Chapter 45: Jump
"Everyone... Please gather around here. I need to check how many are remaining." Jacob’s calm voice echoed throughout the room, but no one was interested in listening to him at the moment.
Their eyes were wide and scared, looking down at the floor which was now stained with blood and gore.
The earlier beautiful tiles were dyed crimson and strewn with corpses belonging to humans and zombies alike.
The air stank with the rotten flesh smell, suffocating everyone within as they pressed a piece of cloth on their noses. Though, that did nothing to lower the disgusting stench.
Jacob continued to announce the same thing, as Jenny looked at Fredrinn and gave him a complicated look.
Then, she dipped her head and made her way towards Max and his group, intending to check on her old friends.
Fredrinn also ignored Jacob’s calls and made his way towards the shelf where he had hidden his three women, all of them huddled together on top of the shelf.
Seeing him, Andrea raised her body and stared at him with tears on the corner of her eyes.
"You’re crying?" Fredrinn looked up at her with a slight smile, "Worried for me that much, huh?"
"As if." Andrea scoffed softly and wiped her tears, "I just didn’t want to lose someone who I gave my first kiss to. That’s all."
Fredrinn raised his eyebrows in surprise, "That was your first...?"
Andrea’s face flushed beet red as she harrumphed and looked to the side, "If you don’t believe me then don’t. At least help me get down from here, mister."
He chuckled, walking towards her and opening his arms, staring up at her.
"Jump then. I will catch you."
"What if you don’t?" Andrea asked hesitantly.
"Then you fall and break a few bones probably."
"..." She stared at him speechlessly, though his words did cause a smile to blossom on her rosy cheeks.
After gathering her courage for a few moments, Andrea stared into Fredrinn’s eyes before closing them.
Then, she stopped maintaining her balance and let herself fall in Fredrinn’s direction.
Gravity did its job, pulling her towards the floor at a rapid speed. But before she could panic, Andrea found herself wrapped with two strong arms, holding her up safely.
"Send me up, I want to try it again. It was fun." Andrea whispered softly, nuzzling into Fredrinn’s chest.
"Sure, though I won’t catch you this time."
Andrea puffed her cheeks, pouting as she looked over his shoulder, at the horrific sight behind him.
"How– How many died...?"
"No idea. Jacob’s trying to do a headcount right now." Fredrinn gently let Andrea on the ground as he shrugged.
His face was cold, as if he wasn’t affected by the scenes all that much.
"Mhm." Seeing his expression, Andrea lowered her gaze and stopped asking more.
"Ahem. Just so you know, we are also stuck up here, mister." Naomi’s soft voice reached Fredrinn, who glanced at them with amusement.
Rhea was silent and visibly shaken by the whole ordeal, while Naomi wasn’t doing that much better either. Still, they both kept their nerves in check and didn’t cause any trouble.
"Same offer then, jump, I will catch you." Fredrinn chuckled at Naomi’s words.
"Don’t drop me, I am fragile." Naomi said shyly, sitting down before letting herself fall slowly.
Since she was standing while she fell, Fredrinn had to wrap his hand around her legs as she slid down his arms, her supple curves of the ass allowed Fredrinn to latch onto her, killing off the momentum.
When Naomi opened her eyes, her breath hitched as she saw the close distance between herself and him.
His arms were wrapped around her thighs, pressing against her ass while her breasts were against his chest.
Blushing beet red, Naomi coughed and slid out of his hands unlike Andrea who didn’t mind him holding her.
Finally, Fredrinn glanced at the last woman on the shelf.
Rhea was watching the whole situation play out, and she felt a little more embarrassed than she liked to show.
When he helped them climb to the top, the situation was different and her useless embarrassment had no right to exist. But now, even after all this death, stench and sorrow... her shyness still surfaced.
"I-I can come down myself." Rhea said softly, turning her body as she stepped on the lower shelf, holding onto the top one with all her strength.
But then came the hardest task.
Stepping to the third shelf while her body was still hanging over the edge.
Rhea wasn’t as fit as Andrea, thanks to her foodie habits and her dreams of pursuing education rather than extra curricular activities like Andrea.
So when Rhea tried to trust her guts and step down, her grip at the top couldn’t help but loosen. One of her hands slipped, making her body jerk backwards as the shelf shook with her weight.
A yelp escaped her lips as Rhea closed her eyes, fully accepting that she was going to fall down on her butt today and embarrass herself even further.
She quietly berated herself for not taking Fredrinn’s help as she began to fall.
But suddenly, she felt a hand wrapping around her waist and pulling her in another direction with such a force that her stomach flipped upside down.
Her lips parted, eyes opened and breath came out in small bursts before...
*BANG*
The shelf she was trying to climb down off slammed into the floor, cracking some tiles with dust flying around.
Rhea blinked.
Then stared at Fredrinn who had pulled her out of the area timely.
She not only risked falling down her butt like a dumb person, but also risked her life without knowing it?!
What if that shelf fell down on her with that force?
Even if she survived, she would’ve suffered at least a couple fractures that were as good as a death sentence in the apocalypse.
Involuntarily, her tears came flowing out uncontrollably. The deaths and attacks inside the group, the near death experience that she just had and the horrific sight of the zombies...
Everything assaulted her at once.
Just then, she felt a pair of hands pulling her closer, and her face was pressed into a masculine, sturdy chest.
Her tears hiccupped to a halt and her eyes went wide as she gasped.
"F-Fredrinn..."