deadheads by jade swiler (top 100 books to read TXT) 📖

I could stay by myself . I always hated that they went on trips and saw different places, now I realized they were in a lab somewhere, creating things that could wipe us off the face of the earth and the last thing they made nearly did. It had been 5 months since the outbreak and over a billion people were dead or turned this very minute. My parents did this. When I was younger I always thought they were awesome like super hero’s, their cover story to me was they helped other countries with finding water or food so babies weren’t starving anymore. Xmas and birhtdays wre forgotten and then weeks later a gift would arrive in the mail.

I wanted to go home, to the station where I had people that loved me and cared for me and who I could protect. My parents had already taken enough blood from me to figure out why I was immune. They didn’t need me here where I was usless.

Of course they tried to talk me out of leaving. But I just couldn’t stay, it was a Wednesday so I told hem I would leave on Friday.

The morning of my birthday dawned bright with new ideals and thoughts about going home. The station was safe from deadheads, the electric steel walls kept them off the wall and they couldn’t break through the fencing, but if Lt. Harris came with his army, we could be doomed, I had a few ideals on how to stop him but wanted to talk to seth about them.

God I missed Seth. Somehow he always made everything seem possible.

 

At breakfast I was surprised to see my parents at the table. As I sat down I could see both of them seemed excited and for a moment I was hopeful they had remembered my birthday.

“jade we have good news! We may of found the compund in your blood that made you immune.” my mother said with a huge smile on her face.

I nodded.

“that is great news mom, I was going to stay until tomorrow but I am leaving after breakfast is done, I need to get back and talk to the others.”

I piled food on to my plate and started to eat. It had took a few days to get here so I wanted a full stomache to get back on the road with. Sometimes you couldn’t eat a meal on the road with the deadheads around, all you could do is run and hide.

My parents didn’t really hear me because they were still talking about the blood I had donated to them.

After I finshed my meal I stood up and faced them. My parents must of knew I meant business because they stopped talking and looked at me.

 

“good luck, I really do hope you find a cure for this, since its my birthday it seems fitting to find a cure for all those poor souls that might be turned because of a virus you both made.” I said this harshly. My mothers face paled and my father looked down. I don’t know if it was because they forgot another birthday or that what I said hit home hard. I turned and walked away to my room to pack my stuff to leave.

I left and never saw my parents. They didn’t follow me to ask to be forgiven and I really didn’t care. Their world was in a lab, mine was outside in the hell they had made.

 

I had walked most of the day when I came upon 3 walkers in the road ahead of me. A lone human was walking up behind them and at first I thought it was another deadhead until it waved at me. She was covered from head to toe in blood from a deadhead, it was black and foul smelling. The other walkers didn’t even turn around and she stabbed each one in the head and watched as they fell to the ground and didn’t move. It was amazing.

 

“hi, how are you?” she asked and walked closer to me. The smell was horrendous, blood and gore covered her in a hick coating and I couldn’t tell even what color her hair was.

“my name is jade, how did you figure out to do this, the deadheads didn’t even smell or see you like they do us.”

“I’m Sara. To answer your question, a few months ago I was fighting a walker, more then 50 were coming at me from across a field. The walker was newly turned and as I stabbed it, its blood sprayed all over me. I was litterly bathed in the shit. I got sick, was bent over throwing up when something hit me from behind, a deadhead walked right into me and then walked past. I walked through them with my knife ready but they didn’t see me. So I do this when I want to go out and find food or whatever, it lasts 2 days before you have to do it again. “

So we put our hands in to one of the deadheads and coated me all over, she was right, the smell of rotted flesh was making me sick but afer a while you got used to it.

She decided to come with me to the station after I told her we had food and a safe place to sleep.

 

It was nice to have someone with me on the long walk home. She was a year younger then me but we liked the same music and guys. I told her about everyone at the station and she wanted to meet marcus really bad. It was warmer, a lot better then the walk here so besides being a little cold, we enjoyed our walk.

I stopped suddenly in the road.

“whats wrong?” sara asked.

I pointed up ahead and she saw them. A huge horde was walking towards us. I took out my sword and she put a hand on my arm.

“you can leave it out if it makes you feel any better but jade, they can’t see or smell us, we are safe. We are going to walk riht past them.”

