Sam’s POV

The car’s ride was nice; we talked about different things, some important things like the survival in this fucking apocalypse and some silly unimportant things like how to fold a paper to make a boat. We joked and laughed as if we were some old friends going on a car ride on a Sunday afternoon for shopping and sightseeing.

Unfortunately, nothing lasts forever, the closer to the town we get the more nervous and uncomfortable I felt. It has been years since I have been with humans or talked to them without killing them (except for Jack), so, what if I got angry and ended up killing them? What if they discovered that I’m a zombie and attacked me?

At that point in time, I doubted any of them could really hurt me unless they used heavy weapons or I allowed myself to get hurt and canceled all my defenses like what I did last time when I got killed.

Jack could hurt me though, if he used his abilities and fought me seriously, which led me to the main question. If a fight between me and the humans happen, what Jack is going to do? Will he help me? Or attack me? Maybe he would step aside and just watch?

As these thoughts occupied my mind, I started to regret my decision to come with Jack, the stakes were high, I could end up being the reason for destroying that group of survivors.

I smiled sadly to myself and turned my head to look through the window at the grain fields, they used to have farmers all day long working in them, but at that moment they had zombies roaming them instead.

I rubbed my forehead with my fingers, trying to clear my mind from all the disturbing thoughts. Suddenly, a hand grabbed my other hand tightly, I looked at Jack and before I could say anything he stated “Everything is going to be fine, even if it isn’t fine, we will make it fine, so, stop worrying yourself so much.”

I smiled at him and retorted “Who said that I’m worried or anything like that?”

He raised his eyebrow and smirked “Good, we will reach the base within five minutes.”

I just nodded and tried to pull my hand away from his, but he tightened his grip on it, I could have pulled it hard and forced it free, but I secretly liked the calming feeling of his hand on mine, so I just sighed and let him hold it.

As I gave up the idea of pulling my hand from his, he glanced at me and grinned, which made me feel like slapping him on that grin of his, I pursed my lips a little embarrassed and looked through the window again.

After a few minutes we were at the outskirts of the small town, I could see soldiers stationed on the rooftops, with a few guarding the entrance to the town, as we approached; they waved at us to stop the car, as soon as we parked on the side of the street, two soldiers came to us with guns in their hands and asked us to get out of the car.

Jack gave me a reassuring look and nodded his head, so I opened my door and stepped out of the car as did Jack; one soldier approached me and examined me, he was looking intently at my body while circling around me as he asked “Did you get scratched or bitten by those infected people?”

“No” I answered him clearly, but I was laughing in my mind and really wanted to mock him and tell him that I’m a full-fledged zombie.

He nodded and asked again “Are you from this base? What is your name?”

Before I could answer him, Jack interfered and said irritated “No, he is not from this base, I brought him with me, and his name is Sam Black. Can we enter now?”

The soldier glared at Jack; clearly not happy with his interference, and sneered “You can only enter after a full body examination and quarantine for eight hours.”

He stopped talking for a moment as he walked toward Jack with a smirk on his face before he continued “By the way, Captain Lucas is waiting for you, he clearly told us to inform you if you ever returned alive.”

Jack just ignored the man and looked at me “Let’s go to that building for the examination and quarantine” and pointed to one of the houses near the entrance, though it’s bigger than a normal house.

I followed Jack quietly until we were a good distance from the soldiers, I looked back at them only to see one of them taking the car to a big yard full of other cars while the other one returned to his position with his eyes fixed on us as if to make sure that we were going to the check-up point.       

I approached Jack and whispered with a shaky voice “What if they made a blood test?”

Jack looked at me for a second then whispered back “They won’t, they tried before to use the blood test but it didn’t work for two reasons, first, the people with abilities have the virus in their system so in a blood test they can’t differentiate between them and the zombies, secondly and most importantly, the virus doesn’t show in the blood until the person is about to turn to a zombie, so they can’t detect it in the first a few hours of the infection, and that is why they are using the quarantine to determine if the person is going to become a zombie or not.”

