oOo

Irene locked her cellphone with a huff of frustration and threw it into her handbag. She ran a hand down her weary face with a sigh and slammed the passenger's door shut before turning to her husband.

"Thirteen times. Thirteen times she called me and now no damn call is coming through." She rubbed the wrinkle between her furrowed brows and felt the guilt rise up her throat with a sickening gut feeling. "Ay Sam, what if something happened to her? What if she had an accident?" She laid her hand flat on her hurting chest.

She'd kept her phone turned off to spare battery, just in case they needed it for emergencies, and upon turning it on that morning, had found a bunch of missed calls from her sister from after they'd left, all on the same day and then nothing. And no messages to even hint as to why she'd called.

"I knew it, I knew I should've just swallowed my pride and apologized instead of leaving like that. Why am I so proud? Why couldn't I have done that? My mom's just got this way of riling me up, I don't know…"

Sam walked up behind her and kneaded the tight muscles of her shoulders. "You're making a storm in a cup outta this. It's not your fault, your mother started it all, as per fucking usual, goddamn woman just can't keep her trap shut. If anything, it's her telling Cátia not to pick up."

"You know Cátia's not like that, she doesn't just go along with every-"

"You talked to her?" Diana asked, approaching her parents with her packed tent tucked under one arm. "'Cause you look like it and it didn't go well." She stuffed the bundle into the trunk of the jeep and leaned on the vehicle while turning to her parents.

Irene shook her head and sighed once more.

"You tried her-"

"Your mother's tried her private number, work, home, husband and even your cousins. Nothing. Fucking radio silence, no filho da puta of a call goes through," Sam said, kissed his wife's head, and finished hauling the remnants of their presence in that camping site into the jeep and shooed Diana away before closing the trunk with a careless thud.

Diana's mouth formed an 'o' in comprehension and she nodded. "So it's serious, then. So what? If we show up at her door, she's not gonna send us away. Ich meine, if not for us, then for the stuff we borrowed." Diana shrugged and sent her mom a joking grin, hoping to lighten her up.

"My problem isn't Cátia, I know I can always count on her. I just feel something's wrong."

"Some fucking excuse for a fight isn't gonna stop her from seeing us off. Cátia's impulsive, but she isn't fucking petty and she doesn't hold grudges," Sam reminded his wife and opened the passenger door for her.

"Pero mi madre sí," Irene reminded, not comforted, and climbed in.

Diana climbed in the back seat and settled between Alice and Felix. The former finished shuffling the UNO deck and dealt each their hand with a sly smirk on her full lips.

Sam started the jeep, putting the camp in the rearview mirror, and Felix breathed in relief when his mom turned on the radio. "Finally, music that's not Alice singing."

The aforementioned girl felt offended and reached around Diana to punch Felix wherever she could reach, which resulted in her brother receiving a fist to the stomach, his card spilling on his lap, and Diana getting hit by the girl's arm in the process.

She inhaled deeply and ignored it. She was not going to sit between them on the flight home, that was a given.

"Du Arschloch, my voice is a godsend and you should count yourself privileged you can listen to it live and for free!" In a whisper, Alice added, "You know I'm insecure about that."

"Chill mal, brudi. Just kidding, learn to take a joke," Felix defended, indignant, and reached behind his older sister to slap Alice on the back of the head.

Alice gasped when her head jerked forward. With wide eyes and UNO forgotten, she was about to retaliate, but was stopped by Sam, glaring at them over his shoulder, "I fucking swear, you don't stop fucking around, I will stop this damned car and beat both your asses!"

Both teens stopped the abuse on the other, but by the murderous looks they shared around their older sister's head, the feud was not yet over.

Diana could feel a headache coming on, but as long as they didn't involve her, she was fine.

"Cristo, Samuel, you don't have to shout all the time." Irene slapped Sam's arm.

"If they won't fucking listen otherwise?!" Sam shouted again, irate, and Irene shook her head in reproach.

