Chapter 1
Day 346; Entry 290; September 26, 2046
Another day alone for me. But what else is new? As the shunning continues, the plague spreads and infects more and more people; people who never deserved to be changed like that. I guess, in some cases, it would be better for a few of them: sick children living in Russian orphanages, cancer victims, veterans suffering from PTSD...
What am I writing here? NO ONE deserves this, not even the sickest person in any prison.
I guess I'm jealous of the infected ones. It's sick, I know, but I wish I was just dead at least by now. Being... me... isn't very entertaining. Whatever, I hope I can find a way to end it soon.
"Another journal, done." I told myself, placing the book on my desk in the corner. Who else would I tell? I'm alone out here. Well, besides the undead just walking and moaning and groaning around outside. Myself, I prefer the abandoned hurricane bunker I found. The family who owns, or should I say owed, it is now apart of the very thing I want to kill me.
You see, there was this plague that spread about two decades ago, just before the time of my birth. Now, I'm no scientist, but I know that whatever is causing this thing is making it's victims just barely functional. They have no heartbeat, but they continue to eat and attack humans like me, if I can even be considered that. That's what baffles me, though. Without a heartbeat, nothing can function, yet, they still do. It comes straight out of a horror movie, or some crazy-ass television show from like, 2010. Yeah, old, I know.
Now, to explain why I don't consider myself truly a human. Before I was even a thought in my parents' minds, they were best friends. Eventually, the classic "girl-next-door" shit went down, and there's a new chick ready for a new season of 16 and Pregnant. Then, the world crashed. Somehow, this plague started, and people were dying, and coming back as zombies all over the place. Being the responsible man my dad was, he tried to protect my mother at all costs.
When she was 3 weeks from her due date to go into labor, a group of about twenty or so zombies stormed out their town. Sadly, my mother was bitten. Then she went into labor. By the time my dad decided to do his own c-section, the blood from the Fleshie was already taking over my mom; and it was already in me. My dad had to get me safe before she could do anything, which he did. Sadly, he had to end my mother. I guess it was the best thing for him to do for all of us; neither him, nor me, was hurt, and my mom finally was able to find salvation with whoever she believed in as a higher power.
As I got older, people started to notice my situation. My father was killed by Boneys, which are things similar to the Fleshies, regular movie-like zombies. Boneys, though, are pretty much all bones, and minimal decayed muscle. Either of them have no remorse, or any thought process that I know of. Now that I was orphaned by the age of six, I stayed by myself most of my life. I was afraid to build relationships with people, fearing they'd betaken away from me, like my parents.
When I turned 15, the people in my little nomadic group shunned me. A group of Boneys found us, and killed most of us. Our numbers went from about a hundred, to less than twenty-five in fifteen minutes, never mind the bitten survivors who we had to shoot. However, I was bitten at least four times in the shoulder, chest, and stomach areas. Thing is, I didn't bleed. There were puncture wounds, showing my torn up muscles and flesh, but no blood leaking out. I never turned either, the wounds just scarred and stayed on me as a permanent reminder of why I've grown to hate the human race, along with the undead. My former "neighbors" thought I was some cursed little girl who was sent to destroy everyone. Note, my old town was overly religious and saw the plague as God's judgement, I guess.
From my 20 years of life in this miserable place, I've learned two things: Never go outside without a source of protection, and I can't trust any living, or moving thing. My name is Cynthia Hatcher, and no one trusts me in this post-apocalyptic world.
I sat in my bunker, savoring a fresh apple I found just sitting in the yard above me. I rolled up my blue, red, and light purple plaid shirt sleeves, and went to work. I grabbed my pistol and a brown leather bag, threw on my boots, and a denim jacket. I slowly opened the bunker doors and climbed to the outside world.
"Good, they're gone." I said to myself. I ventured out into the center of this abandoned town, smearing the black blood of shot down Fleshies and Boneys all over my face and arms.
Once I got into the center of Ashwick, Louisiana, I watched the undead stumble around. Most of them looked to be in their thirties, but a few looked to be in their later teens, early twenties.
I slowly walked, and occasionally stumbled, across the center of town into a warehouse that stored canned goods and packaged food for the needy. I pried open a crate of little wrapped sponge cakes, and stuffed as many cakes into my bag that would fill it halfway.
"Okay, not too heavy." I muttered, not wanting to be heard. I went to go find a crate full of water bottles, when I suddenly felt a searing, burning pain in my side. "Dammit!" I yelled as I pressed my pistol against the skull of a Boney and pulled the trigger. The blow shot the skeleton a good three yards, along with pulling its finger-claw-things out of my ribcage. I threw my bag over my shoulder and ran out as fast as I could. The Fleshies started to notice, and tried to mob me; but most of them just walked towards me in a mass of dead walking bodies.
I found myself, somehow, cornered between two short and broken cement walls in a parking garage, about sixty feet above the paved road, on the top floor. There were cars still parked, waiting to be driven again. Some older than others, and other looked like a new model, but were rusting away into their own kind of grave.
I felt the breeze push my dirty-blonde hair off my shoulders, and towards the edge. I looked down, and saw more masses of Fleshies waiting for me to jump.
So I did.