Everything I thought I was changed. I was in control, I was a strong minded person. People seem to think they are something that they want to be. I wanted to be in control and that's what I thought I was. Once that axe left my hand, I knew that there was a beast inside of me that was threatening to come out. A beast that would push me to my limits until I finally cracked. There is one thing I don't understand though. I killed a dread. My zombie hunter mind doesn't allow me to do that, so how could I have possibly killed him? My thoughts are interrupted by someone touching my shoulder. Then I realise that I am kneeling beside the man I just killed. "Alexandra, let's go inside" Fidelis' soft voice said as she placed her hand onto my shoulder. I also realised that I was crying, hot tears were running down my face. I didn't move. "Come on Ali" she mutters. My head snaps towards her, my eyes wide.

"What did you just call me?" I snap at her. She frowns at me and starts pulling me up. I push her away and shake my head. I then feel this sudden anger run through me. Every time I feel anger it multiplies by ten. "No, get away from me!" I yell. I then feel my body begin to ache, this is what happens when my body wants to turn. "I'm not in control!" I yell at her as I fall to the ground. She backs away from me. Because of this I know my eyes have turned silver, and it is a warning to her to get the heck away from me. I put my head in my hands as my head begins to ache, I want to scream but I feel like I can't without turning. Fidelis then shakes her head and grabs onto my shoulders, she makes me look her in the eye.

"You are in control Alexandra" She says. She doesn't lose eye contact. "Don't let it take over, don't give it that satisfaction" She says. I nod. I close my eyes so I can concentrate on my thoughts.

'I am Alexandra Ductor, I am Sixteen years old, I am not a monster. I have a brother, his name is Luke. I'm friends with Tobias, I might even like him' I think to myself. I don't know why I thought the last part, maybe because I was trying to connect to any other emotion that wasn't anger. I open my eyes and Fidelis is there. She sighs in relief. The pain in my body starts to fade away. "Thank you" I mutter under my breath, I think that she hears me though.

"Let's go inside" she says. I don't say anything, I just walk towards the large building. "Ali, are you okay?" she asks. Why is she being nice to me? She hasn't called me that since the day she found out I was a Dread.

"Quit calling me that, you can't call me that" I snap at her. The look of disappointment appears on her face. I sigh as I know that I am being too harsh. "Sorry" I mumble under my breath but she still hears me of course.

"No, you shouldn't be sorry. You save mine and my brother's life and how do I repay you?" She asks. "By being a bitch. Tobias came and talked to me about it, he really cares about you" she says with a soft smile. "Anyway I realised that I was being horrible because I felt like I owed you something and I felt like I couldn't repay you for what you did for me, my brother is still alive because of you. When you could have been protecting your mother" Fidelis says, she gives me a sorry look. Yes, my brother and I are orphans now. Mum died in the Dread attack, I didn't see it but Luke did. He tried to save her but he couldn't, he was too far away from her. I know that he blames himself for her death and I wish he didn't. I blame the stupid scientist that created the dread virus. That's why I hate what I am. I am one of the monsters that caused my mothers death.

"I never truly understood you" I mutter.

*

I was in training the next day with Tobias. We were both teaching a class of teenage boys. My brother was included in the group. Once they started practicing throwing knives, Tobias began to talk. "I heard what happened" He says openly. Of course he did, Fidelis doesn't know how to keep her mouth shut.

"Great" I mutter, I roll my eyes as I straighten up a kid's arm who has really bad aim. "Does the whole population know?" I ask.

"Yes" says the kid with a smirk. I hit him on the back of the head lightly. "Sorry" he says with a cheeky smile. I do this all the time to this group, they always make snarky remarks. My answer is always the same.

"So there's that" Tobias says with a smile. "I don't understand how you killed him, I mean you're..." he begins to say but I cut him off.

"I know what I am, aren't you the one who said that I shouldn't let that define me?" I ask. He shrugs, he moves towards a kid that threw a knife but somehow it went backwards. Well that's a safety hazard. He adjusts the knife in the kids hand and says something to him that I can't hear.

