“Susan!” I heard Daniel yell as some got closer, he shoved me out of the way throwing off my aim and began shooting at the closest ones he could. There were more than I had originally thought, maybe fifty, sixty closing in around us as it was, and I didn’t let the panic that wanted to take over do so, I began shooting frantically blocking everything out watching as one after another dropped down dead.
I repeatedly reloaded the chamber and shot as long as I could before I noticed not one was standing, not one at all, not even Daniel. That is when the panic took over me finally, I started looking around frantically until I found him lying on the ground in a pool of his own blood, not moving at all, several chunks of his arms and legs were missing and I covered my mouth just staring until he began to move.
“Dan? Daniel?” I asked inching towards him slowly; my gun raised “Danny? Are you okay?”
He turned towards me with a blood-covered face and glazed over lifeless eyes; he let out a groan and started towards me. I could not move, or think rationally, hell I could not even breath as I stared at him, he was moving stiffly and slowly towards me groaning still, my eyes began to burn as I shook my head staring at him.
“Oh Danny… This is my fault, I’m so sorry.” I whispered to him
“Su…an” He groaned moving towards me more, his voice wasn’t even the same now, it was already difficult to understand and his mouth wasn’t working properly as if he was already becoming stiff and dead, something that shouldn’t happen for hours.
I felt as the tears slowly rolled down my cheeks, my arm began to move up slowly but surely and aimed at his head. My eyes met his once beautiful eyes that were now a dead dull brown, his once beautifully tanned skin pale and ashen, his muscular form covered in blood and gashes. When he moved a wound I never saw appeared, on his inside thigh blood began to spurt from it, one had ripped into his leg and hit an artery and it was still bleeding out yet, his neck was tore open, and his arms were missing skin in various parts.
“Su..s.an” He tried again reaching towards me and looking almost sadly at me, as if he wanted to only hold me, but I knew better, I knew so, so much better than that.
“I’m sorry, Daniel, I loved you, I always will love you.” I said and pulled the trigger watching as the bullet flew from my gun and split through his head, and out the back of it, his body fell back onto the ground with a rather loud thump and he stayed still forever more.
I turned away letting the tears fall as I began to cry harder than before, I had lost everything at this point, my family, my daughter, my husband, all because I was stupid I lost all of them, and I was alone in the world, I didn’t know what to do.
I shook my head checking to see what weapons I had left over as I tried to calm down and let my thoughts clear, my rage only coming back harder now, and blurring my rational thoughts.
I was not alone, no, my daughter was out there somewhere alone and I had to find her, my poor sweet little Julie was out there alone in this hellhole. I would find her I had just enough left over of my ammunition and weapons that I could take out some more zombies and save her, or at least I had hoped.
I sucked in a deep breath steadying myself as I started forward again from where I knew they all had gathered from, the next town up ahead, Connellsville. It was a small run down town, I remembered it pretty well, from when I visited a few times, but it had a good amount of people living in it and that alone was a problem.
As I let my leg’s carry my body towards the town I let my mind wander into its own world glimpsing back over my life before this, going back over that day earlier when we had all just woken up and smiled as it replayed in my head slowly.
***
Julie had woken up early and made her way into our room she had always been good for it, she woke us up by jumping on our bed right between the two of us giggling like she was the happiest child in the world, shouting at us.
“Mommy! Daddy! Wake up!” She said giggling.
I woke up slowly letting my groggy eyes meet her own then looked over at my husband who was sleepily smiling up at her.
“Good morning, baby girl.” He smiled
“Morning daddy!” She said then stopped bouncing “You guys slept in late, and I missed the bus!”
I raised my eyebrow and looked over at the alarm clock, she was right it was 9 am and none of us had woken up because our alarms had been off from the storm the night before, we’d all forgotten about it completely.
“How about, I just call us all in sick today.” Daniel said winking as he stood up grabbing his cell phone
“Sounds good to me, come on honey let’s go make breakfast!” I smiled crawling out of bed and pulling Julie down off it as well.
I took her into the Kitchen with me flicking on the TV to the morning news listening as they spoke about the outbreak that had been affecting the world at this rate. Then went into the increasing deaths and I became shocked hearing that but was pulled out of it as Julie changed the channel to her morning cartoons, and watched Dora the Explorer.
“What do you want for breakfast, sweetie?” I asked
“Eggs and bacon!” She shouted happily
“Alright, eggs and bacon it is.”
I got to work making breakfast as Daniel came out looking worried, I looked at him and frowned and once he was close enough that he was able to wrap his arms around my waist and hug me as I cooked I asked what I wanted.
“How bad is it?”
“They called off work at your place, everyone had called in sick, and two people are running my office and half the schools out.” He said sounding fearful
“What is this, Daniel?”
“I don’t know, we’ll be okay though, I promise you.”
“I believe you, Dan.”
He leaned forward pressing his lips to my temple kissing me softly before moving out towards the living room and sitting next to Julie with her watching her show’s with her and joining along as Dora directed them in what to do, I smiled to myself listening to them as I cooked.
