World's Ending

Chapter 4 - Petrol Stop

I continued walking up the empty main street.

It was like a ghost town.

Wait...

It is a ghost town.

Every now and again I would hear slow heavy footsteps behind me.
But when I turned around there was nothing there.

Probably just my imagination.

There were a few old trees scattered about the street's path.
Their leaves were beginning to shrivel, dried out from the immense heat that was shooting down from the now pink sky like lasers.

Everything around me was dead or dying.

There were still a few cars left in the street, cars that had been left unused for years. They had been forgotten when their owners got new ones, and the old ones weren't worth anything, too broken to be fixed, and too expensive to move. They were now just mossy scrap metal that resembled cars.
There was also a few sports cars that had just been left because they couldn't store as much as the big four-wheel drives.

I looked up at the second-floor windows of the terraced miner's houses.
Dirty windows and open curtains, ornaments on the windowsills.
The downstairs windows were the same. But dirtier, with a thin layer of dusty dirt.
I could see in through them all and see what sort of life they lived.
Some were poor, and some had a fair amount of money.
Framed pictures hanged on the walls; the frames held family members and friends, pets and landscapes.
Some houses had cabinets full of unused china. Some houses had cabinets full of porcelain animals.
I could see old and worn out couches and chairs. And I could see barely used expensive couches.
Every one had lead such different lives.

But none of that mattered now.

There is no society left and most people have ended with the same fate.
Attacked, dying whilst scared out of their minds. Regretting the things they had and hadn't done. Pleading for a second chance. Crying, praying, hoping.

None of that mattered now.

They were all gone.

I heard a faint squeaking noise that sent shivers down my spine.
I quickly turned my head, but I could see nothing.

A plastic bag floated through the air in front of me.

It was probably just that. My mind is playing tricks on me. Like when you're blasting music and you swear you can hear someone calling your name, but no one is.

I'm just paranoid.
But who wouldn't be?

***

I got to the outskirts of town.
There wasn't much to see, just endless fields of dying crops.
It really had become a wasteland.

There was a petrol station not too far away.
I just had to get past the farm and the sign that said the town's name, Tow Law.

Not that it was a town anymore. It was just a place filled with man-made stone structures.

There was no community.

Unless you count a few thousand dead people eating any living thing possible a community.

At least they have a common interest.

When I got to the petrol station there were signs up 'NO FUEL'

I guess everywhere was like that, so there'll be no point in trying to get a car if it's just going to run out of fuel.

I cautiously walked up to the small building. There were two zombies nearby, and I didn't yet know much about them, and I didn't want to find out how dangerous they are yet.

When I opened the door, the bell rang, and the zombies turned their attention to me. They began to walk towards me so I ran up the steps and into the shop and closed the door, sliding closed the lock at the top of the door, and I pulled down the blinds.

Looking about, once again there was no milk or bread. But there was a lot of snacks.

This would be the perfect place to camp out for the night.

I found a few sleeping bags in the traveling section, so I made them into a bed, I didn't want to be zipped up in a sleeping bag, in case something sneaked up on me and I couldn't get out.

Then I began to hunt for snacks. And I found some. Small bags of Doritos, tubes of Pringles, chocolate bars, boiled sweets, licorice and cans of pop.

I put as much as I could into the suitcase and settled down to eat my snacks. There were a few books on sale so I decided to read one before it got too dark.

***

I heard a loud noise outside, it was the sound of glass smashing.
I crept up to the window and peeked through, hoping not to be seen.
At first, I didn't see anything. But then I saw that figure again. They were running along the main road, away from me.
With my trolley.
Followed by a fair amount of zombies.
I sighed.
What an idiot.
They'll be fine.
Hopefully.

The sun was starting to set, so I made sure that the doors and windows were barricaded, before going to bed.
It was now fairly quiet, apart from the occasional groan from the zombies outside.

***

BANG!

I woke up with a jump. I had no idea what had woken me until...

BANG!

What the hell was that?

I hid behind a row of shelf's and waited.

Nothing happened for a while so I built up my courage and went over to the main entrance, being as quiet as a mouse.
I peeked through the blinds on the window on the main doors.

Outside was that same person that I had seen multiple times that day.

The zombies had started to surround them, but they didn't seem to care. Then they got out a knife, and after punching one of them, they drove the knife through its skull. It was sickening to watch.

The zombie didn't move after that.
I guess the only way to kill them is to damage the brain.

I continued to watch them, but before I knew it I began to fall asleep.

***

Light shone through the gap in the blinds and woke me.

The sun was up quite high, it must be nearly noon.

I looked outside and there was just a pile of corpses in view. Nothing else.

I gathered up my things, including the sleeping bag, and a few more snacks. I was devastated that I couldn't bring more, but I could always come back once I found a place to settle down for a while.

I stepped outside. The sun was shining. It was just like that day.

***

I was now nearly a mile out of town. I walked past fields of grazing sheep and cows. They were all in fields that has some sort of water supply, I guess the ones that had run out of water had either escaped or died. But the ones that were left seemed to be fine,

Maybe the zombies only attack humans. Maybe this is a punishment, for all the people who damaged the earth and did bad things. Maybe that's why I'm still here. But that doesn't explain why that thief is still here. But maybe they had never done anything wrong before. Maybe they were just desperate. Maybe they were trying to punish me for locking up that storeroom, so they stole my food. Well, they have been following me. I guess we've now both done bad things.
But does really matter now?