Chapter 7

7

Anna

This place hardly smells like a farm anymore. Both the offensive animal stink that typically comes with raising cattle and the bright scent of fresh plants growing in the massive garden are hardly noticeable.

Logically, I understand why. Before they brought supplies to the sorority house, my brothers and our father freed all of the cattle and left the plants behind to die. I don't know how far the cows, pigs, goats, and sheep got before coming to their untimely deaths, but I doubt many of them are still roaming around. It's been almost a year since the breakout, and farm animals who are bred to rely on humans aren't always the best at fending for themselves.

The plants are all victims of the sun and a lack of watering. I can still see the withered rows of what were once flourishing food sources. Cucumbers turned into piles of dead vines and leaves, the same with the tomatoes and beans. It's just all dead.

Leaving my bag on the ship, I check my belt and my boots to make sure I have everything I need for the first scan of the area. Drak and I plan to camp out here tonight, knowing that moving quickly could be counter productive at this point. What if we leave an area too fast, and my brothers come wandering in it the next day? We need to be vigilant about this.

Drak doesn't need to sleep daily, but I do. We'll take shelter in the main house tonight unless Drak doesn't sense that it's safe. Worst case, we just stay in the invisible ship overnight. There's enough space for me to curl up and get a few hours of rest in. But we've got hours before we need to consider my sleeping arrangements.

"Are you going to hide it?" I ask, nodding to the spaceship.

Drak nods, pulling out the small remote and clicking it. Instantly, the hunk of metal disappears. "Where shall we start our search, Mean One?"

Ignoring his insistence on that nickname, I chew on my lip as I think about the best place to begin. Chances are, they're not here. But if they did come back at any point, Caleb may have been smart enough to leave a note, or a clue, or something that could help us. He'd leave it where our father wouldn't think to look.

"The house," I say, pointing to the large white structure a short walk away.

The wrap-around porch still looks intact, so hopefully, squatters haven't been here, using it like some kind of free sanctuary. If some strangers messed up my chances of finding my family by touching anything in there, I might lose my mind.

"Lead the way, fierce hunter," he insists, smiling.

When Drak would call me stuff like that before it made me want to strangle him. He'd call me things like a huntress or a warrior and it just felt like he was teasing me, taunting me about how I'd never be as strong or skilled as him. Fortunately, I learned pretty quickly that while Drak is playful, he's not mean. He doesn't consider himself above me. No, he thinks I'm interesting.

Carefully, we begin to walk through the uncut grass. I wouldn't put it past my father to lay out traps for zombies or even unwelcome visitors. If I step into a bear trap, I'll actually shoot my father if he's still alive. Drak wouldn't let the thing kill me, using his advanced machinery to heal my wounds better than any human medical center might, but he wouldn't be able to erase that initial pain.

"Watch your step," I remind him cautiously.

We already discussed the possibility of dangerous traps lying in wait for us. But, honestly? I think the prospect of besting human traps only added to his excitement about coming here. Drak loves a challenge, after all.

"I am watching," he replies reassuringly. "I do not see any metal in the grass along our expected path, but I will continue to watch carefully."

"You can predict our path?" I ask.

"Yes," he says proudly. "I know where your feet are leading us."

Learning a new Aprixian ability is an everyday sort of thing with Drak. But essentially, they have fucking superpowers. All of their senses are heightened. They're stronger, faster, smarter, and they have almost analytical brains. It's like they see things that aren't there. Apparently, like marking out paths with only deductive reasoning skills.

"And you don't think there are any traps where we're walking?"

"I do not," he agrees. "There are no dents in the grass patterns ahead."

See? Superpowers.

"I'm still going to walk slow," I warn. It's not that I don't trust him; mostly, I don't trust myself. I'm not sure how I'll react to seeing the house and whatever state it may be in.

Drak chuckles lightly. "I am in no rush, An-nana."

Well, good.

After moving slower than necessary for a few too many minutes, we approach the porch steps, and I go still, looking up to take it all in.

