We swiftly turned the corner, fleeing the horde of abominations in pursuit.
We were flying. How did we get into this mess? It was our accumulated stupidity, of course. It was my idea to scavenge downtown, but Louis was the one fired the gun. We were harshly outnumbered; there were four of us, and about twenty of them. We dashed through the street, dodging cars, and corpses. We didn't dare use our guns on them, that would be a waste of bullets and it would only attract more. No, our best chance was to outrun them, they were slow. We just had to keep moving.
"You goddamned idiot!" Ariana yelled. "What were you thinking?"
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" defended Louis. "It came out of nowhere!"
"Why was your gun even out?"
"Just shut up and run!"
The road was covered in trash. The tightly-knit apartment buildings and stores made it hard to shake our stalkers. The noise of our getaway was only attracting more freaks. We needed to get somewhere, anywhere, fast. The entire neighborhood was full of them, we were going to get cornered eventually.
I nearly tripped over a body as I ran. A glance revealed that it was still moving, and it tried to grabbed my foot. I shuddered and held my rifle close. Finally, I saw a building that could work as a fort.
"Let's hide out in there," I told the others. I took their silence a sign of approval.
The shufflers were starting to lag behind, but there were more ahead. We had just enough time to slam the front door open and run inside. The room was dark, but the windows provided just enough light to let us see. It was a semi-nice place with sturdy wall, but it was horribly ransacked. Overturned furniture and debris was everywhere. We were all out of breath, gasping for air. We dropped our bags and coats onto the floor.
"OK. We're good for now," sighed Ariana. "We need to barricade the door."
Ari and I grabbed a dresser and moved it in front of the door. Louis and Mikayla grabbed a nearby couch to add to the pile. It would be enough to keep the door closed, but the windows were a lost cause. I leaned against the doorway, trying to catch my breath. You could run forever, but those animals would never stop following you. Your only chance was to lose them, or to kill them.
Ariana fell back against the wall. In a fit of anger she whacked the ground with her crowbar. She was just tired, I didn't want to hold it against her. At 17 years, she was the oldest. She was the strongest and, admittedly, the most mature. She was a beautiful girl, her dark skin and slick hair dirtied from our travels. If it weren't for her, I would've died long ago.
Louis was pacing around the room nervously. He was tugging at his long blond hair, whispering to himself. We had been in situations like this before, but I suppose he felt a little guilty. It wasn't exactly his fault, he was startled, but I was a little annoyed with him. We were searching a store a few blocks down when a shuffler jumped him. The gunshot alerted every freak nearby of our position. So I let Louis stress out, it was his way of coping.
The final member of our party was Mikayla. My little sister. She was only 13, but she was starting to look older. The years certainly haven't been easy on her. She was looking through an overturned desk for supplies. Her curly brown hair was tied back with string and tucked underneath a ratty, old skiing cap. She was completely silent, detached from the rest of us.
I glanced at Louis, he was toying with the pistol that he had discharged earlier. "Should I reload?" he asked.
Ariana leapt up from her seat and snatched the gun away. "Moron," she hissed. "I'm revoking your gun privileges. You should know better than to fire a gun in an urban area."
