Unconditionally

1

      It all happened so fast..I assumed there would be more of a warning than what there was. Maybe a sign? Something on the news? Hell even a damn billboard would've been a better way to find out than the way we did. To watch them feed was both the scariest thing I've ever seen and the most disturbing, but one thing rung true..I would do whatever it took to protect my family. 

     Ange and I had only been married a year and she was due with our first born in a little over two months. We were both so ecstatic when we found out and couldn't wait to tell our families and all our friends. Ange loved surprises so we neglected to find out the gender of the baby which honestly kinda killed me. I liked to prepare for things and this way I had no way of knowing what I was to prepare for. She liked doing that..pestering my OCD. 

     We sat at the table on a Tuesday afternoon discussing our days and eating dinner just like we did any other night. I talked about my time at the office and she told me what she had done around the house while I was away. Ange had made my favorite for dinner, meatloaf which she did every once in awhile because she knew how much it meant to me. And every time she did I ate way too much because I was always stuck on how I must be the luckiest man in the world to have a woman like Ange sitting right here across from me picking at her own plate of meatloaf. 

     From the age of fifteen I knew Ange would be my wife. I had watched her from afar every chance I got, even if it meant going way too far out of my way through school just to cut a pass by the class I knew she had next to see if she was seated at her desk. The day came and went when I finally jacked up the courage to ask her to a movie with me and to my astonishment she agreed and before I knew it we were courting and now I was due to father her child in just a short while. 

     She had just began telling me about how the bathtub faucet was dripping again when we heard it, a distressed scream rang out in the neighborhood...the first sign. 

     "What the hell?" she asked no one. 

     "Probably just those teenage kids across the street babe it's nothing." I reassured her. Which was a believable explanation. Those same kids had kept us up most nights playing their screamo garage band during the early morning hours. 

     We had been eating for approximately ten minutes before the second and the third screams came and went, "Okay this is getting ridiculous! I'm going over there right now to settle things." Ange rose from the table and approached the door. We had always thought about going over there and discussing things with those hoodlums and their parents but decided against it because they were probably worse up close but with her pregnancy hormones in effect and the dripping faucet making things worse Ange had had enough and was going to face them head on when she stopped catching sight of something through the front window before her fingers grasped the handle. 

     "What the actual fuck?" she sounded confused yet afraid. The screams continued but none ever sounded the same as the last, "Oh my God!" she covered her mouth with her right hand and held the curtain slightly open with her left. 

     "Babe its just those kids, come back to the table before your dinner gets cold." I said. 

     "Alex its not those kids!" 

     "Then what is it? It cant be that bad can it?"

     "Alex...its...dead people..."

     "Dead people?" 

     She nodded, "Yes Alex..dead people come to life.." 

     Rising from my seat at the table I knew she must have made a mistake, dead people were dead they did not come to life and they most certainly would not be walking around outside our house, that would definitely not be happening. I walked over and stood beside my bride at her window perch, stepping aside she allowed me a better view of the world outside our window, and sure enough she was absolutely right. 

     People of various sizes and genders wandered the streets and yards bordering our home, all with flesh flaking and peeling off their bones and some even with bones visible. A woman..Mrs. Frenckle our neighbor to the east crouched before a man begging for her life. He approached the old lady with somewhat of a limp, his head tilted at a 45 degree angle, his clothes battered and torn, his entire body covered in dirt, as he came more into focus I noticed his left leg had completely been stripped of skin and was nothing but bone, the same with the corresponding side of his face allowing me to get a glimpse of his rotting teeth. The man continued to get close to her and she continued to plead with him her walker completely out of reach leaving her without a hope. In the next minute or so Mrs. Frenckle was torn at the belly by the mans bare hands and I watched him begin to feast on her organs starting with her large intestine. Mrs. Frenckle's scream is one I will not soon forget. 

     Ange turned into me covering both her eyes with her hands, crying at the loss of our neighbor; Mrs. Frenckle and Ange had grown rather close throughout Ange's pregnancy with her knitting blankets and hats and little outfits for our unborn child. I held my wife while she wept until she pushed me away and turned to the window once more, "Alex..what's happening? What has the world come to?" she asked the tears still running down her face. 

     "I don't know Angela. I really don't know," was all I could think to say. It wasn't what she wanted to hear but I honestly had no better response. We looked out the window some more avoiding Mrs. Frenckle's yard at all costs. More of them beat in windows of neighboring buildings and broke into cars devouring every family on the block. Finally allowing myself to look over to the east toward where we watched the undead attack our dear neighbor I caught the eye of the grey man, the glaze of his eyes freaked me out so I looked away and in doing so found myself face to face with Mrs. Frenckle. 

     She stood on the other side of the window pane, her stomach having been ravenously torn open advertised the guts normally held underneath by skin. Causing me to throw up a little in the back of my throat. She just stood there looking at us for a second through the window as if she was unsure of something. As Mrs. Frenckle pressed her hands on the window and let out a groan Ange screamed. I reached to cover her mouth when Mrs. Frenckle began beating on the window, she had this look to her..a look I had never known her to possess...she was hungry..and she wanted us..

     Wrapping my arms around Angela again I made to pull her away from the window but it was already too late, the window began to crack, and the cracks began to crack until the window was broken completely..and the undead from outside were starting to make their way inside. 

     "We've got to get out of here!" I yelled to her. 

     "But where do we go? There are too many of them!" and she was right I counted about six right now and more climbing inside. We stood in the kitchen peering out the crack in the door praying for a miracle.

     "We'll go out the back." I decided. 

     "And where will we go? What hope do we have at survival?! You saw what those things are capable of!" her voice trembled when she spoke. 

     "Just trust me." I told her. Reaching down into my waistband I was relieved when I felt the cool steel handle of the 1911 my father had given me as a child. It wasn't much but it would have to do for now. No matter what it took I would protect my family. What other choice did I have? 

     Making our way to the front door was impossible so we ventured to the back moving as quickly as we could yet remaining as silent as possible. There were now about a dozen walkers in the house that we knew of and not all we accounted for in the living room. 

     One last corner to the back room was all we needed. Rounding the corner Ange let out a scream, "ALEX!!" I looked up and saw what she was screaming about, a woman in a nightshirt quickly approached us, arms outstretched, mouth open prepared to feast on us. I ushered Angela behind me with one hand and pulled the pistol with the other. I fired a single shot and the woman fell limp. As we exited our the house one thing was more than clear...

This was the beginning of the end...