"You just get yourself worked up over nothing, just let them do whatever and if they get hurt, it's their own fault."

"Wow, thanks. Great parenting."

Irene turned in her seat and gave a conspiratorial wink.

Diana waited until the moment had passed and tapped her mom on the shoulder. "Mami, change the station, we've been listening to static for the past five minutes, not really my genre."

"Yeah, mine neither." After fumbling with the buttons and getting only white noise in return, Irene finally pressing 'off' in frustration. "Stupid thing's defective," Irene whispered. "Catch us explaining that to the guy who rented us this."

"Just put in a CD," suggested Felix whilst coolly looking out the window at the passing greenery.

Alice took the chance to take a dig at her brother, resuming their verbal fight while shuffling the deck. "How you wanna do that, you wet sock, this isn't our car, we got no CDs in here."

"Why you always gotta-"

"That's it!" Samuel hit the brakes, bringing the jeep to a jerky halt. He turned in his seat, trademark glare intensified and made terrifying by his annoyance.

Diana flinched, even though the look wasn't aimed at her, and saw from her peripheral vision how her brother and sister shrank back into their seats, like turtles tucking their heads into their shells.

Both started apologizing over and over, not even letting their dad start his scolding.

Irene shushed the teens and grabbed her husband by the face to turn his attention to something on the road ahead.

They had long left the dirt path that led out of the camping site and were driving down a side road that would eventually take them to the highway to Atlanta. It had been a quiet drive until now, with no other vehicle but theirs, but that had been to be expected.

Diana unbuckled her belt and leaned forward between the two front seats, pushing Sam out of her line of vision, and turned her eyes to what her mom had spotted. She squinted, trying to make it out through the heat waves distorting the road. What the hell was she looking at?

"The fuck is that?"

"Language."

"Drive closer, drive closer," Alice prompted, tapping her father on the shoulder and shoving Diana aside to squeeze herself forward. Her coiled curls were all up in Diana's face, tickling her.

Hesitant and cautious, Sam started the jeep again and drove in a silent creep, the tires groaning against the occasional gravel.

As they neared the find, the mere sight was enough to draw disgusted sounds from everyone present, but still them into horrified silence.

On the side of the road, a human figure lied on their back, legs tucked into the shrubbery. Had that been it, they might've stopped to check it out and maybe help them, but they were way beyond helping, what with their abdominal cavity torn open, and two other people kneeling over them feeding from it.

They were completed entranced in the activity, bringing guts and innards to their mouths and languidly chomping and chewing on them, oblivious to the stares from the other side of the glass windows of the Hummer.

Irene's dry heaving snapped the family out of their thoughtless transfixion and somehow managed to catch the unwanted attention of the other two things.

They turned slowly to them, finally taking notice.

From their throats sounded dragged groans and low hisses that raised goosebumps on Diana's skin. They righted themselves in an almost lazy way. Red, red blood dripping down their chins, staining the front of their clothes, bathing their hands. A bit of small intestine hanging from the flayed, toothy mouth of the female clenched Diana's stomach and chest until the pressure became unbearable.

Felix shrank away from the window with a fearful whine, grabbing Diana's hand and squeezing hard as he all but climbed onto her lap.

Both figures threw themselves against the jeep, making the Lobos jump in their seats, and Sam finally tore his eyes away and slammed his foot on the gas pedal.

oOo

They sped away in shocked silence for several minutes, no one daring to say a word, no one daring to look behind.

Diana's wide, unblinking eyes hazily spotted her brother's frame as he trembled with shock, his hand still clinging to hers. She didn't register any noises at all, only a high pitched whistle buzzing in her ears.

She blinked very slowly as if a sudden movement would cause her eyelids to peel off and felt the sting of premature tears on the back of her eyes, prickling her nose as it rose.

