Life. Just a four letter word, but the meaning to this one syllable word is always different, and sometimes concluded as a mystery. But what most people don't realize is that they take this particular action for granted and some… well, some just go by it without a care in the world. Now what would happen if this particular privilege was suddenly, without warning, taken away? Not being able to laze around watching TV, waste time with menial problems like being dumped, or not being able to lock yourself in your house playing video games? What if suddenly the dead arose, empty, soulless shells of a once living person arising from what should have been an eternal sleep? But it takes the dead to rise, to force people to start living.
My luck has never been the greatest. Christ, think of the worst bad luck ridden person you know and times that by ten, you still won't be close to the amount to my bad luck. For fuck sakes my middle name is Jinx. Dark humor my parents had, course theirs know reason in speaking ill of the dead, com on where's that gonna get me in life now? But one thing I am grateful for about my shitty luck is the fact it kinda isolated me from other people, sure I got lonely and I eventually resorted to talking to myself but it was good, in a sense; I didn't have the greatest people skills in the world, but hey in a way it prepared me for a world filled with the dead and being alone got ya far in terms of survival, so that's something, not everything, but something.
I was in school when this epidemic started; it was a catholic school that went from kindergarten to eighth grade. I was in eighth at the time. I hated that school, not because the religion part of it was complete and utter bull shit, mainly because I didn't belong with those prissy catholic douche bags. I was always on my own, no one ever bothered to talk to me though that was the way I preferred it. Kids mainly ignored me because I had this small twitch whenever I got agitated, restless, had the shit scared out of me, or when I knew something big was about to happen. My so called therapist diagnosed me with paranoia (my god it's called being careful) but that still didn't stop the kids from steering clear of me like I was an eighteen year old boot a squirrel died in.
Anyway I started twitching like crazy that fateful day and I couldn't figure out why, the fact that everyone was glancing at me, making me even more nervous. Finally, when the teacher had enough of me causing a distraction in her classroom (her words) she sent me to the nurse. I grabbed my stuff and when to the nurses office like madam Bitchington told me to. It was a good thing I left too, because if I didn't I would have never made it out of that school alive. Then I was off to my very first interaction with the dead.
I hate to admit it, mainly because when I look back at the first time I killed one of those things I wanted to travel back in time and hit myself, but I was somewhat terrified when I first saw that walking corpse. At first I thought it was my nurse considering the epidemic had just and I was as clueless as the next guy, so I just wandered in without thinking.
"My twitching thing started again in class and the ward sent me to go find you." I said lightly. But the nurse didn't move, all I heard was horsed and heavy breathing. I didn't take note of this at first because for all I knew she could have just had a that little assumption almost cost me my life.
I took down the cross that was on the wall an inch or two away from my shoulder and started looking at it. It was a beautiful silver cross with gold lining the edges and around the ruby in the middle; the rest was encrusted with some other diamonds I saw emeralds, opal, sapphire, and few others I couldn't recognize, but the edges where about as sharp as most knives I owned.
"Hey, I've always wondered where did you get this? Like some sort of Christen Woodstock or something?" I asked. I never really cared for Christianity one way or another but I did always find myself staring in awe at the artwork that it produced.
Again, no response. I was starting to get a little suspicious I mean sure we weren't friends or anything like that, but we at least had SOME sort of conversation. I whistled to her, her face still turned away from me. At that point I got pissed off and I threw one of the books that she kept about "taking seizures to school" or something stupid like that, which got her attention but as I looked in her face I could see that there was a good chance my nurse wasn't going to be talking any time soon. Her neck was bleeding and I could see her flesh and neck muscle thru the wound.
"Holy SHIT!" I yelled looking completely afraid and disgusted. Then she made some sort of growl and charged at me trying to bite me. I panicked and with my compulsive ADD mind I did the only thing that I could think of. I stabbed my school nurse in the head. Which at the time I figured I wouldn't just get a detention for.
At first I was freaking out thinking holy shit! Holy fuck! I'm a murderer! but then I got a glance outside the window it seemed like what happened in the nurses office wasn't the worst that happened that day. There was complete chaos outside, everyone was running. Some looked like my nurse did decompose and half eaten. Others still looked like humans but with the fear of god in them. And some were on the ground in groups when they weren't chasing anyone.
