1
Stranded
Alek
"No! Please! Don't! I have a fam-"
The voice was cut off with the agonizing screams of pain, excruciating and dreadful pain. The kind of scream that left a man with chills running down his spine and kept him frozen in his tracks. It was that kind of scream. The one of pure terror. Before the reckoning you probably would go your entire life without hearing that scream. That scream that said you were about to die and gave in completely to fear. The one that people screamed when faced with something they had never faced before. Nowadays it's all too familiar.
Hell I could describe it too you right now as I listen to it.
It starts off strong, tinted with a roar in hopes to scare the being off, however it never works. Why would it? Your on your deathbed pretty much, lowly and defeated, using whatever pathetic method you can to stop the demon from finishing you off. It isn't intimidated by something that's already been beaten. Like a boxing champ versus a random rookie.
Then it changes into a high pitched squeal, one that read you gave up, finished, completely and wholly done with the life you were given. Your fight is done. Your desire to live evaporates into the nothingness that created this god forsaken place we called home once.
Oh it isn't done yet…
The scream turns jagged then, mixed with sobs and hiccups as you now grovel and beg for the pathetic thing you call a life. But they don't see us like that. Nah they see us as food that needs to be eaten, no matter what. Nothing matters else. However many don't live that long to get that part of the scream out. Many die far before then.
That scream was far too rare when everything was okay. Well okay as it could be. You know, social media, internet, restaurants, people walking around, that time period you know? When there wasn't undead people roaming around everywhere hunting for anything living to kill and eat. When you had phones that worked, stores open everywhere, people, living people mind you, doing their own day to day business. That okay period…
It was sudden though. When the undead came to be.
Hell I was young, 17, ending my junior year with straight A's, honor roll student, had the ideal girlfriend people used to die for, beautiful BMW M3, The whole shebang. Funny how none of that is even particularly relevant or helpful to me now. I wasted 17 years of my life in school and other bullshit just to have it all taken away. Wasted all those years fucking around and getting used to a world that would change into something so bizzare and different that I didn't even know was possible. So much time wasted…
But anyways I just lived life. Like most teens, I didn't care for any politics, war, or other BS that the news spat out. I just partied, "studied", and had fun. Fucking around like any other hormonal teen, drinking and smoking until I was good and fucked up and just lived.
Then it just happened.
Suddenly everyone was getting sick, it was a small thing, a cough at first, but everyone had it. No one thought anything of it though. They took some tylenol, ibuprofin and boom they assumed they were golden.
They were beyond fucking wrong.
The government inspected a few people that had the disease. "To ensure a cure to combat this new sickness." That's what they said anyways. Whatever twisted shit they did to those people… I'm just glad they didn't take anyone from my family because the people they took never went back home.
My family was perfect, we were healthy and alive. We had gotten lucky to avoid catching the disease, mainly due to our ditching school when everyone was getting sick. It was looking nice for us, until the disease went even more rampant and people began coughing up blood, vomiting, having open sores. People began to die.
We stayed inside, trying to keep away from the population who were being killed by the droves.
We stayed healthy. The government was failing. But we were alive. We were okay…
Then my brother got sick. My prideful, stupid, arrogant, infuriating, little brother. Isidoros. My loving little brother. MY little brother…
Ah, sorry, gets me emotional you know?
Anyways around the time he got sick, people who had died began to move again. Like straight out of the zombie video games, movies and all. Only these didn't just walk, and didn't run. No these undead moved faster but no were close to a run. And they didn't stop. Not one bit.
The undead swept through Seattle, the city I lived in, without any problems. The police and government troops tried for a peaceful solution at first. It cost them dearly. The undead feel no pain, no mercy, no emotion. They felt hunger. Desire to feed. And our humanity made us lose.
IT was simple darwinism. Natural selection was at work. A new species had came into our environment and was the predator now. We for the first time in forever, were the prey and we didn't know what to do.
My brother was dying. The government was losing. The entire USA was failing it seemed. Well from my perspective anyways.
My father was in NYC when the undead began to move, he got on a plane and flew back home to get us out of there.
But my brother was sick and dying and my father didn't want him with us.
My father's blood is still as fresh on my hands today as it was then.
He tried to kill him you see. Him and my mother both. See they assumed I would obey them when they told me about killing him. They clearly didn't know me too well, my loyalty to my brother was far greater than anything that this world could give me. He alone was my responsibility. He was my LITTLE BROTHER DAMMIT!
...
I'm… I'm sorry. I'm fine now.
Well my parents and I got into a fight, a nasty one. It turned violent at one point and my father and I came to blows. I won the engagement however I knew my father far too well. His pride wouldn't allow him a loss without retaliation.
I hid in his closet. My brothers that is.
My father and mother waited all night. They waited until it was 3:23 AM exactly before sneaking into my brothers room. Both of them had a knife.
