A solitary figure stood at the fence looking out over the wasted countryside. She reflected over all she'd been through in the ten years since the virus spread. Some said virus, some said radiation no one knew for certain what caused the dead to rise and some didn't care. They rose, that was all that mattered.
First the cities fell, the overpopulated areas. It wasn't just the zombies to blame. The gangs were always fighting for turf. Some of them saw the zombies as a good distraction and took advantage to take over new territories. They caused the deaths of their own and civilians alike, who then rose causing the zombie horde numbers to swell.
Families fought to protect their homes, just another turf war, as if they had become gangs. They turned against their neighbors and friends when they should have united as one to fight off the dead. That is why the living lost in the beginning. The zombies had one driving force, hunger. The living were bound mostly by fear, hatred, greed, and anger.
There had been mass confusion in the beginning. Many different reactions from the ones who wouldn't give up there homes, to the ones who wanted only to seek help and the ones who fled. Mel wasn't in any of those groups. She was amongst the ones who were travelling when it went bad.
Her family had been on the road. Her father had just gotten a motor home and her family was on what was to be her last vacation before she went off to college.
They started hearing reports on the radio of a virus or some sort of contaminant causing people to go crazy and attack people. Then the reports changed to the dead rising. Her father thought that was crazy. Until he was attacked at a filling station. He turned fast and in an instant everything in her world changed. they locked him out and her mother took off like a bat out of hell with her little brother Steve, who hadn't stirred from his nap, and herself.
It seemed as though they drove for hours and hours. Her mom seemed to be driving aimlessly as if not sure where to go, not sure what happened was real. Mel wasn't even sure what happened. She sat and thought as they passed miles and miles of the dead walking. Pounding on the RV whenever it slowed down, attacking anything that moved, anything alive. By the time her mom was too tired to drive she knew she had to step up and take charge.
She had seen a lot of zombie movies, enough to know that they had to find somewhere safe. If they were to stop to sleep they would be over run. They had to find somewhere safe. She took the wheel. It seemed as though she had been driving ever since. Her mother let her take over things. As if she couldn't be the mom anymore.
Now she stood here at the edge of base, worlds away from that innocent 18 year old girl she was at the beginning. In the distance she could hear the moan of the undead and the shuffling as they moved ever closer. One appeared over the top of the nearest hill to where she was standing. She drew her pistol and fired. As it fell to the ground she holstered her fire arm wiped away a tear and turned back towards home.