. I jumped. I soared. I reached out for the edge of the roof in front of me, but it was too far. No. It was not, I stretched farther and I grabbed it. Looking down, now there were hundreds of undead below me. How did they get there? I looked up again to see someone’s hand reaching out to help me. Who were these people? I couldn’t make out their faces. Was it the sun? I reached up to grab the hand. But it was getting father away now. Why? Were they leaving? No. I’m falling. I wanted to look down, but I couldn’t. I could feel the ground getting closer. I only saw the sky and the building in front of me. The building behind me had vanished. Where did it go? No. There’s more. I see debris falling. I see…. A face…. Wait, I can’t see the face…. I can feel the ground right under me. Soon….

I sit up and open my eyes. It’s still dark. I’m sweating. I here something rustle. I immediately, grab for my gun. The lights turn on. Clasping my firearm, I look around. I’m in a small cluttered office of some sort. Then I see her staring at me. I remember now. I fall back onto the pillow and spread my arms wide exhaling my breath that I didn’t even realize I’d been holding. I closed my eyes to block the overhead light. It was weird. I’d been trapped in here with Amanda for nearly a week now. You’d think I’d be used to it. We didn’t talk much, but then again we barely got along. Every time we started a conversation about making plans to escape, we’d just resort to cursing at each other. Still, this time I was panicked when I awoke. I very rarely dreamed, and this was the first time I’d had a nightmare since I was a child and frankly it scared the living s**t out of me. I felt her standing over me. I opened my eyes halfway.

“What’s wrong…. You’re sweating….” She seemed a little concerned, but by now we’d figured each other out pretty well. The first day we’d met, she accused me of being “rotten to the core” but the truth was that she wasn’t much different. We both hid our animosities well, and barely cared at all about the other’s well being. “You have a nightmare?” She asked.

“Yeah….” I said sitting up slowly. “I never have nightmares…. I never have dreams….” I voiced my concern over the surprising event. I twisted and looked back at her.

“Well if you hadn’t noticed, we live in a nightmare…. Don’t be so distraught by it….” She said as she turned to the bathroom and locked the door behind her. b***h. As if I don’t know what was all around us. Just because she might have nightmares all the time because of our current living situation doesn’t mean I have to get used to it. She walked back out with a tooth brush in hand.

“You know I used to have nightmares every night when this first started, you just have to control them and eventually get them to go away.” She reprimanded and began brushing her teeth hovering over the sink.

“Well sorry, I guess I’m just not used to it…. But when did yours go away?” I asked looking upside down at her as I lie my head back down on the self dampened pillow. She spit in the sink and glanced my direction.

“That’s none of your business….” She stated coldly then turned and swished her mouth out with water. Of course…. I can’t expect her to actually be pleasant in the morning. Nope, that would be just crazy now wouldn’t it? I sighed then got up and walk over to my duffle bag on the desk and sorted out a pair of clean clothes. On the second day I was holed up in here, Amanda mentioned to me that she moves about to other stores in the mall using a ladder to get above the ceiling tiles and crawl over the walls. Problem was it became hard to tell where you were going or what is safe. Also it could be hard to get back up depending on where you dropped down. Either way, I’d raided Sear’s and a few other stores so I’d have at least some basic supplies.

“Nothing is my business….” I mumbled as I took of my shirt and threw it in the corner. Before I could get my clean one on, I received a solid shot to the head with a shampoo bottle. “What the hell was that for?” I demanded.

“Learn to be a little cleaner jerk, and if you haven’t noticed there’s a lady present?” She complained in vain. After staring at me stand there all but clueless for several moments she had no choice but to sigh and addendum, “Try to be a little more clothed when in my view.” Granted I was only wearing a pair of boxers, but what the hell did she want from me? There was no laundry basket for dirty clothing, so I just piled it up until I had a chance to toss it out during the nightly outings to other stores. As far as actually being clothed was concerned, well, she was taking up the ******** bathroom at the moment and I’m an impatient guy. At some point she’ll just have to get used to it.

