A[U]CTOR

Thirsty

Terror

Jenny wakes up in the middle of the night. It's the fifth night in a row and she feels hot in spite of the wind blowing across the window.
And she is thirsty again. She gets up cursing her insomnia and goes to the kitchen to get water.
But halfway to the fridge, she finds her cat and dog standing in front of her, ready to attack whatever is staring beside her.

Jenny woke up in the middle of the night, her bloodshot eyes open and creased showing signs of insomnia, her body felt hot in spite of the wind blowing across the window. Her mouth dry, feeling parched she got out of the bed. "Now I'm thirsty again." She thought, it was the fifth night in the row that she couldn't sleep. "Did it have to be freaking summer?" She asked herself, to make matters worse there was a water rationing due to a drought that affected the reservoir that distributed the precious liquid throughout the north sector of the island. It was the same thing five years ago; drought, water rationing, the cistern craze. Only this time she had to stay indoors to avoid getting infected by a deadly virus that attacks the respiratory system. The Crownvirus; one spike of that crown and it'll attack the bloodstream and the lungs, attacking the respiratory system, then the immune system, and finally, the nervous system. Within a weak, the infected person is dead. According to the news reports.

Jenny walked seven steps towards the living room, her messy tangled hair looked like a bird's nest. She licked her dry lips to moisten them though it wasn't pretty at all. When she reached halfway to the fridge, she finds her cat and dog standing in front of her. The cat hissed and the dog snarled. Not good. "Why were they so agressive all of a sudden?" She thought in her sleep deprived state not knowing that there was a shadow next to her. They cat and dog jumped in the air trying to pounce on an invisible entity. She dodged it, her mind focused on quenching her thirst. She grabbed the handle of the fridge to open it. "Thirsty?" A voice said to her, she discarded it as one of those fiendish thoughts that pop into her head every once in a while. After she poured a cold glass of water, she drank it while she glanced to the side to find a dark shadow staring back at her with blood red eyes. She choked with the water that she was drinking. She heard barking and hissing which was of no help. She felt a suffocating presence, as she dropped the plastic cup that she was holding and the cup fell with a clack, spilling what little water it had left.

She gasped for air as her body convulsed, hitting the wall and the counter as she collapsed to the floor. The hours of sleep deprivation had taken a toll on her and she couldn't wake up. The dog barked, then whimpered. The hound used his snout to nudged her, he sniffed at her neck and she had a faint odor. The dog mourned, and the cat climbed out of the window into the cold night, as cold as her corpse became on the following day.

An autopsy was performed on the corpse that belonged to Jenny Howard, age 25, another victim of the Crownvirus, an asymptomatic carrier.