I Will Live & Learn My Lesson

I Was Born, I Have Lived, I Will Surely Die

Ian breathed heavily as he pressed his back against the wall, swearing he tightened his grip on the pistol in his left hand – he had no idea how the hell he’d gotten into this mess but he regretted getting himself into it. He peeked his head around the corner of the wall just in time to see a blurry silhouette push through the doors at the end of the long corridor; it walked towards him slowly, almost dragging its feet across the ground as it approached him.

From where he stood, Ian wasn’t sure if the zombie was male or female, if you could even make out its facial features or what – all he knew was that if it got too close to him then he’d definitely be done for. So he raised his right arm and jumped out so he was facing it.

Bang.

The zombie fell down, hopefully dead – but Ian was having a very off day and odds are he’d completely missed its brain. He slowly shuffled towards it, his back pressed against the grimy white wall of the corridor; he kept looking to the left and right as he made his way to the zombie just in case the animated corpses had gotten smart on him. He definitely couldn’t afford that now, considering he wasn’t too bright himself – but years of playing zombie video games on his Xbox definitely paid off.

At last he reached the zombie. He checked again to make sure it was only the two of them in the corridor before he knelt down next to its head – the bullet had travelled right through the centre of his skull which was a good sign; the zombie should be dead now. He looked at it more carefully, it was female; she was female, she wore dark jeans that cut off just below her knees and a plain white vest top that was probably accompanied by belts and jewellery or something before she’d died. A large bite mark took up the majority of the right side of her neck, probably the fastest acting of all zombie bites – if your neck is bitten then you have no chance of surviving it, basically.

Ian couldn’t afford to feel bad for the girl, but he found himself feeling sympathetic towards her anyway. That was, until he could hear the faint sound of moaning and footprints. Shit, he thought and tightened his grip on his gun once again before standing up and making his way to the door that the zombie had entered in through. Fast zombies were always the worst – normally they were faster than you were so you definitely needed a head start on them if you wanted to get out alive. Ian had dealt with quite a few of them in the past; one of them was his own friend, Luke. Or ‘Jocko’, everyone preferred to call him. He was a really big guy. Like, REALLY tall and REALLY muscly. Ian was thin and quite small with little to no muscle (at that time, now he’d built up quite a bit). But basically he’d almost been zombified by his own best friend – not that it was Jocko’s fault, really. He’d been really hard to escape and in the end he’d had to smash his brains in with one of the weights that had been kept in his garage.

He ran quickly through the maze of corridors and rooms to get out of the building – he wasn’t even sure where he was, it looked kind of like a hospital but he knew it wasn’t; there would be far more zombies feasting on the corpses and blood bags here (not that the blood would help – it was flesh they craved).

He stopped running once he reached a window that hadn’t been boarded up already. It was pitch black outside and he wasn’t sure if there were zombies outside or not; he thought not considering you would probably hear them if they were there. But in the window, he caught a glimpse of his reflection. It was then he’d realised how bad he’d been living – his hair was greasy and shaggy, his black fringe almost reaching his shoulder due to the fact it hadn’t been cut since way before the whole zombie ordeal started. His face was covered in cuts, scars and bruises, and just like his bare arms it was caked in dirt and blood. His eyes were dull, but afraid – which was pretty much spot on, the only thing he felt any more was fear. And it depressed him, he didn’t want to be scared; but it was hard to be fearless when your life is in permanent danger.

He was torn from his thoughts as he heard the loud, rapid footsteps again. He cursed quietly and brought his fist back before smashing the butt of the gun into the glass. He pushed away all of the excess glass until there was enough room to climb out, he didn’t realise however how far it was to the ground until he’d jumped.

He went plummeting to the ground very fast as gravity held its grip on him. Suddenly remembering everything he was told about these situations though (which wasn’t very much), he tried to crouch down in mid-air to cushion the blow when he struck the ground.

It didn’t work very well.

As his feet made impact, shooting pains travelled quickly up his legs and he fell backwards so he was lying flat on the ground. “Shiiit,” he groaned and rubbed his right ankle, almost positive that he’d sprained it. “Car…I need a car,” he mumbled before pulling himself back up to his feet, dragging his right foot along behind him as he made his way to what he hoped was a street and/or carpark.

His wishes were granted. In the dim light of the moon above him, he could just make out the silhouette of a large people carrier. It probably wasn’t the most convenient car ever but it would do until he found something better.

“God I need someone to help me,” he sighed sadly, quickly trying to remember everything he knew about hotwiring a car.