I looked further as a group of those things got up from they're previous kneeling position, and what I saw was almost enough to make me scream. There laid some guy, almost completely eaten. But just before I could look away another guy who got bit, not as bad as the dude from the group of the dead, immediately got up and bit a girl no older than sixteen. Now what I realized what was dead had rose into an army of some sort; and they were getting new recruits by the minute.
After the horrific scene I witnessed through the window I decided I got to get home. I grabbed my backpack from the floor and I ran the hell out of there. I stopped by my classroom to see if I could get another one of those crosses in case there was one as lethal as the bloodied one that was in my hand. But when I looked inside the window on the door, I realized that going in there wasn't an option anymore, one of those dead bastards broke into the window in the classroom and… let's just say that if you wanted to get eaten alive in there was the place to be, it was like a blood bath.
Everyone was getting eaten and here I was outside the door unscathed. My luck was finally beginning to turn! But then I began to consider that there was NO way I was gonna get back home with everything I saw outside, hell I couldn't even run a full two laps around our gym; I considered this for a moment or two, then it hit me! I couldn't run; but I could flee
Surprisingly enough my idiotic plan worked! I made it home without so much as a scratch on me. I dug out my key from my pocket and then I ran into the house and locked the door behind me. You know? When my family (me, my brother, and my mom) moved to Georgia from Los Angeles I didn't think this is what people do in their spare time down south. I didn't know what to do, so I did the one think I knew I could do, I turned on the news.
"-Police urge you to stay indoors through this epidemic, for those who decide not to stay indoors we advise you go to the refugee center in Atlanta where paramedics are waiting to treat who's been injured through this disaster and to be protected under military-"
I turned off the TV after hearing the small amount of news I just heard on TV. The refugee center! This was become way too easy to fend off. But then I saw a hole through my plan; how the fuck am I gonna get there?! Of course, my luck is never that good how was I gonna get there? My mom and my brother drive but they weren't here, figures! The one time I wanted them around and they probably just went without me. As soon as that thought appeared into my brain I see a note on the kitchen table. Next to the note was a hand gun, a messenger's bag that seemed to be full, and a long stick like thing wrapped in brown paper rapping.
"Dear Zachariah,
I know your never gonna let me hear the end of this but I left for the refugee center in Atlanta. I hope I see you there, but if it isn't what it's said to be, and the city seems quiet, STAY AWAY. Mom died, she got bit when we were getting away from where all the undead seemed to huddle around. In the messengers bag there is enough ammo to last you until you get to the refugee center, a map of the state, a large hunters knife, I think it's called a buck knife or something like that and a few other things, also remember that sword with the dragon design you were looking at in the farmers market? Well consider that your birthday present for this year so you won't have an excuse to bitch at me for not getting you anything though you'll find something though you always do.
Stay safe, Troy
...
I was speechless I realized that for a split moment that he had gone to all this trouble for me, though something told me in the back of my head that I wouldn't see him again, but I think keeping the hope that we would see each other again would make this less harder that it was. I went upstairs to my room and got one thing before I left this house for good. It may be stupid to have considering the circumstances but what the hell I thought. I went in my dresser drawer and I grabbed the one other nice thing that he ever got me; it was a gold barrette with the insignia of the '70s band Queen. He got it for me when I broke my leg when riding my bike when I was six. I put in my hair and said goodbye to the life I knew before. Man I felt like the main Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins when he gets pressured into going into that quest with Gandalf. except I don't think I'll have magic on my side, though that would be awesome! And so with my new sword in my left hand, the gun Troy left me with also given holster for my belt, I head out the door, taking a deep breath towards the new life I was embracing.
Let me just say that killing these undead basterds what possibly the greatest feeling in the world. That may sound wrong but hey at least there isn't many people to judge that particular comment if I say it out loud. But mainly it was a priority if I was going to survive, or at the most unlikely find my brother, killing was just something I had to do. I just had one thing that I didn't actually think about. I stopped in my tracks when I made back to my school.
