{"id":161,"date":"2011-05-09T00:00:26","date_gmt":"2011-05-09T04:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/?p=161"},"modified":"2011-05-09T00:00:26","modified_gmt":"2011-05-09T04:00:26","slug":"day-zero-chapter-3-03","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/?p=161","title":{"rendered":"Day Zero – Chapter 3 – 03"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWhat the hell came down on you guys?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cMy guess would be about two and a half floors.\u201d\u00a0 J.T. hauled himself out of the hole, watching critically as the camps staffers carried Thom\u2019s limp body clear of the rubble they\u2019d just been dug out of.\u00a0 Almost as an afterthought, he reached back to drag Brandon up and out of the hole by the back of his collar.\u00a0 The younger man growled slightly, then dusted himself off as soon as he\u2019d clambered clear of the hole, glaring at J.T.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The glare wore away as he looked at who their rescuers were.\u00a0 Brandon blinked a moment, staring at them, shocked.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2026you guys don\u2019t look like rescuer workers.\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Kellin gave him a level look.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re what you\u2019ve got, Brandon.\u00a0 Don\u2019t knock it.\u201d\u00a0 She glanced toward J.T., then toward Thom, then back toward J.T.\u00a0 \u201cWhat came down on him?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 J.T. grimaced.\u00a0 \u201cLike I said.\u00a0 About two and a half, three floors.\u201d\u00a0 He worked his arm up and around in a wide loop, his shoulder popping as he did.\u00a0 \u201cWe have anyone who can do much of anything for him?\u00a0 Someone not me, I mean.\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019ll sort that out quickly enough, I think.\u00a0 Jacqueline and Leah are in one piece.\u00a0 Maybe a couple PT\/OT students or a couple nursing students.\u00a0 We\u2019ll do what we can with what we\u2019ve got. Don\u2019t have another choice.\u201d\u00a0 She turned toward the camp staffers.\u00a0 \u201cGet a mattress or something so we can carry him back on it.\u201d\u00a0 A pair of them nodded and jogged off, presumably to get the required implements.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 J.T. rubbed his head.\u00a0 \u201cBad, right?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Kellin nodded.\u00a0 \u201cBad enough, anyway.\u00a0 Marin made it back to campus, god only knows how.\u201d\u00a0 She dropped her pendulum to dangle between her fingers again.\u00a0 J.T. attempted to rake the dust from his hair.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWe were coming up from the basement of the building,\u201d he admitted.\u00a0 \u201cThom\u2026said all of a sudden that we needed to come up.\u00a0 Guess we weren\u2019t fast enough.\u201d\u00a0 Either that or he felt it, decided it was nothing, and didn\u2019t mention it until it was too late.\u00a0 That\u2019d fit with Marin\u2019s consistent complaints.<\/em>\u00a0 He looked around.\u00a0 \u201cIs she here?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Kellin tilted her head toward the corner of the courtyard.\u00a0 J.T. could just see Marin perched on a wreck of a bench, looking like she was half asleep, just barely visible over the debris that littered the courtyard.\u00a0 He grimaced.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cShe\u2026you probably don\u2019t want to let her see him like this.\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cYou act like we\u2019re going to get a choice.\u201d\u00a0 Kellin grimaced.\u00a0 \u201cShe won\u2019t give us one, Jay.\u00a0 You know her.\u00a0 She\u2026ugh.\u00a0 She told me to use this to find survivors.\u201d\u00a0 She held up the pendulum a moment, which started swinging in another direction as if on its own accord.\u00a0 Kellin sighed.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 J.T. patted her shoulder.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ll come with you.\u00a0 Rather not see her reaction to Thom.\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Kellin smiled wryly.\u00a0 \u201cDon\u2019t blame you.\u00a0 Come on.\u00a0 Pointing us this way.\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 They crunched quietly together through the rubble and remains.\u00a0 J.T. tried to rub some more of the dust out of his hair.\u00a0 \u201cWho lived?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cSo far?\u00a0 Not enough,\u201d Kellin sighed and shook her head.\u00a0 \u201cBut with finding you and Thom and Brandon\u2026we\u2019re pretty much all accounted for, maybe, I think.\u00a0 I was working at the library.\u00a0 Tala was in the lab.\u00a0 Drew and Davon and Carolyn and Rory and Jac were at the library.\u00a0 You saw Marin.\u00a0 There wasn\u2019t anyone else still kicking around, right?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cNo.\u00a0 Everyone else was gone.\u201d\u00a0 Gone for good, now, probably.<\/em>\u00a0 He felt strangely hollow.\u00a0 The full shock of it probably wouldn\u2019t hit until later, he guessed.\u00a0 There were a lot of friends that were gone now, if this was the end, if the world was in a shambles, never mind the amount of family that was gone.\u00a0 He felt a dull ache at the idea of never seeing his mother or his brother again.\u00a0 Brother\u2026oh shit.\u00a0 What about Marin\u2019s baby brother?<\/em>\u00a0 He looked at Kellin.\u00a0 \u201cWhat about her brother?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Kellin nodded.\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s here.\u00a0 Safe.\u00a0 He was hiking down in the ravine when everything happened, working on some geology project or something.\u00a0 Thank god for small favors, right?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 J.T. grunted, glancing back over his shoulder again.\u00a0 Rubble obscured his view of where Marin had been sitting, of where he and Thom and Brandon had been pulled from the ruins of the building.\u00a0 \u201cDo you really think we\u2019re going to find that many more survivors?\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cNo,\u201d she admitted softly.\u00a0 \u201cBut we have to keep looking until we can\u2019t.\u201d
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He nodded firmly in agreement.\u00a0 More living bodies meant more safety when the chips were down, and it was only a matter of time before that happened.\u00a0 It might not be for weeks or months, but at some point, someone was going to show up and try to take whatever they\u2019d manage to scrounge to survive on.\u00a0 Somehow, in his dysfunctional brain, more people meant a greater chance of survival.\u00a0 Intellectually, he knew that probably wasn\u2019t the case, but if he\u2019d learned anything since starting to hang out with Kellin, Marin, Thom, and all the rest, he\u2019d learned to listen to his gut.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This time, his gut was telling him that they were in this for the long haul, one way or another.<\/p>\n

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\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWhat the hell came down on you guys?\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cMy guess would be about two and a half floors.\u201d\u00a0 J.T. hauled himself out of the hole, watching critically as the camps staffers carried Thom\u2019s limp body clear of the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chapter-03","category-day-zero"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1EBlN-2B","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=161"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/awakenings.embklitzke.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}