"No living things," Drak reports from behind me, and I let out a held breath.

Still, I don't make a move to go inside. Not just yet.

"It is a fascinating structure," he comments, coming to my side to get a closer look. I see his head shifting from the corner of my eye, taking it all in. "Different from the other hu-nim dwelling."

The sorority house he means. "Yeah, well, that place was a mess before we moved in. This one has been used as a family house for generations, so it's been kept in better shape."

Drak hums, absorbing the information. "Should you like for me to go in first?"

"No," I answer immediately. I'm not scared to go in. I don't need Drak to check it out for me. Taking a deep breath, I force my feet to move. I just need to do it.

Drak doesn't move with me, and my heart starts to beat harder.

"Come on," I grit out through my teeth. "Let's go in before there's no sunlight to see in there."

I can practically feel him grinning behind me. "A wise idea, Mean One."

The porch steps creek loudly under our boots, the old wood still sturdy enough to walk on. When we get to the door, I don't hesitate for a second more. Reaching out, I wrap my fingers around the cold metal and twist. It budges without effort, the lock not being used.

"Anybody home?" I call out, cracking it open. "You should probably make yourself known unless you want to be shot!"

Drak rumbles with laughter. "You are too kind, An-nana, warning those who may be lurking."

"Well, on the off chance that anyone hiding here is someone I know, we should probably exercise some caution," I return dully.

His head dips in understanding, white hair bouncing with the action. "Very wise."

Allowing the door to swing open, I check the ground for wire traps and eventually decide that it's safe to pass the threshold. Drak follows my every move, not feeling the need to lead and take over. Drak is perfectly content being a soldier. He's never ignored a direction from Marrec or Terum. Offering me the same respect that he does them is one of the reasons I'm finding it harder and harder to be rude to him.

"Still nothing?" I double check, but begin to walk around inside.

"No heartbeats," Drak answers, eyes scanning the space surrounding us. "No heat, no scents… we are alone."

Nodding, I try to relax and calm my racing mind. The house is a bit messy, but nothing too out of the ordinary. I'm guessing when they abandoned me, they left this place behind just as easily. Maybe they came back once and awhile to regroup, but never stayed. Only my father would see the zombie apocalypse as some sort of cosmic challenge, instead of something to run and hide from.

"Well," I mutter, walking in a circle around the main floor with Drak following my every move. "This is it."

"It is nice," he replies easily. "You lived here all your life?"

Unfortunately . "Yes, the property has been my family's for a long time."

"Ahh," he rumbles in understanding. "Shall we check the next floor?"

Shrugging, I agree. "Sure."

As we pursue through the second story, nothing sticks out in an obvious fashion. There's no written notes hanging on doors or obvious clues that jump out at me. When we get to the third and final floor, my stomach twists. At the end of the hall, my bedroom door stands there, taunting me to have a look.

After my first semester of college, coming home felt disturbing. Like every time I came and went, less of me existed here. Now that I'm twenty, I couldn't feel more disconnected from the eighteen-year-old girl who moved out to go to college. That Anna would never believe I joined a sorority, let alone that I loved being in it before the world went to shit.

Straightening my shoulders, I stride across the wood floors and shove open my door, barely stopping it from crashing against the wall. I don't need Drak to worry about me because I'm slamming things.

My room is pretty much how I remember it. My twin-sized bed is made up with blue blankets and a chaotic bookshelf sits next to it stuffed full of hunting magazines and old textbooks. The paint on the walls seems to be chipping, but that's not new either.

The whole room isn't much. My family never had money to spend on things that a teenage girl might like to fill her room with. There's no excess of clothes, purses, perfumes, or any sort of collectibles… aside from the small pretty stones I've kept and the homemade obsidian knives and arrowheads on my dresser.

