Chapter 4
1202 Words
Ten hours later, footsteps sounded outside the storage room.
I curled up behind the crate. The fever had my consciousness swinging between clarity and delirium.
The door pushed open. Ethan's figure appeared in the doorway. His hands were empty.
"Where's the medicine?" My voice was completely wrecked.
He avoided my eyes. "All of it was used. Claire's condition suddenly worsened. He needed the full dose."
The storage room was so quiet I could hear dust falling.
I pushed myself up against the wall. "Ethan, you promised me."
"The situation changed!" He snapped his head up, his eyes bloodshot.
"What about me?" I pulled open my collar, revealing the vascular dilation under my collarbone caused by the high fever.
"I have a fever too. Isn't my life worth anything?"
"You're different." He stepped forward to steady me, but I pulled away.
"Enough." I cut him off.
"Take me to see Claire." I stared into his eyes.
"Or I'll go to the Safe Zone gate right now and tell everyone how their Commander gave life-saving medicine to the same person over and over, and abandoned his girlfriend who risked her life for him in a nest of zombies."
His face changed.
Half an hour later, he helped me back to the isolation zone office.
I pushed the door open. A thick smell of blood and rot hit my face.
Claire lay on the bed, the blanket pushed aside.
His right arm was already covered with gray-white streaks. The veins under his skin stood out, turning black. His fingertips had begun to show an unnatural blue-purple color.
The whites of his eyes were bloodshot. His pupils sometimes dilated, sometimes contracted. That was the sign of infection entering the second stage.
"Ethan..."
He saw us and struggled to sit up, but only managed a futile twitch.
Ethan rushed over immediately and held him up, his movements as gentle as if handling something fragile.
"Claire, don't move. The medicine has been used. You'll get better..."
I leaned against the doorframe, watching the scene, and suddenly laughed.
The laughter was unusually sharp in the silent room.
"Ethan, how long has he been infected?"
"Symptoms appeared yesterday afternoon..."
"Yesterday afternoon?" I raised my voice.
"So you already knew he was infected yesterday? So when you sent me to get the medicine, it wasn't any kind of preventive treatment at all. He was already beginning to turn?"
He had his back to me, his shoulders tense.
Claire grabbed his sleeve, his voice weak. "Sylvia, I'm sorry... I'm useless..."
"Of course you're useless."
I walked up to him.
"You just hide behind others, using your little healing ability as a golden ticket. How many soldiers in the Safe Zone have risked their lives? How many have you saved? Are you worth using all the resources to protect?"
"Sylvia!" He turned around, and finally there was anger in his eyes.
"Enough is enough! Claire cured Helen's daughter's pneumonia just last week—"
"So what?" I cut him off.
"He gets to drain the Safe Zone's resources indefinitely? Because he's infected, he gets priority for the medicine, and I should just die? Ethan, where are your precious rules? Where's the fairness you're always talking about?"
Claire started coughing, bringing up dark red bloody froth.
He frantically patted his back. The panic and tenderness in his movements were completely undisguised.
I looked at them. The fever inside me suddenly became a burning wave, rushing from my heart to every limb.
The dark red streaks began to burn. The veins under my skin felt like they were about to burst.
"Commander Sterling." I used the formal title.
"According to Article 7 of the Safe Zone Code, a confirmed infected person shall be transferred outside the isolation wall before turning, or shall be terminated by a team leader or higher. Claire's current condition already meets the requirements of the code."
His body went rigid.
"What... what did you say?"
"I said, according to the rules, you have two choices now."
I spoke word by word.
"First: transfer him outside the isolation wall immediately and leave him to his fate. Second: as the team leader, finish him yourself to prevent him from threatening the Safe Zone after turning."
Claire's breathing quickened. His eyes opened wide in terror.
He held him tighter. He looked at me with disbelief and fury.
"Sylvia, are you insane?!"
I shook my head.
"Why are you putting such an important resource at risk of turning into a zombie? Or is it that you, Commander Sterling, think your personal feelings are above the lives of everyone in the Safe Zone?"
The words wiped the last trace of composure from his face.
His face turned ashen. His lips trembled, but he couldn't say a word.
The standoff lasted a full minute.
Then he gently set her down, stood up, and walked to me.
He pulled out his gun and pointed it at me.
"Hand over your gear. Then leave." His voice was ice-cold.
I looked at him and suddenly understood.
"You're kicking me out?"
"Article 9 of the Safe Zone Code..." He recited it expressionlessly.
"Sylvia, you are currently emotionally unstable and showing symptoms of possible infection. I have reason to believe you may commit acts that endanger the Safe Zone."
I laughed.
"Fine."
Still laughing, I began unbuckling my tactical vest.
"Ethan, you've gotten really good at this move. When you need me, I'm a trustworthy comrade. When you don't need me, I'm a potential threat."
I took off my gear piece by piece and threw it on the ground.
In the end, I was left in only my faded, washed-out combat uniform.
"Is that enough?" I asked.
His gun was still aimed at me. "Get out."
I bent down and picked up a survival knife he had missed.
It was very old, the handle worn. It was the gift he gave me when we graduated from military school.
"This, let me keep it as a souvenir," I said.
He opened his mouth, but in the end said nothing.
I gripped the knife, turned around, and walked out of the office.
Outside the door stood a few team members who had come running at the noise.
They saw me, their eyes went wide. They seemed about to say something, but I stopped them with a shake of my head.
The gate of the isolation zone slowly opened.
I walked out. I didn't look back.
The sun was sinking below the horizon. The sky was dyed blood-red.
In the distant ruins, zombies howled, one after another, as if welcoming my arrival.
I walked about half a mile and stopped at the base of a broken highway bridge pillar.
The fever had reached its limit.
Dark red streaks crawled up half my neck. My skin was so hot it felt like it was melting.
I leaned against the cold concrete pillar and slid down to the ground. The hand holding the knife was trembling.
Not from fear.
But from something inside me—something surging and crashing through my veins, trying to burst out.
"Ethan, Claire... I will make you pay."
I closed my eyes and let that wave of heat consume my entire body.
- Writer
