Rotten Hearts

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

It was almost the middle of the night, the time where Dreadful's are the most active. What is a Dreadful? In short, they're more advanced than just the normal everyday walking corpses. Alexia didn't like to think of them much. Not after the first breakout. The full moon shined down upon the city's destroyed buildings, creating shadows that intertwined with each other due to destruction of bombs that were dropped when the first outbreak happened. Alexia crouched on top of an abandoned hospital roof, well, what was left of the roof, looking down upon the Dreadful's racing around the streets, looking like ants on a dark pavement. The fall was only a few stories down, but Alexia knew that she would either have to go back down through the hospital, or she would jump. She knew that she was in the restricted zone of the city and that her group would deeply disapprove if they ever found out, but the hunting instincts ran in her blood. The most supplies were stored here; food, weapons, water, and medicine.

But checking the hospital was too late. Alexia tried to convince the others that the hospital should be the first thing that they check, but they waited too long. What a coincidence; there were no supplies in the only hospital in the entire city. The government or perhaps other groups raided the hospital for medicine and first aid kits. Alexia was irritated that she would have to get back down where the Dreadful's ran. A loud bang from the trapdoor got her attention as that was the only way back through the hospital.

"Damn," She cursed underneath her breath. Taking out a silver dagger that was hung around her belt, she casually walked over to the trapdoor, the banging noise and the snarls of the Dreadful's becoming louder in her ears. The latch on the door kept going up rapidly, the buckle looking like it was about to break. A smirk spread on lips.

"I haven't had any action all day." Alexia told her herself as she decided it was no use of going back down that way. The latch on the door broke and coming out with their rotten hands first, the Dreadful's emerged, some of them had blood running down their cheeks from their eyes. She brought her mask over her nose, as to not breathe in any of the virus. One by one, they charged towards her at full speed, their arms and hands were stretched out, waiting to grab hold of her and take a chunk of her body in their mouths. With one single blow with her dagger, she slashed their throats, each body dropping like flies on top of the roof. Blood hardly stained her shirt and pants as she did a quick turn at the heel, avoiding the blood splurging out. After she stabbed the head of one Dreadful, she didn't notice one of the Dreadful's that she thought was dead, grabbed hold of her heel, bringing her down onto her stomach, and dropping her dagger along the way.

With a yelp, the Dreadful kept dragging her closer; its mouth kept opening and closing, letting out snarls of hunger. The face of this Dreadful wasn't fully skinned as the whole face was practically a skeleton, with patches of blood red muscles scattered throughout. On her heel, she could feel the boney fingers starting to dig into her skin. Alexia had to think of something as the dagger was now completely out of reach. A hard rock from the debris of the roof was lying next to a dead corpse. Turning her body around, she ignored the pain of her muscle stretching into an uncomfortable position as she grabbed the rock, and with a single tug of her leg, she brought the Dreadful closer to her. Alexia bit her lip at the pain as she twisted her leg back around and sat on top of the hungry zombie. She raised the rock above her head and slammed in right on top of the Dreadful's face, the blood splashing just above her cheek. The noise of bones breaking and seeing a headless Dreadful wasn't a pleasant one.

Wiping away the blood, she got up and looked down at the Dreadful that captured her. At the base of the neck was a slash mark the shape of a sun. There was no denying what it meant. A frown caught on Alexia's lips. Sympathy is not a simple emotion when it's towards Dreadful's. But seeing the scar made her feel like not all Dreadful's are the same. Out of all the Dreadful's she ran into, never has she seen a good mark on one of them.