I start to panic and search frantically. Fighting the urge to call out her name. I stop to centre myself, and look for tracks. From the glow of the lights in the power station parking lot I can see a pair making their way up the hill. A pair that are not my own.

I lose sight of them about half way up the hill. Where the light from the parking lot fades into darkness.

Looking around my immediate area I see nothing. I venture closer to where I believe the other tracks would have reached the top. But still I see nothing.

The illuminated part of the hill only shows one set of tracks. No indication of anything having gone back down. That only leaves one place for them to have gone. The forest.

It takes me a moment to find an opening, as I scan along the line of trees. That must have been where they went in. I follow.

I'm barely three steps into the forest before something grabs onto my leg. I jump and pull back. Ready to fight, sure this is the thing that took Germaine down. Then I hear a whisper.

"Levi."

I look closer to see it's Germaine herself, hiding in the bush.

"What are you doing? Are you okay?"

I ask as soon as I get close enough that she can hear my whispers.

"Did you see any zombies?"

I continue before she has a chance to reply.

"I'm fine, one was coming up the hill so I crawled into the bush here. It didn't see me, stumbled past about ten minutes ago. It should be far enough away now that we don't need to worry about it. I saw more and more zombies filling in the fenced area, what's going on in there?"

"It's the zombies."

I pause, trying to catch my breath.

"They must've turned the power back on. They're electrocuting themselves."

"Oh God, they're recharging. When we left the car. The one that attacked me, did you notice the slime that came out of its head? It wasn't moving. It wasn't even glowing. I didn't think much of it at the time. Because I had never actually seen the slime for myself up until that point. I only had accounts from you and Court to go by. But it all makes sense now. That's what was happening. They were running out of power. That's why the one that took your boot was crawling. If it had a broken leg the bugs would have fixed it. But if it was low on power they wouldn't be able to. I was right when we were back in the apartment and I said we could just wait it out until their batteries die. I never thought they'd restore power themselves."

Germaine grabs my hand.

"Levi, we have to stop this. We need to find a way to shut it down."

"How? There's nothing we can do. There's too many of them. What we need to do is leave."

"We can't just leave."

"Why not?"

"Because the fate of humanity could be resting in our hands. This could be our chance to put an end to this whole apocalypse."

"The fate of humanity? We're all that's left of humanity. Ours is the only fate there is. And if we try and stop them, our fate ends right there. There's too many in there. Even if we rammed a truck into the building we'd never get out alive."

"Do you really want to live in this world! Wouldn't you rather die a hero than live like this?"

"I don't want to die at all. I'm leaving now. If you want we can come up with a plan. Return when we find a way to blow up the station from a distance or something, so we don't die in the process. Until then I'm leaving. Are you coming with me or not?"

"I hate you sometimes. You know I don't have a choice but to go with you. Where are we even going? How long will we be gone. Every minute more of them are recharging, every minute counts you know."

Germaine continued on like this for a long time. I stopped listen almost immediately. Not that I didn't care about what she was saying. But I had to focus on getting us out of this hot spot. And take us somewhere safe and warm with plenty of food.

I walked through the wooded area heading the opposite direction we had come from originally, dragging Germaine behind me. It didn't take us too long to find a street with plenty of cars on it. Spoiled for choice but freezing I put Germaine in the passenger seat of the nearest one.

Thankfully the doors were unlocked. I got in reached down to hot wire it, and it started right up. Germaine turned on the heat. A feature I didn't know was available before now. And the gas tank was full. I'm still not sure exactly how far that will get us. But I figure it's probably more than sufficient.

I follow the signs to the highway. Another sign lets me know its only a few exits to Gristol. I know exactly where we need to go.

Pulling up to a familiar home, I park in the drive way. Before we get out of the car I tell Germaine.

"This place is perfect. It's got everything we need. Food, protection, warmth. It will be a nice comfortable way to spend the night."

"How do you know about this place?"

"I've been here before. But I have to warn you. When we enter, you won't like what you see. Maybe I should go in and get it ready first."

"No, whatever it is can't be any scarier than sitting out here alone. Just take me in."

I scoop Germaine up into my arms. And walk us both over to the front door. Germaine grabs the knob and turns it.

The door swings open and Germaine lets out a scream.

An even louder scream comes from inside the house. As there in the door way, staring directly at us. The zombie baby.