Clare gagged for breath, trying to keep up with Emily, although the other, more nimble girl, was meters infront of her. Clare's vizion had become blurry, the taste of blood in her mouth nearly making her vomit, her knees, along with the rest of her joints, inflamed, and yet she kept running.
She could hear them better now, even over her loud, wheezling breathing. Not only behind her, but on the sides as well, she realised. The girl moaned in terror, trying to run even faster, but the rustling from the trees and cracking of dead treebrances told her that the creatures were closer now, much too close. Their muffled screams, filled with yearning and bloodlust for the fresh meat that they were so surely about to recive, terrified her, pushing the poor girl to her limits. Clare added to her pace, trying to push out the sounds and just focus on the house, the only option they had, so close now, and yet so far, but a sudden commotion from behind her almost made the teenager scream.
She looked over her shoulder and came to a sudden stop, as she realized in a sudden flash of panic that Adele had fallen. „This is NOT happening" she though, as she ran back twoards her breathless friend. „ Come on, get up, come ON!" she whispered to Adele, grabbing the limp girl by her elbow, but she just looked at Clare with hazy, glassy eyes, not really seeing anything. Trying to pull the fallen girl up, Clare looked back twoards the highway and felt her heart skip a beat. There they were, nearing in a disturbingly quick pace, half limping, half crawling, but nearing with certainty. Looking for help, she almost called out for Emily, but the slim blonde had almost made it to the house and calling her back would have resaulted in death for all three of them.
Turning back to Adele and trying to not glance at the nearing death, Clare yanked at her arm again, but her friend showed no intention to move. With a moan of desperation Clare fell to her knees, pulled Adele's hand over her shoulders and stoop up, gritting her teeth, lifting the much taller girl. The duo headed twoards the house, with Clare half carrying, half pulling Adele forward. She couldn't see much and for a moment she thought that perhaps she had lost her glasses, but as Clare felt soft warm streaks runnind down over her cheeks, the girl realized she was, infact, crying. Furiously blinking, her line of sight became clearer, and she saw Emily at the door now, hitting the lock with her axe. „Well" she thought with a sarcastic smirk, „atleast one of us will live through the night."
The closeness of the creatures was obvious without even a glance, their wheezing breating and the sounds of their limp feet dragging on the ground clear in the otherwise silent house wasn't far now, barely 30 meters, if that, but at their currents pace there was no chance they would make it. Emily stood at the door, not sure whether to run to them and help or to follow her previous guidance. She made a dubious step twoards her friends but Clare shaked her head furiously and mouthed: „Go!", too out of breath to make any sort of voice. Emily gulped, but nodded and tashed into the house to look for something to barricade the door.
Emily seemed to trust Clare, but Clare herself wasn't that sure of her choice at all. Perhaps they could have made it, had the two of them been dragging Adele along? „I guess we'll never know", she thought, as she felt her legs become limp. Part of her just wanted to throw herself on the ground and let the inevitable happen, but yet she kept moving despite of her limp feet. The creatures were close now, so close infact, that she could smell their rotting flesh, hear their watery flesh smack against itself, and it gave her power which she never thought she might have. The smell had also seemed to awaken Adele from her haze, and the taller girl began to use her own feet properly again.
The duo's pace doubled as they stumbled twoards the porch, followed by screeches of despair as the walkers of death realized that their pray was literally slipping through their rotting fingers. The girls climbed onto the porch side by side, Emily running twoards them through the coridor. Clare pushed Adele infront of her and Emily pulled her best friend in. Clare was just about to follow her when she felt a sudden jank at the back of her head and a flash of pain in her neck as her head was jerked back. Grabbing onto the railing post, she stopped herself from falling backwards and couldn't help but look up.
For a moment, life and time itself seemed to have stop, as Clare stared into the eyes of a zombie. The moon was directly above the rotting creatures head, giving it silver halo around its cracked head, veiling the half-gone nose and cheek from which its teeth would otherwise have been visible. The creature almost looked human, and Clare couldn't help but think that it even seemed... beautiful, in its grotesque way. Then the zombie opened it's mouth and screached in the most befaul way, breaking the illusion as fast as it had appeared.
Clare tried to pull herself forward at the same time she heard a deep and gruesome roar. She didn't realize where is came from untill she saw Emily jump forward, waving her axe. Before she even had a sence of what had happened, the blonde had cut off the foul creature's hand and pushed Clare into the house. With another swift move, she cut off the zombies head and was inside the house before the scalp had even hit the ground. The thin girl yanked the door close and slided the old lock above the broken one shut. She then grabbed the rope connected to the doorhandle and tied it to a pole on the coridor wall that seemed to be there just for that purpose. Making sure she had done everything she could for that moment, she leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor. There the tree girls laid, in silence, trying to catch their breath, praying that their primitive locks would keep them safe against the roaming death that was just on the other side of the door.
Clare just laid on the floor, sweat dripping down from her forhead. She felt her heart slowly nearing back to it's normal pace, but she was too limp to move her body yet. Emily stood up, gripping her axe, and slowly headed forward into the house. Given the commotion and noice they had made at the front door, it was unlikely that there were any zombies in the house, but they still had to check. They also needed to secure any other exits, doors or windows from which the walkers could enter.
Clare knew she should get up and give Emily a hand, but she couldn't make herself get up. She also didn't posess a weapon and she had no interest in facing another zombie with just her bare hands. The zombie's face flashed infront of her eyes and she felt a shiver running all over her body. The girl shook her head and forced herself to get up. Even if she couldn't push herself to help Emily, she atleast needed to take care of Adele. The tall girl was curled up on the floor, shaken in silent sobs.
„I know honey. I know. I know" Clare sang quietly to her friend, stroking her head. „Come now, we need to go further in, okay?" Adele didn't reply, but did let herself be helped up and together the two girls headed into the first room on the left. The TV, couches, the laptop on the coffe table and bookcases against the walls made it pretty obvious that this was the living room. Clare helped Adele into one of the armchairs and looked around.
There was something odd about the room. The coffetable was covered with everyday clutter. A book with a cutout of a naked lady as a bookmark was on the table with an empty coffe cup next to it. It didn't look like a summerhouse which had been empty for months. It also didn't seem like the owners had rushed out of here in terror, grabbing only the first things they could think of. In truth, the room seemed as if somebody was still living in it.
„Did you notice?" Clare asked Adele, but the girl ignored her completely, having fallen into her dark haze again. She couldn't really blame Adele: having to see your boyfriend sacrifice himself and be ripped apart infront of your eyes couldn't have been easy for her, and today wasn't easy either. But at the same time, Clare was annoyed as well. They were all having a hard time, but neither she nor Emily had the luxury to be falling apart. Atleast she still keeps running when we tell her to, Clare though, as she left Adele to her thoughts and exited the room quietly.
Now that she looked around, she noticed more things indicating that the house wasn't abandoned. Muddy patch on the floor where somebody's boots would have been placed, an empty hanger where a jacket would normally hang. She headed across the hall to the kitchen. Slowly she took a step in an looked around. It seemed safe and she continued, grateful for the curtains that had been pulled shut, hiding the view of the endlesly crawling walkers roaming the land with no destination and purpose other than the need to kill.
Clare relaxed a bit and took a look around. A half-empty jar of jam on the table next to the salt and paper shakers. Fresh garbage in the can. Clean but still wet cluttery in the sink. Yup, she though, somebody's still living here. Had to be.