Chapter 2
She still remembered that day so clearly. The day the world went to shit. She was going to her first class of the day at her university, Psychology. The professor was telling them about a new virus that was rapidly becoming an epidemic. He said that it was becoming known to affect people's brains and brain stem. She shrugged it off, thinking it was just the media trying to find the next big story. Instead, she day dreamed about her date with Bryan Kerry, the quarterback of the football team, next Saturday.
After the rest of her classes that day, she drove back to her tiny apartment. She was singing along to Celine Dion when the radio began playing an emergency broadcast over and over about the same virus that the professor mentioned. That was when she first started to worry. When she got home, she went straight into her cramped living room and turned on the news. It was a video being played over and over of a man chasing and biting another man in the arm, apparently caused by the same virus, called TQP-57. But he didn't just look like a regular man, his eyes were a milky bluish-green color, and he kept making growling and moaning sounds. People were referring to him as a 'zombie'. She felt sick as they replayed the video again.
She tried calling her parents but they're phone must have been off, so she left a message instead. "I don't know if you're watching the news but something is weird is going on. I just wanted to call and make sure you guys were safe. Hopefully you get this. I love you guys!" As she hung up the power began to flicker and turned off, leaving her in complete darkness.
That's when she knew she had to get out of there. If something bad was happening, she wanted to get out of the city. She had seen enough movies to know that. She grabbed a flashlight from the kitchen and went into her bedroom. As quickly as she could, she packed some of her clothes, her phone and charger, some flashlights, toiletries, and anything else she thought she could possibly need for a couple days away. She went down to her white Honda Civic and started up the engine, only then did she notice how much her hands were shaking. The radio continued to broadcast the same emergency announcement, sometimes airing a news story with a new case of people 'biting' and 'eating' one another.
She told herself over and over again that it wasn't what she thought it was and that it was all some sort of big misunderstanding. She drove for a couple hours and finally pulled over along the side of a small, back road. Maybe she was overreacting. She started to think she was a complete fool for freaking out like that. Did she actually believe that zombies were taking over the world? She decided to go back to her apartment. She looked out the window; the sky was darkening and the stars were beginning to come out. She turned around and began the drive back, but it was what she saw next that really changed her life.
She drove through a small town along the highway. She was passing by a hygienic store when she heard a woman was screaming. She looked out the window and saw a woman running away from a man stumbling towards her, his teeth bared and snapping at her. She tripped and fell into the dirt, and the man caught up. He grabbed her and bit down on her shoulder. He then began to rip her shoulder off. It was like nothing she had ever seen before, not even in movies. She slammed on the gas pedal, as she began to get light headed. She contemplating going back and trying to help her. But whatever this virus was, it was making people completely irrational, and she knew if she tried going back, she probably wouldn't make it out alive.