The plants slowly disappeared behind us as the SUV got as far away from the Costco parking as humanly possible.

In fact, I was pretty sure that we left skid marks on the asphalt in our hurry.

Not that I blamed Yuche, hell, that creeped me out, and I was hard to creep out.

Of course, I wasn’t creeped out enough that I hadn’t completely stripped Costco of everything it had. I mean, I left the zombie rats and the humans... but the food, the snacks, the supplies? Yeah, all that was mine now.

I had no idea what I was going to do with ten mini fridges, but I was sure that I could come up with something...

If not, it wasn’t that big of a deal.

Either way... waste not, want not.

And I wanted everything.

I heard the long, drawn out sigh of four men who thought that the threat was long gone, but I knew better.

Even several streets away, I could still see movement in the rearview mirror every once in a while. Vines slipped across abandoned vehicles while tree branches stretched farther into the roads than I remembered.

And that was only on the surface.

Anyone who was smart knew that a plant’s powerhouse was under the ground where the roots could reach out.

But I refused to worry about the fact that the greenery looked thicker now.

Hungrier.

Like the rats had been fertilizer with legs.

Honestly?

That sounded like a them problem.

My problem was... where the fuck were we going now?

"This doesn’t seem like the way home," I said, looking at Yuche and wondering if he was pulling the same shit as Zhenlan and Chenghai. "In fact, I would almost say that we are going in the completely wrong direction."

Yuche looked at me for a second, his eyes going wide. "Fuck," he grumbled under his breath like he didn’t even realize it.

"This is the direction of our old base," chuckled Lingyun. "I know you warned us about what muscle memory could do when you panicked... but I didn’t think that even you could get turned around like that."

Yuche shot Lingyun a glare. "I am not panicked," said the other man, straightening up in his seat. His hands gripped the steering wheel tighter for a single second before he forced his body to relax. "I meant to go this way."

"Uh-huh," I agreed. "But can we now head back home? I’m more than done with today." I jerked my thumb back toward the way we came as if Yuche needed help figuring out where to go.

Yuche stiffly nodded his head, and was about to turn the SUV around when Chenghai opened his mouth and continued to ruin my day.

"We need to stop somewhere else."

I turned slowly in my seat.

"I’m sorry," I start, blinking rapidly at him like he had suddenly started to speak a foreign language "...Why would we do something stupid like that?"

"We didn’t get enough supplies," was his immediate answer. His face was dark but expressionless as he looked at me. "If we want to survive, we need more things."

I stared at him for several long seconds. I mean... I get his need for more supplies... but.... no.

I looked at Zhenlan, the man who had once never been able to say no to me. But he was completely useless, giving me the same look that Chenghai was.

Still not convinced, I turned back to Chenghai again.

"You saw the zombie rats, right?" I asked, wanting to make sure that we were all on the same page. I mean... there really was only one page.

My page.

"We left with almost nothing," came his reply.

"We left with our lives," I pointed out. "I think that makes us higher up in the standings if you know what I mean."

"That’s not the same thing," said Zhenlan. "We can’t hid in a house and wait for death. Without supplies, we might as well walk out into a horde and let it tear us apart."

Honestly, the fact that he said that with a straight face felt deeply concerning.

Lingyun looked horrified too. "No. Absolutely not. Costco was enough adventure for one day. My vote is going home."

"The downtown core should still have supplies," Zhenlan said calmly. "If the infected population moved outward during the early outbreak, then most of the stores downtown should still be intact."

"Or," I suggested, "we could go home."

Nobody answered immediately even though Lingyun was frantically nodding with me.

I crossed my arms and leaned back against the seat. "I still don’t understand why everyone feels the need to leave their homes during an apocalypse. Don’t they listen to the government when they say ’shelter in place’?"

Lingyun snorted softly. "Most people don’t have killer plants protecting their driveway."

"That’s a minor detail."

"That’s an extremely important detail."

I waved one hand vaguely toward the window. "If you’re going to die anyway, you might as well die in your own bed. At least you get to be comfortable."

Lingyun stared at me through the rearview mirror.

"That is genuinely one of the most depressing things you’ve ever said."

"No," I corrected. "Depressing was getting eaten alive by zombie rats in a Costco. I’m pretty sure that all those people wished that they hadn’t left home."

"...Okay, fair."

Yuche’s fingers tapped once against the steering wheel before he glanced toward the mirror.

"They’re not wrong about the supplies."

Fucking traitor.

I narrowed my eyes at the side of his head.

"We’re already out here," he continued. "If downtown is emptier, then we should take advantage of it."

"That’s exactly the kind of logic people use right before becoming cautionary tales. You might as well be auditioning for Shark Week with the whole ’we only went in for one last swim.’" 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

Chenghai ignored me completely. "The farther inward we go, the fewer scavengers there should be."

"And the fewer scavengers there are," I muttered, "the more likely something horrible already ate them."

Nobody argued with that, but the car still wasn’t turning around. In fact, it changed direction just enough that I could see that we were heading toward downtown Rongdu.

The same place where the radio was telling everyone that would listen to NOT go.

But hey... what did I know? I only survived this once. Why not test my luck a second time?

Gritting my teeth, I stared out the window.

Out of the frying pan and straight into the fucking fire.