A/N: This is a continuation of the flashback from the last chapter. Enjoy ^_^

Chapter 2:

Reign's POV:

Once we packed our stuff into the truck, Lance drove to the exit.

Joey had closed the fence when we entered the parking lot of the abandoned residence hall, which meant he had to open the gate for Lance.

Joey hopped out the car and pushed the chain link fence until there was enough room for Lance to get through. It was dark now so the streetlights were on but they were dim. Joey stood directly under the glow of one of them.

As Joey waited for us to pull up, I saw a figure emerge from the shadows behind him. The light was so faint and my eyesight was so bad at night that I thought my mind was playing tricks on me at first. It was clearly one of those things. Its eyes were devoid of any emotion and they were cloudy as well. Almost like it had cataracts. There was a huge chunk of flesh missing from the base of his neck.

Lance noticed it as quickly as I did. He quickly braked and put the truck in park. Causing Marlene and I to lurch forward.

Lance jumped out of the truck with his pistol aimed.

"Joey move," he ordered.

Joey lunged to the side just as the monster swiped at him. Lance immediately emptied 5 rounds into the things chest.

It was knocked back several steps by the force of the bullets until it was flat on its back. Joey was still on the ground in disbelief, several feet away from it.

"Dude, what the hell?"

"What did you want me to do," Lance argued back at Joey. "He was gonna hurt you."

"You just killed a man!"

"I don't think he's dead," Marlene interjected.

We looked to the figure and we noticed that he was still growling and moaning. Its hands and fingers writhed and contorted in the dirt.

The thing slowly sat up and growled at all of us.

"Oh my fuck," Joey whispered.

Joey's comment drew the things attention to him. It began to clamber to its feet. Its sights were on Joey.

Joey scrambled to the truck and flung open the passengers side door. Lance was already in the truck ready to take off. Joey slammed the door shut just in time. The creature threw itself against the door and began clawing and banging at the window.

"Lance drive," Marlene ordered. All of our eyes were fixated on the thing that looked living and dead at the same time.

"Lance," Marlene called.

No response.

I looked in the distance and saw several figures approaching us.

"Fucking drive Lance," I yelled.

He snapped out of it and slammed his foot on the gas.

Once we got a safe distance away the panic started up.

"What kind of person survives 5 bullets to the chest," Joey yelled.

"That wasn't a person," Marlene said back. "It was something but it wasn't a person."

"Well please enlighten me Mars," Joey snapped sarcastically.

"Drop the 'tude Joey."

"Did you guys even recognize who that was," Lance asked in a slightly spaced out tone.

No one answered.

"That was Professor Holden."

"What," I said in disbelief. "No way is that Holden. I had a class with him a noon earlier today. What could've happened to him that he looks like that in less than a couple of hours?"

Holden was one of the professors for the music program at our school. He was young to have such a prestigious job. He obtained his masters a little over a year ago. He took over as the professor for trumpet this school year after the previous one retired due to health complications. Holden was only 28.

Holden looked so lively earlier today. But now, he looked like he'd been dead for over a week.

"It's whatever is going around," Lance replied. "That disease."

"I don't know where it started. I don't think anyone really does. All I know is that all of a sudden there were numerous reports of "people" attacking other people. Trying to bite or eat them. Then the people that got bit would die then "come back to life" and do the same thing."

We were already half way to our destination.

"It seemed like the government had it under control for a second," Marlene added. "Then for the past couple of weeks the whole world began spiraling out of control. Out of nowhere major cities were either getting evacuated or shut down. People were being forced on to military bases by the government. Airports and train stations were permanently shut down."

All this did was make me wonder, what would've happened to me if Marlene hadn't warned me. What if she had never came back to the dorm and just left with Lance and Joey? I was so caught up in my stress I didn't notice how quickly the world was crumbling around me. I'd probably still be in the dorm oblivious to whatever it was scraping on the other side of the door. I'd probably be dead or one of them. And if not, I'd probably be stumbling around campus, hopeless and clueless to everything going on.

"There's no time to be concerned with how it happened. That time has long passed and it's too late to try, at least in this moment," Lance said. "Let's focus our energy on getting out of the city first. Cities are the ones having the most trouble with these things and get overpowered quickly. Once we get out of the city, we stay out of the city."

We could see the main entrance/exit in the distance. There were more of those things than before. Joey getting out to move the roadblocks wasn't going to be an option.

Just like Lance and Joey said, the roadblocks were flimsy plastic ones. Due to our position, it was a straight shot to the main exit.

Lance put the truck in park and turned off the headlights.

"Seatbelts on guys," he ordered.

We did as told. He put the car in drive but pressed on the brake to keep the car still.

"You guys ready," he asked.

"Yeah."

"Alrighty then."

He took a deep breath and let it out. It only took a split second for him to take his foot off the brake and slam it on the gas.

The tires screeched against the pavement. The truck surged towards the exit. Those things heard us coming but they weren't quick enough to get to us before the truck mowed down the roadblocks. As soon as that happened Lance pressed on the brakes to keep the truck from running into any of the buildings across from campus. He turned his wheel completely to the right before taking off down the road. He skipped all of the entrances to get on the highway and took the back road that led to the countryside. He kept his foot firmly on the gas and didn't let up until we passed a sign that let us know we were leaving Athens.

End of Flashback