When I started college, the first thing I did was get a part-time job that actually paid money. Working on a farm for your family means you earn dinner and a warm house in the winter, not cash to actually profit financially. Hell, if I didn't get a full-ride scholarship, there's no way my dad would have let me leave to begin with. With a partial sorority scholarship, too, I was able to pay my dues with my salary without fuss.

So while I was studying Education in hopes of landing a teaching job in the future, I was delivering pizzas and finally had the ability to pay for things I wanted. I tried new foods, adopting a severe love of sushi and every kind of dumpling. I got my hair done professionally for the first time and even started to get manicures.

I felt like an adult for once, like a woman instead of some farm girl with no future prospects and a life mapped out for her. I got to choose what I did, what I wore, who I talked to. It was amazing and terrifying. And it was all for nothing .

Money means nothing, half an education means nothing, and all the progress I made adapting into who I wanted to be meant nothing. I'm right back where I grew up, in survivalist mode. Only now, I'm not hopeful like I used to be. I'm bitter and rotten. Mean too.

The harsh sting of tears hits my eyes, and I shake my head before water can start to pool there. I will not cry. Especially not in front of Drak.

Speaking of…

"Is this your room, An-nana?"

"It is," I mutter, attempting to distract myself from the emotion trying to clog up my throat. I hate it so much, the way that being here affects me.

I maneuver around my bed, searching for any sort of hint from Caleb. If he were going to leave a message anywhere, it would be here. Dad never comes into my room, whether I'm home or not. God forbid the man sees a bra hanging about.

"Ooo," Drak coos, moving to my dresser. "Are these stone blades?"

"They're volcanic glass," I answer, immediately knowing he's looking at the obsidian. "It's not natural to this area, but it's been used a lot throughout history. My brothers and I found some in a nearby river."

Someone probably forgot it there once upon a time, which is cool when you think about it. At the time, I didn't care where it came from, just that I'd gotten it for free.

" Volcanic ?" he asks, picking up an arrowhead to test its sharpness against his finger.

"Made by a mountain that explodes with really hot liquid rock," I explain the best way I can. "There aren't any close by here, but on the other side of the country there is."

Countries are still something the Aprixians are digesting. Both their planet and city go by the same name. A lot of their planet is unused by their people, full of animals and plants that are allowed to roam free. We've described it to them like other little planets living on one globe, and apparently, they know of other beings on planets that live that way. They call them sanctuary planets, I think. They're used for various types of aliens to reside when they have to flee their homes or something.

"Hu-nim mountains explode?" he asks, examining the other obsidian blades.

"Only some," I emphasize. "Volcanoes."

"Ahh," he hums. "This word translates."

Volcano does, but volcanic doesn't? Their translators seriously need an update. I'll tell the girls to find some dictionaries to bring with them when they go, maybe they can do something with them. Scan them, or I don't know, learn the old-fashioned way.

"Yeah, well, volcanoes make the glassy rocks, and then humans can break them into tools and stuff. I used deer antlers—horns—to make those."

His eyes practically sparkle. "You crafted these?"

I shrug. "Yeah, when I was younger. They're kind of messy."

Drak shakes his head. "I like this one," he gushes, smiling at the biggest of the bunch. It's probably the sharpest as well.

Shrugging again, I sit on my bed and tell him, "Keep it."

Drak freezes. His eyes go wide, and swing over to me. "Truly? You wish to gift it to me?" He looks like I just told him he can have Earth if he wants it.

"Don't make it weird," I say quickly.

Holding the blade close, he practically clutches it to his chest. "I will cherish this gift, An-nana. It is an honor."

"You're making it weird," I point out.

We've both made each other a knife now, does that mean… oh lord, am I friends with Drak? How did that happen?

I make a move to stand up, ready to get the hell out of this godforsaken room when a lump under my pillow catches my eye. Carefully, I lift up the soft cotton, discovering an unfamiliar journal underneath.

"Drak?" I croak, emotion swelling in the back of my throat once more.

"What is it, An-nana?"

I pull out the little book and hold it up. "This isn't mine."

Please let it be a message.