07/07/2026
Today by Michael Anderson
Today, was a fun day, but it all ended when one of my cowrokers called in today. This forced me to come in and work a long sixteen hour security shift for the community College I work for. The hard part for me is not staying awakebut falling asleep, my next days off aren’t for a whole week.
The best thing about working graveyardshift, is that it is peaceful. On occasion I have to respond to malfunctioning builing alarms, or students commiting acts of vandalism to the very rare drug addicted homeless person. Other than that, the campus is beautiful, with tress all over, grass overlapping on the sidewalks to help absorb the heat from the cement. Beautiful metal and brick building complement eachother with age, and grace. But with all this grace and beauty, it doesn’t come close to any of this at night. On night shift which is usually from eight pm to eight am, the shadows, the trees even the fu***ng bushes all seem off. There are occasions where I think I see something for it to be a hydrant, or a fucing bush just moving because of the autmn breeze pushing through.
With all of this it is no wonder why I have worked her for so long.The pay is crap, but the location is nice and safe. The only thing that stands out from all of this is the fu***ng graveyard about a mile away. It takes up about ten miels of the great outdoors. In fact it borders a small lab. No one really knows what goes on in the lab, but the lab house the mortuary for the city. But people have to stand in line like a fu***ng drive through to just get a pitue of their loved one’s body. No unfortunately for me, the college owns the graveyard, so on occasion I spend entire nights standing at a gate, to prevent people form entering. Now the creepiest thing about the graveyard is how silent it is. The main road doesn’t even have taffic loud enough to break the silence in the grave yard.
Tonight is different. Its different becuae we are shorthanded on Halloween night. The night that the most vandalism happens. I do not have any suspects though as to why three of my coworkers called off, but they already got their days off. I wanted my days off to spend with the family. So, I have to spend a lot of time driving back and forth between the school and the grave yard. It’s a drag driving up and down a mile. But man this happens eveyr year. With the defund the police movement and crap most colleges have physilly fired the most security officers in years. Most are contractors getting paid way lees than me.
I step out of my shower, wrap a towle on and make my way into my bedroom, where my wife is sitting at her armoir putting on make up.
“You know Dill, it is a pain in the ass that you never call off from work. But they make you go in to cover those dumbasses?”
“Yes, honey that’s just how it is apparently, you know with the defund the police movement security guards in general have been removed for the dumbest things.”
“Well what would have happpend if you called off sick? You know your kids were looking forward to spending this hallowween for you and with You.” Julie says trembling holding back tears.
“I take my towel off wand wlak over to Julie, look I will make things u to you once this is all paid off. Once that happns I will spend more time with you and the kids.”
“Dill, when the f**k is this ever going to work, where your job doesn’t fu***ng interfere with us!” Julie shouts angry, gets up and stomps her way into theb athrrom and slam the door shut.
“I swear Julie, I will make thisu p to you guys!” I shout back.
“I love you!” I shout through the door. I look at my watch and it reads 7 15 pm. S**t I have fourty five minute to get ready and leave. I rush getting ready, brushing hair, m teehtm getting my unfirom onand strapping my boots up. I grab my waterb ottel, and my lunch box.
“Ilvoe youguys, have a fun night!” I yell with excitement for my kids to have excitement. But no one retunrs the excitement.
I grab my gun and holster it after checking the one clip, and the one round in the barrel. We are only authorized one clip, on our persons at any one time, to ensure proper policing procedures are followed. In my case to make sure I cn’t survive a group attack if a group ends up attacking me. I walk right out the door and into my beat up SUV. It has fog lights on top, and a RGB light strip going around the sides of my suv.
I open the driver side door, and throw my lunch box and water on the passenger chair. I throw the SUV into reverse and slowly back up while buckling my seat belt closed. I get the damn car onto the road at a good angle. I throw the car into drive and begin my way by cutting the wheel to the right to head east down Main ave. I start going down hill only to be greeted by small rain drops. I look out to my left and right and see hundreds of kids, teenagers and parents running back home in their costumes for cover from the slowly passing rain storm. “Good, no one to mess with me tonight too easy.” I think to myself has I follow the windy road down hill to Fortmire Community College. As I start to see the College multiple lines of cars begin leaving from the campus. Speeding offin all directions. Leaving a few strglers behind on the main grassy field, where it looks like about five or six people. I aprk my vehicle behind the security office. I go inside drop off my lunchbox, and my water bottle. I grab the unit keys for a modern day ford f-450.
