Chapter 5 - Encounter

Tears began to fall as I looked at the zombie. It was a child who looked to be around the age of twelve. Slowly, I inched towards the end of the bed trying to remain silent as I escaped. I stifled my screams of fear and sorrow.

As I planted my feet on the cold floor, I noticed bloodied drag marks leading under the bed. The entire house was a mess when I first arrived, blood splatters and drag marks were everywhere, I didn’t think that I needed to inspect all of them.

But look at how that could’ve cost me my life, I was sleeping peacefully above an undead child. At least he wasn’t chasing me; the room was already small, and the door was barricaded. Moving the items in front of the door would take too long, so I would have to escape through the window.

I cautiously approached my bag and picked it up, as I kept glancing back at the zombie. As I knelt down to retrieve my bag, something under the bed caught my eye, something that I couldn’t see in the dark of night. The sunlight illuminated the room, it’s rays of light reaching everywhere.

Under the bed laid a half-eaten child. Her mouth hung open showing signs that she screamed for help, blood leaking from every orifice on her face. Horrified, I peeled my eyes away from her and made my way toward the window. It opened with a soft click that seemed louder in this suffocatingly silent room. I held my breath as I shot a quick glance towards the zombie, I thought it would rush toward the source of the noise but it didn’t. It was just standing there, staring at the bed.

That’s when it dawned on me, he wasn’t staring at the bed. The undead child knew his sister was under there, and it didn’t take an expert to figure out what happened. The drag marks on the floor and blood around his mouth and arms were evidence enough.

At first, the two children hid in their parents’ room when their home was attacked. However, the boy was already injured from protecting his sister earlier. It didn’t take long for him to turn, and as soon as he did, he viciously tore into his sister. Feasting on her flesh and blood as she struggled helplessly.

I wasn’t here when it had happened, but I vividly remembered seeing this scene play out before. It reminded me of the first time I had that dream.

Quietly, I climbed out the window, wanting to get as far away from the horrifying scene as possible. As soon as my feet touched the concrete, I ran as fast as I could. I didn’t have a specific direction in mind; I just wanted to get away. Why did I have to see that? It wasn’t enough that I had to see mother getting mauled but children as well?

Why was I seeing these things? They were just children; they didn’t deserve that. Tears streamed down my face as I ran, unable to hold it in anymore I let out a wail of agony. All around me were corpses and for some reason, the moment my eyes landed on one, I would recall how gruesomely they died.

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Time passed quickly, it was already noon. I still haven’t found Rina. I was currently in a cyber-mart scavenging for food and medical supplies. It’s not that the cyber-mart was empty, it was actually the opposite. The items were protected by argon glass, which I couldn’t break, even if I wanted to.

Argon glass was one of the most theft-proof inventions three decades ago. It was expensive, but an investment people were willing to make. Bats, hammer, crowbars and other common weapons were useless against it. Well, military weapons were an exception. And anything that’s equivalent to a car going sixty miles per hour.

To purchase an item, you would have to scan your ID watch on the glass and then choose the items you want. I sighed as I looked at my wrist. It wasn’t bleeding as much as yesterday, and if it weren’t for the painkillers I wouldn’t have been able to keep going. It was still difficult to move without limping but I couldn’t afford to slow down.

“Um…do you want me to get that for you?” came a timid voice from behind me.

I turned to see a small child peeking out from behind a shelf. Normally, I wouldn’t let a child to pay for stuff for me but I didn’t really have a choice right now.

“I’d appreciate that,” I said with a friendly smile.

The girl was carrying a small backpack that was filled with too many items, you cold tell from how the zippers struggled to close. As she scanned her watch, I selected some alcohol wipes, gauze, medical tape and antibiotics. While I was hungry, I didn’t take any food. I had already felt embarrassed that a child was paying for me.

Before I could thank her, she interrupted, “In…in exchange for the stuff…please…please help my mommy.”

She was on the verge of tears as she asked me this and I couldn’t refuse. I told her to give me some time to treat my wounds and then she could lead the way. Finding Rina was important, but I couldn’t just abandon a child. Fortunately, the area where her mother was located had few zombies and was close by. My treated leg also made running much easier.

“Mommy said that…most people evac…ev…um…ran away to higher districts when…when the monsters came. And that we…we should too,” she explained timidly as we approached the house doors.

As I thought, she wasn’t from this district. I had noticed how patched up her clothes were and that she was covered in an excessive amount of dirt and grime. She was also malnourished and if they were evacuating to higher districts, that can only mean she came from D5. The same district where the first zombie appeared.

It was probably hard for her and her mother to escape. I’m actually surprised that the guards even opened the gates for the people there. It was well-known that the D5 guards were intransigently strict.