"Seems like you listen to me" Tobias says once he's finished. "But seriously haven't you even thought of why you killed him?" He asks concerned. I turn to watch how the boys are throwing knives. Luke isn't really good at throwing knives, he's good with a gun. He turns towards us and sees that we are talking. He walks over to us.

"I think about it more than you think" I mutter, I roll my eyes as if it is the most obvious thing ever. Luke lets out a scoff. "What do you want twerp?" I ask him. He chuckles and crosses his arms over his chest. "Go on, say something since you know everything"

"Well I think that you have been in control so long that your dread instincts are getting mixed with your human instincts, the dread with in is getting confused" Luke says with a smug look on his face that makes me want to hit him. I don't. "That's just what I think"

"I think that we should see what Felix thinks about this, he's good with this." Tobias says. Luke nods in agreement. I roll my eyes and push him towards the other boys. He lets out an annoyed groan as I do this. "Come on Lukey, better get back to throwing knives"

"I'll throw one at your head" Luke mutters.

"By the way you're going Lukey, I think you'll be lucky if you hit me at all" Tobias states with a smirk. I let out a laugh. Luke's glare burns a hole through my head.

*
Felix seemed to be excited when I walked in to the medical, science room wondering what was wrong with me. For a while now we have had access to a lot of technology, Felix knows a guy that lives in his highly secure home not far from here that can supply him with new technologies. He had an x-ray machine and he had an x-ray of my brain from when I first turned into a Dread. He wanted to x-ray my brain again to see if there have been any changes since the last time he scanned it. I didn't care much about what he wanted to do as long as it helped me figure out what was happening to me. He points at an x-ray of a brain. "This here is a scan of a human brain" he says. When I give him a look that suggests that he should change that sentence straight away he gulps and mutters "An unaffected human brain" he looks at me for approval. I nod at him to continue talking. He then points at another brain. "This is your brain from five months ago when I did the x-ray on it, see how your brain has these circular shapes surrounding the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex at the front of you brain?"

"A dorso.. What now?" I ask, my voice full of confusion and my eyebrows raised. He lets out a chuckle as if I am the most stupid person in the world. Thanks a lot Felix, you old prick.

"It's the part of the brain that controls your self-control, there is also circular shapes in the area of your brain that controls emotion and your thought process" Felix says. I understand what he is talking about now. "So what we want to find out is if anything has changed from five months ago, I'll get Fidelis to come in and get her brain x-rayed so that it is more reliable" I nod.

After I get my x-ray done Felix informs me that Fidelis doesn't want her x-ray done so he does it on Tobias who is very willing. I don't understand why Fidelis wouldn't do it since apparently we are on good terms. "Okay so looking at the results, there has been a change" Felix says with excitement. "An amazing change" Felix's eyes light up like this is some huge scientific breakthrough. Frankly, I don't see a change. I don't know what he is talking about. He notices the confused expression on my face. He lets out one of those 'you're a dumb ass' chuckles and puts the x-ray up against the light next to the one from five months ago. "In the original, the Dread virus is surrounding certain parts of your brain. In this one the virus is blending in with your brain and seems to be less noticeable. That's probably why you killed that dread, because your human brain cells are fighting the virus. It's quite amazing, It seems like the Dread virus has given up fighting your brain cells. See how it blends and it has faded? that means it has given up basically. By blending in I mean that your brain cells and the virus seem to be working together"

"Okay but why is it that when I get angry I feel like I'm turning into one" I ask. And yes, what he just said is basically what Luke. Bloody twit was right again. Apparently he knows everything about this virus without actually knowing. Felix gets more excitement in his eyes.

"Oh well the part of your brain that controls your emotions still has the virus fighting" Felix says with a smile.

"I'm not going to die from this am I?" I ask worried. Felix laughs and shakes his head.

"Not a chance, you heal quickly because of the virus" Felix says. "Other words your brain cells heal quickly, the virus can't exactly kill off your brain cells when it is also acting as a healer." Felix explains with a grin on his small face. Sometimes he is too brilliant for his own good.

