by D, Hannah
Introduction
Life as everyone knew it was over.
Smoke was everywhere, covering the sky so it made it look as black as night, you wouldn’t think it was only midday.
The smokes were coming from piles of burned victims, and let’s just say the smell was even worse. Think of mouldy milk mixed with rotting flesh and you’ll understand why it made the living people want to vomit and cry.
Cars littered the highway, all were abandoned. There were no people around, save for the small group of people now walking through the score of abandoned cars, looking in them, trying to see if any were able to drive and if not, what items there were in the cars they could scavenge. They were taking as much as they could carry. Who knew when they would next come across food, water, extra clothes and general necessities to live?
It was the extra clothes they needed the most at the moment, it was September and already beginning to get cold as winter was fast approaching. T-shirts, thin jumpers and flimsy shoes just wouldn’t cut it anymore and they could end up dying from the cold. They hadn’t come this far, avoiding those things, to die from the cold. They just wouldn’t.
They were an unlikely group of people. They had only met each other two months ago, when the world just went to shit. Some were already friends or related but most were strangers at the time. Now they all needed each other, to survive.
There were tensions amongst some of them; a dislike there that they just couldn’t shake off, you could even say that for a few people in the group they wished some of the group dead (as if the world really needed more of that). At times, it was proving hard for the rest of the group to try and keep the peace and the more those members fought and argued amongst themselves, the more they were heard by those they didn’t want to hear them and the more they were found and had to fight their way out to survive.
I know what you’re thinking, why don’t those people who dislike each other go their separate ways? Well; in this new world, the more people you have in a group, the more chance you have at survival so the moral is; suck it up and get on with it. Great moral to live by huh?
The worst thing you could do was to be by yourself, especially at night. At night you needed someone to always be awake, on guard, watching. Waiting to see if there was any movement in the shadows. Weapons at the ready. If you were on your own, well you would either never sleep or you would sleep and be killed. So, having a group was always the best choice.
This group of people were about to realise a lot of things on their journey to find somewhere were they could live safely and away from those creepy things now overtaking this world.
The three things they would come to realise were these;
One – They would always be running and killing those things everywhere they went, never getting a break and there were a lot more out there than they originally thought.
Two – Running into more living people didn’t always mean a good thing and other living people didn’t always want to help.
Three – There would be no real safe place for them to live anymore.
Chapter One.
The day was July 7th 2018.
A roasting day, like it had been since May. The warmest summer Scotland had ever had.
People were out taking full advantage of the sun, sunbathing, in beer gardens, spending time with family or friends. It was a Saturday after all.
Zoe wasn’t as lucky as everyone else was. She was stuck in work, she had just finished her first job which was cleaning bank offices and now she was about to start her second job which was looking after a few elderly people in their homes.
Zoe would have loved to have been able to take it easy and at least sit out in the sun but that wasn’t possible. You see, Zoe lived on her own and she was completely alone. She had no family as she was abandoned when she was a baby and hated her foster parents so ran as far away from them as she could get as soon as she turned 18. Zoe also avoided friendships as she didn’t want the chance of other people letting her down like her foster parents had. Also, Zoe had no time for any friendships even if she wanted them, she had to hold down two jobs, sometimes extra shifts in a bar at the weekends to be able to afford her rent. Rent for a flat that was like living in a cupboard. Why did Edinburgh have to be so expensive to live in?
Zoe’s first visit was to Catherine, an elderly woman in her 80’s. Zoe wasn’t very fond of Catherine and vice versa. Zoe and Catherine would make little snide comments to each other the whole hour long visit. Zoe always dreaded this visit. She wondered if Catherine would “accidently” hit her with her walking stick again. Another ‘oops, I didn’t see you standing there moment’. ‘Yeah’, Zoe thought to herself, ‘I’m sure you didn’t see me standing right beside you’.
As Zoe approached the door and was about to type the code into the keypad to get Catherine’s spare key to get into her house, Zoe heard a loud scream and feet pounding the pavement, getting closer and closer.
Zoe turned to see a teenage boy running up the path, sweat glistening from his forehead, panting so hard it was like he had been running for miles and miles. He kept glancing behind him, it was very obvious he was running away from someone. The boy stopped at Catherine’s gate.
“Are you okay?” Zoe asked him. The boy jumped when she asked, he must not have seen her standing at Catherine’s door.
“I don’t know what’s going on, he just came for me, growling, it wasn’t a human sound. He looked at me like he wanted to eat me. I had to get out of there. No way was I letting that asshole do whatever he wanted to do to me. If you see some mad man running up this path asking for me, you never seen me alright?”.
“Okay.. I never seen you” Zoe told the boy. And with that the boy was back off running down the path.
‘That was weird..’ Zoe thought to herself.. The growling man must have been on some new drug. That was common around Zoe’s area where she lived, people were constantly in a new drug craze and acting, well, not like themselves. Zoe used to be scared when she first moved there but now it was just the norm for her. Like this morning when she left for job number one at 4am, there was a woman standing just up the road from her flat, head tilted with her arms swinging at her sides, hair all tangled and her clothes ripped and torn with blood on her. There had been a few people acting like that Zoe had noticed, she wondered what new drug it was this time.
