The car had held out far longer than Takiko had thought it would. Now it slowed down, the little lamp showing her tank was empty was blinking steadily, ringing a few times every few mintes, as if to remind her, that thinks would get back to being a lot harder way too soon. She had been lucky to have gotten hold of it when she'd searched a big, modern and absolutely deserted house. The former inhabitants seemed to have left in a hurry, leaving most of the food and drinks behind they'd owned. Much to Takikos joy. It was close to unbelievable that noone else had been there before her. She'd been able to obtain a variety of canned and other durable foods, as well as a sixpack of 1,5l water bottles and the keys to their second car, still securely parked in the garage. It was some kind of new bmw, very sleek and, what was best with a tank still half-full. Apparently they had taken a different car as they left, its place in the garage was empty. 

So, with a basket full of supplies for at least a week on the passengerseat and her backpack on top she would soon be stranded just outside the suburbs of chicago. She had taken the smallest, most deserted, out-of-the-way road she had been able to find on the map she had found in the car. She had spent one night sleeping on the backseat, resulting in her neck aching horribly as she stared down the road.

Sighing, she took off her glasses and rubbed her tired and aching eyes before putting them back on. She had to blink a few times to get her eyes back into focus when she froze, noticing a movement on the side of the road. She carefully stepped onto the brakes, merely slowing down, holding back her initial reflex of abruptly jerking to a halt with screeching tires. Her hands shook and she gripped the wheel tightly, taking deep breaths to keep calm until the car drove by the place she'd thought to have seen something moving about. For several seconds she didn't move, her eyes searching the surrounding bushes and trees for any kind of movement. Her heart was pounding harder and harder, but nothing happened and soon she was a good distance from whatever might, or might not have, been in those bushes.

It took her some time to relax and a lot of self-lecturing at how paranoid she was getting. Not that, in these circumstances, anyone could find fault in her being a little paranoid. After running from her infected, once-pretty-girl-turned-not-too-good-to-look-at-creature, roommate with scraps of skin dangling from what was left of her dead, white flesh- she shuddered at the thought and stopped herself from remembering that particular detail any further. She had yet to cry. About losing her life, about her roommate being dead- mostly- about probably never seeing her parents and friends again, about all these things that should be making her howl and thrash and cry her eyes out. It irritated her. Greatly. She was a little worried over her psychological health, still being so rational, even though weeks had gone by, plenty of time to realize and properly understand everything that had happened, and was still happening.

Takiko glanced at her smartphone she had put on top of her bag, where it couldn't slide down and was in plain sight should it relay any signs of life. It didn't, of course. She had desperately searched for one of those charging-adapters for cars for a few days after realizing that that might be one of the only ways to get any kind of electricity, but so far, she had had no luck. A sigh escaped her and she reached out to put it in her bag. Throwing it away was out of the question. It was the same with her wallet. Money was of no use anymore, but throwing it out, felt simply wrong to her. That also applied to her IPod. It still had some battery left, but soon that would be over as well. But whenever the absolute silence got too heavy to take it anymore, she'd listen to one of her favourite songs. It helped, at least a little.

The road was now going downhill, not to steep, but enough to hope that her car would roll on somehow, just long enough to find some fuel. She had a theoretical idea of how to get some from another car into hers, but she'd need a long hose and a car with some fuel left in its tank. How she was going to find that out, she wasn't sure yet. She'd have to improvise. Something she really wasn't too good at..