I make my way back outside to go see what htose people are up to. I quickly inspect the unit, and jump into it. I turn on the red nd blue lights and begin driving towards the main grass field. Where I saw a bout five to six groups of two people. The last thing I want are for these kids to be trying to make babies on the grass field.
Once I get to the grassfield the rain is pouring down, making it harder and harder for me to see through the windshield. I get to the edge of the grassfield and decide to stop my unit. I place it into park. I open the door, and instantly get soaked. I push through the cold, crisp air. Once I am on the field, the ground begins to suck my boots deep into the air making suction sounds with every step. In someplaces the soil goes up to my ankles, and in others it travels up my leg. As I make my way through the grassfield lightning lights up the area. Followed by the clap of thunder. It is so loud it makes me dizzy and deaf for a few moments, making it hard for me to wlak straight. I eventually get to the side walk that goes around the grassfield and I see a pile of clothes lying on it. “F**k a goddamn maze of trying to find these damn people. Just what I need. I follow the pile of clothes south along the side walk being careful not to walk on the grass for fear of getting stuck in the soil.
I get to a low part in the sidewalk completely submerged by water. I scan the immediate area and find at least on group of two. It looks like a man, and a woman. The woman is moaning. While the man lays silent. I keep the flashlight on them. “Ma’am!” I yell. “Ma’am are you alright?” I yell out. I get no response. I get closer and I start noticing strange marks on the back of the girl. Strange skin tone, one I haven’t seen. Then I hear the disgusting sound. The sound of something being ripped open. I continue approaching and like a flash of lightning finally reveals, deep lacerations on the womens, back. So, deep that you could almost see the bones in her back through the bloody holes. I stop dead in my tracks. Frozen with flashes of lightning going by so fast. That I still have no clue on whats going on. The women turns her head at me, and the man begins to convulse and throw himself around. The woman stands slowly back up to her feat, chuncks offlesh missing from her face, stomach. A greyish tint to her skin is showing now. With a very bloated skin. Breast hanging down, that it makes me want to gag. This woman appeared so young. She begins approaching me naked. And the man she was ontop of also gets up. I quickly pull my gun out. “Freeze or I’ll.. or I’ll… I’llshoot!” I finanly spit out. TRembling with fear.
Then I notice four more behind these two I ma looking at also completely naked. “S**t I ran up on a fu***ng gang here.” I think to myself.
“Stop or I’ll Shoot!” I yell again. This time I aim at the woman in front of me. Perfect sight alignment. Bang! The shot rings out but covered up by thunder. I see it hit the woman, in the chest. Blood spills out, the woman stumbles back a foot but still keeps coming towards me. “What the f**k is going on here?” I yell. I turn my head to start looking for a way out of this situation. I soon realize I am surrounded by hundreds of these people. I begin following the side walk back up towards my truck to the north east. Avoinding the grass as much as possible.
To my dismay I end up getting lost trying to find my way back due to the rain. I somehow managed to find the ground keeprs shed. The shed is made of red Wood, with a window by the front door, a small air conditioner unit hangs from the window. It also has a tin roof.”F**k it this the best I can do for now!” I yell to myself. I sprint to the door. I knock on it once, and no one answers. I psuh on the door and it opens up. I point my flash light through the door frame first. It is empty with a small wood cutters ax, a shovel, and of course shears. I decide to hoslter my handgun considering once shot doesn’t affect these people. I grab the ax, and close the door quietly. I lock the door, and place the chain across. I look around and find a wheelbarrow and some bricks next to it. I quickly move the wheelbarrow in front of the door. I carry a brick at a time and before I know it. The door has been blocked for now.
I ifnd an empoty space across from the window. I decide to stare out the window. I wait and wait, as I haven’t seen any of those people come by yet. “What the f**k is going on here? I mumble to myself. I realized after some time has passed I hadn’t even notified dispatch I was here. “S**t! I am so fired.” I use my phone to call dispatch. The phone goes dead. “What the f**k?” I mumble to myself again. It seems my phone has never worked since I got it. That’s when I see the last news artcle headline read on my ntofication bar.
No Cure! The people have lost their minds and resorted to cannablism.
The article before that was evcen more strange.
New virus released on mainland USA no one is safe!
Virus spreads too fast to be quarantined. US army and Airforce to consider Nuclear weapons.
Gone the world is gone. New virus found in every country.