Once, the food was prepared I had started to shuffle it out onto three separate plates and using my ‘Diner skills’ to carry the food out to the living room with the silver wear on each plate, handing one to Dan, and one to Julie.
“Eat up; I put all my love into that.” I laughed jokingly to Dan; he only rolled his eyes in response to me
“Mommy, your food always tastes good with love!” Julie interjected and I smiled
“Well thank you baby, mommy tries to make her food as tasty as possible.”
“Well, you do a good job!” She said and dug into her food
I sat down next to Dan smiling to myself as I began to shovel food into my mouth, thinking about Julie, her mental status always worried me she was eight years old and acted more like she was maybe five at the most but it was only when she was home with us, especially when her father was home.
I shrugged it off and let myself sit back relaxing and enjoying the food.
***
I shook my head, erasing the memory from mind as I noticed the border of a town up ahead, I pulled out a gun and began moving forward faster and faster, until I hit the limit and knew I was in town from all the buildings that swarmed me.
I listened intently to my surroundings trying to see if I heard anything and for the first few minutes I heard absolutely nothing not even a rustle from the wind, then I heard it the sound, the horrible sound they always made.
Shuffling, groaning, and scratching.
I froze raising my gun up and was faced with a decent sized group of zombies that were making their way closer to me, at first I was sure they saw me then I saw what they were after, A man started trying to run up the road and fell, getting grabbed quickly.
I could not help but stare, I was frozen in fear and awe at what they were doing to him, remembering Daniel as I did. They grabbed his arm holding him down as one bit into his arm ripping the flesh off all the way from his wrist up to his elbow. I could practically hear
the terribly ripping sound as I watched and heard him yell, another bit into his chest ripping flesh straight from there beginning to rip into his chest and eat hungrily, another one was on his leg biting into it ripping and tearing.
As I watched one moved and bit his nose clean off his face then ripped off a chunk of his cheek, the cries form the man were almost painful to hear but I was glued to where I stood until me, at the last moment but also too late snapped out of it. I loaded my gun beginning to shoot at them, a small one ripped out his throat as I began shooting and I managed to get them all down but two.
I grabbed my blade once I was out of bullets rushing forward to the last two, I got as close as possible to the taller one, slamming my blade into his skull feeling sick as it split it in half blood squirting out towards me. Blood splattering all over me, I pulled the blade from his skull and took a slow step back, moving my arm up slowly and slashed out slamming the blade across his throat and watched as his head fell from his body.
I only had one more left and turned towards the small child feeling bad for whoever’s child it was. They were cute enough looking from behind, blond curls, little dirty ripped up dress on made of a soft blue fabric, and then, she turned around and I dropped my blade feeling my blood run cold as those blue eyes looked up at mine.
“Julie!” I stared at her going numb; she only tilted her head slowly and stared at me.
She was covered in blood from head to toe, her skin was ashen and ripped open I could not even tell where one wound began and another ended, she was riddled with fun bullet holes and I felt sick, staring at my child like this I could not take it.
She looked at me and seemed to smile almost “M…mmy?” she got out moving towards me with her arms outstretched. I started bawling as I watched her make her way towards me; I slowly dropped to my knees as she grew closer smiling at her forgetting what she was then and only seeing what she had been to me, my baby girl.
“It’s me Julie, its mommy.” I said holding out my arms to her, she moved slowly to me and then suddenly shot at me, biting into my shoulder and I screeched feeling her rip flesh from my body. It was the most painful thing I ever felt, but I couldn’t bring myself to hurt my child so I only laid there as she mauled me alive, ripping flesh off me, biting me everywhere she could until I couldn’t feel anymore and grew cold.
I felt my vision begin to blur only seeing my daughter’s face as she once was as she looked down at me and then bit into my neck making me jump, everything began to grow black and dim and I felt myself drift off into a sleep almost, my life ending there.
***
Epilogue
I woke up, looking around where I had been, slowly crawling and pulling me up into a standing position, Julie was next to me and only nodded before she started out, I followed quickly behind her. We made our way through the deserted streets of Connellsville passing junior high west as we did, and seeing the blood stained walls.
After a while we met more of our kind, I did not know what we were, but I knew they were like me and Julie were, and they looked at us then said what had been on my mind.
“Fo….od”
The rest agreed in unison and I only grunted, they started moving out and I followed them taking in my sites, we hit an area full of houses and tree’s up the road from where we had been and then we all stopped dead, I stood there thinking the same thing over and over again as I waited.
“Food…” I thought once more, just groaning as I followed my pack, my child holding my hand tightly “Fo…od.” I tried to say out loud looking for anything that had moved
“Foo!” one of the crowds shouted and we all started towards where he looked.
We dragged ourselves at full speed towards the dog as it tried to run chasing it until it had grown weak and slow, and pounced on it, finding two more along the way that had tried to come out and protect it, me and Julie had caught the one.
