“I’m surprised there are no other cars,” Caeden remarked.
“We felt it wasn't necessary,” Titania explained, “We’ll meet up with them later. For now, do you have space for one more person?”
“Of course!” I smiled, placing my hand on the testing panel, lights settling on green quickly before stepping in the van, waiting for the others to complete their tests.
“Tia, you want to drive?” I tossed the keys to her and turned to Titania, “Where are we going?”
“Memphis.” Titania promptly answered, and Tia nodded, climbing into the driver seat, buckling up and starting the van.
“Sit anywhere you want.” Caeden waved his arms indicating the seats around the van before taking his seat at his computer.
“You could also take a nap.” I pointed above me to a small cord.
“I’ll do that then.” Titania stepped back while I reached up to tug the cord and small stairs led up to a slightly cramped space with a bed, “Thank you.”
“Of course!” I responded, putting the stairs up after she climbed up before heading to my computer and started on the video feed from a few days ago.
I knocked on the ceiling saying, “Mrs. Titania, we’re here.” I then pulled the cord and almost immediately her face appeared, glaring at me.
“Titania, I mean.” i amended
“Thank you.” she said before climbing down.
“Let me guess, those big black SUVs are the ones we are with?” Tia popped up at my side, making Titania jump.
“Y-yes. Most likely.” Titania replied.
“Well then, let's not keep them waiting.” Caeden lifted his head to the ceiling, “Van, open the door please.”
“Of course, Caeden.” the van responded, provoking a wide eyed expression from Titania.
“Mrs. Titania, please tell me you know who these people really are.” Tia stared at Titania expectantly.
“I- uhh..” Titania bit her lip provoking a groan from Tia.
“You chose us but didn’t know who they were?” Tia shook her head and shoved me and Caeden together, both of us laughing hysterically, “These two. Are the children of Mr. and Mrs. Grion.”
“But..they said their last names are Wright..”Titania trailed off, confusion evident in her face.
“Yes, which is true.” Caeden said, before stopping and allowing me to finish, “We just decided to change our names.”
“Anyways. Let's get this nice lady away from all this confusion, shall we?” Caeden clapped his hands.
Me and Tia nodded, and both of us helped Titania out of the van and towards the hotel we had convinced her to let us book. We had Caeden go to the register and get our room keys before we went to the elevator.
“See you in the morning, Titania.” I said, once we arrived at her room.
“Same to you. I still cannot believe you are the children of Mr. and Mrs. Grion.” Titania shook her head before placing her hand on the testing panel.
We left to go to our own rooms, each of us with separate rooms. And they were huge. They had separate kitchens, bathrooms, living rooms and bedrooms. We placed our hands on the testing panels at the same time, and all of them settled on green. We nodded to each other before entering our rooms for blessed sleep.
Early in the morning, I was getting my boots on when there was a moan from the hallway. I grabbed my pistol and rushed to the door, looking out the peephole and grit my teeth, seeing infected in the hallway. Time to get some ratings, I grinned and threw open my door, drawing the infected towards me. I opened fire, taking down one zombie per shot. None got as close as five feet before they fell. Soon, I was standing alone in the hallway, corpses of the dead littering the floor. I looked at them, wondering how they had gotten up here before hearing moans from outside.
“Wha-” I broke off as I rushed to my window and looked out. The biggest pack I had ever seen had surrounded the hotel, “How?!”
I rushed to my bag and grabbed my sniper rifle, and rested it on the window sill, before realizing I was too high. I rushed back into the hallway, heading to Caeden’s door, banging on it.
“Not now!!” came a hurried reply.
The door swung open, to reveal an empty room. I cautiously walked in, heading towards the door opposite that was slightly ajar.
I tapped my ear cuff and said, “Call Caeden.”
There was a single beep before Caeden answered, “What?! I’m a little busy right now!”
“Where are you?!” I asked, getting worried now.
“Stuck in my room.”
“Where in your room?!”
“The living room.”
“Stay there, I'm coming.” I nudged open the door leading into the kitchen, from there I looked left to the door to the living room.
“I don’t have a choice, Lyn. Somehow the infected got into my room.”
I ran to the living door, slung my rifle over my back and pulled out my pistols. Caeden was standing on the table, shooting down zombies as fast as he could. His sunglasses had fallen slightly down his nose, revealing his dark looking eyes full of pain. A mob of what looked like 20 surrounded him.
I grunted as I opened fire. 10 zombies falling before even getting the chance to turn towards me. 5 more successfully turned and rushed toward me. I barely had time to fire before they were within five feet of me. I quickly fired 5 times, hitting each zombie in the center of their foreheads. I looked at Caeden and my knees nearly turned to jelly, realizing one of the zombies was the lady from the register. That's how they got up here. She was probably in a panic and the zombies managed to get in the elevator before the doors closed but she had already pressed the button to go to this floor. But how did this outbreak start? I thought, holstering one pistol and changing the other’s magazine, firing twice more. Caeden shot the other three and climbed down from the table.
“Let’s go check on Tia and Titania, shall we?” he winced before pushing his sunglasses farther up his nose.
“Yeah. why don't you ever let me buy those special sunglasses for you?" I asked.
“Because these work fine.” and with that he walked out of the room, heading for the hallway and I followed quickly.