by Sands, Samie
The town that I’ve grown so used to during my time living here looks like a wasteland. Dust and dirt flicks up the roads, and in a short time, it’s already looking very abandoned. Maybe litter has always scattered about the place and paint’s always been peeling off the walls...I just didn’t notice it because there were people everywhere. I know the blood and grime haven’t always been there though, or the bodies. That’s an extremely unwelcome change I could do without.
Will it ever get better? Is this life ever going to improve?
I need it to, I don’t want to think that this is our future, but maybe it is. I don’t know. Maybe we’re really done with humanity as it once was and now this will be our survival forever.
“Yeah, it’s just around the corner.” Is it me, or does Enrico sound truly anxious? “I hope it’s not as bad as they say. I really don’t want to wander head first into a shit show.”
“No, nor do I.” I shake my head fervently. “We won’t go in if it’s like that. We’ll just leave.”
I shouldn’t have dragged my friend into this, especially when I already suspect this will end up a bust. It wasn’t fair of me to even ask him when Katie is the main reason behind it. I part my lips, ready to confess the truth, just to ease my conscience a little bit, but somehow the words don’t come out my mouth. The get stuck firmly in my throat like there’s a golf ball in the way.
“Holy hell!” Enrico stops dead where he is and he points. “Look at that.”
My heart sinks as I follow his eyeline. The sight before me is dreadful. The hospital is surrounded by them, the intense stench of death is unbearable, I even gag because it’s so powerful. Even in a world where I’m used to it, it’s bad. This place is worse than anywhere I’ve seen yet, it’s even worse than the specialist medical facility. Whoever Katie was hoping I’d find is long gone.
“So, we go, right?” I ask Enrico while taking a tentative step forward. “We need to go back.”
My mind races, I try desperately to think of a way to make this worthwhile. I know I have the information I came for, but I still feel like this dangerous journey has all been for nothing. Maybe we could stop off at a supermarket or something, try to find one that hasn’t been looted yet. Taking food back to the station will make me feel better about myself...
“Argh!”
Enrico screams, and it’s a sound so loud it pierces violently through my brain. I spin at the speed of light to tell him to can it before we attract all those millions of beasts over to us. I’m sure as hell not expecting to see him in the arms of one.
“Enrico, what are you doing?” I yell. “Get away from it.”
He fires off shots, but they’re random and in the air. I don’t understand, why isn’t he just killing the thing? It makes no sense, he’s the best shot I know.
I feel compelled to do the job for him, so I lift my gun and take aim, but it’s hard to fire when he’s battling with it and there’s too much money. I’m so scared I’ll hit Enrico rather than the infected.
“Push him away!” I scream. “Enrico, shove him off you. Let me kill it.”
My heart thunders in my ears, my fingers tremble with nerves. I don’t usually get shook up when I have to do something like this, but I guess it isn’t usually this stressful and I don’t always have my friend on the other end of the shot. I need to do it though, somehow.
I try to squeeze the trigger, to force myself to do it, but the memory of the teenage boy flickers through my mind at the last second, making me blink rapidly. My past mistake floods me, making me ill, I almost vomit.
“Argh!”
This time as Enrico screams and my vision clears I see a sight the freezes me completely. Even my bones succumb to the chill.
The zombified idiot has a chunk of Enrico’s neck in his mouth and he’s tugging it violently, ripping it from his body.
Enrico is going to die...
Nine
I'm frozen to the spot, my ears buzz with the knowledge that absolutely everything has gone horribly wrong in the absolute worst way possible. My spine is icy and I'm frozen to this spot. Blood splurts out absolutely everywhere, making it acutely obvious to me that this is the worst horror movie that I’ve ever witnessed...only it’s real, and it’s happening right in front of me, in real life.
That there is my actual best friend being torn to shreds, and I can’t do a damn thing about it.
My brain unhelpfully replays the moment that the zombie first latched onto Enrico over and over again, letting me know all the things that I could, and should, have done differently, but it’s too late now. His body is in tatters. He’s lost to me.
Of all the mistakes that I have made in my life, and we all know that there have been far too many, this is one thousand percent the worst. I hate myself for it. I dragged my friend out here on a fruitless mission, all because I’ve made the dumb ass mistake of allowing my heart to open up to someone during the worst thing to ever happen in human history.
It’s the dam apocalypse, the end of humanity as we know it, and I’m idiotically falling in love...
“Enrico,” I finally rasp out desperately. “No!”
He parts his lips and tries to reply to me, but more blood flies from his mouth and dribbles down his chin. His throat has been torn out, his vocal chords have probably long gone. This must be the most agonizing death that anyone has ever had to suffer...and I’m here witnessing it without taking action.
All of a sudden, just as I’m about to collapse into a pathetic heap on the ground, Enrico finds one last burst of strength from God knows where. Like a freaking superhero, he shoves the zombie off him and he races into the crowd, allowing them all to take him down and dig out small pieces of him. I can’t even see him anymore because they are all over him.
