Chapter 5

Courtney turned away from Jemma and broke out in a sprint. She didn’t notice Sarah and Leah lagging behind. She had already rushed back up the hill.

She couldn’t get caught.

She wouldn’t let herself be turned into a monster.

Not a monster created by Mrs Grungle.

Courtney ran as if her life depended upon it. Because it did.

She bolted up the hill, past the basketball court. She could see across the asphalt to the other side of the school, where Jack was turning a few other kids into zombies. Courtney mentally noted all the students who turned.

She couldn’t trust anyone. How many others were like Jemma? Seemingly normal until they burst.

She turned her head to see if Jemma was still hunting.

She was gone.

But so too were Leah and Sarah.

Somehow, in all that running, she had lost sight of her friends.

Now she was all alone.

Truly alone.

Courtney felt tears beginning to form. She quickly wiped her eyes. She wasn’t going to cry. She wouldn’t let Mrs Grungle have that satisfaction. She would find a way to defeat her.

Courtney placed her foot firmly on the ground, spinning on one foot to face back towards the oval. She was not going to let anything happen to her friends. She would save them. Even if it meant putting herself in danger. That’s what it meant to be a BFF.

She walked back towards the oval. She would’ve run, but there was no telling whether she’d come face-to-face with another zombie anytime soon. If she had to run away, she wanted to have as much energy as she could.

She made it to the bottom of the basketball court and down to the monkey bars just before the oval. She scanned the area, but couldn’t see Leah, Sarah, or Jemma. Courtney climbed up to the third step of the monkey bars, as high as she could go, and glanced across the oval.

Nothing.

No signs of zombies.

But also no sign of her best friends.

Courtney prayed that they had managed to escape.

“Help!”

Her head snapped around. The voice came from the cricket nets. Aaron, one of the boys from her class, was at the back of the net. Two other boys from her class were slowly closing in.

“Brains!” they called. Courtney knew she couldn’t do anything to help the poor kid. Another zombie in Mrs Grungle's army.

How many kids were already infected?

Who could she trust now?

“Brains!”

Courtney fell from the third step onto the tanbark below.

It was Jack, rushing towards her from the bottom of the oval’s slope.

He had snuck up on her while she was distracted with the other zombie attack. But he was still quite some distance away. She got to her feet in record time and sprinted. She didn’t stop, pushing through a stitch as her lungs burnt.

Glancing back, once she reached the top right-hand corner of the school grounds, she saw that she had somehow managed to avoid Jack once again. But she was still alone. Worst of all, she was beginning to lose hope.

How could she escape Mrs Grungle’s zombie army?

They seemed to be continuously multiplying. Doubling by the minute. It wouldn’t be long before she was the only one remaining.

Courtney looked at the fence.

Out of school grounds.

If she ran out of one of the gates, she’d be able to escape the zombies. But… That wasn’t allowed. She’d get into big trouble. Maybe even a suspension. That had to be worse than becoming a zombie.

Courtney bit her lip.

Which one was worse?

She made up her mind.

Suspension was worse. If you got enough of them, you would get expelled. That was what the other kids said. One of the kids even said that their big brother told them they knew someone who had been expelled. That was more than enough proof to avoid suspensions.

Why did such cruel conditions have to be placed on her?

She decided to walk past the playground, hugging the metal fence border. If anyone approached, she would see them first. She continued on until she reached the top left-hand corner of the school.

Still no zombies.

She appeared to be safe and able to catch her breath.

For now.

Why did this have to happen?

How did it happen?

Courtney just wished she could erase everything. Fade away into nothingness. Hide away forever. All so Mrs Grungle couldn’t terrorise her any further.

Hide…

She thought about a place where zombies may not look.

The toilets.

Very few people would look there. And zombies didn’t have brains so they wouldn’t think of it.

The northern toilet block was dark, stinky and a place that many students avoided. Even Courtney rarely visited the northern ones. They were perfect. Best of all, they were just down the dirt steps from where she was.

She jogged down the steps and entered the concrete corridor.

Darkness.

A cold blast of frosty air blew through the dark passage.

Courtney shivered as her eyes began to adjust.

A figure. A silhouette. At the other end.

She squinted. Who? Who could it be? Friend or Foe?

She took a few steps, passing the boys' toilets, and only then could she make out who it was. Sarah.

Standing at the other end.

“Sarah!” Courtney called out, running towards her.

She was only metres away when Sarah let out a loud scream. “Brains!”

Courtney skidded to a stop. Trembling, she did the fastest one-eighty she could and darted in the other direction. Stepping out from around the corner was Leah.

“Leah! Sarah is a zombie!” Courtney tried to warn the other girl.

She tilted her head unnaturally.

“Brains!”

Courtney froze, turning her head to see Sarah slowly closing in on her with her hands extended. She took a few steps backwards, trying to keep out of Leah’s range. Courtney took a step backwards, and then another. Courtney could feel her heart rate increasing.

She tried to step backwards, but tripped over her own foot, which had frozen in fear.

“Brains!” the two girls called, moving slowly towards her.

Courtney began to crawl on her hands and knees, trying to capitalise on even the slimmest of free space between them.

Leah and Sarah continued to close in from either side.

Courtney reached the brick wall. She had nowhere to go. Left with no escape, she finally broke and began crying.

“What’s wrong?” Leah asked.

Courtney looked up at Leah, sniffling up snot.

“You aren’t going to eat me?”

Leah tilted her head to the side.

“What do you mean?”

“You were an evil zombie.”

“Yeah, we were playing a game,” she replied calmly.

“A game?” Courtney sniffled.

“Zombie tiggy,” Sarah replied.

“Zombie tiggy?” Courtney didn’t know what this game was. She only knew of regular Tiggy.

“You know, zombie tiggy. It’s a game where when you get tagged, you also become ‘it’,” she explained.

“So you aren’t really a monster?” Courtney’s eyes were watery, this time with relief.

“No!” they both replied.

Courtney gave Leah and Sarah a big hug. She continued to cry, but they were tears of relief as opposed to those of the fear she had previously felt.

Courtney’s tears made the other two girls cry as well.

It was a game of ‘tear tiggy’, and all three girls were ‘it’.

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End of Chapter 5