 

I nodded but was scared to death. The horde got closer and I knew not to talk. They shuffled up to us and then wet past like we were not there. She was right, they didn’t see or smell me. We moved to the side so I wouldn’t have to brush up against them and walked forward at a slow pace. Soon they were long behind us and it was safe to talk again in whispers.

“that was amazing, I can’t wait to show the others. This makes us safe.” I said to sara happily.

“well it does until it rains.” sara repided with a sad look on her face.

She saw my questioning look.

“yeah I lost a good friend, we were out hunting for food and it started to rain, I got in a house and didn’t get wet, she did. I held there and watched a horde the size of what we just passed , rip her to pieces in front of me and there was nothing I could do. “

 

I stared at her in horror. That had to be the hardest thing to ever see and not be able to do nothing. We were quiet after that and kept walking.

 

It was getting late so we picked out a house in a subdivision and laid down to rest. The blood and gore was uncomfortable and we felt sticky but it was worth it if it kepts us safe and from being eaten.

 

The next day it was more of the sme, sometimes we passed deadheads, not a big horde but still enough od a pack to kill is if we were discovered. When it got dark, we still walked. The station was only a few miles away and I wanted to get there and get a shower. As we neared the darkened compound, a bright light suddenly turned on from the wall and I was blinded.

“its me jade, don’t shoot.!” I screamed towards the light.

“jade???” The Doc’s voice cut across to us.

“yeah let us in.”

The gates swung open and seth was there to greet me. He stopped walking and stared at me. I realized he saw the blood and gore all over us.

“its okay, ill tell you about it after I shower.” I laughed.

We were taken to the back of the building and washed with a hose to get most of the blood off of us. The water was cold as hell but the stuff did rinse away easily.

We went to the shower room right away and took off our clothes. In to a trash bag they went to be burned later. The hot water felt wonderful and I could see that in 5 months of walking around, sara had not known such heaven.

Jess brought me some clothes from my room for sara and I. we had washed 3 times to make sure all the deadhead shit was off of us.

 

I took Sara to the kitchen so we could eat a hot meal. a woman was standing at the stove, cooking hamburgers.

She turned around when she heard us enter the room .

“hey guys, I am making hamburgers and French fries for dinner. Be ready in a minute, go sit in the dinning room and we’ll be bring it out to you.”

I nodded and took saras arm. I didn’t know who that woman was but the smell from the kitchen was heavenly.

Everyone was at the table.

I sat down near seth and Sara sat next to marcus and jess.

“who’s the new cook?” I asked.

“her name is maggie, she was found by doc in an old apartment building west of us. Great shot with a rifle.” Seth told me with a smile.

Maggie brought out the food and we ate in silence.

Afterwards we went to the living room and I told the group why we had shown up covered in deadhead gore.

 

“wow that should help us if we are ever attacked outside the gates. They wouldn’t get us and we could still fight harris or whoever we run across. The deadheads will attck them and we can get away just fine.” jess said.

We hung out with the group until late and everyone said goodnight after jess said she would take Sara to an empty room that would be hers.

As I opened my door, I found a surprise inside, on my bed was a package wrapped in red with a green bow. A banner across my wall said “happy birthday.” it had everyones name on it and it brought tears to my eyes.

I sat down quietly and opened the package. Inside was a CD player with CD’s of my favorite music. I plugged it in and put on a cd of soft music. Seth came in and offered a hand to me and I stood up to dance. We held each other and I knew I was finally able to relax and enjoy my new life. The good and the bad.

 

Living at the station was great but sometimes borning, when spring finally hit with warm temps and spring flowers, I wanted to go outside in the yard and do something.

“hey jess, want to go out and help me plan some gardens?” I asked at breakfast.

“sorry jade, I have school with the kids, wwhy not ask maggie, shes got a green thumb.” jess pointed at maggie.

Maggie laughed.

“well I would say just a finger but ill help you.” maggie said as she got up to take her dishes to the kitchen.

 

The sun was warm on my face as I tilted my head back and looked up. The wall gave me piece of mind. I left my sword in the station. The yard was wide and mostly dirt because the shod was never put down. The rolls were still near the wall in the back. Maggie came out and we got shovels and started to dig up the earth in sections .

 

We worked all afternoon, taking a small break for lunch and