Alice had curled herself into a little ball on her seat, hair hanging like a dark cloud over her head, shielding her from the world. She stared unblinkingly, almost not breathing; a wound-up doll that would lash out at whoever bothered her.

Irene's lips kept moving, but no words came out. Sometimes she would lift a hand to her lips, look green in the face, and then she would take a shaky swig from her water flask.

Sam's stony features spoke of an admirable undisturbed calm, his tight grip on the steering wheel and jerky driving contradicted.

Everyone seemed to be holding their breath. Tension made the air stuffy and heavy inside the jeep.

The whole mood was one of anticipation. Anticipation for what? Maybe for some fuckhead with a camera and their jackass friends to jump out from behind a bush and laugh in their face at their trauma, magically making everything okay because it was just a 'prank'? Some stupid social experiment or whatever, like those her mom watched on Facebook. Or maybe they'd stumbled into a movie set and those had just been very dedicated actors.

Diana sincerely hoped that was it.

They arrived at the entrance to the highway sooner than expected and came upon a barricade of vehicles blocking it.

Killing the engine, Samuel exhaled long and deep, composing himself and finding his voice, and turned to his wife. He put a hand on her knee and massaged it soothingly. "You okay?" He grabbed her by the shoulders and brought her to him, kissing her brow, then looked to the back seat with a crease between his brow deeper than a grave. "You kids okay?"

His voice ceased the buzz in her ears and Diana admired how it didn't betray his tough façade.

Next thing, Irene flung her door open and threw herself to the asphalt, throwing up the contents of her stomach in gut-wrenching heaves and gasps.

Concern overcame the shock, and Diana felt the sting of tears dry up before they even welled in her eyes. She followed Sam with her eyes as he sprinted around the front of the jeep and fell to his knees next to his wife, calling to her and caressing her hair and back.

"Mami?" Diana called, feeling hopelessly useless, and climbed over Alice and out of the jeep, almost falling on her face with hurry.

Felix and Alice climbed out after her and would've crowded around Irene if Diana hadn't asked them for breathing space for the heaving woman.

Irene's face was streaked with tears, shimmering their tracks down her freckled cheeks, and her eyes were red from exertion and beginning to swell. She gasped and gagged, a line of spittle hanging from her bottom lip, her eyes wide in panic, jumping from husband to daughter, hands clawing their arms; she was a pitiful mess and Diana hated it, it was so unlike her mother that it made her heart beat against her chest in refusal.

That was enough of a change to flip the switch to the nurse mentality she'd been refining over the years, and she went through the motions like she would at work; with empathy and cold detachment.

"It's okay, mami, breathe in, breathe out, listen to me, listen to my voice," Diana both begged and commanded with a hoarse voice but a tone so professional it sounded like it was one of her patients she was dealing with and not her own mother. "It's only me, there's nothing else, you're okay, breathe slowly."

She dabbed away the spit with the sleeve of her shirt. She finally registered the rank smell of vomit from the puddle she was almost kneeling on, and her nose twitched as she tried not to show revulsion.

When Irene was relatively calmer, sitting on her legs, upper body limp against her daughter, head tucked under her chin, Diana carefully retreated with an exhausted exhale and let her dad take her place.

He fussed over her, offering her water, wiping her sweaty forehead and kissing it, combing the hair from her face and letting her rest her head against his wide chest in his concerned and loving embrace.

Diana forced her gaze away, feeling like an intruder on their tenderness, and focused on Felix and Alice, who were speechless and transfixed. She looked them over and asked if they were okay.

"That a fucking question?" "Didn't you see what the fuck just happened?"

Both exploded at her with questions she didn't have the answers to and accusations and complaints as if she were the one personally responsible for what was happening. Diana sighed in relief; they were back to themselves.

Now that she'd taken care of her mom and the shock had dissipated, they could start thinking rationally again.

First, what in the actual fuck was going on?

If it had been a prank, she was sure someone would have come to disperse their desperation by the time her mom had started having the attack.

