The Dead, The Living and The Broken

Chapter 6: Choices

        Elijah bounded down the stairs to join the others in the kitchen but was stopped when his foot fell through the floorboards of the stairs leaving a large hole in the step. He groaned and pulled his foot from the hole and lumbered into the kitchen.

        Erin, Cass, Oliver and Damien sat around the table talking while Piper sat on the edge staring straight ahead. She was still a little shocked after the teenagers in the forest but at least now she was actually moving and eating.

        He plopped down into one of the chairs and the back tumbled off. “We really need to fix this place up a bit,” he informed the others.

        “Why is there a hole in the middle of the dang staircase?” Kiara called from the stairs as she too joined the rest of the group at the kitchen table.

        “Guilty,” Elijah replied with a sheepish smile, “But seriously, we need to fix this place up. It’s a mess!”

        The others nodded in agreement.

        “Yeah, just last night I was on guard duty and I leaned against the wall and part of the railing broken off,” Erin stated in agreement.

        “Do we have anything that we can use to patch this place up?” Cass asked

        Damien shook his head. “No, all we have is a couple of screwdrivers, but I don't think those will help much especially since we have no nails.”

        “Okay, so I guess  we need to try and head back to the hardware store in town and get some wood and tools,” Cass said.

        With that the seven teenagers set out in hopes to add a bit of security to their ramshackled cabin.

        They reached the edge of the dark forest and scoped out their surroundings. The number of undead creatures seemed to increase at an astonishing rate. They were coming out of what seemed like nowhere, but in reality, the casualties of the virus were  rapidly escalating. A couple of zombies stood between the group and the street that lead to the store. Not many were in sight but any kind of sound would cause them to come in hordes.

        As quietly as they could, they quickly exited the forest and approached the quiet street. As they got closer, a single zombie detected them. He paused in his spot and seemed to sniff the air, as if he smelt a delicious dinner, before he lazily turned towards the group. He let out a low growl but the sound was enough to grab the attention of the other two zombies standing a little whiles away from him. They stumbled in the direction of the group surprisingly quickly.

        Oliver swung his metal bat at the zombie but failed at hitting his head and instead made contact with the zombie’s side. The zombie flew to the left and tripped over her own feet causing her to tumble the dusty ground. Piper looked away as Erin furiously stabbed a steak knife into its head.

    The two other zombies were now directly in front of the group. One zombie grabbed onto Erin’s shoulders as she struggled to stab it and the other zombie approached Cass. Erin and the corpse wrestled wildy making it impossible for the others to hit the undead without risking hitting ,and possibly killing, Erin. Erin managed to stab her knife into the creature’s shoulder and even though it didn’t kill the monster it gave Erin another free hand.

    Erin swiftly pushed the zombie away and kicked it backwards with her leather boot. The zombie growled loudly and stepped forwards to take another shot at Erin but the corpse’s body went slack as Kiara drove a screwdriver through the back of its skull.

         Meanwhile the other zombie seemed to glare at Cass with its milky and glazed eyes. Blood from the zombies previous victim was smeared across the undead’s tattered clothes. Cass instinctively stumbled away from the zombie. Her breath sped up and her chest seemed to tighten as the zombie took rapid steps towards her. The world blurred and she couldn’t seem to focus but she still raised her knife and stabbed forwards, hoping that somehow the knife would make it through the zombie’s skull. It landed in the zombie’s shoulder but now Cass had an idea of where to stab and stabbed upwards into the corpses brain.