You're Okay

Blurry Memories

It was so quick: they came so fast. We could smell the disgusting stench of decaying flesh but we had no idea what it ment. We just thought it was the starved and dead animals that currently decomposed in the dirt patch outside the abandoned slaughter house we had passed on the way. What else were we supposed to think? We had no idea what was to come if we stayed. It was the first...herd of them we had ever encountered.  They just came and kept coming: hundreds and hundreds of them. They were pretty silent- I noticed. Not making much noises except for the occasional grunt or moan from either falling or hearing something that could be their next potential meal. Maybe that's why we didn't hear them. Didn't realize what was happening untill it was too late.

What happened, exactly, is still a blur to me. Even while sitting here on this log hours later , I still can't put all the pieces together. Why not a single one of us herd them. Why my brother...he was the only one trying to help! No one else was doing anything except scream: causing more of them to be aware of our location. Or they were running away like the cowards they are. And it's not like there's a lot of us, especially now that the herd wiped out almost half of us. We could have easily gotten away if we had all worked together. If everyone had helped eachother instead of just helping themselves. Which didn't really work out for them either considering most of us had no idea how to defend and protect ourselves. All but one of us are women, suprisingly, and none of them had any idea how to use a weapon.

I was the only one who could actually do anything but that's only because my brother had showed me how. After the virus had mutated and started infecting humans we fled our busy city of Chicago and tried going up north into Canada since the virus had begun in Tokyo. All flights were cancled and all of Asia's territories had been put under "containment protocal" as the man on the radio called it. But it hadn't worked. We made it as far as 10 miles from the northern border when the announcement was made that the virus was in North America. It didn't matter where we went, the virus would be there.

We tried getting back home but the Army guys forced us into tents and checked our blood for the virus. A couple days later when an infected became violent and started ripping people apart with their hands and teeth, everyone fled without any real direction. Some of us flocked together and that's how we had become the group we are.

Were.

And fate had pulled a harsh one on us for, as I said before, we werent "survive-in-the-wild" type of people. But that's all I could remember clearly now.

That night before was quiet, nothing unusual except that horrid stench that seemed to be getting stronger. The next day we had discussed our strengths, which weren't many, and weaknesses to figure out a plan. The original plan was to head west were the virus was said to be less frequent. Most of us (not including me, my mother Megan, or my brother Zackery) had decided we would leave in the morning because they deamed it safe where we were.

I can't remember the exact time I went to sleep but I know it was pretty early considering I hadn't actually slept since this all began. Then all I remember was the screaming, and the squishy-slooshy sound of what I can only imagine was blood being walked on and splattered everywhere. Next thing I know my brother is throwing me and my mom towards the thick blanket of trees not too far behind our camp site shouting for us to run. My mother was hesitant to leave but my brother had convinced us he would be fine. We watched in horror as he ran back in the mess to try and find others to save. Everyone else seemed to be retreating in all directions, most of them getting trapped and shredded into hundreds of pieces of flesh and blood and internal organs. Then just as my brother had gotten a few of the other women out my mother grabbed my arm and motioned for me to go with her into the trees. Then that's when it gets really blurry. I herd my brother scream, I spun around but I couldn't see him. I felt my mothers grip on me tighten and then all of a sudden we were surrounded by trees and we're running. More and more trees passed as we continued to run untill most of us colapsed into to dirt and mud that lay below us. We took refuge in a somewhat safe looking clearing with a couple fallen over logs and lots of flowers.