Drowning. That had hands down, no doubt been Stacy Campbells worst fear since grade school, when she saw Vesper Lynd drown in an elevator while watching Casino Royale with her older brother. What could be worse than drowning (to your death, no less!) in a small space, such as the elevator? Being caught in a car that was slowly sinking into a lake, surrounded by mindless, flesh eating zombies? Well, maybe that. Which is the exact predicament we find poor Ms. Stacy in. She had been driving down the road in this Zombie infested town, on her way to a rumored safe haven a few days drive away when she caught sight of a massive horde of Zombies, shuffling slowly across the road, some stopping to gnaw at an unseen once living creature blocked from her view. In a brief moment of panic, she slammed on her breaks, jerking the wheel and she saw her greatest fear play out before her eyes. You know how in the Saturday morning cartoons, Bugs Bunny, or Shaggy and Scooby would run off the side off a cliff and pause, remaining suspended for a few moments until they looked down and gravity wrapped its grimy claws around them, yanking them to the ground? Well for the first time, Stacy realized what that must have felt like as her car flew over the water for a few yards, before inevitably taking a nose dive, hitting the water with such a force that it cracked the windshield and jerked her against the locked seat belt. The brief moment of panic suddenly wasn't very brief anymore, as she realized water was seeping into the car. Much like her favorite cartoon characters, she froze, her mind and everything coming to a halt as the shock hit her full force, even harder than the water had hit her car. The water, which was now tickling her ankles, is what brought her back to reality. A calm mind increases the chance of survival, this is something her parents taught her on multiple occasions. She took several deep breaths, willing herself to calm down so she could think clearly. First, assess the situation: Shin deep in water in a sinking car, with zombies now lining the shore. Second, come up with a plan, figure out how to escape: Clearly she needs to unbuckle first, then perhaps break a window? The water pressure from the outside would be far too strong to push open the door. She presses in the buckle, giving the belt a hard jerk, but nothing. Pushing back the tendrils of panic threatening to ensnare her mind once again, she gave it another hard jerk, and another, and another. Still nothing. Not to the seat belt, anyways. The car, however, slowly tips forwards in an almost painful, agonizing few seconds that seem to stretch into oblivion. She can't help but scream as the front of the car splits the murky water, revealing endless depths below before splashing on its roof, sending the water from her feet across the rest of her body, soaking her in one quick moment. She begins to jerk on the seat belt with an increased fervor no doubt brought on by the cruel reality she was currently fighting against. After a few more tries, the seat belt comes flying loose and she topples head first into the roof of the car. Her excitement and triumph lasts only for a fleeting second though, when the sudden drop as she hit the roof registers in her brain, as does the fact that the car seems to be sinking faster than before. The water is up to her belly button, she realizes, and begins to kick furiously at the half submerged window, but she might as well be kicking at a brick wall for all the good it does. She takes a moment to realize that even if she does escape the car, she has to fight through the horde of zombies on the shore. Either way presented certian death, but to Stacy, atleast, being torn limb from limb was more favorable than drowning. With that in mind, and the fact that she was now chest deep in water, she began pounding at the glass till she was sure her foot would cave in if the window didn't. Seeing no other option, she took a last deep breath before the water filled in over her head, submerging her completely. In a last ditch effort to spare herself a watery demise, she tried the door, and much to her surprise, with a little weight behind it, she found the door pushed open. The car sunk faster, but she was free and she began to swim towards the surface, the stale air she was still holding in beginning to taste a little like freedom. Just before she broke surface, (her fingertips did, they touched cool air, just long enough to spark her hope a little more) she felt herself being dragged downward. Panicking once more, she begun thrashing wildly, trying desperately to reach the top, until her lungs gave way, forcing her to gasp for air, sucking in the lethal breath of water that burned her throat and filled her lungs, following her worst fear, almost to the letter. Stacy Campell is dead before she even reaches the bottom of the lake. If only she would have remembered to untangle her foot from the seat belt, maybe her story would have ended much different.