"How in god's name am I gonna get there?" I asked out loud.
I never think things through. Here I was; hell bent on getting to Atlanta, when I haven't even considered how I was gonna get there. I sure as hell couldn't walk, I couldn't take a bike, and I no idea how to even get there. But hey, I've been through worst, and I've spent my entire life watching movies and preparing for the worst, so if anyone had any idea what to do, it would be me. I walked back into the school, mainly because I left something in my desk that I knew I should get. Unlike before, getting there was easy as pie.
I walked in, slice a few heads, and walked out. I got to my class and from what I could see there where only a few of the undead in there, I counted about a dozen, and they were all facing the window. "It's like shooting fish in a barrel." I thought. I quietly opened the door, walked in, and hacked away.
Slicing these guys where simple because all of the corpses where my classmates and let's just say, finishing them off wasn't the hardest thing in the world. After I killed the last one, being as easy as I thought, I went to my desk and found my sketch book. I know, a stupid thing to put my life at risk for, but it has sentimental value. I got out of the school taking one last distasteful glance at the building and smiling as I walked away from a place id never have to step foot in ever again. Moving on looking at the map my brother left me, I headed to the direction of the capital of Georgia.
A stupid thing to do at the state of shock everyone was in I decided to hitch hike. I waited for like an hour at the side of the road until someone finally pulled over. Finally I thought as the driver got out of the car. That was the good news, the bad news being it was a cop that I've seen before, and he's arrested my brother for carjacking I think, shoplifting, and a few other things. But the thing is that he didn't seem to recognize me.
"Hey" he said. I didn't really want interaction from this guy, but I soon realized that I was running out of options, so I swallowed my pride, and got his help.
"Yeah, hey… I need a ride to Atlanta. You heading there?" I asked.
"Yeah were going there, need a lift?" he asked. I decided that considering no one else pulled over that my chances to hitch hiking to the city were slim to none.
"Yeah that would be nice" I said trying to sound neutral about the decision. Without another word he motioned his head to the car he was driving and got into the driver's seat. I got into the door he moved his head to and didn't say another word.
"This is Lori," he looked into the direction of the woman in the front seat. "And this is Carl." He said looking and the boy that I was sitting next to. He looked no older than I was; maybe I was a year or two older than me.
"Hey." I said, and then not another word. It was completely awkward.
I think at this point it would have been easier if I walked, towards the entrance of Atlanta, there was a huge traffic snare. Lori and Carl got out of the car and not too far they were talking to a woman with a short hair cut and a little girl the same age as Carl. I still sat in the back while the guy what screwing with the radio. After listening to radio static for a good ten minutes I decided to break the awkward silence.
"Your wife and kid seem nice." I said briefly. He looked up to me and with a bit of surprised look in his eyes.
"They aren't my family." He said. The look on his face told me I should change the subject.
"Aren't you a cop?" I asked wondering if I had been right about the guy.
"Yeah I am how do you know?" he asked.
"You just seem like it." I said. Though the truth is Troy was arrested by this guy once or twice.
"Oh." He said.
"I'm Zachariah by the way." I said, thinking that I should at least state my name. He nodded my way and went back to the radio.
"Don't you have a partner you're usually with?" I asked thinking that on the entire way to Atlanta.
"Yeah, but he got shot and he died in the hospital he was in when this started." He said softly.
"Oh… well if makes you feel any better, my mom died during this too." I said, why I did? No idea I guess to make him feel better. But then a thought popped into my head.
"It's kinda weird that I haven't heard anything about the refugee center. Do you think that they're still taking people in?" I asked with a hint of worry in my voice.
"I don't know, but is strange that we haven't heard anything." He said starting to look worried himself.
"I'm gonna look on ahead, see if there's anything happening further up. I'll be back." I said. Then got out of the car.
And what a sight did I see.
Okay i just want to point out that this is my first time writing a fan fiction and that if i carry on with the little details, just try to work with me im gonna write more just give me time, i still have a LONG way to go and constructive criticism will probably help me so dont hold back on your opinions. thanks ;D