Somewhere in a hospital, a girl opened her eyes.

Not a girl locked away in a secret room, right at the back of the bottom most floor for dramatic purposes. No, instead she was on the middle floor, in an abandoned ward. It appears that no one came to take her away once the outbreak began. It seems that the ones who should have loved her enough to do so either scarpered or became what they should have saved her from.

She wasn't locked away, but as the secret to survival of the human race she could have been, she should be. Somewhere…safe.

My eyes felt heavy as I opened them, the oxygen cramming into my lungs until it frazzled my taste buds. It was a sudden awakening, not gradual or dreamlike in the least. Ironically, the sweet flute of morning birdsong fluttered past my ears. But my heart thudded itself in interruption to pry the doors to my consciousness with bleeding nails.

I scanned my surroundings in a darting motion, my head being all that would obey my orders to move. It probably used to be pure white, given away by the random smear of brown next to a missed streak of white. That's when the oder hit me. Iron, rust, toxic, old, dust. Not quite blood, not quite faecal, almost visceral. Just all bad stuff, rolled together to insult the human senses without killing. Or maybe I was alive thanks to the disinfectant.

I look down to my hands, ask them to move, and they move. "Thank god," I breathed, leaning up to prove I hadn't forgotten how to move myself. I felt like id mastered a physics calculation, and kept the solution close to the forefront of my brain. I hopped out of bed, almost jumping back on as my feet slammed on the frozen ice sheet covering the floor, invisible of course. I take another look around, the room seeming a lot smaller now I was standing. I realised the curtains were drawing me into a box. I poked and waved my hand through until I found an opening, and pealed it back to peak. The baron ward was silent, grey and dusty.

…

The pale undead, the restless dead, the walking corpses, the woken, the sleepless, the anonymous…

I sigh as my new game finally draws to its natural and inevitable close.

Oh, the inevitables…

Nah, sounds like a group of superheros rather than the name for the dead surrounding me, shuffling so noticeably that their mother would scorn them for sloppiness. I gaze around my person in an attempt to make myself appear less like the gormless faces, empty gazes with empty vision. It was vaguely annoying that they didn't trip or fall over a fallen brick. Not that id find it funny. Even if I did, I couldn't even smirk.

I sometimes wonder how I would introduce myself, beyond the sophisticated groan I have mastered.

"Hi, my name is Rrrr…..s…."

No, that would not do. If I were to meet one of the living, I don't want to die all over again. I want to appear like ive got more smarts about me.

"Hey, you don't know me. Hell, I don't know me. But just let me have a slice of your brain and I'll be more personable, I swear."

Sometimes I wish I could talk as fast as I could think. I wonder how I'd reply if that girl over there came over, the light of life beaming in her dead, saved in eyes, walking instead of lumbering.

"Hi," I would begin. "R is my name and death is my game."

No, if death was my game that sentence would come out as a series of eloquent murmurs. Maybe ill just forget it.

I was probably a douche bag anyway when I could talk. Yeah, maybe im better this way.

Maybe im better looking this way.

I sure as hell don't have the stress in my life to give me wrinkles.

All I do is eat, shuffle, groan, eat and think. Like an intelligent dog. I think that thinking gives me authority around here. I should walk straighter to assert my authority. I give it a thought, but recall the last time I tried it and disliking the sound the sacs between my vertebrae made, like wet rubber.

The city is unusually busy. By that I mean, considering there are none of the living around to hunt. If that were the case, zombies would be the flies. Maybe that's why its so busy; new recruits.

Why am I here? I glance down at my shirt; no fresh blood. Im glad my memory isn't failing me. I was sure I hadn't killed today. This week infact. I should change that.

I instantly start looking for M, but hes nowhere in sight. I take a chance, scanning for the living among the dead. In all this rust and rot, I couldn't smell them if I tried, and if I did it would most likely be the fresh red around their mouths. I venture out through them, occasionally bumping into the shoulder of an ex office worker with bits of unidentifiable tissue stuck in their hair, and log all the places I cant remember attacking. That's where they'll be, waiting with their firearms brandished, boasting invconvenient accuracy. If anyone thought it would be more plausible that humans are more scared of us, that would be a slight error. The humans were quick, trained, organised, smart. We relied on hunger, sense and the energy from our last feeds. I would say the fear is just about even.

Maybe, from a logical point of view, (hey, logical, logical zombie, ha) one could see why they would be frightened. Our stench, our eerie countenance, our pale faces, our ugly out of date fashion. Maybe it's the question of who we have stuck in our teeth. Maybe it's the fact that with one bite, they could drop dead. Or worse…

Rise to become me.