So, it was unlikely to be a prank. Probably not a movie going on either, or else they would've been informed since they were staying so close to the location.

Second, if this happened so close to their camping site, how had they managed to avoid such an encounter by the skin of their teeth? That could've been them back there!

Third, was this somehow correlated to her finding the bow the day before? And if so, how? And why? And so many other questions that made her brain feel like it was losing itself in a thick fog.

Diana pinched herself in a desperate attempt, and when nothing happened, she pinched both her siblings, which got her punched twice. But nothing else. No waking up in a cold sweat and an awkward 'hey, it was just a dream after all, ha ha'.

A weight in her chest accompanied her next thought.

Zombies.

They had seen real life zombies feeding from a real life person that was not alive anymore. Because it had been killed by zombies…

It felt like the cogs were working very slowly to reach their conclusion like her head was full of honey and everything stuck together. Like she was subconsciously refusing to acknowledge it.

Her stupid open-minded trait won over in the end, allowing her to accept and process what she'd seen.

They'd just witnessed the aftermath of a horrific murder and there was absolutely no guaranty that the same couldn't or wouldn't happen to them next.

Diana swallowed dryly and glanced at her mom; the woman had always been squeamish, but now Diana fully understood her panic.

Sam held up Irene and helped her sit sideways in the passenger's seat, legs hanging down the side of the jeep tucked between it and Sam. He held the water flask from where she took small sips, seeing as her shaking hands were almost incapable of the task.

Diana noted the slight trembling in her dad's legs, possibly more by fear for his wife than anything else, but seeing both like that made her knees wobbly.

She realized what a heavy mantle they carried; their kids looked to them for strength and guidance in the world, it was no light burden on any parent. But it was a burden she, as their oldest child, was willing to help carry. She was an adult, after all, maybe it was time she started acting sort of like one.

She had helped Sam by finding her composure during her mom's breakdown and allowing him some room to panic without having to remain stoic in such an emotionally stressing situation.

She regarded Felix and Alice; the former was more open about his feelings and it showed on his face and posture how agitated he was. Alice, on the other hand, hid her emotions behind a sky-high steel wall. She'd had her time to be upset and now she was closing off any show of weakness behind locked doors. Only a slight indication of worry remained on her furrowed brow.

Her detachment was both admirable and unhealthy. But everyone deals with things differently, and Alice had developed at a young age an aversion towards displays of affection and everything else that could make one seem vulnerable, and would probably not change back so quickly.

Diana squeezed their arms and asked them to climb back inside the jeep, which they only obeyed after Sam repeated the order.

Diana gently asked her mom and dad to do the same. Sam squeezed her upper arm with a significant look of gratitude and a sloppy kiss on the forehead and rounded back to the driver's side.

Diana rubbed her forehead dry, a fond tug on her lips, and closed her mother's door with a quiet thud. Finding herself alone outside the vehicle with the notion of having been followed by zombies hanging over her head, she flung open the door like it would rip right off and climbed over Alice's lap like her ass was on fire, ignoring the girl's cry of pain and slapping hands.

Everyone sat immobile for a few seconds, until Sam broke the silence, purposefully avoiding mentioning the heinous creatures as he comforted them. "We're gonna get the fuck outta here. I don't care if that shit was real or just a publicity stunt, we're not dealing with this kind of bullshit white-people fuckery, not today."

Irene nodded along, eyes rimmed red, and he continued, voice reassuring, "We're gonna check on Cátia and then we're leaving."

Irene nodded again, thankful, and let herself be kissed by her husband.

Diana sighed, she really wouldn't mind leaving. This was the kind of bullshit she used to see in movies or on the news and think 'of course, only in America', the country where every bad thing always happened.

Had it been a one-time thing? A freak accident that went unreported and would remain a mystery; three missing persons' cases with them as the only witnesses, forever unsolved. A fluke in the Universe that had taken three unwilling victims in a vicious twist in reality.