Us is the last place of another pandemic of cannabolism.
USA is gone no Government left.
All of these articles after reading them describe in some fashion the ned of days. People aren’t people anymore. This disease spread faster than the plague of the middle ages. IT has gone undetected for years, and suddenly it is all the rave. The articles had no concrete evidence of how any of it spread. Why the f**k didn’t I just go home. I thinkm while looking through the window.
My phone rings as I dial my wife’s phone, a series of tones goes through, but again I get voicemail. “No!” I say with tears running down my cheeks. The lightning flashes and I se hundreds of those people walking by the shed not even looking my way. A few pass by the window without a second glance. I must now wait until they have passed by to try and make it back to my truck if possible. However long that will be.
As time passes even slower I decide to crawl my way to the window and lay there underneath it getting drops of rain on me. I passout only to be aroused by something else. I open my eyes and don’t see anything. As they adjust a see something small crawling around my face. I turn on my flash light and I shine it around. Then my eyes spot its shadow, a small squeak comes out. A big fu***ng rat, with its face torn off, and its back scarred aand bleeding. “Fucl” I say in a low tone of voice. I get the axe ready and wait for the damn trhing to come at me. But then I see two more pop down from the ceiling. The three more pop out from the walls. I am slowly being surrounded s**t. “I can stay here and be eatren slowly or I can leave and take my chances.” I mumble again to myself. I llok at the wall and see a lattern with a match next to it. I can throw the lattern set it to fire and throw it and break the window andleave I suppose.
I slowly make my way to the wall on my far right and really close to rthe rats who keep getting reinforcements. I find the lamp and quickly start it to turn it on. I can hear the fule inside but its not starting. I decide to throw the lamp at thr ground. Crash! Ding! The lattern breaks apart on impact throwing gas towars all the rats. I grab the lighter and start it from the wall’s striking mat. SSSHSPP! The flame is lit. I take one more step closer to the rats and quickly throw the match at them. They all catch on fire and begin running around. I run to the window, I push the Ac out of the window. But then try to push up the window. Its stuck. I try leveraging it, but fail to make it budege. I use the ax and swing it at the window. Crash!. The galls falls backwards and breaks. I take out the window divdiers. I hope out of the shed and start heading south back towards my truck.
The more I moved around the more I realized I was lost and disorientated. “F**k did I get bit?” I stop moving in the rain and look for a tree to stand by. I look around making sure no one is following me. I lift up my shirt and see bite marks littered all over my stomach. “What the f**k? Did those fu***ng rats do this?” I ask myself, trying to think why I did not feel them biting. As I remove my shirt and my arms come out of my sleeves, I begin tio realize my shirt was bit through, but the marks on my skin are shallow. I feel them with my fingers.
Suddenly flash backs of mice bitting me flashes through my eyes as if I was a mouse rally biting myself. I am so shocked that when my finger stops moving and thrust back into the cold rain with my shirt off covered in mouse bites. “What the f**k?” I ask myself again. Feeling so uneasy about this. I check my duty belt for my radio. “I got to contact dispatch.” I am still too new for this campus and I am lost, I need medical attention. Once I realize I have my radio by no micro phonme my heart stops. And searing pain shoot through my body. “FFF**K!” I have never felt this pain before. I am recving images of people running around and biting people. Just like when I touched my wounds. My heart begins to pound harder and harder then it retunrs to normal, and the images fade away.
I tunr on my radio. “905 to dispatch come in.” I say keeping the volume of my voice and my radio down. I repaeat the message again, and again wsith noi hope of ever getting a hold of someone. I lean back against the tree I am at, and I start to think of what else I can do to gert back to my family.
Then the crackle comes over the radio in a broken message, “905, this… Dispatch… Are… You there?”
“F**k!” I recognize the voice to being one of the older dispatch officers on campus.
“905 to dispatch over.” I say.
“Yes, F**k yeah I finally got a hold of you. Casn you comeb ack to the security office please?”
“Yes I can which way do I go? I am stuck inside the field park thing.”
“F**k how did you end up over there? You know what never mind, Look are you by the shed?”
“Yes, I am maybe half a mile to the south from the shed.”
“Ok, so maybe you aren’t too helpless keep going east, follow the lights from the buildings I am going toactivate them now which will attract those fu***ng things.”
“Ok, do you have any news of what is causing this?”
“No, but If I had to guess it has something to do with that lab in the graveyard though. We will talk more once you arrive.”