Zoe realised she had been standing at Catherine’s door for the past ten minutes.
“Well, no more avoiding going in here, might as well get this hour over with” she sighed and opened the door and went in.
The hall was dark and there was no sound or light coming from anywhere. Usually by now Zoe would hear Catherine screeching at her asking her ‘what time do you call this’ and ‘I have been waiting for ages, this is ridiculous leaving me lying here in my old age!’, and there would always be light coming from Catherine’s bedroom as Catherine always turned her bedside light on. Very strange.
“Catherine, it’s Zoe, I’m so sorry I’m late, are you awake?” Zoe asked as she made her way to Catherine’s bedroom. It was 10:10am, ten minutes later than Zoe should have been there.
On her way to the bedroom she stopped. She felt a breeze coming through the kitchen door. ‘Hmm that’s weird, Catherine never has any windows open overnight’ Zoe thought to herself. Zoe made her way into the kitchen and noticed the kitchen door was open that led to the back garden. ‘Maybe Catherine’s daughter stopped by and forgot to close the door that must be it, it’s the only explanation’ Zoe thought as she went to close the door. It didn’t stop Zoe from grabbing a knife on the kitchen table as she slowly made her way to Catherine’s bedroom though, Zoe wasn’t that delusional.
As she got closer to Catherine’s bedroom she could hear what sounded
like snoring. Zoe breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Thank god she’s still alive’. Knife in her back pocket she walked into Catherine’s room.
“Hi Catherine, not like you to still be sleeping, let’s get you up and ready for the day. Did your daughter stop by? I only ask since the kitchen door was open”. Zoe said as she walked around the bed to open Catherine’s curtains. Catherine let out what sounded to be a strained breath. Zoe felt herself start to panic, that did not sound good at all. Looks like she was going to have to call 999.
Zoe opened the curtains and turned around. What she saw made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up and made her want to scream.
There was Catherine, still lying in bed, but she was covered in blood. Catherine was missing part of her neck, arm, legs and the contents of her stomach were on display lying on the bed and some on the floor. Bizarrely Catherine was still alive, reaching out to Zoe and making those strained breathing noises. Catherine’s eyes never left Zoe and she kept on clanking her teeth together.
“Catherine.. Catherine are you..? Catherine what.. what happened? How are you still alive?” Zoe stammered out. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. How was it possible Catherine was still alive? Who would even want to do this to someone!
Just as Zoe was about to grab her mobile phone from her jumper pocket to call 999 for an ambulance she froze. She could hear shuffling feet coming from the hall.
“My god.. you’re still in the house” Zoe said out loud. There was no point in being quiet, whoever had done this had heard her speaking to Catherine, well speaking to what was left of Catherine.
“I know what you’ve done, I’m armed so you either leave this house or I will hurt you” Zoe yelled out as she moved slowly towards the bedroom door. Zoe hoped she sounded a lot more confident than she actually felt.
The feet didn’t stop shuffling up the hall, she heard the same strained breathing noise that she was hearing coming from Catherine. “Oh God, Oh God, Oh God!” Zoe whispered to herself. She felt her heart pounding, sweat was beginning to break out on her forehead. Zoe moved closer to the bedroom door still. She was nearly within arms reach of Catherine whose arms were still outstretched towards Zoe.
Zoe could see out the door, she could see a figure shuffling up the hall, one leg dragging behind, arms swinging as the figure moved. Zoe was about to jump out the bedroom door, ready to face whoever this was when Catherine grabbed her and pulled her down onto the bed. Zoe fell onto Catherine and could feel the wet blood and organs from Catherine and could smell the blood. Before Zoe could even gag at the smell she seen Catherine’s mouth coming toward her, teeth still clanking and was aiming for Zoe’s face. Zoe used her free arm that wasn’t in Catherine’s grasp and put it on Catherine’s face and began shoving Catherine’s face away. Catherine wasn’t stopping.
“Catherine! Please stop! What are you doing! Stop this!” Zoe screamed. Apparently this was only making Catherine want to attack Zoe more. Zoe shoved so hard that Catherine’s head moved further back and slammed against the headboard, this gave Zoe a good 3 seconds to reach into her back pocket and grab the knife. Once she grabbed the knife, Catherine’s head came back forward and as Catherine’s head came forward Zoe pushed the knife up and into Catherine’s skull. Zoe heard the crunch and squelch as the knife went in. Catherine stopped moving. Zoe stood up and without thinking grabbed the knife right out of Catherine’s head and turned. By this point the moving figure, which turned out to be a man was at the door.
Zoe glimpsed at him and seen that he too was in no good shape, well better than what Catherine was. His neck and arms were covered in bite marks, this man was also missing chunks off part of his body. He too was coming at Zoe with his teeth clanking like he was very, very hungry.
Zoe didn’t stop to think, she put the knife into the mans chest, that must kill him. However Zoe soon realised it didn’t. The man kept coming toward her, like the knife sitting in his chest that should have killed him was nothing more that a little scratch, not even noticeable.
