Dead Bite

chapter one

   I wake up to my dad shaking me, and Rubble licking my face. Rubble has grown into a huge pitbull with one unique feature, he has a mustache. He is grown now. It was only a dream, Kaylee, I think. I feel some tears rolling down my cheek bone. My dad looks at me and checks my neck. Then he walks out of the room without a word. I could not help but laugh at Rubble for licking my face. I pat his head and got up. I slump to the bathroom to look at my face. My face is a bit red, probably from crying or screaming; however, no acne.
   My long black hair causes my skin to be paper white that contours with my soft, light, pink lips. I am skinny, maybe a hundred and ten pounds, but most of that consists of muscles. I have toned abs and have medium sized muscles. My father used to say I had his eyes and my mother's. I, being heterochromic iridium, have one blue and one green eye. I got my green eye from my mother and my blue eye from my father. My eyes look so tired.
   I splash some water on my face to wake up my lifeless body. I walk out and start rummaging through the clothes I had, which was not much. I decide to wear my black shorts, a black tank top, and a guys sweatshirt. I want something to control my jungle of hair and decided to wear my beanie. Once I have made a few adjustments to my outfit, I drag myself to my dad's room. Outside, in the hall, are old news papers, trash, and other random useless things. A fridge, couch, and tv along with other big things block the stairs to the eighth floor. I stare at a small teddy bear. I wonder whose teddy bear this is? I get distracted very easily. I snap out of my trance and slid into my father's room. In his room, he has already made two bowls of biscuits and gravy and a bowl of dog food. I sit at the opposite side of the small table, and shovel food into my mouth.
   "So," my father starts," have the nightmare again?"
   I nod my head," it seems like every time I have it, the memories become more vivid and I remember more."
   My father sighs,"well, if you keep screaming like that then we are gonna have infected up our ass."
   "Sorry, I need my medicine..." I whisper under my breath.
   "Well then I will have to go on a run for supplies; besides, we are running low. While I'm there, I will get you some more anxiety pills and anti-depressants if they have any.
   "I'm sorry I'm fucked up," I answer slightly hurt.
   "You are fine and definitely not fucked up. I'm just trying to protect you." He finishs eating before me and starts packing his usual stuff for his trip outside. I set my bowl down and clear my throat.
   "Dad, can I go on the run with you?" I ask meekly. He hesitates a second before answering.
   "No," he replies as he continues to pack. I stomp my feet a little.
   "But dad! I'm seventeen! You cannot keep me locked up here on the seventh floor of this lousy apartment building forever!" I yell agitated.
   "Well, you do NOT want to end up like your mother, do you?"
   "But you didn't have to shoot her," I answer as I storm out of the room. The first room I went to was the room at the end of the hall. That is my anger room. Once I enter, the walls were decorated with holes. The holes in the walls scream angrily at me while the walls mock me. I scream and punch the wall as hard as I can, adding more "decorations" to the walls. My dad begins pounding on the door with his mighty hands.
   "Kaylee, are you alright?" He asks. I open the door but not enough so he could see inside.  My hands bled down the side of the door frame out of sight from my father. I take deep breaths to calm myself. He tries pushing past me, but I put my foot in the way.
   "Sorry, there is a fridge in the way," I lie smiling. I step back.
   "Hmm, well, I must be going if I am going to make it back by sundown," he kisses my forehead and descends down the stairs. He stops at the balcony.
   "Oh, by the way, you might want to clean your hands off so you don't get an infection." He calls. Agitated, I punch the wall one last time. The warm, red liquid trickles down my hand and onto the dark, cold floor. He is right, I do need to clean this off. I go to our water supplies and start washing off the blood. The blood continues to flow out of my hands; I might have broken a few knuckles, but I do not care. I wrap both my hand and then throw myself onto my bed. I lay in silence for a while until a muffled voice interrupts my silence. I pull the walkie talkie out from under my pillow.
   "Come again?" I ask.
   "Your screaming has brought quiet a few infected tonight, even more than we have had actually."
   "Sorry," I growl slightly. I wait a few seconds before asking," oh, how did you know I punched the walls?"
   "I have been in there. There are holes all over those walls. And I'm sorry about bringing up your mother. It's just that..."
   "I don't care. I do not want to talk about it," I interrupt.
   He sighs,"I have to go," an arrow zooms by the walkie-talkie," be safe, please. I love you, honey."
