Chapter 02. Old Friend

At nighttime James decided to stay up late to scroll down his laptop, trying to figure out what was going on. News pops up informing people to stay indoors, lock the doors, and stay vigilant due to a mysterious virus that’s spreading across the country. James who’s beginning to worry kept looking through his laptop “across the country? Are there any safe shelters?” he said to himself.

Aslan who couldn’t sleep woke up and went to James for comfort, he walked and laid his head on James’s thigh, startling James. “Baby why aren’t you asleep?” James said worried, “I’m scared, I don’want tona be alone.” Aslan Answered as he snuggled closely to James. “Have you messaged your friends?” James said as he strokes Aslan’s hair. Aslan who never thought about that looked up at James with panic “no, should I?!”. James looks at Aslan also panics “No! no… don’t worry about them, they’re probably fine in their home, just go back to sleep baby.” James said, trying to reassure Aslan to not make him more worried. Aslan who’s still worried decided to listen and went back to sleep.

In the morning James woke up before grabbing his phone to check. He was shocked to find 10 messages and 20+ missed calls, he quickly called back the number and a woman picked up the call, “Thank God! James! I thought you were dead!!” the woman said with a sigh of relief. James who recognizes the voice finally spoke up “Maria? How did you find my number?” James said as he rubbed his eyes and yawns. Maria paused “what? Why is that important? You gave your number- you didn’t save my number, did you?”. James who was in the middle of yawning, shakes his head “like you said, how’s that important? anyways I’m glad you’re still alive, mind telling me what’s going on?” Maria paused before answering “after I did some research there’s a virus that’s been spreading around, the virus came from my home town.” James paused “are your parents-“, before James could finish, Maria cuts him off “no, they don’t seem to have survived based on the dead calls and the worse conditions there, though I’m not sure and I hope they did survive.” James who listened sigh “I’m sorry, are you alone there?” Maria paused before sobbing “yeah, I’m alone. I can’t seem to reach Daniel’s phone and Mr. Hank hasn’t come back since yesterday, his phone also died.” James who heard this looks down to where Aslan is still sleeping, “are you in Hank’s apartment? His apartment isn’t far from mine.” Maria who heard this, wiped her tears away “yeah, I’m at Mr. Hank’s apartment.” Hearing this James sigh “before I go there can you please research for any safe shelter or bunkers?” James said as he carefully moved Aslan’s head to stand and walked towards the balcony. Maria who heard this looks confused “shelters? Why? Aren’t we going to stay at your apartment?”. James peeks through the balcony and sees a swarm of the infected people, he glances at the big creature that’s smashing doors and cars “no, because I only have one risked chance of getting out but not in”. Maria looked outside of the window worried “y- you know maybe saving me is a bad idea, maybe you should stay inside.”. James sighs and shakes his head “No, I have some plans outside.”. Maria looks at the phone annoyed “James! This is literally no different like the zombie apocalypse and you’re worried about plans?!”. James looks at the phone also annoyed “not that kind of plans, I mean that I want to find a better shelter there’s a giant creature smashing doors and cars, it wont take long until that creature finds us and smashes out or even your door down”. Maria looks outside still unsure with the plan just nods and sigh. “okay, thank you James, I owe you one”.

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