LEON'S POV:
I stood on the balcony staring off into the distance, waiting for Matt's return. Obviously, I was really hoping Matt would return, since we've been friends for over five years. In the meantime, I decided to think about the past times before the epidemic. Unfortunately, there was only one memory I could really play back in my mind. I could have thought about our first encounter, our first time to Six Flags, or the time we tried to go out drinking. All those times it ended with Matt throwing up.
The only thing I could think about was how we got into this mess.
FLASHBACK:
On the day it all happened, we were at a party at one of our friend's place. Timothy had always been a great guy on the field, sportsmanship-like, agile, and overall just a great guy. Additionally, he rarely threw parties, and when he did, they were mad, and if you were invited, it was pretty much a honor. I had been invited by Timothy himself, and I got the option to take Matt along. Even though it took a bit of bribing and persuading, including dragging him to the party, he decided to join me.
"If you make me drink alcohol, I'm shoving the bottle up your ass and breaking it." Matt had said before we left, to which I laughed at, much to his dismay. We met up with Timothy, who was hanging out with some of the other party-goers (some I recognized as some of my jock pals) and chugging an abnormally large bottle of beer. When he got a glimpse of us, he finished his bottle and slammed it to the ground, causing the bottle to shatter into pieces. He stumbled over to his and said in a raspy voice:"Hey...glad you could make it." His breath was horrid, and Matt backed away as a result as Timothy shoved a bottle into my hands. He went off to some random area, stumbling all the way and knocking a lamp over in the process. I turned to Matt, who huffed and took his phone out. He strolled off and plopped himself down in a corner and started to text someone, probably someone I didn't know. The two jock party-goers, Jake and Will, snickered at Matt. Meanwhile, I entertained myself by hanging out the other women, some hot, some not, and some in between.
I heard a doorbell ring out through the house and Timothy started stumbling towards it, shoving people out of the way and even knocking a dancing couple onto the coffee table. I followed him and saw him about to walk face first into the door. I put a hand on his chest.
"Aww...you love me…" Timothy slurred. I groaned and lightly shoved him back and opened the door.
As soon as I opened the door, a man fell forward, startling me and nearly making me fall on my ass. Timothy wavered a bit before tripping over the prone body on the floor, he moaned and got himself back up and began kicking the prone body. He yelled out a few profane words that I couldn't understand due to the fact that he was drunk. While he was kicking, I noticed a big, red mark on his neck, and when I pulled the shirt collar down, I...nearly vomited.
A big, gaping, red, veiny, bloody hole was present on the poor man, and his skin was horrifically pale. I yelled out.
"HELP! THERE'S A DEAD GUY HERE!"
I didn't even know if he was dead, but based on that fucking sight...there was no doubt about it that he was dead. One of the girls, I think her name was Chloe, ran over and began performing CPR, even though she wasn't a doctor and his heart wasn't the problem. Another party-goer called Mitch, noticed this and barked at her, causing her to burst into tears and began arguing with him. While Mitch and Chloe were bickering, I reluctantly looked at the wound again. Good job it was disgusting. The blood had begun to seep onto the floor, into his shirt, and to my horror, onto my hands. I looked at it again, and noticed something.
The texture of the wound looked like flesh had ripped out by teeth.
Suddenly, the wound began to bubble, and the body moved. I was about to call for Matt, but before I did that, my jaw literally dropped, as the presumably dead man...fucking stood up. For a brief moment, he stood idly and I got a good look at his face. The man looked young, maybe in his early 20's, his black hair and his bangs in front of his face were ruffled. I could confirm he might have been an emo kid due to black eyeliner that was ruined and black, uneasy lines ran down his face. However, the most noticeable thing was that his eyes were pearly white. His pupils were gone, the iris, pretty much the whole eye was only white.
The guy then lunged at Mitch, who was too shocked to react when the man grabbed his shoulders, pulled him towards him, and clamped his jaws right on the side of his face.
Good god...good fucking god...the scream was horrendous...Chloe screamed as well, but Mitch's scream was much louder and more agonizing. Jake and Will ran over and began to attempt to pry the man off Mitch, which was easier said than done. The man's jaws were clamped to Mitch's face like a bear trap, and soon as the jaws were pried off, the man turned and sunk his teeth into the wrist of Jake. When Jake got bit, that prompted everyone to go into a frenzy and begin pushing and shoving their way to the back door. I actually witnessed one of the partiers fall over a piece of furniture, and as he tried to get up, he was repeatedly stepped on, kicked, and trampled.
All I could do is watch...and watch...and watch.
I was shook out of my thoughts when my foot hit something hard followed by a loud clang. I shivered and looked around wildly. I then looked down at the ground and saw I had kicked a wheelbarrow off the porch. I didn't even remember the wheelbarrow on the porch, and who the hell would put a wheelbarrow on a porch. Anyways, the porch may have not might big, but that was loud as hell and I hoped nothing heard that.
To my dismay, a lot of them did.
Beasties started stumbling out of the woods, some standing, and some crawling, even to my horror, some were crawling with no legs, their entails trailing behind them and even a few breaking off and taking its place in the ground. I raised my rifle and took one male beastie down with a shot to the head, and witnessed his brains fly out the back of his head. I gulped and continued this for god knows how long. Aim, shoot, repeat. I ran out of ammo however and I then resorted to beating them with a small, wooden, thin plank that was next to my feet. No matter how many hits I made, not a single one would go down. The only damage I did was making a small dent in the top of a female beastie's head.
I turned around to see a beastie walking towards me at an ungodly speed. I barely had enough time to force my hands under its neck as it snarled ferociously, snapped its jaws as if he was one of the chattering teeth wind-up toys, and it flailed wildly. I started screaming in fear as I noticed another one lurking behind me, looking forward to making a meal out of my neck. I screamed for my mom, my dad, my family, Matt, my fucking dog, anyone who would just burst out of the woods and shoot these beasties dead.
Then a gunshot sounded off as the beastie behind me slumped to the ground dead.
I saw Matt run out of the woods with a younger man following him. Matt took aim again and shot the beastie I was grappling with, and felt the beasties weight drop like a brick and I breathed a sigh of relief as he shot another beastie. This gave me time to grab the rifle and whack the rest of the beasties until all were nonexistent.
"Hey, you ok?" Matt asked breathing heavily. I saw the man follow closely behind him, noticeably shook up.
"Yeah, I'm good." I replied. I took another look at the man again, who had brown hair and looked like he was somewhere around nineteen. His hair was frazzled and extremely dirty, and the same could go with his hands and green polo. Black marks around his eyes indicated he had not slept in a while, but then again, I couldn't blame him.
"Umm, who's he?" I asked Matt. Matt looked back at the stranger, then back to me.
"This is Tyler, he lost his entire group so he's staying with-" I cut off Matt.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa." I said startled. I wish we could help the guy but it seemed like we didn't have enough food.
"What?" Matt asked surprised.
"Dude, I want to help him, but what about the supplies?" I asked. Matt gave me the stink-eye and I rolled my eyes at his stubbornness.
"He lost his whole group in one quick sweep, in a graphic way might I add; I think we should help him." Matt said.
I was now very conflicted on whether to help Tyler or leave him. On one hand, I felt bad for him. He was young and alone, and since these woods are kind of thick, I doubt he would last long. On the other hand, the supplies we have are very scarce. I didn't want to waste the supplies on this guy even though he was in good health. So I had a choice to make.