I had my families Kopis, an Iron age Greek sword that was used in ancient times combat, at my side ready to use. Nice and sleek blade, heavy on the top of the blade going into a curve. It allows for great slashing and terrible stabbing. All in all, I loved using it.
My father and mother each had a steak knife in their hands. They whispered goodbye to my brother, nothing else. Goodbye. Emotionless. Without remorse. My brother had just fallen asleep too. He struggled with the disease that ate at him. He struggled to live. He fought though. God he fought. He refused to die. And I would not let him be killed by traitorous family members who dare weild the name mother and father.
I killed them.
My mother and father.
It haunts me… it tears at me. The memory lives inside me, forever reoccurring in my dreams, never letting me get sleep. It constantly eats away at my soul, the guilt I feel overwhelms me at times, but I remind myself it was them or my brother and I wasn't willing to give him up. Not yet.
When I did the crime… Man, the world we lived in now had changed. We had seen people get eaten, people died everyday, screaming for help knowing none would. Killing became a natural for those of us who lived. This was different though. These people were my family… LIVING people on top of it all.
So I crept behind my mother and made one good, deep downward slash across her back.
God… My father didn't know what to think. All he saw was his wife, his lover, his children's mother suddenly spit a mouthful of blood out and fall to the floor, his own Greek Kopis , Ascent, in my right hand, covered in her blood, dripping.
"Wha? Aleksander?" he had said to me.
I had tears streaming down my face. My head hurt from the sudden adrenaline I felt. I had killed someone. I just killed my mother. The pain was intolerable. My legs were shaking, my hands trembling, the thought of never seeing her again had begun to destroy me. But my father lunged at me. Ready to kill me. To end my life.
And Darwinism came into play once again. Like always.
And I used the other sword, Defiance, to cut open his stomach before he could touch me.
The look he gave me then, the look of betrayal and hurt that was on his face was too much for me to bear. I fell right along with him.
I remember thinking that not long ago I was a normal student, a normal teenage fucking around and being a fool. Worrying about college and getting caught by my parents when I snuck out, the silly shit.
Now my parents were dead.
Dead at my own hands.
I would do it again though. I knew that for a fact. Anything for my brother. That's true loyalty. Straight to the end…
I remember waking up on the floor next to my brothers bed. He was sitting up, growling loudly, his skin grey and covered in scratched open sores. His hair, once black and long, now had little to no hair on his head, his body was tense…
He lunged at my father's corpse then. He began to eat, tearing at his flesh like he was a homeless man that found cooked steak. I scooted back. I couldn't believe it. I didn't want too. He couldn't be dead. He shouldn't be! He was faithful to God! He prayed and went to church every sunday! So why him?! I was the one who had doubts! I was the one who questioned his existence and now he is dead and I am forced to live?
BULLSHIT!
I cut his head off while he ate…
I couldn't see him like that. Not when he was still my little brother.
No… he wasn't my little brother anymore. It was a beast that would kill me. It would feed on my flesh because of my weakness.
Natural Selection at work.
I ran after that.
I gathered what little food we had left, waters, my families swords and jumped onto the next giant group of people who were headed to New England, the place the government said was the last safe haven left.
I traveled with them for awhile.
Most of the undead traveled east due to the large amount of people who remained untouched. Due to such circumstances the group remained untouched for a long time, avoiding cities and scavenging anything along the way. It wasn't until we gotten into Montana that things got bad. We were forced to fight to get through the woodland state. We fought everyday, killed every night. Killing became a normal part of life then, the world we lived in had changed so we either had to adapt to it or fall behind and get killed. Many thought we would go back to how things used to be, they lived in delusional fantasies. They lied to themselves to make themselves feel better about the world they truly lived in. A twisted, fucked up world that had no remorse or sympathy for anyone or anything.
We took many losses as we treked east. We began to leave them behind. If they got infected, they were killed, if they died they stayed where they were. We were told we couldn't afford to waste time burying the dead. I didn't question. I just fought for the leaders of the expedition. I just wanted to find somewhere safe.
I bonded with people then. Actually made a few friends. People I knew I could trust. Trust with my life when it came down to it. Some had their own fucked backgrounds, people who lost new friends when they got to the expedition, or lost more family after the intial wave of infection hit. Others just managed to live and were trying to just get somewhere safe. Regardless of their background, we defended each other to the end.
Cassius Semenov.
A young man, who is far more mysterious than should be possible. Always wearing a hood, Cassius and I ran into each other during one of the early engagements in Montana. The undead had massed in the central highway and were rapidly rushing towards us. All of those who could fight rallied together and shot down the bastards. Everyone was yelling and screaming in anger, pain and vengeance. But not Cassius. No he just sat there. Firing his own submachine gun, which god knows how he got that, his hood on, his aim precise and accurate. He never said a word. Not until something clicked inside of him.