“Copy, ten four. Enroute.” I say with shock and excitement. I look to my left towards where I came from the shed. The shed is still on fire burning down to the ground, with those rats running around outside on fire as well. I llok tio my right and see bright spotlights on. I got to head towards those. The light burn my eyes. So I llok for way towards the smaedirection just covered in vegetation. I begin too put my shirt back on, and follow a small dirt path, that ws createds by foot traffic.
As I follow the dirt path I begin to hear frogs, toads, crickets and other creatures, and the rain is slowly starting to give up. Making traveling easier. I guage where I am at by looking at the lights but walking in such away as to avoid my eyes and head from hurting. I keep my gun holsetered because I don’t wanrt to attract anything else.
I eventually get to the parking lot in front of the east, west, north and south buildings. I get on my radio, “905 to dispatch Ian at the parking lot which way do I go?”
“I am turning off the field lights and turning on the west path lights follw them they are red lights and will be the only ones on. This is how we guide officers to emergencies.”
“Ten four.” I exclaim sharply getting frustrated. I get pain in my abdomen before I am able to look around. I fall to the ground, I hear screams followed by people working together to bring down families, people, animals and so on. All I hear is moaning, and screams of terror, with the occasional gunshot.” Before I know it I am out cold,. I fall to the ground. I lay motionless unable to breathe and move.
When I come back around I awake inside a dark room. Some one standing over me. They walk over offering me something to drink. I am unable to move my head and my eyes close again. This time, instead ofseeing only black. I am having visions, fast paced. Of myself chasing after people, takcing them down and tearing them apart. Wait no, this isn’t me I am seeing. I am seeing through the eyes of something else. What the f**k? I have never had dreams this detailed, where I hear screaming, like its coming through my own ears, the flesh squealshing, the taste of iron going on my tongue. My heart rate picks up, and It starts pounding so hard, as fear rises through me. I wouldn’t want to hurt my feeling. Then my heart stops. The vision or dream disappears, and I see myself laying on the gorund with two paddles. “Clear!” I hear barely audiable. A shock goes through my chest, and I can smell air, musky, sweet, clean air. “Clear!” I hear again. My eyes open and I see the dispatcher.
The dispatcher throws her arms around me and gives me a warm embrace. I can feel cold, but her body is so warm that it is nice. “Thank god your awake.” The dispatcher exclaims, wiping tears from her cheeks. “What do you mean?” I ask weakly. I slowly sit up and my vision slowly returns.
“I cleaned your wounds, but the skin is gross green grayish color. I used medical bandage to keep it form getting worse. But your blood is very clotted, which is odd. I haven’t seen this type of wound before.” She sit staring at me waiting for me to respond.
I struggle to get up and the dispatcher assists me up. Even though I am still on the floor, I am feeling a little bit better. “Thank you, I do apologize but I forgot your name ma’am.”
“You forgot my name?” The dispatcher says with annoyance.
“My name is Sandra. I know your new but that’s rude. I know your name Dill.” Sandra says with anger. She crosses her arms and looks away.
“Sorry Sandra, but we have to get out of here.”
Sandra uncrosses her arms, and looks at me. “Look Dill in your condition we may never get out of here, I want to go home too, but with those weird people out there it just seems impossible.”
“I know Sandra, but I want to get going. If I can get pain killers we can can get out of here.”
“Yeah but how, your truck is on the other side of the campus. I don’t have any way of protecting myself.”
“Look Sandra we are in the same situation, I only have fourteen bullets left. We need to find the security armory here on Campus, and we may be able to stand a chance. I am hoping we can find more guns, and ammo, which will make this easier.”
“Right the armory I didn’t think of that.” Sandra launches up to her feet and begins opening up filing cabinets after filing cabinets. Thenshe finds the map of the school. She spreads it open, knocking micro phones off the security desk.
“Look the armory is located in Building Delta to the north of here.”
“How many meters, yards or miles is it exactly?”
“Umm… Judging from where we are to Delta building it is about half a mile. Why?”
“We need to plot a path from the edge of this building through the other building along the way to prevent those people from getting to us. I am the only one with weapons, the most I can give you is a small butterfly knife that is spring loaded. But even that may not stop. I shot a woman that was eating a man, and she stumbled back, she didn’t even drop. I am sure I shot her heart too.” I say with conviction and concern for our safety.
