'Shoot me! Just do it now!'

I hesitated, the gun wavering unsteadily in my hands. Was I really going to do this? Just kill a human being outright? It wasn't that I'd never shot anything before, I'd taken out one of those zombie bastards earlier. But this was different, and the mere thought made me sick.

'Kill me!' The girl screamed, her long brown hair matted and obscuring her face. There was a large, deep wound on the side of her neck, already beginning to clot.

'I-I can't-' I stuttered. Suddenly, she spasmed, and a long crimson spray of liquid flew from her lips. Who was I kidding? This girl was already dead.

'I'm sorry,' I murmured, too quiet for her to hear and raised the pistol level with her blood spattered forehead. She screamed again, a long pitiful howl, and my emotions hardened. If I didn't pop her now with one bullet, I'd only have to do it later with six. I pulled the trigger.

Eight minutes later I stumbled out of the corridor, my hands and jeans covered in drying blood. Using my left hand against the wall to steady myself, I limped towards my room, number 202, and fumbled around for the key in my pockets. My left arm felt kind of numb, as did my left hand after firing that gun. I twiddled the key around in the lock, and hobbled inside.

My room was a mess, as usual, scattered with pizza boxes, comic books, paperback novels and empty bottles of diet coke. One window at the back of the room gazed out into the Racoon City housing estates, the moonlight was hitting the glass at a slightly odd angle, giving the room an eerie feel.

I pushed a few boxes of cereal off the armchair and collapsed into it, placing the gun on the coffee table. Screw precautions, I was a murderer now. Maybe the police would come looking for me….

No. That was ridiculous. The RPD had way too much on their hands, what with those monsters outside, and communications were down. No phones, no radios, nothing.

Nothing….

I leant forward in the chair and massaged my eyelids slowly. That girl…I'd seen her before at the Dry Cleaning place a few roads down, but never bothered to talk to her. Wouldn't have been much use if I had done. Come to think of it, if she had never got involved with that dickhead of a boyfriend she never would have even entered this hellhole.

It began about a week ago. Me and some others who lived in the apartment had heard messages going round, just before the radio went down. Crazy stuff; monsters, zombies and all that crap. No one took it seriously until this really weird guy showed up in reception. He stank to high heaven and must have been sleeping rough. The landlord had left his office to see what was going on. He stepped up to the freak, acted as if to shake his hand, all friendly but still cautious.

He didn't stand a chance.

Within a matter of seconds, blood had sprayed up the walls, and the others, including me went hysterical and began to stampede back upstairs.

I can still hear the landlord's screaming as we abandoned him….

For three days we all hid out on the second floor, about nine of us. One guy, Hank, decided to go and see what was going on, check things out. We didn't see him again for hours, just heard the sound of chewing. But when he did come back, the guy was covered in blood and bites, all over his face and neck.

That was where I came in. Up until then, I'd been living on my own in room 202, helping myself to the various snacks in there. Soon, there's this girl banging on my door. Hanks girlfriend. She was crying and looked really rough.

'He…he was fine when he got back…' She sobbed, and then pulled away her scarf to reveal a large, bloody wound.

'But then he did this to me!'

I'd had some training as a doctor, before everything went tits up, so told this girl I'd do my best. She led me into her apartment, the door was only hanging by one rust, broken hinge-

-and there was this bloody, screaming guy on the floor, throwing some kind of tantrum. Hank.

Neither of us really knew what to do with him, so we tied him up-damn, was that dangerous- and locked him in the bathroom to get on with it. Soon, he quietened down, but we didn't let him out.

I stood up to leave after an hour of sitting with this girl, but suddenly she grabbed by the forearm, really tight. I could tell there was something really wrong with her, the way her eyes had gone white, and her were going dark brown.

'Shoot me! Just do it now!' She wailed at me. And that's when I became a murderer….

The chair was warm and comfortable, but I couldn't get my head down. Someone outside was moaning so loud I could hear it through the window, it was another one of those monsters.

Come to think of it, maybe it wasn't coming from outside. It seemed closer, maybe-

-I suddenly remembered the other survivors in the building. One of them had said something when I tied up Hank…

'If you don't untie him in two hours, asshole, I'm gonna do it myself,'

Shit!

I leapt up and threw open a chest of drawers. Two years ago I'd bought some ammunition and a large hunting knife from that Kendo place, and now they were both about to come in handy. The box of bullets was in a hidden draw, the knife inside a shoe box. I took both and shoved the knife into my belt, creating a makeshift holster for my weapon.

Stepping into the corridor, I raised my pistol and gazed out into the darkness. If anyone shoed up, there was no way of telling if they were human.

'Mmmrrurrhhhgghh…'

I whirled around, beginning to breath heavily. It was the same noise as before, only louder and nearer. One of those things was in here with me, maybe more if the others had got infected.

'Muurrghhh…' Louder. Nearer. But it was so dark I couldn't even see the walls. Was I gonna die?

Ten long, grubby fingers stroked slowly against my back, and primitive instincts kicked in. Keeping the weapon steady, and pointing it away from my chest, I crouched and spun round, simultaneously drawing the knife. With one sharp, fatal blow I thrust it in a downwards motion and felt something burst. The thing moaned pitifully, and I heard it fall to the ground with a thump, blood trickling gently from its new wound.

'Take that, motherfucker,' I growled, and kicked out with my left foot, hoping to crush its ugly head.

I didn't. The foot sailed through thin air, and for a moment I lost balanced. Suddenly, something grabbed my ankle, and I felt what could only be a mouth of broken teeth slide against my shoe.

'No!' I shouted, and aimed the gun roughly where its head must have been. If I didn't kill it now, my ankle was gonna be a lumpy chunk of meat.

I fired the weapon frantically, and sent three bullets into the floor, briefly lighting up the room. What I saw in that split second of light drove me to turn around and sprint to the fire exit. As the creature's dying moans faded away behind me, I slammed against the fire exit door with my left shoulder. It flew open straight away, and I began to pick my way down the stairs to the ground. I finally got to the ladder, and hoisted myself down into the alleyway that ran parallel to the Motel.

My body ached, my eyes were burning, and all I wanted more than anything was a few hours sleep. However, it just wasn't going to work out like that, and ten minutes later, I stood outside my car, pleasantly surprised it hadn't been stolen.

There weren't really a lot of places to go to, as far as I knew, everyone was dead. The only building that could be safe would be the hospital, about two miles away. There'd be medicine, beds, food….everything.

With one last look at the Motel, I stepped into my car and headed north, the memory of what I'd done still vivid in my mind.