Zoe kept walking backwards, around the bed. The man still following her, arms outstretched. Catherine was still not moving or breathing. She was still lying in the same position as she was when Zoe put a knife in her head.
“In her head.. it must only work when they get stabbed in the head!” Zoe said aloud to the room, not that she was expecting an answer. Zoe climbed on the bed and over Catherine, through the bedroom door and ran straight for the kitchen. She ran to the drawer that held the knives, grabbed the big butcher knife and turned toward the kitchen door, waiting on the man to come into the room so that Zoe could end this.
What was only minutes felt like hours to Zoe. She was breathing heavy by now, her head was beginning to spin. She couldn’t think straight.
‘What was going on? Why did Catherine want to hurt me and now this man as well?’.
Before Zoe could even answer her own question the man came through the kitchen door. In the harsh sunlight that made everything brighter in the kitchen, Zoe could see the blood dripping from his mouth and bits of flesh dribbling down his chin. His eyes were black.
“Oh god.. did you begin to eat Catherine?” Zoe said to the man.
Zoe didn’t get a worded reply, instead she got a guttural, hungry moan and the man was shuffling toward her.
‘Okay.. I know what I have to do.. aim for the head..’ Zoe moved toward the man, lifted the knife and shoved it right into the top of his head. The man fell to the floor with a thud. Zoe moved back against the wall and slid down it to sit on the floor. Only now did she let herself begin to cry, now that the adrenaline was wearing off.
“I have just killed two people.. Or where they even people anymore?” Zoe said to herself.
She didn’t know how long she sat there for or even remember when she decided she should call the police, hand herself over to them until she was standing over the phone in the living room. As she picked up the phone, she could see siren lights going past the window and hear the noise of police and ambulance cars. She wondered where they were going, if they were trying to find her.
Zoe dialled 999 and were there was meant to be ringing she was met with the busy tone, just constant beeping. Zoe put the phone down and tried again, and again, and again but was met with the same busy beeping noise.
‘This is far too strange.. Something is happening’ and with that thought in her head Zoe left the house and walked back outside.
It was quieter now than when Zoe had went into Catherine’s house. Zoe couldn’t believe what had happened in the past half an hour. Zoe couldn’t believe that she had just killed two people.
As Zoe walked out the gate she saw her reflection on a car window. She was covered in blood and her eyes looked terrified. Zoe saw more than felt herself shaking.
As Zoe sat down on the kerb beside the car she saw moving figures up ahead. Zoe put her hand over her eyes to try and see better as the sun was glaring brightly and what she saw where the same shuffling moves coming from these figures like she saw the man inside doing. Except there was more than just one man and a bedbound old lady. There was a group of at least eight of them. Zoe jumped to her feet, a little too fast as she got headrush. As she regained herself and the headrush was gone she saw they were getting closer. Zoe remembered she didn’t have a weapon. The knives she had were both still in the man inside, one in his chest and one in his head.
“Shit!” Zoe shouted and she turned and began to run further up the street from Catherine’s house. Zoe had no idea where to go. She was two bus rides away from her house and if there were more of those shuffling, human but not human things around then she would be dead soon.
As Zoe stopped running up the street to think for a second she heard a noise like a door opening slightly. Before she could investigate what door it was she heard someone speaking.
“Pssst.. over here” the voice called out to her.
Zoe twirled but couldn’t see anyone.
“Pssssssst, look over to the green door
on your right” the voice said again.
Zoe turned and spotted the green door with a face peering through it.
“Hello? Do I know you?” Zoe asked.
“No, you’re covered in blood, have you been bitten?”
“What do you mean bitten? What are you talking about?”
“Bitten by one of those things that’s been following you up here?”
“No.. I..I just killed two of them in a house further down there, that’s why I’m covered in blood.”
“Cool, you best come in here, unless you want to be dinner?”
“I don’t know who you are..”
“Well it’s up to you. Come into a house with strangers or be dinner. You have 30 seconds to decide before I close this door”.
Zoe turned and saw the figures getting closer and without a second thought she ran towards the green door and turned around to find three curious strangers faces looking at her.
‘Oh I hope I made the right choice in doing this’ Zoe thought to herself as she stuck out her hand, ready to introduce herself.
Outside the door, Zoe began to hear the moaning and the strained breathing sounds coupled with the shuffling feet and wondered what the hell was going on since she entered Catherine’s house at 10:10am that morning.
Chapter 2
Zoe’s hand was left dangling in the air, no one stepped forward to shake her hand. Looks like chivalry has died like Catherine and the man are now in that house. Zoe let her hand drop awkwardly and began to look at anywhere but at these three stranger’s faces. There was an awkward silence in the air, like no one wanted to be the first to speak. Zoe thought one of these strangers should speak first considering that they were the ones who invited her into their home. Finally someone broke the silence, the man who let her into the house.
“My name’s Mike and this is my wife Sue” Mike told Zoe as he gestured at his wife. Sue looked to be like she was trying to get as far away from Zoe as she possibly could. Sue looked like she was terrified of Zoe. Zoe gave her a wave to which Sue turned and walked away.