Ch. 1: Dana Simms
It was 12:00 p.m and Dana Simms was sitting on the ground of the Entrance Plaza in the Willamette Parkview Mall, in hysterics about the zombie attack.
"Zombies! How could this happen?" she cried to her new found friend Verlene Willis.
"I'll be with you the whole time, so don't worry," Verlene said, trying to comfort Dana.
At those supposed to be comforting words, Dana broke into another bout of hysterics, remembering the past day, wishing she could have said those same words to her old friends, who she was sure were dead.
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The day before, she'd been at a party with one of her friends, Mindy Baker. She had persuaded Dana to go even though she wanted to go shopping. She was glad she had gone, the party had been great, people were dancing and talking. Suddenly there was loud thump on the door, followed by more at the windows. People stopped dancing and looked at the door, wondering what was happening outside.
"What's going on?" someone asked Dana.
"How should I know? Probably just the wind or something."
The thumping got louder and louder, and the sound of moaning was deafening.
"Dana, open the door and see what's up," someone else ordered.
"Why me?" Dana asked.
"Just do it," they said, pointing at the door.
Dana reluctantly went to the door and opened it. There, standing in front of her was a sea of undead. Time seemed to stand still. She looked at them, and they looked at her, none of them moving. Suddenly, they were pouring into the house, grabbing people and tearing open their stomachs, ripping their limbs off in hopes of getting a bite before the person was either to mutilated and died, or until they too became a zombie.
Dana frantically tried to find her friends in the mass of undead.
"Dana!" Mindy called out. Dana ran to her and saw she was on the counter, hitting zombies away with a frying pan.
"Dana! Help me!" Mindy yelled.
Dana ran through the mass, just narrowly avoiding a zombie that tried to rip her left hand off. She joined Mindy on the counter.
"Are you okay?" Dana asked, grabbing a knife.
"I'm fine," she said.
Before Dana could say anything else a zombie lurched up and grabbed Mindy's leg.
Mindy screamed and was on the floor before Dana could react. Now in a full state of panic, she leaped off the counter, not even noticing Mindy was still alive, and doing a good job of kicking them off of her, and ran out the kitchen door.
Once she was outside, she saw even more of them coming toward her.
"Oh my god! What's happening here!" she screamed.
Her only thought was to get somewhere safe, so she ran to her car and locked the door. She tore her keys out of her purse and with trembling fingers managed to put them in the ignition.
She started the car and drove out of the drive way and down the street. As she drove she noticed the crowd thinning. Up ahead she saw the mall and thought that would be the perfect place to hide. She started thinking about what she would do.
"I'll build a barricade out of benches and trashcans," she mumbled to herself, starting to form a plan.
She was so wrapped in her thoughts she didn't notice that there were cars sitting in the middle of the road and she crashed right into one. She was thrown violently forward, but her seatbelt kept her from going through the windshield.
She sat there, in shock at what had just happened, and suddenly noticed her car was on fire.
"Oh no!" she screamed as she jumped out of the car. She started running as fast as she could and tripped over her own feet and fell onto the ground. She crawled as fast as he could away from the car, and hid behind a nearby tree.
There was a loud bang and flaming car parts flew everywhere, and she saw the flaming remains of her purse fly through the air and land on an approaching zombie, lighting it on fire.
She noticed more coming toward her, got up an ran as fast as she could to the mall. She was in the parking lot five minutes later and noticed a barricade already over the front doors.
She ran to them and started pounding on the door with her fists. She could hear the zombies approaching behind her and yelled, "Let me in! Please let me in! Open the doors, please!"
She hears the sound of benches moving and a hand came through the gap and motioned for her to come in. She ran and saw there was a man in a red plaid shirt pointing a shotgun at her, and the man who had let he in was holding her arm tightly.
"Were you bitten?" Ryan LaRosa asked her.
"N-no" she stammered.
Ryan then checked her arms, legs and neck for bites. He then examined her clothes to make sure there were no tears that suggested she had been bitten.
"She's fine Brian," he said. He let Dana go and she, wanting to sit down, went to a corner. She looked around the empty plaza and had a terrible thought.
What if we're the only ones alive! My friends and family are all probably dead and it's my fault! I didn't even try to help Mindy!
At the thought of all her friends dead, she had broken down and cried. She cried for almost 2 hours and finally fell asleep. She was awoken early the next morning by the sound of someone yelling, and Brian talking. Two people came in. One of them had been Verlene.
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"Dana!" Verlene yelled, shaking her violently and bringing Dana out of her memories.
"Hmm?"
"Oh thank god you're okay! I thought you were turning!" Verlene explained.
"Oh," she said in reply. Suddenly she heard a door open and looked up. She saw a man with a camera come down the stairs and talk to Ryan. Ryan said something to him and he started walking toward her and Verlene. He paused right in front of her, held up his camera, took a picture and continued on.
"That was weird," she said.
"Yeah," Verlene answered. They both watched him walk to the gate and grab a trashcan, suddenly there was a loud yell.
They looked around and saw Lindsay running toward the doors.
"Madonna! My Madonna is out there!" Lindsay yelled pushing away the people trying to keep her from opening the doors. She pushed them away and opened the doors. She went right into the mass and grabbed her dog. Dana saw zombies grab her and start tearing her flesh, but she didn't let go of the dog, or try to escape.
Suddenly, it was the party all over again. Zombies were streaming in and people were frantically trying to escape. But this time Dana Simms wouldn't be so lucky. As soon as he stood up to run, a zombie pushed her down, laid it's head on her neck as if kissing her, and bit. There was a blinding pain, and more zombies joined the other one in feasting upon her. In her last moments of life, she saw zombies swarming all over the plaza, and slowly overpowering her now dearest friend, Verlene Willis.