He snapped.
For a very slim individual, he was fast.
His face went from emotionless to pure, unbridled anger as he pulled two knives and charged the undead with the vanguard of people without guns. Of course, me being without a gun, I followed him into the fray. He and I fought together far too well to be possible. He charged through the undead, his knives cutting a path as I covered him using my dual Kopis to keep any undead from surrounding and engulfing him. Many followed us as we carved a path through the undead, leading the vanguard to form a giant wedge formation. Cassius was skinny. I mean like Slim jim kind of motherfucker, but I would never EVER want to be on the receiving end of his knives when he's mad. That a truly terrifying experience. After we finished the last of the undead, Cassius had followed me to my tent after bailing on me during the end of the fight. He just walked into my little home and made himself comfortable. The only thing he said was, "WE do good together."
Been together ever since.
It wasn't long after him when I had met Rin and Emmet-
"GOD DAMMIT!"
Bullet fire erupted suddenly, jarring me out of my thoughts.
I opened my eyes, slowly, the pure white light engulfing my vision as it struggled to adapt itself. After a few moments my eyes cleared.
The smell of rotting flesh suddenly swarmed into my nostrils.
Corpses were covering me, their decayed blood and guts had drenched me from head to toe.
I tried to move my arms, which were pinned beneath a host of dead zombies. Same results with my legs and torso.
How the fuck did I end up here? Was I asleep or unconscious?
Suddenly more bullet fire rang out closer sounding than the first set.
Someone was nearby, someone living.
The sounds of moans and groaning became loud and evident then.
I froze.
Why wasn't I being eaten? Who was firing? Why am I in the what appears to be middle of a town with a host of dead zombies on top of me, soaking in their blood and guts? AND WHY I CAN'T REMEMBER A DAMN THING?!
"Fuck off you mangly bastards!"
More bullet fire rang out, louder and closer this time.
Why did that voice sound so damn familiar?
I tried to turn my neck around slowly to look behind me to see what was going on. Who was yelling?
I managed to shift my weight out from underneath the corpses a bit and look behind me.
I couldn't believe it.
Lance McDuffy.
He was one of my group members and a good friend of mine as we ran into him one day in an abandoned trailer, looking for food and some water. He helped us clear some zombies and asked to join us. After some debating and testing his loyalties, we let him in.
He was 25, young still, was a burly dude, since he was a lumberjack prior to the Reckoning. He was a nice man. Thoughtful, caring, optimistic about everything. He as our medic in a way. Only he didn't know how to do anything medical. Yet now he stood surrounded by the undead on top of a van, firing down at them as they tried to grab him.
I opened my mouth to cry out when I realized that the undead weren't bothering me at all. Why?
It clicked.
They couldn't smell me… I had the corpses juices on me. They assumed I was dead! But... If I moved, I was doomed. They would realize I was alive and attack me. I was stuck while they shuffled closer towards Lance. If Lance could keep them coming closer to him and away from me. I could run…
I growled in anger.
I had to do something to help! What the hell was the matter with me! He was my friend and I refused to let him die!
I looked around, hoping to see anything to aid him.
We appeared to be in the center of a 4-way intersection, old cars around us, zombies from all over town it seemed converging on Lance as he yelled and screamed, firing the assault rifle we gave him when we ran into him not even a few months ago. He was being swarmed, it was only a matter of time before he got caught and eaten alive.
I could make a break for it, they all seemed distracted enough on him...
Lance looked right at me then as if sensing my thoughts.
"Alek! RUN! GO! The Farmhouse!" he yelled to me.
Then his foot got snagged and he was pulled into the giant horde of the undead.
And I made a break for it… I had never abandoned a friend before. It went against my nature. My mind was revolting against me yet my body only ran harder and faster. I must have really been out of my mind.
It was coming back to me.
Well partially...
The farmhouse.
We had taken refuge in a farmhouse a mile from a town an hour away from Saint Paul, Minnesota. Lance, Emmet, Cassius and Ben all didn't come home during a scavenging assignment. I had went back out to find them… I had kissed Rin that same day too.
Fuck what went wrong?
I still couldn't remember it all. My head ached. My body was tired. I had no clue why. All I knew was Lance was dead, I was stuck in the middle of town, my two swords at my waist and I was alone.
Stranded.
My fucking luck.
WELL GENTS! Here's another chapter! A bit longer for ya since I know you all love longer chapters. This is the true beginning of this tale. It has begun.
It does occur after the events of the previous chapter fyi. I still need more OC's! REVIEW! GOOD and BAD! Trust me, i need it guys! I appreciate it all and it makes me want to write more and longer chapters! You will see from other POV's dont worry about that. Its coming very very very soon… (NEXT CHAPTER!)
Anyways, i hope ya like it!
-JulesLeInvicta
(REVIEW DAMMIT :D )
