CHAPTER ONE
The sound of old English country music playing on the radio engulfed her in an oblivion of musical ingenuity as she swayed her waist back and forth in harmony to its beat and rhythm. The morning was serine and peaceful, just like any other day in this side of the country. The birds chipping outside felt as if they sang to the song on the radio, nature in perfect harmony with man. The cold morning air always gave way to a clear sky and a little sunshine, but bright enough to chase away the dark. The smell of freshly lawn garden brought a different kind of joy to her. Her husband was at it again. She opened her window’s curtain to see him dancing to the same song. Oh how much she loved him.
‘Shake that ass for me’ she yelled to him through the window. He turned around to catch a glimpse of her staring at him and gave her some little ass shaking, it always felt awkward when he did that but her husband was far from being a shy man. He blew a kiss to her before he went back to what he was doing. She pretended to catch the virtual kiss and held it against her chest for a while, then she blew him a kiss back. This was perfection she thought to herself.
‘Mom! Come and tie my shoes for me, I’m already late for school’ her 6 year old daughter who was in the living room called out to her. Hearing her daughter’s voice was always the highlight of her day.
‘I’m coming honey, I am packing your breakfast’ she said while trying to fasten up what she was doing. The music playing on the radio stopped all of a sudden, which was weird she thought. It felt like the whole city had gone quiet in an instance. They never stop playing music until it was 12pm, and the time was a little over nine thirty. She picked up the radio to investigate what the problem could be, the she gave it a little tap to see if the music would restart. It still kept on playing static noises.
“Mom!” her daughter screamed this time. She was very impatient for a little girl. This wouldn’t be the first time she would be going late to school, so she wondered why all the rush.
“I will soon be right there with you honey,” she said rather less interested about her daughters nagging to why the lawn mower’s engine had gone off. She shifted the curtain of her window to know what was going on. Her husband was no longer in sight and the lawn mower was overturned. She became frightened and she tried looking at all angles to find her husband while she continuously yelled ‘honey’. Nothing seemed unusual except the overturned lawn mower. Maybe her husband was up to one of his pranks, and this time it wasn’t even funny. One day he would give her a heart attack, she always told him any time he tries pulling such pranks on her.
She was taken aback the by sight of blood splattered against the edges of the lawn mower. This triggered her anxiety attack and she began to breathe faster. This bloody prank always gets to her, she hated the sight of blood. She tried to get a closer look at the lawn mower by moving close to the window and she was startled to her core by the sight of her husband pressed against the window. His face looked like it had been shredded with a meat grinded. He had blood all over him. His jaw bones were visible and one of his eyes were missing, exposing his eye socket. He was trying to say something but he wasn’t audible, she tried to reach for him when she heard her daughters scream calling out to her.
“Mom! Mom!! Mom!!” she looked back to the direction of the sitting room, then turned immediately to stare back at her husband to tell him she was coming back for him but he was already gone. What was left was just splashes of his blood all over the window in a pattern suggesting that something or someone had dragged him off the window, sliding his face over the window. She shook with fear at this point, and the remembering her daughter’s calls. She dropped the toasted bread she was holding and immediately ran to the living room. She saw her daughter clenched up like a ball at the right corner of the living room, while she covered her face screaming. She called out to her to come towards where she stood. Her daughter raised her teary face up and looked at her. Her face went pale, like she had just seen a ghost.
“Mon behind you,” her daughter screamed while pointing towards her. The smell that emanated from what was behind her was horrible. It smelt of decayed flesh and putrefied organs, and it made some sort of distorted grunted sounds. She turned slowly around, and opened her eyes wide in shock to what she saw. Its whole body was looked grey like that of a decomposing corpse. It had no eyes, just black empty sockets with maggots coming out from them. It stared at her like she was nothing but food. She could not explain what she was looking at, the best she could think of was a walking dead. The creature in front of her looked like someone had dig up a thousand year old mummy and given it life.
It opened its mouth to expose its decomposed teeth having fresh blood and flesh hanging out from it. She screamed in panic and without thinking, ran towards her daughter, picked her up by her hands and made a run for her back door. The creature ran after her. She opened the back door, with her daughter on her back and ran for her car. What she saw outside was total chaos. Smoke from burning cars and houses had engulfed the once clear sky, it seemed like a black hood had covered the earth. Cars moving haphazardly jammed against each other like the drivers of such vehicles had gone mad. People were running helter shelter in no particular direction as these creatures chased after them. Dead bodies laid around with the creatures feasting on them by tearing flesh from bones.
She saw her husband’s body or what was left of him lying in front of their car, but she had no time to be sad. Her heart sunk in dismay just looking at what was done to her husband’s body. She was sure she didn’t want her daughter to see her father in that state, so she immediately covered her daughter’s eyes and made her way to open the door of her car. She tried opening the door but it was stuck. She pulled and pulled but it wasn’t bulging. The zombie was just few feet away from where she was.
“The keys” she thought. She left them on the dining table. How could she not remember the keys? She turned round to see the zombie already upon her. Using her hands, she covered her daughter in a protective gesture, shut her eyes tightly and then waited for the creature to devour them both.
The sound of metal crashing on bones forced her to open her eyes to see the creature crushed under the tires of a car.
“Get in immediately,” she heard the voice of her neighbor call out to her. He must have saw the situation she was in and came to her rescue. He was driving a black pickup van, with the bumper almost fallen apart. She ran towards the driver’s seat of his car while crying her daughter still on her hands. He opened the door for her and she hopped in immediately closing the door behind her abruptly.
“What’s going on”, she asked him while panting heavily from all she has been through. He ignored her and started the engine immediately began to move. She saw stress and pain in his eyes. That was when she noticed his wife and two kids were not with him in the car. She saw blood all over his hands. She did not need anyone to tell her his wife and kids were gone. He switched on the radio and an emergency broadcast was playing.
“… Everyone should stay calm and remain indoors. The military and home land security are on their way to restore order. Latest information reaching us here in the studio is that there has been an out outbreak of an unknown virus which has spread life a wild fire across the country and into Europe, Asia and Africa. The virus is believed to…” the broadcast what interrupted by the already familiar grunted sounds of the creatures and the loud scream of the radio broadcaster. Her neighbor seemed lost in his thoughts when she saw a group of the creatures blocking the road and screamed pointing to them. He tried to sway the vehicle to avoid colliding with them but lost control of it and it summersaulted a couple of times before it came to a stop. She was already bleeding from her head and her daughter looked unconscious.
From the broken front window she could see the creatures heading towards their car. She tried to get free of her seat belt but it was stuck. She looked around for anything sharp to use and cut them but there was none. She knew this was the end of her journey. The creatures kept their eyes on their car as they rushed frenetically towards it. She was too weak to scream, too weak to move, too weak to wish. So she just gently laid down back and closed her eyes, hoping they would make it quick, while reaching for her daughter who was still unconscious in a last desperate bid to assure her that all would be alright.
She heard sounds of gun shots, several rounds fired. And then a firm and masculine voice said to her in a very reassuring tone
“Good day ma’am, I’m Silas with the US army. Remain calm and we would get you out of here.”
...to be continued.