"Doesn't it act as a healer to my brain or my whole body?" I ask him. A thoughtful look forms on his face.

"I don't exactly know, I only have evidence of your brain cells healing" Felix says with a thoughtful look. Tobias is sitting in the corner of the room reading a book. "I want to try something" he says as he looks over at Tobias and then at me. Tobias looks up instantly. "I'm wondering if it would be okay if I could give both of you a wound and see how long it takes to heal"

"Hey man, I'm not letting you shoot me" Tobias says with his hands up in surrender. Felix gives him a smile.

"No I mean just a cut on your hands" Felix says. I don't say anything I just put my palm out in front of him. Tobias walks over and does the same. Felix gets a scalpel and cuts into Tobias' hand first, Tobias winces in pain. Felix then cuts my hand open and pain shoots through my hand. I see my reflexion and my eyes light up silver for a few a second before going back to blue. He gets bandages and puts them on our hands. "I want you two to see me in an hour" Felix announces.

Within the hour that we had to wait I decided to speak to Fidelis. "Hey" she mutters with a nervous smile when she sees me walking towards her. "What happened to you hand?" she asks, yet no concern crosses her face.

"One of Felix's experiments, i'm sure it will heal" I explain. She nods, she was standing outside guarding near the door with a gun in her hand. She seemed shaky with it, something is wrong. "Are you okay?" I ask her.

"Yes" she says flatly, I don't believe her. She turns to me. "Have you found out anything about why you killed the dread?" she asks as if it really mattered to her. She also seemed to be going off topic. If she didn't want to talk about what was bothering her than that's fine.

"Something about my humanity is fighting my Dread side, it's quite boring" I say with a chuckle. She gives me a nervous laugh. "Seen any Zombies?" I ask with a chuckle. I'm trying to lighten up her mood but this seems to make her more nervous.

"Uh no" She says shakily. She realises how nervous she sounds and her eyes lighten up and she smiles at me. "You would know, you were joking" she says with a fake laugh following it. I raise my eyebrow at her.

"Are you sure you're okay? Why didn't you come and get your brain x-rayed, Felix said that you didn't want to" I say. She shrugs. My watch beeps and I look to see that I am wanted back in the medical centre. "Looks like Felix wants to look at my wound, I'll talk to you later"

*

Felix takes Tobias' bandage off first, the cut is still bleeding and it looks brand new. What can I expect he is human? What am I saying? I'm human too. When Felix takes my bandage off I am shocked. The wound has already started healing, I have noticed this before. It has dry blood all around it and looks like it hasn't been bleeding for days. There is still a cut in my skin but it's not bleeding and it isn't as big as Tobias' cut. "This is amazing" Felix says with a huge grin on his small face. "This is brilliant actually, do you have any scars?" Felix asks me. I think for a moment, I have one on my shoulder. I pull the side of my shirt down and look at my shoulder, there is no scar. How have I never noticed that? Then I remember something. Fidelis' face, I can't remember seeing a scar on it when I saw her. I get up from my chair and run outside to where Fidelis was standing.

"You refused to get an x-ray because you knew that they would see the same thing in your brain as they saw in mine five months ago" I say to her. She turns her scar less face towards me. She lets out a shaky sigh. That's why she was so nervous when I mentioned zombies. "How did this happen?" I ask.

"I don't know" she says after a while. "I didn't kill one, I have no idea why I became one but i'm scared and I'm not scared of most things"

"oh no"

"What?" she asks. Why it is that karma loves to bite people in the ass? Why does my actions effect everyone? I hate it and now I ruined her life. This is all my fault.

"I killed the Dread" I say softly. "I'm already one so I can't become one again so it must have rebounded onto the closest human and that was you" Her eyes drop to the ground as if she doesn't know how to react. I have the feeling now that whatever friendship we just had is now over. When she didn't say anything for a while I say "I'm so sorry Fidelis"