But it just couldn't be everywhere, that would be insane.

How many times before had been there news coverage of crazy people going apeshit and throwing their own guts at the police, or eating their neighbor's face? And everyone had said it was the end of the world, zombies were here and all that baloney, when it was just dudes drugged out of their minds, losing their heads on international television?

"Why's the thing blocked?" Felix pointed ahead to the barricade they had stopped in front of but hadn't been in the right mind to question.

"Ah, merda, c'um caralho, filhos da puta!" Samuel slammed his hands on the steering wheel. "The fuck is it now?" He turned to Diana and gestured behind her. "Pass the motherfucking bat."

Diana knelt backwards on her seat and dug around until her hand caught the grip and she pulled it out, handing it to her father, no questions asked.

"What are you gonna do?" sounded Irene's hoarse voice, her hand small on Sam's bicep.

His hand dwarfed hers and he brought it to his lips, kissing her knuckles. He unlatched his door and looked at each of them. "I'll be right back, stay here."

Sam tested the weight by hitting it against his palm and exited the jeep. He disappeared from view, weaving between vehicles, only to return a few silent, tension-filled minutes later.

He climbed in heavily, throwing the bat at Irene's feet with a sigh, and rubbed his forehead with the tips of his fingers. "Everything's abandoned. Not a damn soul." Silence and confusion. "Doesn't seem recent."

His brow was deeply furrowed, aging him significantly. "We're gonna have to follow by foot," he said in an exhausted tone, "the whole damned thing's packed, no way to drive this fucking beast through there."

Alice leaned forward. "Wait- wait, backtrack there, what you mean 'abandoned'? There can't just be nobody left!" The skin was tight around her knuckles, her hands bunching the fabric of her jeans.

"Yeah, where's-where's everyone?"

"I don't know."

"Pai, how're we gonna get home?"

"I-I don't know."

"We can't be the only ones left, right?"

"I don't fucking know! Foda-se! Caralho!" Sam slammed his hands on the steering wheel, silencing everything. The only sound was of his heavy breathing. "We gotta think. What are we gonna do? Fucking hell! I'm done to the beef, that's what I am."

Irene tenderly took one of his hands and turned his face to her. She cradled his cheek. "It's okay," she said, sweet and simple, and the tension released from Sam's shoulders like a weight had dropped. "We're gonna be just fine, God's my witness, we're gonna be fine.

"This is nothing, we'll find a way together; we'll find some answers, we'll go home. Sam, you know you're not alone in this."

Sam looked back to the kids and again to his wife, his voice was a mere whisper, "I can't protect us from something I don't understand."

"I think I'm old enough to look after my own sorry ass, pai. Don't worry," Diana said softly, afraid to intrude. Even though her insides trembled at the possibility of witnessing another display of…supernatural cannibalism, she knew she had to step up her game. "We'll look after each other, protect each other. It's what we do."

"It's not all on you, mi corazón." Irene caressed her husband's unshaven cheek and planted a lingering kiss on his lips.

"We're not little pirralhos anymore, too, you know?" Alice scooched forward in her seat while gesturing at herself and Felix with a thumb. "We can kick a little butt here, fight a little there. And I mean, you're not twenty anymore, namsayin'? Wouldn't wanna break a hip."

Sam's lip tugged at the corner, but he hid it. "But I'm your father," he said to them, and to Irene, "and your husband, it's supposed to be my fucking duty to protect you."

Diana had only seen her dad so vulnerable once in the past, not very long ago. His desperation was palpable, and she knew that no matter how strong he was, this would be too heavy for him to carry alone.

Not that he was supposed to, that's why he had a wife, that's why he had kids; it was cheesy as hell, but they were a family, one's troubles were everyone's troubles, and they were the Lobos, they've gone through so much and they've endured everything. If this was the end of the world, they would endure it, too.