His answer made me wonder how and why I can sense the infected people only after a few minutes of the infection, nevertheless, I just nodded my head.

We entered the house with two other soldiers, they asked us to remove all our clothes except for our boxers and made sure that we had no scratches and bite marks, it was really uncomfortable how the soldier was staring at my body, I’m glad that my skin’s color was almost normal and I didn’t have any rotten flesh or old scars since I can heal myself when I eat human flesh.

After the check-up, we put our clothes back on and one of the soldiers escorted us to another big room or more like a big hall, filled with people, some were wearing military uniforms and some had normal clothes.

Suddenly, Jack held my hand tightly and pulled me to him, almost crashing me against his chest, I looked at him only to see his face was a little red, I didn’t really know why, but he looked angry for some reason while trying to find an empty place for us to sit.

We found an empty space in a corner, Jack pulled a blanket from his space-storage and laid it on the floor and asked me to sit, I eyed him before mumbling “Thanks” and sat on it, he looked around him for a moment then made himself comfortable next to me.

We were sitting silently and watching the people, some people were talking to each other while some were crying and sobbing, the atmosphere was really bad and making me angry to some degree, so I decided to close my eyes and tried not to focus on them.

After about half an hour, I heard an angry voice shouting Jack’s name which made me open my eyes and looked at the man, he was tall and masculine with small eyes and black short hair, he was wearing a military uniform.

The man looked at Jack with fire shooting from his eyes and shouted angrily “You fucking put me in a bad situation in front of the general because of your fucking lie and added to that your disappearance, don’t you ever dare come to me again.” As he finished shouting, he left stomping just as he came.

Jack’s face twisted because so many people were staring at him, some with curious looks while others with disgust, I couldn’t help but cover my mouth to hide a laugh was trying to escape my lips, Jack looked at me for a moment then he started to laugh which made me laugh even harder.

After we calmed down I asked Jack about that man, it turned out his name is Lucas, and he was the team leader which Jack went out with at the morning, and since Jack left them and came to see me, the team leader had it rough with Jack’s father and to make matters worse, Jack lied and said that he had taken permission from his father, while in reality, he went out without permission.

During the quarantine period, we talked, rested, played some stupid games and even secretly absorbed some crystals, it was really boring and a waste of time, they really should find another way to determine the infected people.

According to Jack though, they had invented a machine to test the people in the original timeline a few years after the start of the apocalypse, but he has no idea how it worked, so he can’t help in making it.

When the quarantine period was over, it was already about two in the morning, we made our way to the house Jack was occupying, fortunately, the house was empty, no other people were assigned to it yet, Jack led me to a room while he went to the one next to it, we said our good night and entered the rooms.

I lay on the bed and closed my eyes, I don’t need to sleep but I was mentally exhausted, the day felt very long and full of events, especially for me who lived for years almost alone without anything to do, a smile crept on my lips at the dramatic change in my lifestyle, for the first time in years I almost felt alive.

Early in the morning I left my room and went downstairs to the living room, I took a book and sat on the couch and started reading until I saw jack coming down while rubbing his eyes to wake himself up, he looked cute for some reason, I shook my head to remove the thought and greeted him, he looked at me then smiled sweetly before saying with a hoarse voice from sleeping “Good morning, how long have you been awake?”

I just shrugged and answered “I don’t really need to sleep, but I have been up for about an hour or so.”

He looked at me with his eyes half-open while rubbing his head then went to the kitchen and mumbled in a hardly audible voice “You could have prepared some breakfast.” 

I was then convinced that he was still half-asleep or even sleepwalking since he almost hit his head on the wall while trying to enter the kitchen, I said in a loud voice to make sure that he could hear me “Jack, wash up until I prepare some breakfast.”

He looked at me with a happy foolish smile and made his way up the stairs.