Do or Die

I’m a very selfish person. 

I don’t have to be, but I am. If faced with helping someone else and self-preservation, I pick me. Every. Single. Time. It’s not because I don’t want to die. That’s not a huge factor in my M.O., no, but I guess you could say it was my hamartia that does it. I will be selfish to the end. No one’s better for me than me, and if I have to go out, it’ll be with a bang, dammit, and I’ll look better than everyone else while doing it.

So that’s why I’m here, standing in front of the Lanvedre mansion’s doors, along with my sort-of girlfriend. I’m not really sure what we are. Anyway, the Lanvedre are all gone, all turned by the undead. Now their vast estate is being used for...other purposes. There’s not much time. The kids I left, back safe in the basement of the subway station slash bomb shelter, are depending on me. I take a deep breath and head in. 

Swelling music greets me as I walk into the foyer, my muddy boots making prints on the thick red carpet. A masked butler proffers a tray--on it is resting five gray masks with ribbons to tie around and large eyeholes. Smart--now no one will know who’s dancing with the devil. I take a mask and tie it on quickly. Next to me, Quinn takes a mask as well, the gray covering up the sprinkle of freckles on her nose and her wide mouth. Her hair is under a hood, and only one tight black curl escapes it. I push it back into her black hoodie, and she nods at me. 

“Thanks.”

The weight of my toolbelt at my waist reminds me that we don’t have time to waste on pleasantries. “Let’s just get this over with.”

We push through the ballroom doors and step onto the top of the stairs.

“Welcome to Do or Die,” announces a suave voice, smooth as cream, as we enter the ballroom. It’s all gold and silver, the floors streaked marble with tints of rose and cream. Everyone on the dance floor is either wearing ragged finery that looks as though it was from a decayed Victorian costumer’s shop or jeans and hoodies like Quinn and I. Everyone wears the identical gray masks, and it’s impossible to say who has the telltale bruises of death. Quinn’s skirt swishes and she grabs my hand, holding tight.

“Don’t let go,” she whispers.

“I won’t,” I tell her. 

The announcer is still talking. “May I present our final two guests, these lovely ladies!” He whips off Quinn’s hood and my knit cap before I can stop him. “You all know the rules. Whoever makes it to midnight gets the loot.” He waves a languid hand toward the stacks of crates and sacks. I lick my lips. We all know what’s in there. Survival. “Food, medicine, whatever you need is in there. Play the game, get the prize. Ready? It’s time to…”

As if we’re on a crappy game show, like the ones from years ago when TV still had more than just the news channels and presidential bulletins, the crowd chants “Do or Die!” right along with him. 

“Presenting, before we begin! The Duke of Andere!” A man in a gray mask and long red frock coat waves to the crowd, gloved hand shaking slightly. He seems on edge. Wonder why.

The room goes black just then and Quinn’s hand is wrenched from mine. “Ellie!” she yells, right before I can no longer keep ahold of her hand. 

When the lights come back on everyone is paired up. There’s a girl in a ragged ballgown extending her hand to me. An offer to dance. A waltz is struck up, and I take her hand. Play the part, Ellie, I remind myself. The final problem is near, but I have only to make it through one dance. 

It’s a simple waltz, one-two-three in circles, and a twirl every now and then. The other girl is leading, thank God, because I can barely dance, even something as easy as this. 

“Hello,” she says after a short pause. Her voice is formal, and she has a slight accent. Upper-class, then, so this must be just a way to bide the time. Her hair is in a fancy swirl, with a collection of tiny braids pinned up throughout her long dark locks. I should’ve known she was a rich girl at a glance, but my mind’s not really on this. It’s only on what comes next, what I need to do.

“Hi,” I respond. 

“What’s your name?” she asks.

I blink. “I’m not in the habit of giving my name to strangers.”

“Pity. We could be more than strangers,” she hints. “But tell me about you.”

“Nothing to tell,” I say flatly. “I’m a very boring person, really. Just me all by myself.”

“Siblings?” she asks. “Surely you can’t be alone in the world, not for you to be doing this just so you can dance until midnight or whatever it is that the rules are. How useless that would be.”

“I have two sisters and a brother, and they are starving. So yes, I do need to make it to midnight, whatever the cost,” I snap.

She sounds bored. “How sad.”

“You think this is all a funny game,” I accuse. “You disgust me.”

