Chapter 4

First Blood

An hour had passed since Bill had finished setting up the Television. The time was now 10:15 in the morning, and the new station finally had received "breaking news." Bill listened as the anchorman reviewed an announcement made by the police department. It stated that there was no cure for anyone who was bitten by the infected, and that any one bitten was doomed. The government said that the only ways for dealing with those infected were to either removing the head, or destroying the brain. Bill was happily surprised that the station was being didactic; he thought that this could mean less people would die. He thought that maybe they would actually show candor. Then the new station turned to commentary, in which they actually came out and publically called these cases zombies. Acting capriciously, they had a couple of people brought in to the room; all of them claiming to have seen a zombie either attack them or attack other people nearby. Some of them began to say they had seen zombies running or jumping over trucks. Bill actually snorted at this and turned to look at the T.V. to see if they had really said that. After those people left the station, several scientists were interviewed, but they mostly were just trying to shock the audience. There were two scientists who were actually being honest, one of them had several wrong theories, and was confused about several behaviors of zombies, while the other scientist actually knew what he was talking about.

Bill sighed, and reflected on the new information. It mostly meant that the government was continuing its clandestine actions, and that the new stations were reporting assumptions rather than facts. Bill couldn't blame them too much, there were not that many facts made public. However, they should still try to avoid naming a guess as "evidence." With people acting how they are right now, it probably wouldn't pay to be cohesive with others, or even form camaraderie. He wouldn't be surprised if politics would try to fan the flames of hatred, or if extremists started popping up everywhere, whether they were existentialists, terrorists, or militants.

His thoughts had distracted him so much that he almost didn't hear the moaning coming from down the street. Quickly, he snatched up his PSG1 and looked down the street using the scope attached to the sniper rifle. There were two people standing there, facing each other. One of them, a man in his thirties, was staring at the other, not quite sure how to react. Bill guessed the other to be about nineteen, and he was wearing jeans, a T-shirt, and only one shoe. Dark blood was dripping down from a gash in his shin to his bare foot, and finally on to the ground. The teenager was moaning, and his arms were raised towards the man. There was now only ten feet between the man and the teenager, and the man still wasn't going to act. On the other hand, Bill had decided to act. As soon as the teenager reached out and grabbed the man, Bill pulled the trigger, and a bullet left the barrel of his gun, whizzed through the air, and then entered the teenagers head. The moaning stopped and the corpse hit the ground. The man froze, and then wheeled around in shock, but Bill had already ducked back inside his house. He did not want the police to put him in detention, even though he was sure that they would be far too busy to deal with him.


A/N= I was preparing for Halloween, and I realized that my main character's name, Bill, is the same name as one of the Survivors in the video game Left 4 Dead. My subconscious is going to get me sued. I wrote most of this chapter late at night, so I am sorry if it isn't as good as the rest. It was a challenge fitting in "Existentialism," so I think that sentence doesn't fit in with the rest of the paragraph. Although it will be hard to fit in more fight scenes (try fitting epistemology into a shooting scene), it definitely will not be his last.