“F**k that’s bad, if a bullet can’t even stop them it may make no sense for me to have a gun. Ok let me look and see what we can do.” Sandra studies the map, she traces in pencil a route that goes to John H Alpha building, Golfing business center, He school of business and medicine, and lastly Tourism science building, then to Delta. Looking at the map, the space between the buildings is less than a quarter of a mile, but they are all along the way to Delta.
I get up and walk over to Sandra. “Sandra,” I say gently. “What is the most direct way to delta building?” I ask has I hobble to her desk.
“Well we can go through the Golfing business center then go around to the right towards the School of business and Medicine and then to Tourism science and then Delta. The space would be half a mile because we would be skipping the other buildings to go through.”
I look at the cameras and see a sparse population around all of the buildings.
“We can either skip the buildings or go through all of them. If any of the buildings have any people inside we may be screwed.”
“I understand, it would make sense to go through these buildings and sneak around this way then going through all the buildings.”
“Exactly Sandra, we will have to listen and find out if anyone is still inside and avoid the buildings all together.”
“ok this makes sense. Hopefully if any of those people are not here anymore. Shall we get moving?” Sandra asks in a high pitch voice.
I look at her taking in the sight of her nice toned ass, her very pronounced hips, and her huge breasts. I think for a moment. I feel as if I am dying. I take a long slow deep breath. “Yes the armory is a good place to get weapons, were going to need every last round. I will give you my baton and taser. So that way you do not have to get too terribly close to these people.”
“What are you going to use?”
“Well if I can figure out how to take these people down a knife, but for distance I will use my gun. Hopefully if I can I will get another baton and taser as pepper spray at this point wont be effective at all.” I begin to move towards the door limping. Its like my body is slowly stopping. I work hard to get my legs moving and when I meet Sandra at the door, I hand my taser and baton to her. Sandra puts the baton in her belt to keep it around her waist. She carries the taser like a gun. I also hand her six reloadable probes in case she needs them.
“To go to drive stun flip the switch down, otherwise it will stay in probe mode. The taser can shoot out to twenty five feet. The further spread the probes are the more electricity can arc through the body. The baton you just flick with your wrist. When you strike aim down at an angle.” I say to gently guide Sandra to being successful using the weapons I have handed her.
“So the further away I am the morethe electricity will arc inside a targets body? Then to use the baton right just aim at an angle?”
“Correct, now lets move.” I say in a low tone. I holster my pistol. I draw my spring loaded butterfly knife out.
Sandra slowly opens the dispatch office door. We look around and realize it was just us inside. “Ok Sandra which way?”
Sandra looks at the signs inside the building. One sign reads rooms 100-200 200-300 300-400 Golfing business center >>>
“We have to go down the central hall to get to the golfing Business center.” Sandra says confidently.
“Ok lets go.” I say.
We move down the hall listening to our footsteps echo. Our footsteps echo making us relax. I follow closely behind Sandra has my body starts to regain control over itself. We continue going down the hallway, looking around the open classroom doors. You couldn’t even tell that this was a college with how clean the inside of the building was.
“Look we are almost to the exit.”
“Yes good. We must be prepared for anything beyond these doors. Sandra do not hesitate; you do not want to get bitten.”
Sandra looks at me with a smirk, “Don’t worry I will not hesitate.”
We get to the door I look around the best I can. But because the lights are on inside it was really difficult to look out until the lightning flashed across the sky and thunder rumbled. That’s when I saw the few people standing around, and some were even shuffling around.
“F**k!” I say with anger.
“Sandra we need to move quietly, and try to avoid these ones as much as possible. If we can I will take them down. Don’t use the taser unless necessary.”
“Ok then you take the lead.”
We nod in agreement. I slowly push the door open. Sandra catches it and closes it slowly and softly only leaving a click sound behind. The lightning flashed again and thunder rumbled. The rain starts to pick up again. I take a step forward studying the people. They seem not to care, I start to move as quickly as possible but quietly, avoiding people, by walking behind them or a few feet in front. Some of them had their heads down, others were merciless and wandering around.