It takes me a moment to work out why he would do something so courageous, yet so dumb. He’s helping me out, one last time. Distracting the crowd so I can find a way through to get into the hospital. I don’t even want to do it anymore, it seems like a massive waste of time, but I have to. Enrico didn’t give his life for nothing and I need to make the most of it. Even if I can grab something useful, it’ll be worth it a little bit.
Nothing is worth losing a life over, especially not when it’s someone as incredible as Enrico, but I don’t want his death to be for nothing either. He definitely wouldn’t want that.
With intense grief crushing down my spine, I turn my back on the scene that is wholly my fault and I head towards the hospital. Angry, hot tears prick the corners of my eyes, but I refuse to let them out. Not now, no way! I can fall apart once I’m back at the station, once I’ve told everyone the terrible news. I’m sure I won’t be the only one who’s gutted, Enrico touched a lot of lives.
The white building of the hospital looms in front of me, promising nothing but a circus of horrors. My entire body screams at me to run in the opposite direction, but Enrico’s death drives me to take that one step closer.
“Hey, idiot!” an unfamiliar voice yells out to me, bursting through my shock barrier and grabbing my attention. “Where the hell do you think you’re going? Do you want to die?”
Do I want to die? Now that really is a question!
Ten
“Huh? Who are you?” I snap back, maybe a little harshly considering.
I run my eyes up and down the guy who seems to have appeared from nowhere. On the one hand, I’m glad to no longer be alone, but on the other, anyone who isn’t Enrico isn’t welcome. I just want to turn back time, spin back the moments. I want to reverse my mistakes and to have my friend back.
“Does it matter?” he sneers while jutting his chin out at me. “We’re both in a shit storm here, so maybe it’s best we focus on getting away from the hospital building first.”
I glance towards the building longingly. Even after everything, I still want to make it inside for Katie. I have this feeling that whatever she’s hunting for, whatever she needs, it’s in there and by turning my back on it, I’m effectively
leaving her in trouble.
“Trust me.” The stranger rests one hand on my shoulder, making me jump. “I’ve just come from there. It isn’t worth going inside. Nothing is salvageable.”
“You were in there?” He nods slowly. “Like, as a patient?”
“No, I was a doctor.”
Okay, this is good. Maybe this is what I need, someone with medical training. Someone who might be able to help Katie out more than I can. I hate relying on others, I’ve never been great at that, but this is a different time. This calls for a whole different set of rules.
“Okay, great. Well, I don’t know what your plan is, but I have a place...”
I don’t know if I can trust him or not, but for now, it feels like I should try. I need to step out of the mold and be a better version of myself.
He offers me a one-shouldered shrug. “Sure, whatever. Anything has to be better than here.”
We start off lightly jogging away from the hospital building, but soon it becomes more of a fast-paced run. I keep thinking of Enrico and the terrible way that he died, the danger that’s out here runs through my head over and over, causing me to pick up the pace. Thankfully, it seems the stranger can keep up.
I don’t look at him as we run, I don’t know if I can make eye contact with him because I fear feeling anything for him at all. If I start to care about this man, even one percent of what I felt for Enrico, and I lose him too, that’ll crush me. So, I keep my eyes fixed forward, thinking about the police station the entire time. The place I left not so long ago, with my whole life intact...
Well, sort of. I guess it hasn’t been whole since all of this happened.
“Where are we going?” the guy eventually asks me. “Where’s this place of yours?”
I slide my eyes closed, resisting the urge to tell him to get lost. “It’s not far. It’s the police station.”
“Huh...are you a cop?” I nod slowly. “I wouldn’t have pegged you for one.”
I suppose I still look a bit like the bad boy who once lived on the other side of the law, but I can’t stop myself from being petty back. Something about his attitude rubs me the wrong way. It isn’t that I regret rescuing him or anything, I just don’t want to speak to him right now.
“Yeah, well you don’t look like a doctor, so what can we do about that?”
He laughs, completely unbothered by my insult. “True! Very true. So, is this where we’re going?”
“It is.” I nod towards the police station. “I have some people in there from the specialist medical facility, so you might already have people that you know in there.”
“Oh right!” His eyes brighten with happiness. “Like who? Hannah? Dave? Katie?”
Katie...!
I don’t know why, but when he says her name, my blood runs icy cold. Of course, he knows her, they are both from the same field, but I can’t help needing to know more.
“Yeah, Katie. You know her?”
He nods. “Sure, I do. I’m sure she talks about me all the time! We really... close.”
Did I imagine that pause or did he put it in there on purpose? I feel like he desperately wants to wind me up.
“What’s your name?” I fold my arms definitively across my chest. “I’ll see if I’ve heard of you.”
“Ryan.”
Ryan...who the hell is Ryan?
Eleven
I knew that I’d heard the name Ryan before, I realized it straight away. What I didn’t know was how I knew it, not until we got back to the prison. I mean, I’m not so dumb that I didn’t get that he already knew Katie...but I never realized how close their relationship was.
He’s been with her ever since we got back. He’s been sitting with her, talking to her, comforting her, and that’s the position I want to be in. I want to be the one with my arms around her, but I can’t. Not when they have a history, not when he’s trying to be nice, not when there’s no logical reason why I should be protesting their moment alone together.