A huge building come into sight as I slowly plod around a balding skyscraper, and recognise it, but cannot picture the interior.

Maybe…

…

Unfortnately my reason for my stint hospital wasn't urgent enough to have on the table surgery; not a drill, saw, even a scalpel in sight. Not a single think to arm myself with.

That's when I hear it.

An ear shattering, high pitched wail breaks my concentration, and for a while I just stand there. I don't know how long I wait until the echoes leave the building.

OK, ok, breathe. Breathe…

I found myself pacing, thinking, and take a quick glance out of the window, so bright was the light that shielded me with an off white glow reflecting off of the thin coating of the curtains. You would hardly believe it came from the sunless sky outside, the clouds looking more like a thick grey gazebo. I look down, not that high off the ground. I could see details, including the very few people, what they wore, the fallen bricks and tiles littering the roads. I noticed that not once did the few people even seem to acknowledge each other. All individual, walking about like they were the last living people in the world.

Wait…

Something tugged at my memory, just in time for my eyes to capture and follow a black head lumbering into the building, disappearing beneath the sheltered entrance.

Oooooh crap. No, no don't come in here! Nothing here!

Now I remembered, what the wails were from, what happened to the city, like all others in the known world. Small nigglings of information hit me, crept up, slapped me in the face and tugged at my memory, not all in order. But I pieced them together.

I just couldn't remember what the hell I was doing here.

I instantly found the bedside cabinet and began dismembering it, until I ended up with a long stick, about the size of a baseball bat. It would do, at least. I hopped back onto the bed to steady my nerves, maybe delay being found for as long as possible, if at all. Then I'd decide what to do.

I hear a clatter down the outer corridor, and my chest feels like its about to burst. My stomach churns uncomfortably, my head floats in adrenaline. I secure my hand around the bludgeoning weapon until I feel on of the edges crushed against the whole of my palm.

The footsteps creep closer, closer, infrequent and clumsy and heavy. I begin to jump at each one, noticing how close each one took whatever was out there.

Then it stops. I wait, and hold my breath. I don't dare to put my feet to the floor, potentially casting shadows. Instead, I wait. I wait for a whole minute.

I hear a low grunt, and then further silence, until I hear more steps. I gently lower myself, delicately placing my feet to the floor.

…

I wait patiently, while the hunger lays at bay. Really, I barely notice it. But a hospital, to myself. Who can resist.

I listen out for any signs of life, and get nothing. I wait in the third floor ward, it looks like there was a horrible accident, or massacre of the dead, brown smears along the curtains of one particular bed. The stench overpowers everything when theres that much.

Huh.

I grunt in vague interest, and shuffle closer. My slow eyes catch a movement below, tiny shadows growing out beneath the white sheets.

Ah.

…

I edge the curtain closer, constantly listening out for anything, any sign of anything. I was sure having a weapon wasn't a good idea in such taught circumstances, but what the hell. Better than having my face eaten off.

Finally, I peak through the hole, and a grey eye appears before mine. My hand clenches around the edge of the curtain, but I back away and slip, taking the curtain with me. The weakened rungs snap and fall onto the zombie's head, not bothering him in any way. Really, he just stands there, watching me.

…

I watched the girl fall back in fear, and im too slow to catch her. My dead, decaying body with no reflexes, my dumb struck school boy awe, could be anything. But I feel ill. I dislike the look in her eyes. The flinch at the frightened whimpers escaping from her full lips, while my decayed ones begin to mumble.

I edge forward, my hand outstretched like some moronic attempt of peace offering. But she takes it the wrong way. She lunges forward, the long stick in her hand pointed straight for me. I feel the scrape against my throat, and my weak feet fail. I fall on my back with her stubbornly holding on to her weapon, following me down.

Well, this is awkward.

Instinct kicks in, and I roll her on her back. She falls off me, and yanks out the stick, which as probably left a gaping hole in my neck. I hold her down by the neck, not quite squeezing the life from her lungs.

Her panicked eyes, angered and spitting venom at me, are too much to bare. I try to keep my eyes on my own hand, concentrating on the kill. Her legs continue to kick, and I find I admire her will for survival.

Just then, I feel something. In my chest, my vast cavity, as inactive and dusty as this building. I must be imagining it.

A drop of thick brown, like paint, drops onto the back of my tensed hand, and im mesmerised as it rolls onto the pale white of her throat, nearly disappearing into the mass of copper waves. An idea strikes.

I don't quite let go of her neck, but let my hand run the ex-blood up her jaw and her face. I then bring the finger to my lips.

"S..shhh..sh."