It feels like an eternity moving quietly. We come up a sign that reads, Golfing Business Center Common Bar. I look at Sandra and gesture going to the left from the sign, still moving quietly. Lightning flashing every few moments and thunder exploding overhead. A person standing a few feet away from us stumbles onto our grass path forcing us on the side walk, which was covered in trails of blood, and dead bodies. As we step on the sidewalk our foot steps echoed. Which cause the people around us to stop moving. I put my hand up and clench it into a fist. I stop moving and Sandra does to. I look around and notice those people are following us. I grab Sandra and I take her to the dirt to the right of the side walk and we stand still. I ready my knife and Sandra readies her taser. “Just wait we wont do anything until we need to.” I say in a hush tone of voice. I look to Sandra for confirmation of understanding and she nods her head. The people pass by us. Like they don’t even see us. We watch as a large group of people stumble down the side walk, un able to keep their legs moving without stoping periodically. They eventually pass and go down to where the other person was.
Bang! A gun shot rings out from a distance. It smacks one of the people in his arm. The group begins running to the west back towards the dispatch building.
“Let’s go!” I say exdcitedly.
“What about the other person shooting?” Sandra asks, distraught.
Then machine gun fire picks up. BRRRT! BBRRT! Bang! Bang! The gunfire rings out loudly.
“I don’t think they need our assistance,” I say with confidence.
“Let’s stick to the plan. Then we can think about regrouping with other survivors.”
Sandra looks concerned but keeps following me. We sprint to the Golfing Center. We get to the door, and it doesn’t budge. “S**t!” I say.
I pull my key ring out and try going through all of the keys but the lock just doesn’t seem to turn. I use my flashlight and shine it at the keyhole. Thunder rumbling, and lightning flashing off in the distance, with gunfire going wild. That’s when I noticed the door requires a special key and the glass on the door is triple pane reinforced glass, my gun wouldn’t be able to break the glass alone.
“This lock is strange; it requires a Master Lock key to open it, and I don’t have it. Sandra looks around, let's go to the left. The next building is that way, anyway. Hopefully, we can find an open window to crawl through.” Sandra begins to take the lead, and we move quickly while the gunfire continues. It eventually stops. Making it harder for us to run around.
“Let’s move on to the next building, this one we cannot enter,” Sandra suggests. I nod in agreement.
We continue on to the next building, the School of Business and Medicine. We make it to a courtyard covered in grass. But the grass is covered in blood, organs, people literally ripped from limb from limb and torn apart. Bodies litter the ground here. “S**t! I think I m going to be sick.” Sandra says. She runs over to a trash can and pukes into the can. He puking echos out of the can and begisn arousing the bodies here. I walk over to Sandra, and I pull her head out of the trash can. “Let’s go before the party starts here.” I say. Sandra nods in agreement. We go around the grass area, and continue on the sidewalk, looking for dirt to walk on. For the most part, it seems the people around here were attracted to the gunfire.
“Well its like all of those gore fest movies come to life.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well with those bodies on the ground starting ot move at the sound of your vomiting. It safe to say there are lots of zombies around here now.”
“Right that explains the terrible death smell. I cant get it out of my nose.” Sandra exclaims while wlaking along side me.”
“Well I was bit by some freaky looking mice, and I am not sure how much longer I have.”
“What do you mean?”
“I may become one of them, if I cant get back to my family I want you to take care fo the mfor me, I will make sure you have my truck.”
“I’m guessing your wounds were from infected mice, which means the animals are all infected too. Which will make things complicated for survival.”
“Exactly I got messages on my pohone that said the government is gone. That everyone is killing eachother but nothing about the animals. I fell asleep in a shed here on campus thinking nothing was in it. But since then I have been seeing other zombies rip people apart and attack them. I cannot do anything to stop this either.”
“That’s strange, it is almost like you're connected with the zombies. Like telepathjy almost.”
“Yeah like a parasite, or a bug is controlling all of this almost.”
“Exactly! Don’t worry, we will get through this. If I need to I will put you down myself.”
We stop moving and look at each other and make eye contact. We both smile and nod.
We come across a sign that says, East parking structure, School of Medicne and business .
“We have to go right.” I say with conviction. Sandra looks at me “Duh! Genus, lets go.”
We begin moving again. As we move, my body starts to get stiff again; this time, it’s my arms. Then my legs give out, causing me to fall forward and hit the ground. I was unable to brace myself. Everything goes black.
“S**t!” I say.
“Dill! Dill!” I repeat a few times. “F**k, the armory isn’t far, it’s just two buildings to go.” I look down at Dill and notice blood coming from his face. But the blood is in chunks of black blood clots, which is very unusual for him to still be alive. I place my fingers on the side of his neck and I wait to feel his pulse. I feel a slight pulse; it is almost as if he is slipping away. He needs to get to the hospital. But his truck is surrounded by these people.
