Chasing The Dead

Chapter Two

I stare into my small campfire; watch the flames move across the wood hungrily. I am in a forest, surrounded by small trees. This is a new and young forest, but it has seen many terrors in its short life. I can see the blast marks in one of the trees indicative of a shotgun. I see blood splatters farther on. If I wanted to, I could look father and see were the body is. This forest has seen much, but I have seen worse. My thoughts go back to when the creatures first showed up, when I had a family, a home.

"Mom! I'm going out to the mall with some friends! I'll be home around ten!" I yelled back into the house without waiting for a reply. If mom wasn't okay with it, she could deal with it. I had made plans to go to the mall two days ago and if she didn't like that, I would hear about it when I got back.

My friend beckoned me from her flashy red honda civic, "Hurry up! We're going to miss all the sales!"

I ran over to her car and close the door. She doesn't wait for me to put my seat belt on before she puts the car gear and starts to head out. "The sales last for the rest of the weekend, besides you'd stay there all night if you needed to. There is no need to rush."

She may have loved shopping, and I did too, but I didn't get so worked up about it like she did. She just rolled her eyes and kept driving.

Our evening at the mall worked out pretty well. She got lots of frilly clothes, and I managed to find some good pairs of jeans. I normally didn't buy so much denim, but for some reason I had decided it would be a good idea. Who was I to argue with myself?

We got home around eleven-thirty, just enough time for me to expect my mom to be angry. But when I went inside and yelled, I didn't hear anything. I checked my parent's bedroom, and I checked the kitchen, but they weren't there. So instead of calling them on my cell phone, I went to my room to do some late homework. Maybe they would see me doing my homework and not bother me.

Around twelve that same night, I heard a knock on the door. If it was my parents or anybody I knew, they would have just came in and yelled for me, so I ignored it and went back to my homework. I never liked solicitors. But the knock was insistant, so I went to see who it was. Before I opened up the door, I looked through the peephole to see who it was. It was some woman who had a scared look on her face. She had been knocking very insistantly, so I opened the door to see what it was she wanted. Without even looking at me, she ran into my house and started towards the kitchen.

I was about to yell at her and find out why she was so upset when a pair of hands grabbed me, I screamed and tried to turn around, but they had a vice-like grip and I could not break it. I heard a low moan and felt something bite into my neck. I felt the pain of my flesh being chewed on, and torn off my neck. I felt the terror of being unable to do anything about it.

I do not like these thoughts, so I put out the fire. It is morning anyways, and time to get moving. I grab my backpack and head out east. I do not have any reason for my direction, save that any direction away from where I came is fine. I make sure the fire is out cold before I go, I would hate to cause a gathering of those cursed creatures. They are stronger that way, they are most lethal in groups.

I come up on a stretch of country highway, it is only a two-lane highway, but the sign I see beside it clearly says "Highway 64". I decide that it is going the right direction, so I follow it. I see cars lined up on it stretching as far as the highway does. They are all in disrepair, many with broken glass and missing tires. Somebody has been here before me, and removed most of anything that is worthwhile. It is fine by me, I don't need a car to move around quickly. I pass a car that appears untouched, and then I see why.

Inside there are four of the creatures. All of them are buckled in, but that does not stop them from moving and trying to get out, and to get at me. Many of them have messed up appendages, one of them is even missing both of its legs. Clearly they do not care about self destruction if it means the possibility of food. They all have human eyes, each with their own form of pain written inside.