The Zombie Chronicles

Part II: Darkness Falls

The first thing I saw was the bodies. They were horribly shredded and still moving. The zombies that killed them left too little for them to stand up. Next to the fresh bodies was a pile of burnt bodies. Me and Noah jumped down from the truck and proceeded carefully across the road.

“Oh god.” Noah whispered as he ran to the still moving bodies searching for some mark that his Amy wasn’t among them.

I panicked for a second seeing the bodies but quickly realized that they couldn’t be from the expedition.

 “Dude chill they aren’t ours.” I said.

“How could you know that?” Noah asked still looking the bodies over.

“They're too tall.” He stepped back and looked them all over.

“Yeah you're right.” he said. “These were adults.”

He drove his knife into one of their heads and it stopped moving.

“What the hell?” he said to himself as he walked over to a pile of stuff.

“What is it?” I asked looking around for any sign of survivors.

“The supplies.” he said.

I whipped my head around

“What?”

“The supplies.” he said again. “There all loaded up in back packs.” He opened one. “They got medicine, Band-Aids, some food.” 

“So it’s all here,” he said “now where did they go?”

I walked over to the pile of burnt bodies. 

“These have been here for a while,” I said “a couple of days.”

“Could they have burnt them got the supplies and then went back into the hospital?”

I stood up and looked at the ominous building. It radiated death.

“Well,” Noah said “there’s only one way to find out.”

He grabbed two flash lights out of his backpack and threw one to me.

“The batteries have been in here for a while.” he said “I don’t know how much more juice they have left.”

“So we're going into the dark scary hospital that may or may not contain the bodies of our dead friends with flashlights that could die at any moment. Great.”

Inside the hospital it was dark except for the small amount of light that made it through the lobby windows. We switched our flashlights on and advanced. We checked the waiting room which was an off shoot from the main lobby and found a map of the hospital in one of those visitor stands.

“Ok,” I said shining the light onto the map so we could see it in the darkness. “We will just take it a hallway at time. We'll search each one and each room until we find them.”

“But how do we know they're even in here?” he asked.

“Where else would they be?” I responded.

We set off down the east wing hallway.

“How do you do it he asked?”

“Do what?” I asked back leaning into an empty room.

“You killed that guy not ten minutes ago and you're totally chill about it.”

I leaned into the next room shining my flash light over everything.

“I've done it before.” I said.

“And you're already used to it?” he questioned.

I turned to him.

“When this went down I killed someone, someone who was close to me and a friend.”

I turned back to the hallway and continued walking.

“So you just don’t feel?” He asked.

“No I just don’t feel when I have too. I don’t have to be sad or sorry that I killed that man. It was him or us.”

The floors above us creaked and we both looked up.

“Man its dark in here.” Noah said sliding his light over the hallway in front of us.

“Yeah” I said looking into the last room of the hallway.

“Ok it’s clear.” I said “Lets head back to the lobby and then search the west wing.”

“So.” I asked after we had gone a ways in silence “is Amy your girlfriend?”

He chuckled

“Yeah she is. She’s kind of the reason I came here, no offence” he said

“Yeah none taken” I said “I’m not sure that I would have come for just a girl.” I said, “You two serious?”

“As serious as you can be at the end of the world.” He responded.

”After this I think I’m gona ask her marry me cause you know life is short especially now.”

 “You're telln me” I said.

We walked a little more in silence before reaching the end of the west wing hallway.

“Ok” I said looking at the map with my flashlight, just the south hallway and then we have to go upstairs.

We turned around only to be face to face with them.

“Those fuckers.” I whispered under my breath.

There were about five of them all dressed in hospital gowns and letting out that ungodly moan.

“They're too packed!” Noah said his voice full of panic. “If we go for one another will bite us.”

“Damn it!” I yelled. “Up the stairs. GO!” I yelled. 

We rushed up the staircase that was located at the end of the hallway.

“The door is locked” Noah practically screamed reaching the door before I did.

“Try and get it open!” I yelled un-slinging the dead man’s rifle from my shoulder.

I had never shot a gun before and defiantly wasn't prepared for the recoil. It knocked me onto my butt and the shot missed by a mile. The creepers were getting closer, almost past the last room. The next shot I was ready I aimed it right for the center of the closest zombie’s forehead and pulled the trigger. A cloud of blood shot out of the back its head and it dropped dead.

“I hit it, I hit it!” I called excitedly to Noah.

“Well hit the others too.” he said with a strained voice still trying to get the door open.

I looked down the sights confident that I could dispatch the remaining four before they reached us. Then the gun jammed.

“Fuck!” I yelled pulling the trigger repeatedly trying to get it to shoot.

My confidence was gone and I was freaking out. I slammed the rifle butt into the face of one of the zombie that was at the bottom of the stairs. It stumbled back and knocked down one of the others. I threw the rifle down at them and drew my knife. I ran to the top of the stairs where Noah was still struggling with the door.

“I think something is barring it from the other side!” he yelled.

They were ascending the stairs and the two I had knocked down were getting back up. We both threw ourselves against it.

“It moved!” he yelled “I felt it!”

“Ok” I said “let’s do it again.”

We backed up a bit and both threw ourselves into the door. This time the door defiantly moved. They were so close I could see the whites of their eyes.

“Ahhhhh” he yelled as we made one final push and fell into the room beyond.