I check his pockets and find his truck key. I decided to leave Dill here since he is near the northeast parking lot, between the Golfing building and the medicine building. I look around for another sign, then I see it closer to the dirt. I approach the sign, which is an arrow pointing straight towards the south lot. “F**k yeah, a break.” I decide to move along the dirt path and make my way towards Dill’s truck.
After a while, almost an hour, I notice the sun starting to rise. “F**k, at least we made it, Dill. We made it through the night.” I say to myself quietly. I come up with a group of zombies. They are just standing still. I slow my pace down and come to a stop. “F**k I should have gone to the armory first.” I squeak out by accident. The group is still motionless. I look around and find planting soil to walk on, allowing me to get around the zombies. But it brings me really close. I leap to the soil, giving out a low sigh. Still no movement. I get to the edge of the planting soil and follow it through the group of zombies. I try so hard to walk slowly, but then I trip. I try to land on my hands and knees. But I fall entirely, making a muffled thud noise. I look up and try to spit the muddy soil out of my mouth. Then I realized what would happen. I looked to my right and saw the group moving around towards me. “S**t!”
I push myself up and start sprinting out of the area, and towards the truck. I look behind me, and the zombies begin sprinting after me. Before I realized it. I smack into a zombie. I push it down with my speed and force. Its bones break free from its body, sending blood and guts everywhere. “S**t!” The zombie I am on top of stops moving. I try to get up, but I am stuck in the mud. Before I know it, the group of zombies chasing after me is on top of me. I am unable to defend myself. I started feeling bites all over my body. I lose my arm, before my eyes close. Everything is black.
While I lay motionless, unable to move or see. I have another weird dream. This time, I watched a group of zombies follow and attack a woman. The woman bears a striking resemblance to Sandra. In fact, I believe it is Sandra who is being ripped apart. She did her best to escape. But failed. I must get up I must go save my family. But I watch and listen to the woman screaming, lying on her stomach on another person. As zombies tear into her back. At one point, I watched them bite her arm off clean through and her legs. Leaving the torso mostly intact and her head on. I cough, and I feel blood leave my mouth. This must be it. Where I am unable to move, unable to see what’s going on around me.
The zombie I am watching through looks up, and a group of people with guns starts to shoot. I stop seeing what’s going on. The gunfire echoes throughout the Campus.
“Over here, there’s more!” Someone yells from a close distance.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
“They’re everywhere! Fire! Open Fire!”
Automatic gunfire fills the air. Bullet casings hit the ground fast, ringing through out. As I lie here, I can hear footsteps running and stopping.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
The rapid gunfire intensifies; I start to feel the carbon in the air. It burns my skin on contact.
“Sir! What about this one? He doesn’t look like a zombie.”
“Let me call the scientist over.”
“Space Hawk to Lizard Person Over.”
“GO for Lizard person.”
“Yeah, we got one, he’s infected, but he ain’t moving. Should we kill him? Or bring him in?”
“F**k what do you mean? Infected?”
“He is starting to turn, but the infection stopped. He looks very much alive, unable to move. It’s like his body hasn’t officially died yet.”
“F**k! Imagine the research potential on him? Who is he?”
“A campus Security Guard Dill Hourghbred.”
“A security guard? Still alive after being infected? Bring his ass in. Do not kill him, just be careful.”
“Roger, do you want us to give him the antibodies?”
“Negative, this man is necessary for combat research on slowing down the infection. There is something in his genetics that is preventing him from fully turning. He must be communicating with the other zombies through telepathy at this point. Can you find out what infected him?”
“Yeah give me a few Sierra echo charlies.”
“Ok, looking at his wounds that were cleaned, it looks like rodent bites. Another human did not bite him.”
“Interesting, bring him in, find his family, and execute them.”
“Just to warn you, the US Government is sending in the Marines, and all lab employees are considered war criminals wanted alive or dead. So we gotta get him back ASAP. We are activating the Armor group to take out the rest of the campus population.”
“F**k! Roger! Over and out!”
“Alright, boys, let’s get him and go!”
“Roger sir!”
I have images of other zombies being killed. Shot and blown up. It seems like an eternity being stuck like this. Unable to move, and unable to think. These images torment me for a while in an endless loop.
The next time I open my eyes, I see people in lab coats, and seeing their flesh makes me hungry.
I hope everyone enjoyed this one as well. Today was one of the short stories I used to test certain concepts just like farm. I am open to any and all critique.