"Welcome to the modern age, pai. This duty you talking about, it works both ways."

oOo

The next fifteen minutes found the Lobos with the trunk popped open and them sorting through their belongings and dividing the load among the five of them.

It was a pity to abandon the jeep and its almost full tank of fuel, but the only option it offered was backwards and that would lead them nowhere. They couldn't afford to waste any more time, they didn't know what state the city was in, had no idea what else was waiting for them out there.

Once everything had been split among them, only one item remained inside the trunk, its golden glint shining like a beacon from inside the jeep.

Samuel took it in his large hand, and maybe his daughter had been right, he felt like he sensed it exude a strange sort of power, almost humming in anticipation of something. Was their situation the reason the bow had manifested itself? Called to Diana? Was this all planned? His thoughts led only to frustration, so he tried his best to swat them away.

He knew the implication of his actions when he handed the weapon to Diana with newly earned respect and fear.

A silent question of 'can you? If it comes down to it?'

It was a tough thing to ask of one's own child, knowing that she might be put in danger because of it, and he would never even put her up to it if he could use the weapon himself.

But he couldn't, and he had the feeling that the bow, with its unique properties, was mightier than the bat hanging from his belt and he needed someone at his side who could wield it. They might come to need both or none at all, but two people at the battlefront were always better than one.

oOo

"The cars are all facing away from the city," Alice remarked first thing as they warily ventured into the gridlocked highway. "Why are we going there if they were evacuating? There must be a reason."

They formed a single line as they weaved between vehicles. Sam led the front while Diana manned the rear, bow at the ready, and Irene took the middle so that each teen was surrounded by adults. Everyone kept low and alert to any strange sight or sound.

"We don't know if they were evacuating," Irene whispered, "When bad things happen, people want to be with their family. Could be that." She was grabbing hold of Alice and Felix by the shirts, not wanting to get separated from them. The frightened woman from before was a mere ghost now, her terror-stricken face replaced by the strength of a mother. "Besides, your Tía is there, we're gonna go to her."

Thirteen calls. It made sense now. Irene was a realist, and two weeks was a long time, she worried there would be nothing but an apartment full of corpses, or worse, to come back to.

In the eerie silence of their leisurely pace, Diana looked around at the abandoned vehicles, a light coat of dust and dirt on almost every window, the heat rising in waves from the sun-bleached paint jobs, empty food and drink packages caught by the tires. Doors opened in hurry and never closed.

Where was everyone? If they had abandoned their cars, where could they have gone? What had they missed? When had this all started, and what was the cause for what they'd seen? Had a disease broken out? If so, how far had it spread? Were they standing on ground zero? Were they in danger of contagion, basically a ticking time-bomb? How was the rest of the state, the country, the continent? Was it a worldwide pandemic?

There were so many questions. It killed her not knowing!

She started counting back the days, collecting facts. They had left her Godmother's fifteen days ago; it was relatively not very long ago. So whatever had happened - or was happening - had evolved over the course of those two weeks.

Evidence of a disease was prominent; maybe a dormant mutation, kicked to life by some trigger, or those spore things she'd seen on National Geographic, that invaded ants, like on 'The Last of Us', or the Cheeto president had finally pissed some nation off and this was part of some warfare tactic. Basic fact was that Diana didn't know enough. And it was grating.

She peeked into a car with the driver's door wide open. There was a baby seat in the back, dried blood sprayed on the window that colored the seat maroon. The sight summoned bile up her throat and she had to swallow hard to force it down.

She closed the door silently, trying not to think about it, readjusted the straps of her backpack and trotted to the back of the five-person file.

Five more cars and Samuel raised a hand, military style, to halt them. He tilted his head to listen around with his good ear – the one he wasn't deaf from – and crouched low, making the others follow his example. They squished themselves against the car, hoping it would make them disappear entirely.