“I’m sorry, I’d forgotten that I was breaking the queen’s law your highness….” I mocked. We began our clockwork bickering when we both shut up completely as we heard glass shatter. We both snatched up pistols and moved cautiously to the door. I creaked it open slightly and we both peaked through. It was still early enough for the sun to shine through the sky lights in the main hall, so we spotted the broken front window glass easily. There were several undead trying to force their way through on the east side. Though they weren’t making very good progress, the triple thick window pane that I didn’t think they’d break anytime soon was now gone. How long would the makeshift furniture barricade hold for in all actuality? I looked at her at the same time that she looked at me and our eyes dead locked. It was unspoken, but I could tell she was thinking the same thing I was. We would not be able to sleep here for much longer. I closed the door and took a seat on the filing cabinet after I placed it back. When I turned she was still watching me intently while she sat on the desk next to my duffle bag.

“No more fighting…. We need to leave…. Tonight has to be the last night for us….” She eyed me with so much concentration that I was almost thrown off by it. She was dead serious for once. I probably could have said anything I wanted to her without pissing her off at that point. But I had to be just as serious now. We were ********.

“If we can make it to the roof my bike is outside the food court entrance. We won’t be able to take much with us, but I have plenty of supplies where I was before coming here. It’s not too far, so we can get there within an hour and if the road situation is still similar to when I came here, then we should be fine.” I said hoping that she would have some idea as to how to find some roof access. Surprisingly she commented back in a way that I didn’t expect at all.

“What makes you think I have any desire of escaping here with you at all? If you didn’t notice, I was fine here on my own until you came and ruined it. Then any chance of the zombies giving up went out the window since you’re the biggest a*****e I’ve ever met and we do nothing but argue which attracts more of them….” She spoke with an emotionless tone. I was stunned. I knew she was cold, but ******** I figured she’d take the opportunity to make it to a safe place at the very least.

“Well….” I spoke disappointedly, “I plan on living…. As much of a pain in the a** that you are, I can’t help but to be relieved while you’re around…. I don’t want to be alone and have to sleep with one eye open….” I stated honestly staring her straight in the eyes. I forced the thought from my mind that I just wanted her to help me get to the roof. I refused to think that I wouldn’t care less if she stayed behind once I got out there. I had to cede to the fact that she could see right through me, so I can’t expect that others wouldn’t be able to either. I needed to be more honest. I needed to convince people through logic instead of treachery. There was a long silence before she answered.

“I want to go with you. No, I have to go with you. But that doesn’t mean I’m staying once we make it to your little hideout. I have other things that I need to do, so don’t count on me being there to watch you sleep all the time. But since neither of us want to die here, I’ll get us to the roof.” She stated reluctantly as she started to pack her things. We both only packed what we needed. I packed everything I’d brought with me in the first place, and I also filled the duffle bag with many of the items that I’d picked up in various locations around the mall. I was planning all along on my eventual return home, so every time I dropped into a random store in the mall, I’d keep an eye out for something that I knew would make life at home a little more convenient.

After a short explanation, we jumped up into the ceiling. I had to admit she was daring to say the least. Her plan for making it to roof access involved a long dash down one of the corridors in order to reach a staircase hidden in one of the service access hallways. Unfortunately, we would not be able to cross the corridor due to the skylights, so we’d need to exit from the front of one of the stores and run around. This covered a good 80 yards that would be in the open. As we got ready to climb up and leave for good, she stopped me and opened a cabinet I hadn’t really noticed before. As I peered inside, a grin stretched across my face. I couldn’t help but think if I didn’t hate this girl’s guts I’d probably have ******** kissed her. Two Mossberg street sweepers and a several boxes of buckshot were stuffed inside. I pulled one out and loaded it up shoving four of the extra boxes into my duffle bag.

As we slowly crawled around air ducts attempting to be as quiet as possible, we would periodically lift up tiles to check on any undead. So far we’re clear. I really want to avoid being surrounded again. We continued across store after store towards the end of the row. Only a few more stores to go, and of course, disaster strikes. You see, those ceilings, don’t exactly get cleaning very often, so dirty as they are, I just so happened to catch a great big whiff of dust bunny central and bam, I start sneezing my a** off. Besides the fact that I sneeze loud as hell, and many times in a row, the zed could hear easily through the cheap crap tiles and they started waltzing our way.

