Almost Surviving

Chapter Four

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Chapter Four: Salutations From the Afterlife

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|Trudging forwards along the path, when there is a building he ducks and slows even more. He circles them checking for groups and for fire escape ladders to climb up.

Eventually, he finds his way to the pharmacy, but the windows are busted open and there are several groups. spread throughout the main street.

Obviously, there is food otherwise the undead wouldn't join groups like this.|

Crouched by a small gray building Casien contemplates his decision. He needs medicine and he can't waste the time.

This is dangerous for both him and Kain, but without the medical attention Kain could succumb to influenza, and with the high probability he has it too, they will need enough for both of them.

After contemplating he decided to take a pathway across roofs as it will keep him out of sight and smell of the groups, but also keep him away from others.

People are more dangerous than the groups, but at least the group only kills for food. Granted in some circumstances it could be necessary, but he didn't have the time for a moral debate with himself.

Rubbing the back of his dirty gloves Casien fails to wipe his shield. Only succeeding in scattering splinters of broken bark and mud onto his helmet in an attempt to clean the dew and leaves stuck to his shield.

He gives up and decides to wipe his gloves onto his jeans before trying again, this time actually taking off the leaves hindering his vision. Narrowing his eyes in an attempt to see better in the darkness.

A body, inches towards the next house over, one less crowded with the undead. Limping slightly, Hein a burly man in his thirties climbs through a small open window to a living room.

He looks at the chaos from the window in horror as he can vaguely make out his already dead friend being devoured by an undead.

The undead is lashing out at anything that gets close to it, it even attacks a few of its own.

He shivers, his face a ghostly white color compared to his tan body, he looks away quickly.

Now staring at his feet, Hein blanks out, he slides to his knees and breaks down into silent tears.

He isn't gonna live through this, is he? He is never gonna see his family, his beautiful wife, and his son. He'll never see her tears, never see her glare at him with love in her eyes or yell at him for being reckless or pick up their beautiful child.

His son, oh his son he'll never see him grow up to have children of his own or see him fulfill that dream of his. Oh god, he is such a smart kid he could go anywhere if he wanted.

Such a deserving child, a model of his father. Hein shakes his head, he couldn't believe it- he's gonna die. He may not be the best person but surely he deserves to live.

When his father died he seemed peaceful and ready. Why is it that he is terrified? He doesn't want to die, but he always thought he could die if the situation called for it.

So why isn't he dead too? Why him? Hein clutches his chest, but out of the corner of his eye, he spots a child sprinting right in front of the window.

All dressed in black with a helmet covering their head. With a backpack on their back with a knife in hand, the child creeps towards the group of undead.

Hein watches in shock as the child stabs one luring the group of three towards them. The kid runs to get away and shifts themselves up a ladder onto a small house.

As the undead climbs, the kid kills all three one by one as they try to pull themselves towards the sitting child.

After the group is taken care of Hein watches, squinting his eyes through his broken glasses, as the child pulls out something from their bag and begins to rub it onto their jacket.

They then, shimmy down the ladder and sprint towards him. He is sat open-mouthed, now able to see more than just shadows.

The kid looks to be in their early teens, as the child looks at him once and then looks past him straight at the pharmacy. The kid jogs past him, towards where the group once was and slips behind a house.

After glancing around at the mostly cleared sidewalk he shifts into gear. Hein slowly climbs through the window once again and quickly limps away, following the way the child came and into the shadows of the night. Never turning back.

Casien circumvents another group of undead and finally makes it to the back entrance of the pharmacy.

He can vaguely hear shuffling but by the pattern, deciding it's most likely an undead, he pushes his back to the wall with the drive-through windows and slowly pushes the window open more.

It slides up as high as it can go but he notices that he wouldn't be able to fit in. Not without a struggle at least. He slides the window down again and tries to open a door on his left instead.

The door is blocked, it opens slightly but wouldn't move any further. Not without pushing harder and that could result in alerting the groups to his location.

He shifts his head towards the window and cautiously looks at the inside. There is an undead sliding across the ground, it only uses its arms its legs seemingly broken with how they were bent in sickeningly unnatural angles.

The face of the undead is one of a woman in her early thirties covered in scratches and bruises, there is one of a handprint on her neck, with several fingerprints on the undead's chin.

Many smaller darker prints line down her chest at seemingly random points. Only in a ripped and dirtied dress, the undead, unaware of its surroundings rips the already tattered dress, even more, dragging along the ground.

An undead to the side of the body is a body of someone related to the corpse due to the similar face shape. The taller man had tattered clothes too but in a more purposeful way than that of his- its companion.

There is a pair of crutches in the corner of the room broken but useable. A puffed-up wound can be seen in the chest of the man.

Blood and wet substances stain his white shirt making it slightly see-through. But it is obvious that the stab or the wound was self-inflicted but it didn't seem to be what killed the man. Casien had seen this type of scenery before.

Casien shifts his eyes towards the body in the corner it is unmoving and undamaged, but he has a feeling he needs to stay away from it. Though he can sparsely see the body through the window.

Unbeknownst to our character the eyes of the body flutter slightly to reveal eyes not dead to the world, unseeing of anything but food, but of something more.

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