Morgan Jones still didn't understand what had happened to the world in the last few weeks, one day everything had been fine, he had a steady job, his wife and son were well cared for, his lawn was immaculate and his only complaint was a lack of anything good to watch on tv.
Now, now the world was a different place, the dead were walking and the living were becoming more and more outnumbered, every bite, every scratch, almost any contact with the dead could kill. And when you died, you came back...
The first time he had seen it happen had been at work, a few weeks ago, when a homeless guy had come into the shop, a gash by his eye and blood all down his face. Morgan had let the man in, called the cops, asked him what happened, but the man hadn't said anything, he just sat still in a chair, sweating, mumbling and bleeding, before going still.
Just before the police had arrived the man had gotten back up, his groans dumb and like an animal, the concerned onlookers had no time to react as the man grabbed hold of a woman's arm and bit a chunk out of it.
Morgan and several other men had tried to hold back the man, but no matter what they did he kept on coming, eventually someone had killed him with a hit to the head.
At the time, he had thought it was just an isolated incident, one insane hobo taking a bite out of someone, not exactly earth-shattering. But when reports started to come out of it happening all over the country, all over the world, people started to worry.
Once people started worrying, when the dead were striking people down in the streets and the government was seemingly powerless to stop it, they got crazy. They started acting just as insane as the damned biters.
Once things got really bad, ads went up on t.v., on the radio and in the one or two newspapers which were still being printed telling everyone to head to the large cities. In his case that meant Atlanta, it was safer in the big cities the government said, and it would be easier to protect everyone.
Morgan hadn't ever fully trusted the police or the government, it was hard to as a black man in the deep south, but when they said to get to Atlanta, and the only alternative was to sit on his ass at home while the world went crazy around him, he decided that Atlanta was where he and his family were going. Better safe than sorry!
His family... his beautiful wife, and their son Duane, they had packed their things and headed out, Morgan had only taken what he thought he would need, clothes, money, supplies, his son, being a young boy had brought a few comic books. His wife, God bless her, had refused to leave the damn house without taking the family photo albums.
Now they were in a little town in King County, staying the night in an abandoned house. Morgan's wife had almost gotten herself bit today, and God damn if it wasn't the most terrifying moment of his life, seeing the biter pushing his wife to the ground, by the time he got to her Morgan was sure it was too late. Seems his wife had been stronger than he thought, she managed to hold the damn ghoul's head up so it couldn't bite her, and Morgan stabbed it in the head.
The day after tomorrow they would move on to the next town, after resting and gathering some more supplies while they were here. Morgan would absolutely not be letting his wife out of his eyesight for more than half a second from now on.
For a moment Morgan wondered what would have happened if his wife had been bitten. The thought was too unpleasant, and he soon turned his mind to Atlanta. With all the craziness out here in the countryside and small towns he hoped it would be better there, like the ads said it was.