I could feel my mind slowly disappearing as I ate what I knew becoming replaced with something different.
Food…
Blood…
I dug into the ‘food’ ripping and tearing as the blood went down my throat, shoving the little child next to me away and taking the food for my own, finishing quickly.
I stood up and looked around trying to figure out where I was, there were objects all over, tall and big, and something bright above that I could not stare at for long, it started with an S, I still remembered that. I looked around and soon could not remember anything at all, only saw the food and attacked, this was the new me.
Book Of Curses: Vampire Formal
“Hold still!” Morana hissed “Don’t you know how to brush your hair honestly Layre, and why do you wear it up like this?”
“The same reason you hide here, looking disgusting?” Layre asked yelping as Morana yanked her hair
“What you don’t want people to see how pretty you are either?”
“I’m hideous; no girl with scars like mine is pretty.” Layre said gesturing to her scars along her face and arms
Morana only laughed and finished brushing out Layre’s long hair; she was prettier with it down like that I had to admit.
“Now, get your dress on and wait while I help Raine.” She said
I stoop up in the dress I dreaded to wear out, I felt twice as bad as I did earlier, I swear if this fell off I’d kill her myself, I walked over to Morana and she practically shoved me into the chair, beginning on my hair, my scalp would never recover from this.
I wasn’t sure how long I sat there wincing inwardly at the pain while Morana worked on my hair but I know she forced my eyes shut at one point then stood in front of me. I felt stuff being pressed along my eyes, and skin then he barked at me to open my eyes and she started pressing the same stuff onto my eyelids, when she stood back I finally got to look at her for once.
She finally cleaned herself up, her hair was down, washed and in glossy waves, her skin was dirt free and her green eyes sparkling, she had red lipstick on her lips and she wore a dress that was slit down the center showing cleavage and her navel before it ended, and the dress it’s self-fell onto the floor around her feet, fitting tightly to her body.
“Perfect, come here Layre, Raine you can go wait, when I’m done with her we’re leaving.” She said shooing me away
She didn’t take long on Layre, she mainly traced her eyes with black liquid I guess it was the substitute of eyeliner, messed with her hair a bit so that it framed her face and kept it like that.
Honestly she didn’t need much done to her anyways, true she had scars along her face but she was still pretty, especially in the dress she wore, it was a strapless and red and it had a slit along the right side of it that went up her thighs.
“Now, we’re good to go, by the way Raine here.” Morana said holding a mirror up to me.
She did the same eyeliner thing to my eyes and put deep blue shadow of some sort on my eyes, my lips were red and my black hair hung in loose waves along my shoulders, I didn’t know what to do or say, she just shrugged and put the mirror down “I know you want to thank me, come on.”
“I swear, if I didn’t have to go to this thing I wouldn’t.” I said walking with the two towards the ‘castle’
“Oh hush, you’ll enjoy it.” Morana smiled
“Sure I will.”
“Don’t worry Raine, when I ditch this place I’ll say I kidnapped you.” Layre said
“That, sounds like a plan.”
“Thought you’d agree.”
***
We walked past different men and women and children, the kids were dressed up and the men as well, though some not as nicely as other’s, the women were all in dresses.
Some were modest others were worse than what I even had on, I shook my head as we got closer towards the ball room that I never even knew was inside this place, and saw the guards, there were groups of five in different area’s but they all had on the same pure black outfits.
“Those are the guards that got stuck
on duty, also higher ranked than what we are, we’re group fifteen those are groups, seventeen, sixteen, eighteen, and nineteen.” She said pointing to each
I looked at her then the guards and nodded
“We protect those inside the court, they work outside it, I think you met some of them when you first came here, Fang’s under group sixteen though he works with us for now, so they had to replace him.”
“Oh.”
“And no, he’s not off right now, he’s over there.” She pointed at the man dressed in black, the only thing standing out on him was his blond hair, and he was talking to another man dressed like him and a woman.
“So where are Nixon and the others then?” I asked
“I found them!” Morana said
“Of course you did, where are they?” Layre sighed
Morana grabbed my arm and yanked me behind her so that she could hide me, but made me follow her nonetheless. We made our way towards a group and I saw Eyloff, who wasn’t dressed up at all, he had on a pair of loose pants and a shirt, his hair was pulled back messily, and he looked ready to kill.
“Hey Mora.” Tom said
“Hey. Oh...“ Morana turned around pulling me in front of her, “You didn’t have to stay back there, you know.”
“I rather I did, I enjoy hiding where no one can see me.” I said, glaring daggers at her.
“Whoa, my sister can actually look pretty?” Tom asked
I hit him crossing my arms over my chest and he started laughing, he wasn’t exactly dressed up, actually none of the guys really were, they were just in clothes that I knew they considered nice.
“Sexy is she not? Even Larie is sexy.” Morana beamed
Layre huffed and rolled her eyes “Are you done embarrassing the poor girl, I think she’s had enough besides you got your wish, they’re staring at her.”
The Darker Side: Short Stories Page 4