Title: Fine
Fandom: Warm Bodies
Rating: Mature
Length: 416 words
Content notes: Also for the weekend challenge at 1 Million Words, with the prompt "zone." Character Death
Summary: As far as she knows, Nora is the last living member of the pharma hunting party


As soon as the noises were gone, Nora slipped out of her hiding place. She ached all over and even walking was painful, but she knew that she couldn't stay beneath the desk forever. Worse things that Corpses roamed this world. She looked out the window, and saw Julie walking away, surrounded by the Corpses who had just attacked them. Nora wasn't sure if she had been turned or was only a captive, but there was nothing she could do about it either way. She had to save herself.

It took her a few minutes, but she found a gun that still had some ammo left - Jeff's - and then she began a careful inspection of the room. There were a few bodies on the floor, and she checked each one carefully. There were four Corpses, each with a head-shot. Nora stared at the one who had pinned her for a long moment before moving on. There were also five humans, all dead: Perry, Berg, Monique, Jeff, and Thom. All five had had their skulls busted in, and Nora tried to avoid looking at them above the neck.

Nora wanted to race back to the city, but Perry's words halted her. They needed a pharma run desperately; she knew that better than most, as she was normally on work detail at the infirmary. It was a gruesome task to get the other's bags, but she managed it, and she filled them all as quickly as possible. The Corpses were gone, but that didn't mean that there weren't more out there. Or worse, Skeletons.

Slinging the bags over her shoulder, wincing as they smacked into her bruises, she grabbed a second loaded gun and, doubly armed, burst out into the hallway. The trip back was nerve-wracking, but mercifully free of the walking dead. Nora almost sobbed when she saw the graffiti scrawl "Welcome to the Dead Zone" that they had passed on the way out. She hurried around the corner, knowing that she was almost to safety. Kevin was on duty, and he hurried towards her, raising his gun.

"I'm not bitten!" She yelled, holding her two guns up in her least threatening way. "I'm fine!"

She wasn't really. She had just seen her best friend get dragged away by Corpses and the deaths of the rest of the hunting party. She was bruised from head to toe and had almost died herself. She wasn't bitten, wasn't going to turn into a corpse, but she was not fine.