Diana saw Irene grab Alice and Felix closer to her, and putting her arms around them. She raised her bow like she had practiced the previous day while playing pretend, and kept her fingers quiet on the string, ready to pull at any sign of trouble. Her heart was loud in her ears, hammering against her ribcage, her hands trembled, as did her insides, and her breath came out uneven in her attempt to be silent.

She heard them before she saw them, their shuffling gait and hellish noises. They came in a group of four from behind a bus ahead of them. There could be more, she couldn't see. She only saw milky eyes sunken in their sockets, gaunt features, grayish skin and gaping mouths. She could smell the decay clinging to them, and it made her clench her teeth to keep from gagging. Her mom looked green in the face as she ducked her head.

They hadn't been spotted, which was good, but the zombies were blocking the road and hobbling in their direction, so there was no way to sneak around without them noticing. Diana cursed in all languages she knew inside her head, screaming internally.

She heard her dad spit out some of the swears she'd been repeating as the zombie closest to their hiding spot, just one SUV away, tilted its head and slowly changed direction, dragging itself towards them, a slight limp making it bob up and down, the ripped shoulder seams of its suede jacket flapping away.

When it got close enough, Sam righted himself, about to bring the bat down on it when something sneaked up on Diana.

Her yell of surprise caught Sam's attention and distracted him from his task, giving the zombie the opportunity it needed to latch itself onto him, trying to claw and bite his way into the man's bare arms.

Diana toppled over with the added weight and struggled with the zombie on top of her, her backpack digging painfully into her back and using her bow to stop its descent onto her. Its yellowed teeth clicking around the grip, a line of spit falling dangerously close to Diana's cheek and the foul smell of rotten flesh filling her nostrils. She would've breathed through her mouth, but didn't want to risk the zombie's saliva dribbling in.

She could feel its arms squirming between them, pressed against her stomach, its nails scratching against the fabric, and her heart skipped a beat and started racing, the fear invading her, adrenaline forcing her weakened biceps to build up momentum and lift it off her and to the side, using her legs as leverage.

She got on her knees and scampered away until her back hit the side of the car. The zombie started towards her, long ratty hair dragging on the ground, but Diana stopped it with her foot against its face.

Before it could grab her leg, she jerked away and brought her bow down on it like a baseball bat. When its nasty face cracked against the asphalt, Diana sat up on her knees and clubbed the bow against the side of its skull, time and time again until it cracked open like an egg and blood and dead brain matter oozed out, painting her bow and splattering her.

She stood on wobbly legs, adrenaline leaving her, and was able to register what else was going on around her.

Her dad had already brought down two of them, his powerful swings almost taking one's head clean off, and was taking care of a third while Alice and Felix fought bare handed to pull a zombie off their struggling mom.

Diana was about to step up to help when the teens pulled a final time and it came toppling to the ground, neck at an odd angle against the car, where it started crawling back towards the woman. Felix searched frantically around for something to smash its head with, but Alice, without further ado, opened the passenger's door and slammed it shut on its head, one, two, three times before its skull burst open and it fell to the ground missing the top of its head.

Irene managed a few steps away before throwing up, and Felix, with a trembling chin, soon followed. Alice covered her mouth and nose with her elbow while awkwardly rubbing her mom's back.

Sam fell against the hood of the car, exhausted, two more zombies on him. He kept shouting profanities at them, his voice raw and panting. As Diana did to raise her bow in her shaky aim to help him she was grabbed by the backpack yet again. The back of her eyes stung with tears of anxiety as fear gripped her chest, halting her breath.

She was going to die. There was no way to survive this.

In a last desperate attempt, she let her backpack slide off and turned around to shoot it with shaking hands, but it dropped dead at her feet, an arrow that didn't belong to her sticking out the back of its decaying head of hair.

Two consecutive shots from a gun that made her flinch brought down the other two zombies surrounding her dad with a gaudy display of skull splinters and brain gunk as they toppled down one over the other.

"Well, well. Look what we have here, lil brother."


please leave a comment. tell me your thoughts, i'd really appreciate it