One of the most terrible things about a zombie apocalypse is that the stench of rotting corpses is all around you so it’s hard to tell when a zombie is nearby. It was because my nostrils had gotten used to the scent that I didn’t know zombies were under my bed earlier. And it was also because of this, that I wasn’t ready for what I had walked into.

My eyes widened in shock, and my breath hitched. Two of the grotesque creatures that we saw on our way here were stuck under some bookshelves, groans and growls escaping their throats. It seemed as though someone had intentionally thrown the shelf them.

I was about to ask her where her mother was so we could leave this place when she happily exclaimed “Mommy! I brought help!”

Huh? That zombie was her mother?

The once timid girl turned to me and grumpily said “Now that you’re here, we can get mommy out. Those bad people from earlier used my mommy as bait to catch the zombie and ran.”

As the words left her mouth, I recalled a memory that I didn’t even know I had forgotten. It was just like earlier. That’s right, I dreamt of this too. When people started turning and attacking each other, the people from D5 fled to the gates, the guards were trying to lock them out but a frightened mob of people were not to be taken lightly. The people of D5 had steadily spilled into D4, trampling the guards who tried to stop them. This child and her mother were among the crowd.

It was every man for themselves. The people of D4 were equally terrified of the creatures that came in from D5. The child and her mother were trying to hide but were unlucky, the house they’d ran into was already invaded by a zombie. But the pair were oblivious as they approached the residents of the home.

A loving family would do anything for each other, so when the woman approached him, the man saw an opportunity to save his son. “Kick down the bookshelf” he shouted as he threw the girl’s mother at the zombie. The man and his family then escaped, but the girl’s mother was trapped under the bookshelf as the zombie tore into her. Only the child’s screams prevented the zombie from finishing her off.

The child was telling me descriptions of the people who did this to her mother. She was going on about how she’ll beat them up if she ever sees them again.

I swallowed the lump in my throat as I looked at her sadly “Your mother….” She stopped talking and waited for me to continue “Your mother isn’t alive anymore.”

My words came out harsher than I intended, and her hopeful eyes turned sad and furious. “Yes, she is! My mommy is alive, we have to save her!”

Both zombies became more agitated as she shouted. I tried to calm her down but it was futile. Why couldn’t she understand that her mother is one of those monsters she was talking about? Although she was a child, she didn’t scream when we saw zombies on our way here, she was calm and focused on saving her mother.

No. It was I who couldn’t understand. They were mother and daughter, it was natural for them to want to save each other.

I gave up on trying to reason with her. I would drag her away by force. But before I could take even one step, one of the zombies’ struggles was successful and it lunged at the child.

“Behind you!” I shouted, but a gunshot went off at the same time drowning out my voice. The creature’s head was blown off, bits and pieces splattering everywhere.

“I wondered who the screaming idiots were. Are you both trying to die?” The strange man’s voice came from behind me and I turned around.

“That shot will attract more of them. We need to leave now,” he was curt and straight to the point.

“No! My mommy-”

“Then stay and get eaten by zombies,” he wasted no time in cutting her off. He had helped us earlier, but he wouldn’t tolerate our foolishness.

I tried to convince her again but failed.

“Fine,” she said and for one second, I was relieved. The child had knelt beside the zombie “I’ll help my mommy. I’ll stay with her.”

As the child reached her hands out towards her mother, so did she. The zombie pulled the child towards her and bit her jaw off, ripping out pieces of her neck in the process.

The child’s lifeless body slumped to the ground as the zombie continued its feast. I stood there frozen, unable to process what just happened.

A few seconds later another gunshot went off, blowing the zombie’s head to pieces.

I turned to the culprit, anger fueling me as I approached him. I grabbed his shirt. “Why didn’t you shoot before it killed the child?!” I demanded, tears brimming my eyes as I gritted my teeth.

“She was being stubborn. Even if I’d shot the zombie, she would’ve still stayed and cried over the creature’s corpse. Not long after she would’ve been zombie food,” he said this as if he did her a favor.

“She was just a child,” the tears finally fell and I recalled the children from earlier too. “They were just children…” My grip on his shirt loosened and for a moment his eyes softened.

He sighed wearily “We could stand here all day and debate my actions and become zombie food, or we can get out of here and try to make sense of what’s happening. Personally, I’m in favor of the latter.”

I took a second and pushed him away as I clicked my tongue.

“Good,” he said as he straightened his shirt, “Let’s go.”

As I walked to the door, I couldn’t help but look back. They did nothing wrong, there was no reason for them to die like that. It pained me as all I could do was mumble an apology and turn my back on them.