   "I love you too daddy." I clip the walkie-talkie to my belt and venture to my father's room. I rummaged through his closet and find his tool belt. There were different sizes of knives; I pick out the smallest ones. The two smallest knives are my favorite knives, but no guns. The reasons I do not just steal a gun from my dad is because they are loud and will attract infected. Also because guns are not my favorite. Maybe if I used guns more I would grow to like them, but for now I do not. I slip into my dads boots and walk out into the hall. 
   "Rubble, come on boy," I whistle. He rushes towards me with a wagging tail. "I need you to watch my back." I jump down the first flight of stairs to the sixth floor. I descend down until I got to the second floor. I look down the hall and see a winged object. I silently walk down the hall; my knives ready to strike. I come up to the object. It is a black bat bag and a pair of black converse boots. I check the size, only two sizes too big for me; way better than my dad's seven sizes too big army boots. I slip into the black converse and put my dad's boots in the bat bag. I throw it over my shoulder and, jump down the last flight of stairs. I push the door open. I am blinded for a few seconds before my eyes finally adjust. Outside is beautiful when I get to go outside. The leaves on the trees are green, the birds are chirping, the beautiful flowers smell amazing, and then the infected lay on the ground. I knew my dad had killed them all, but that does not mean there are not any infected near by. The first infected I walk up to is a male, maybe, that is an office worker, maybe. I kneel down next to it and rummage through its pockets. What I find is cool; I found two unopened packets of gum, a notebook, a pen, a pencil, and a phone. Many of the people I rummage through have phones. I do the same to the other infected, patting them down for cool knick knacks. From around twenty infected, I conjure up two hundred and three dollars, three pocket knives, seventeen cell phones, and one amazing leather jacket. Many of the infected I rummage through are young. The younger you are, the most likely you are to die.
   I stuff everything into my bag and head inside. I still have a lot of room in my bag, I thought, and my dad will not be home until around sundown.
   "Should we go explore other floors?" I baby talk. Rubble barks,"I am taking that a sign of yes." I walk around the first floor, not finding much as well as the floors leading up to the fifth floor. However, on the fifth floor, I find a few boxes of unused bullets, two hand guns, and my favorite find, a rifle. I climb the stairs to my floor and in my secret chest, I stuff all the new stuff I found in there. I close the chest and hide it. I stand up and start thinking, I wonder what is on the eighth floor. I open the blinds to see where the sun was. It is only starting to set; I have plenty of time to explore the unknown levels of this apartment building.
   I hold my knives close to my body, knowing my dad had not cleared the floors above us. I slowly maneuver around the pile up to the door that leads to the eighth floor. I manage to get through as well as Rubble who wiggles his way through the heap of objects. I push the door open a crack and look inside and down the hall. Down the hall is clear, for now. I step inside and partially close the creaky, rusted door just in case infected chase me. I creep down the hall a bit, avoiding making loud noises. The first door I go to is slightly open. I swung the door open and stepped inside. There is a smell of death so strong it nauseats me. This smell is... familiar to me. A memory consumes my mind and blurrs my vision.
   "Kaylee hurry! We have to go before we are completely swarmed!" My dad yelled over the snarls of the infected piled up at the door,"we need to get to those apartment buildings," he pointed.
   "Dad, I cannot hold them much longer. I'm running out of ammo!" I screamed over the infected. The glass doors were beginning to crack. "I'm gonna let them in. Hand me that sword!" He handed me a katana. It was a nice sword. I moved away from the door. The infected flooded in like a typhoon as the doors hit against the opposite walls and shattered. I started slicing all of them; they fell all around me. My dad shot the ones that I had missed. The flow of infected started decreasing. One infected got behind my dad and was about to bite him.
   "Dad watch out!" I screamed. I threw my katana at the infected and it fell. He turned around and I knew there were infected coming right for me. I roundhouse kicked straight through an infecteds head. Its body fell to the ground. Infected encircled me and the flow of infected stopped. There was maybe thirty infected around me. I dropped to my knees. The smell, the same smell I'm smelling now.
   I snapped out of my memory with me sitting up against the wall and Rubble licking my hand. I was shaking uncontrollably although I was hot and did not have the strength to stand up or move. I slipped in and out of consciousness. The smell was so nauseating now.
   "Go get dad," I manage to get out. I lose myself in the evolving darkness. The tempting, monstrous darkness.