“s**t! Move your a** David!” Amanda growled as she pushed by me while I was attempting to recover. She made it a whopping ten or fifteen yards before her rushing cam back and bit her in the a**. The ceiling caved beneath her and she plummeted to the floor below. I quickly crawled after and peered down on her. She seemed conscious, but dazed. No undead were in the store yet, so I dropped down and helped her to her feet. I flipped on my flashlight and looked around. Knives, swords, and axes were everywhere. We’d landed in the knife shop. I glanced up at the nearest wall and smiled coyly. Maybe this was good luck after all. A quick kick to the glass display case in front of me shattered the one thing standing between me and my brand new pair of katana. I gleefully dismounted them and crammed them into my duffle bag as Amanda elbowed me in the side to draw my attention.

“Hmm…. Crap….” I muttered aloud as I glared out the front glass windows to see ourselves completely surrounded. I stood there for a moment counting out the heads and deciding the best way to deal with situation. Before I could finish, a roaring boom in my ear left me deafened. I winced blinking my eyes for a moment. When I opened them, the glass was raining down all around the zombies and a few of them were lying on the ground. Turning my head slowly, a steaming shell flew past my face as Amanda squeezed the trigger on her shotgun again, leveling two more of the shamblers and completely eradicating of their heads. Following suite I yanked on the strap across my chest, pulling the gun over my shoulder and let loose. As we walked into the aisle in front of the store dozens of bodies smushed under foot and we slowly walked back to back to the end of the guard rail blasting any moving corpse we could see. By the time we’d made it around the banister to the side where our escape route lie, the wave of undead in the distance seemed ceaseless. And we had a full 50 yards to the hall where we needed to be. No words were spoken. They didn’t need to be. We just ran. And we ran like mad. We quit killing everything in our path and settled for blowing away only the zombies that we couldn’t get past. The wave was getting closer and closer to our only exit, but we had to get there first. Ten yards away, almost there, we were about to make it when she caught one. It tripped her up and she fell hard sliding a few yards before coming to a dead stop right behind me.

“********! Get up b***h! Get up!” I screamed trying my damnedest to fuel her rage. But it didn’t work, she had no adrenaline rush. She was out for the count. I slammed the butt of my Mossberg against the forehead of the one who knocked her down sending it reeling over the rail. Tossing the gun back over my shoulder, I grabbed her by the arm and yanked hard, pulling her limp body up enough to scoop her into my arms. Turning back I dashed as fast as I could to the opening. The horde had caught up first though, so I had no choice but to dive right into the fray. I jump towards the one closest to the door foot first knocking it back. It crashed into the others behind it toppling several, and allowing a tiny gap for me to get through. Barely scraping by with hands scraping across my back, I pumped my legs painfully. Coming up to the stairwell access, I slammed shoulder first as hard as I could into the door knocking it off its hinges. The door crashed against the far wall with me not far behind. I hit back first and dropped straight to my a**. The impact knocked the breath out of me and I was left there on the cold damp floor gasping for air with the unconscious woman in my lap. Breathing deep I stare up at the roof above noticing the stairs only had 2 flights to the top. I was almost there. Before I could get enough air into my lungs, I felt a hand grab my shoulder. I jumped and reached for my knife, but before I could my eyes caught another’s and I was staring dead into a pair of deep blue eyes. Just then I felt another hand pat me gently on the cheek and I realized I was looking right at Amanda. She rose shakily using my shoulder for a brace, then lent me her hand and pulled me up. Both battered and out of breath, we slowly took the stairs with our attackers lagging behind. Thank god that these bastards don’t do well with stairs. They can’t climb anything really, and only manage to make it up stairs by crawling over each other as they fall. By time we’d reached the top we were completely exhausted and I didn’t have the energy to take out another door. Amanda shot the handle off, and I leaned into the door head first swinging it open. I walked several yards to a higher level of the roof and boosted her up, climbing up soon after with her assistance which took what little left we had in us. Falling flat on my back I looked up at the moon and stars and took a fresh breath of air that smelled sweet as the night sky. Amanda plopped down next to me and strategically whacked me just under the ribs as she lay back.

“That’s for calling me a b***h.” She stated smirking while staring into the night. I rubbed my gut slightly then lay back again. We’d made it out alive somehow even if it was a painful process. Tired and aching I could do nothing but laugh. I was pleasantly surprised when she joined in rather than hitting me again. Soon after that we fell asleep under the stars. I slept well that night too.