Post by mithrilwisdom on Jun 21, 2012 8:30:25 GMT
This is the first part of an ongoing series of zombie flash fiction that I'm posting on my fantasy blog www.mithrilwisdom.com to go with my zombie fitness project. Any comments and critiques are most welcome. Enjoy!
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No one knows how it happened. No one knows how it all got so messed up, so very quickly. And if I'm 100% honest with myself, I don't think anybody cares. Does it really make a difference if it was some kind of biological attack, or whether some pissed off deity up there decided to punish mankind for its sins? None of that matters. Knowing how the story starts won't help you when yours is suddenly cut short. There are only three things that you need to know.
Zombies are real. They are here. And they are everywhere.
I can imagine in years to come, if there are any of us left, that they'll ask the question. The one that gets asked whenever a major catastrophe shakes the world. "Where were you when Kennedy got shot?". "Where were you when the Towers fell?".
"Where were you when you saw your first shamble?"
My answer will forever be burned into my memory, like the festering wound of a firebrand.
I was working late the night before last, and I decided to walk home rather than take the bus. There was no rain for a change so I thought the walk would do me some good after being stuck in the office all day. There's a railway bridge about two streets away from my flat; the kind of place you try to avoid at night because the council won't replace the lights on the underside so you're walking in complete darkness, leaving yourself open to become the area's newest crime statistic.
I chanced it; Sod's Law dictated that the dark and dangerous underpass was by far the quickest way home. Sod's Law also dictated that on the one occasion that I use said underpass that I had company.
The kid couldn't have been more than twelve. He wore a white baseball cap covered with the hood of a black sweatshirt, so most of his face wasn't visible. What was visible, though, was that one side of his face had been chewed open, the white bone of his jaw reflecting the light from the mobile phone I used as a makeshift torch.
The thing that you don't realise about shambles is that it's not the way they look that's so terrifying. It's the way they move. They walk as if they're being pushed, as if the last remnants of whatever humanity they have left is fighting back against the instinct and the hunger that drives them all, screaming in futile protest from within their reanimated shell. That's what makes the terror grip you, and it's the memory of that what stops me sleeping at night.
I ran. What else could I do? I ran as fast as my two hundred pounds of vending machine coffee, free donuts and office chair lifestyle could allow me. In a twisted kind of way, I'm glad that the first shamble I encountered was a child, since there's no way I could have outrun an adult. My throat was so constricted with fear that I couldn't even scream. I ran the two streets to my flat, and I could hear the shamble running behind me, its angry groans spurring my legs on faster.
I hurled myself at my front door, headbutting the hard wood in the process and nearly giving myself a concussion. By the time I had shut and bolted the door behind me, the shamble was gone. I spent that first night on the floor with my back against the door, unable to stop my body from shaking so violently that it made me sick.
That was two nights ago. I've not left the flat since.
I need to survive.
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No one knows how it happened. No one knows how it all got so messed up, so very quickly. And if I'm 100% honest with myself, I don't think anybody cares. Does it really make a difference if it was some kind of biological attack, or whether some pissed off deity up there decided to punish mankind for its sins? None of that matters. Knowing how the story starts won't help you when yours is suddenly cut short. There are only three things that you need to know.
Zombies are real. They are here. And they are everywhere.
I can imagine in years to come, if there are any of us left, that they'll ask the question. The one that gets asked whenever a major catastrophe shakes the world. "Where were you when Kennedy got shot?". "Where were you when the Towers fell?".
"Where were you when you saw your first shamble?"
My answer will forever be burned into my memory, like the festering wound of a firebrand.
I was working late the night before last, and I decided to walk home rather than take the bus. There was no rain for a change so I thought the walk would do me some good after being stuck in the office all day. There's a railway bridge about two streets away from my flat; the kind of place you try to avoid at night because the council won't replace the lights on the underside so you're walking in complete darkness, leaving yourself open to become the area's newest crime statistic.
I chanced it; Sod's Law dictated that the dark and dangerous underpass was by far the quickest way home. Sod's Law also dictated that on the one occasion that I use said underpass that I had company.
The kid couldn't have been more than twelve. He wore a white baseball cap covered with the hood of a black sweatshirt, so most of his face wasn't visible. What was visible, though, was that one side of his face had been chewed open, the white bone of his jaw reflecting the light from the mobile phone I used as a makeshift torch.
The thing that you don't realise about shambles is that it's not the way they look that's so terrifying. It's the way they move. They walk as if they're being pushed, as if the last remnants of whatever humanity they have left is fighting back against the instinct and the hunger that drives them all, screaming in futile protest from within their reanimated shell. That's what makes the terror grip you, and it's the memory of that what stops me sleeping at night.
I ran. What else could I do? I ran as fast as my two hundred pounds of vending machine coffee, free donuts and office chair lifestyle could allow me. In a twisted kind of way, I'm glad that the first shamble I encountered was a child, since there's no way I could have outrun an adult. My throat was so constricted with fear that I couldn't even scream. I ran the two streets to my flat, and I could hear the shamble running behind me, its angry groans spurring my legs on faster.
I hurled myself at my front door, headbutting the hard wood in the process and nearly giving myself a concussion. By the time I had shut and bolted the door behind me, the shamble was gone. I spent that first night on the floor with my back against the door, unable to stop my body from shaking so violently that it made me sick.
That was two nights ago. I've not left the flat since.
I need to survive.