The girl in her fancy dress sneers at me, her skirts turning in a flounce of silk and satin. “I won’t waste any more time on you, then.” There’s a bruise on her wrist, purple and stained and spreading and--

“Undead!” I scream, and the room dissolves into immediate chaos. The zombie girl I was dancing with shrieks helplessly as the couple next to me whips out knives and falls upon her. Others are being recognized and attacked, and it’s like a stampede of dead and alive right now, and all I can think of is--

“Ellie!” Quinn yells. “Get to the crates!”

I see something running away from me, and at that moment have an insane idea. “Give me a second!”

“What are you doing!” she shouts. Our plan was to steal the stuff and run, but I have a better plan now. His red coattails are flapping as he sprints out of the room, but years of being on the edge of starving have given me the advantage--I can run faster than anyone else when it’s my life on the line. I seize the duke’s arm and haul him backward.

“Nice escape attempt,” I say. “But I’m faster.”

“Unhand me this instant!” 

Bruise purple rings his eyes as his mask falls to the ground. “I don’t think so.” Idiot. An undead, specifically the one ringmaster of this entire stupid Do or Die ordeal, should know better than to come to his own party. I have the upper hand, and I’m not about to throw it away. “Come on, Your Grace. I require your humble assistance.” I drag him over to where the crates of food are stacked and pause. 

The boxes are piled so high they hide a door. I push two of them out of the way and turn the knob with one hand, still clutching the zombie’s upper arm tightly, and then I gasp. It’s a huge storeroom, filled floor to ceiling with labeled boxes of food, water and medicine, all marked with specifics. “You--you have all this? And you just hoard it!” My voice rises in anger. This is sickening.

“Food is power,” the duke replies. I hadn’t expected an answer and so am surprised, until I hear an enraged shriek. Quinn. I turn and drop the zombie’s arm.

A woman in a netting skirt and decaying top is holding Quinn’s arms behind her back. “Leave the food or your girlfriend dies.”

“She’s not my girlfriend!” Quinn and I say in unison. She glares at me as though she weren’t currently a hostage for a lot of angry zombies.

“You can keep her!” I announce. “She’s more annoying than she’s worth, to be honest.” 

“Get her!” the duke orders. He doesn’t look at all amused with what I’ve just said, but that’s showbiz, baby. 

“Tough crowd tonight,” I mutter. As one, the zombies lunge forward, machetes and machine guns all directed at me. What a hell of a way to die. I can’t let this be it. 

“There’s something you should know!” I say quickly. The undead pause. Leaning forward as if to tell them some deep secret, I place one hand on the pin at my waist. “I always have a backup plan.” The undead woman holding Quinn screeches and pushes her towards me at the same time I pull the pin and throw the grenade at their feet. It explodes instantly, sending up a wall of flame. The zombies are burned to ashes instantly, and only the ones at the back avoid immediate vaporization.

“Ellie!” Quinn sounds more annoyed than relieved that I just saved her freakin’ life. “Now how do we get the crates?”

“We don’t,” I say. “Look around you. Is it worth it? Is any of this worth it? Find something else, Quinn. Another supply of food that doesn’t mean we have to risk our lives. And if nothing else, we just destroyed the biggest amount of food in one place in this entire country. Undead still have to eat, you know.”

“But you-”

“We don’t have time for this!” I grab her arm and start her running because the flames are growing bigger by the second. “I did it, it’s done, let’s just go, okay?”

Then a hand grips my hair and pulls me back. I scream. “Let go of me!”

The half-burned zombie snarls, exposing rotted teeth and blackened, burned lips. “You...did...this..to us.”

“Let--me--go!” His grip is unbelievably strong. 

“Not...before...we..pay..you..back.” His voice is raspy, but filled with meaning. They owe me, and right now is collecting time. We’re so close to the doors. They’re wide open, and no undead are outside. Freedom is within my grasp. But Quinn is too close to the fire, and so am I. It’s not ordinary fire; this is gasoline-doused flames, and the heat of it is searing my face. He means to shove me in. “Quinn,” I say urgently. “If something happens, you promise you’ll take care of my siblings? Promise!”

“I promise, Ellie,” Quinn says. She’s yanking at the zombie, trying to force his hand. “But please don’t talk like we won’t get out of here.” But the undead’s fingers are fumbling at the last pin on my toolbelt, the second bomb I had yet to use. 

“Stop!” I’m yelling uselessly. He pulls the pin and tosses it just a few feet away. Finally, I can get free of his grasp.

I’m a very selfish person. That’s why it’s so strange when I shove Quinn out of the way, out of the open door, and the blast knocks me off my feet, right into the towering inferno waiting hungrily. Damn this hamartia, I think, and then