Dead Man Walking: Living By Day, Dead By Night

Chapter 66: Beaten Black And Blue

Zane went to sleep immediately after hearing what Elena had to say about him, while the girl herself cried in her bed for several hours. Neither of them were able to sleep for long, drifting in and out of consciousness as the hours passed, dreaded by what had happened earlier in the day.

And after midnight had struck, Elena could no longer take it. Living under the same roof as the man who had killed her family. Something had to be done about this. How could she tolerate such a thing?

Because of this, she got up from her bed, while dressed in a pair of pajamas that she had taken from her wardrobe earlier in the night. She reached into her gun belt's waistband, which lie scattered on her floor, and pulled out her combat knife.

The crimson haired beauty then stalked through the halls of her own family home, a home which now suddenly felt like a graveyard. She then reached towards the door of her brother's room, where Zane now shamelessly slept, after murdering the boy himself.

Elena grabbed hold of the doorknob and twisted it, surprised to find that the room was unlocked. She then opened the door silently, while staring at the target of her hatred. Zane appeared to be sleeping, facing the wall as he wore nothing but a pair of boxers.

No matter how hard she tried to quell her rage, Elena could not, and thus she crept closer and closer to Zane, who appeared to be entirely unconscious. Just when she was about to stab him in the back, the man rolled over in his sleep.

This created some difficulty for Elena, as she now had to stare at Zane's sleeping face as she took his life. Causing her hands to tremble as she held the knife within them. Yet after silently assuring herself that the deed needed to be done, to properly avenge her family, Elena climbed on top of Zane and held the knife high in the air, ready to plunge it straight into the man's heart.

Yet, as much as she wanted to do so, she could not. Her body froze on the spot. No matter how much her brain told her hands to do the deed, they refused to do so. Causing a twisted expression to appear on the girl's otherwise beautiful face as she struggled to kill Zane.

Yet in the next moment, something shocked Elena. Zane opened his eyes, revealing that he had been awake the whole time. He did not appear to be angry with her in the slightest, instead he almost appeared like he welcomed the idea of her killing him, a sentiment which he unbelievably expressed aloud in a whisper so low, Elena thought perhaps she was hearing things.

"Do it… I deserve it…"

When Elena heard these words, the fire that raged in heart was washed away by a tidal wave of complicated emotions. Kill Zane? Was he really responsible for her family's death? After all, he did everything he could to ensure that the group made it to Elena's residence as quickly as possible after fleeing from the High School campus.

Yet they were not fast enough. By the time they arrived, her family was already turned. In fact, on several occasions, Zane had urged her and Olivia to double their efforts to reach the suburban home where Elena's family resided. Yet if Zane wasn't to blame, who was?

Without even realizing it, Elena had tossed the knife aside and broke out into tears. She didn't really want to kill Zane; she was just confused; she did not know who to blame for this tragedy. And if she couldn't blame Zane, then who would take responsibility for her hatred and her grief?

As Elena cried, Zane did something that neither Elena nor he expected. He sat up with Elena in his lap and hugged the girl. An act which startled her. She may not really want to murder Zane, but she was still incredibly angry with the man over what he did.

Because of this, her immediate response was to punch Zane in the face. An act which had far more power than Zane was expecting. Prior to the apocalypse, a woman punching a man was considered a laughable affair. After all, even professional female fighters were generally not capable of generating the amount of force in their strikes that an average man pulled off the street could.

But the apocalypse had changed everything. An awakened individual, regardless of gender, had the same strength as another who shared the same strength stat. And though Zane's strength was slightly higher than Elena's, the crimson-haired beauty's strength stat of 12 was nothing to laugh at.

Because of this, her punch knocked the man down on to the bed, where she repeatedly began to strike his face. Not only giving him a black eye, but a bloody nose as she did so. As for Zane, he could resist Elena's attacks, but he did not do so.

After all, Zane had long since grown accustomed to taking a beating without fighting back. In a fucked up sense, he had always believed that he deserved it. After all, Eleana's family were not the first people who died because of him. Nor would they be the last. Because of this, Zane let Elena vent her emotions on him, and she did just that, all the while screaming at him.

"I hate you! I hate you so much! Why did it have to be my family!?! Why couldn't you have died in their place? You heartless bastard!"

After saying all of this, and leaving Zane black and blue, Elena ran off crying back to her room. All the while, the man sat there in his bed, wondering to himself why indeed he was still alive, when everyone else around him appeared to be dropping like flies.

In the end, Zane placed Elena's knife on her deceased little brother's dresser, and then crawled back into bed, falling asleep. Completely ignoring the fact that his face was now bloody and bruised. After all, he deserved it, or so he kept telling himself…