It’s been awful. We cannot get out of this store that we’ve barricaded ourselves into. The Undead are everywhere outside. We have no idea where the twins are and it seems to be getting more and more hopeless as the hours pass. Each time an undead child passes the windows of the store, all of us are frantic to see if it’s Lily or Liam.

At some point, we need to get out of here but it doesn’t look like that’s going to be possible. We have 4 firearms and limited ammunition. The stakes are stacked highly against us.

One of the good things about being holed up in the store is the availability of canned goods. This little store did not appear to have been looted at all. I’m not sure if that’s a good sign though. If the infection spread so quickly here, there might not have been time for people to get out. That could mean that there are veritable hordes of the Undead just outside our view.

Of course we could rely on the fact that Clarke’s brain scrambling machine had knocked them all out. The horde at the warehouse was very large but it certainly wasn’t the population of Savannah by any means.

And we have a new addition to our group. Late last night Polly went into labour. It was tense let me tell you. We had no way of sterilizing anything and if there had been complications it could have meant death for Polly and the baby. But Ben handled the delivery with as much care as he could given the conditions. Even Polly herself was so very brave.

We didn’t have a clue if her screams would attract the Undead. Hell, if the smell of the delivery would draw them any closer to our location. But Polly was a trooper; I think she only whimpered a few times in the very thick of her delivery. A few us were keeping watch at the windows, waiting to see if we were going to get any unwanted visitors but they stayed away from us. I’m glad that they have no idea where we are for the moment. It gives us time to plan our escape.

Polly named her baby boy Eduardo, after his father. She was visibly shaken in those first few moments. Probably trying to figure out how she was going to manage a baby and the apocalypse. And then her resolve kicked in. And you could tell that she was prepared to do whatever it took.

Her baby was healthy despite the stress that Polly was under and lack of nutrition that she must have endured at points during the last few weeks of her pregnancy. And it was like he knew that it wasn’t safe to cry. Not a peep left his mouth. When he was first born, Ben was concerned because he hadn’t cried yet. When he handed the baby to one of the women helping him with the delivery, she looked at him and noticed that he was alert and just keeping quiet. Ben did the normal things that doctors do, trying to elicit that first scream from him, knowing that he had to make sure his lungs were clear of fluid. The tiny scratch from the foot got a response and he let out a loud wail and then as soon as it started it was over. It was the strangest thing…

Is this what we are going to be reduced to? That our children will be born with the understanding that crying could mean death? It was too much to take in for a lot of us. How could such a small little being have the inherent knowledge that making noise could get it killed?

Mind you, I probably shouldn’t complain. A few moments ago, a woman went running down the road, screaming at the top of her lungs. I’m not entirely sure how she managed to run and scream but she was doing it. And all of the Undead in our general area turned in response to the noise that she was making. You might think that they only noticed her when she passed but that wasn’t the case. There were members of the Undead army that turned in response to her screaming that were in front of her and moving in a direction that didn’t allow them to see her coming. At least we know that they can now hear us. And of course they followed her down the road. In fact there seemed to be a large number of the Undead moving along in her general direction.

We are going to have to figure out how to get out of here soon. There is a city bus across the street and it looks sound enough. All of the windows are intact and the doors are open. It’s a pretty safe bet that there would be no Undead left on the bus to surprise us. Julie thinks that she can get it running. It’s just a matter of keeping her protected while she does. The area has been clearing a bit since the woman ran through but you can never be too sure with the Undead.

The moment that we make a noise it might attract them. And there is the possibility that we try to get the bus going but cannot. What will we do then? We can’t walk out of here and expect to survive. If it came down to it, we would still try but let’s hope it doesn’t come down to it.

We’re going to attempt to get to the bus in the morning. Wish us luck and Godspeed. Finding Lily and Liam is important but there’s nothing we can do while we’re stuck in here.

The Next Day