It’s the loving looks that I can’t stand. The little glances that Katie keeps giving him. They’re burning inside of me, coiling through me like a jealous snake, creating a burning rage in my chest.
I squeeze the can of pop in my hand, crushing it slightly as I let some of my emotion out.
I lost Enrico for this mission, I sacrificed him to help Katie out, and now I might lose her. That’s impossible for me to accept.
“She seems happier,” Rachael comments smilingly next to me. “Katie has more color in her cheeks.”
Normally, I would love to hear a comment like that, it would buck me up and keep me going, but this time it riles me up further. I don’t want to hear another man making her smile.
“Yeah,” I grumble back. “I suppose so.”
Rachael sighs loudly, sensing the anger rolling off me in waves. “I’m sorry about your friend.”
Burning hot tears ball behind my eyes, I can feel them at risk of falling. I cannot cry out here, I can’t let anyone see me fall apart. I’m the one left in charge now, I’m the one who everyone looks up to if I crumble, so will everyone else.
“I’m sorry too.” I breathe out loudly, trying to relinquish all of this negativity. “But, what can you do? In this world everyone is at risk, no one is safe. And it doesn’t look like it’s going to get better.”
I haven’t felt this hopeless ever since the first victim of the AM13 virus emerged and everything changed, but with Enrico gone and Katie seemingly slipping through my fingers, I don’t know what I’m fighting for. I’ve gone back to that place of intense wondering. What are we all doing? If this is the way of the world now, then what’s the point of carrying on?
If I knew for sure that there’s someone out there fighting to get rid of this virus, then I’d be okay, but I don’t, and I’m not sure there is.
I think of Enrico, putting myself in his shoes, trying to imagine the horror as a horde of zombies peels off my skin, eats me, and tears me to shreds. It makes me feel sparks of pain all over my body.
“It will get better,” Rachael replies with a bright optimism that feels misplaced. “Soon enough.”
But as I look at Ryan and I watch the way that his arm drapes so casually over Katie’s shoulder as if it belongs there, as if there’s a past history between these two, I feel everything good that’s happened to me fade.
This world sucks, there’s no doubt about it, and I don’t know how long I can keep fighting it.
“I don’t see much point in me sticking around here tonight.” My tone is false, Rachael must be able to sense that. “Katie seems just fine, so I’m going to get some sleep. I guess I’ll see you in the morning.”
I can feel eyes pricking into my neck as I walk away, causing all the hairs there to stand on edge, but I continue moving anyway. I need space to breathe, a place to think, I have to escape that awful situation before it pushes me over the edge.
If it does that, there’s no telling what I’ll do!
Twelve
Over the next couple of days, we welcome more people into our fold making it impossible for me to get any time alone with Katie. While out trying to secure the prison a little better, I found a group of teenage boys. Rhys, Jordan, and a few others whose names I can barely remember, and they were struggling. The signs of dehydration and lack of sustenance were apparent, so of course, I invited them in despite the fact that we don’t actually have a lot of space for them.
My humanity might have left me once before, but it won’t happen again.
So, in between trying to fit them all in, keep the prison as safe as possible, and dividing up labor in the fairest way, I haven’t had even a second for the woman I’m falling for. She’s on my mind all the time, all I really want to do is see her, but somehow all these responsibilities have been shoved on my shoulders and they must come first.
“So, Rhys and the others are out boarding up the windows,” Rachael tells me with a smile. She’s taken it upon herself to become my second-in-command which I’m
absolutely fine with. She might be young but she’s got nerves of steel. She also has this way of making people do what she wants to without any hassle. It’s admirable, really. “What’s next on the agenda?”
I roll my eyes and rub my forehead, trying to ward off the headache that’s threatening to burst free. I was good at being a cop, but I didn’t ever yearn for more. I didn’t want to be a part of the admin and delegation side. Yet here I am, doing all that I didn’t want.
“What’s everyone else doing?”
By this, I mean ‘what’s Ryan doing?’ but I’m too afraid of the answer to ask outright. I already know where he’ll be, glued to Katie’s side, probably winning her around. If he has the answers to all the struggles that she’s been going through since everything went wrong at the specialist medical facility then he’s already got something over me, and that might well be enough to win her over.
“I’m not sure about everyone. I can find out if you like, let you know?”
I nod gratefully and let my head fall into my hands for just a moment. With every second that passes by, rescue seems less and less likely. This is something I’ve considered before, but now I need to really think about it. I need to work out a real way to live in this new environment.
If our group keeps getting bigger, the prison isn’t going to cut it. It just doesn’t have the room. But then, I can’t exactly send people away, can I? Judging by the increasing number of shambling flesh-eating monsters outside, if I do then I’m sentencing them to death. There’s no way I can live with that.
But where else can we go?
I grab my list of scribbled ideas, trying to work out if any of them are appropriate, but I’m just not sure. I don’t want to make the call and end up losing lots of people along the way. I don’t want to be responsible for endless deaths.
It’s hard for my brain to focus on such a life-changing operation when really my brain wants to think about something or more someone else. I can’t get Katie out of my brain and it’s killing me. Maybe I should just go and see her, even if Ryan’s there, what’s stopping me? There’s no reason I can’t go...