Life After Undeath

Chapter 2: Beginning Of The End

NOW

The door was buckling under the pressure. The hinges squeaked and the wood creaked, a mesh of fractures forming. A boarded-up window kept the room in permanent twilight. A morbid air of putrefying flesh prevailed in the small bedroom, as a young boy cowered in the corner, farthest from the door. The moans of the gathering undead had soon ceased to affect him any longer. He mumbled in a delirium, barely aware of what was happening.

A body of a woman lay nearby, a gruesome wound on her side, and her neck bent at an unnatural angle. She wasn't breathing, nor was she moving. In another life, she might have been preparing breakfast for her son, as he prepared for school. She might have been worrying about his grades, and what she had to prepare for lunch. But it was all another life, where she hadn't been bitten trying to save her son from his father.

Rik sobbed on the floor near his mother's body, her blood staining his hands. He had accepted his fate. In his final moments, he wondered how such a situation had come to pass.

The door cracked.

24 hours earlier.

"ALL CITIZENS ARE BEING ADVISED TO STAY INSIDE THEIR HOMES. A CURFEW IS IN EFFECT. DO NOT APPROACH AN INDIVIDUAL SHOWING SIGNS OF INFECTION, AT ANY COST. IF YOU ARE INFECTED, YOU ARE ORDERED TO REPORT TO THE TREATMENT CLINICS. STAY AT HOME, AND STAY ALERT. THE GOVERNMENT HAS THIS UNDER CONTROL. KEEP WATCHING FOR UPDATES."

All the channels on television were scrolling through this message on a loop. The last update, regarding the locations of Treatment Clinics, had come more than six hours ago.

48 hours earlier.

"Hey bro, wait up", Rik called out as Amit strode away into the emerging crowd from the Maidan metro station. The latter slowed his pace, and as Rik caught up, he said, "Who caught your fancy eh?" This earned Amit a reply consisting of general indignation as if the insinuation on Rik's pristine character was completely unwarranted.

Walking towards school, they bantered along, which premier league team was the best. Between the two of them, neither could kick a football straight. But the first thing Rik asked, once they were clear of the Metro station crowd, was "Did you catch the news yesterday?"

"Yeah, I did. It must have been those insurgents or something. MIght be real, might be fake. Who knows?", Amit said.

"True that. It was strange though. The gunfire seemed to be one-sided. Yet the soldiers seemed to be injured; injured enough to be carried to the heli", said Rik.

"I don't know bro, something was off about it. Anyway, how does it matter anyway, it's contained now. The Army and stuff will take care of it.", Amit said. "But what we need to think about is the maths exam Mr. Majumdar will be giving today. I'd rather be inside that building than in the classroom during the test", he quipped.

"Hehe, very funny," Rik replied with a wry smile, "But you have to accept that something did happen there. I hope it's nothing too bad. Look, that's Upal! Let's pounce on him."

They left the talk of the incident as they entered the school gates, assimilating into the morning crowd. Soon after bells rang, classes started, and the topic of what had happened in Himachal Pradesh was deemed "too uncool" to be discussed.

It was almost 1 pm, the zero period* when a screeching crash resounded through the entire school. The reverberation was enough to make dust rain down in the classrooms. Rik stopped in the middle of his tirade about the dangers of capitalism, much to the relief of his friends, as the screech of bending metal echoed across the grounds.

[A/ N: Zero Period: A time usually kept for doing homework, and other extracurricular activities, during school hours, only for the senior classes.]