A Zombie Story

Chapter 3: Doubt

August 6th, Sunday, 9:16 a.m., Eldorado City.

Finn gathered all the courage he had, bit the neck of his hoodie to prevent himself from screaming, and with one quick motion, he pushed himself up the floor. He let out pain-filled moans as he did that. “Hnng! Uh… Haa…”

Sweat trickled down his forehead and down to his cheeks. He felt like passing out.

He desperately looked around him and saw there was still some stuff left on the second floor. Few impractical clothes—string bikinis and such. They wouldn’t protect against zombie attacks. Still, he collected them to use as bandages.

Seeing himself in the broken dressing cubicle mirror across from him, he couldn’t quite decide which was worse: Duct tapes and cardboard cutouts or colorful string bikinis.

‘Rainbow turd…’ 

And…

He was somehow hurt by what he thought.

But then, he noticed something surprising: his wounds weren't bleeding. The blood pooling around him had come from elsewhere, leaving him bewildered yet oddly relieved. ‘Is this the effect of mutated rabies?’ He wondered.

When he was done, he decided he had to keep moving as well so through gritted teeth, he limped towards the ground floor. Only that this time, he didn’t have to pretend like an undead. His limping and staggering were all real this time.

He made his way through the entrance and like usual, the zombies just let him pass after a few sniffing here and there.

And it was at that moment, maybe the universe had finally shown him mercy or something. 

‘Oh dear!’ 

Just across the street, exactly across from him, was a solar-powered car.

He knew because the exact model in front of him was the exact same thing that broke the internet a week before the apocalypse three years ago. He could never forget about it.

‘But it wasn’t there last night!’ He internally screamed. ‘I’m sure it wasn’t there. I’m really sure but it couldn’t be—’ He thought it belonged to George. ‘But why?’

He paused for a while to catch a breath, he had conflicting emotions.

‘But… What use would knowing the why even benefit me? The guy’s already dead. Would it even matter? Ha! Can’t believe I’d be grateful to my own bully one day. Unbelievable.’

So with that, he pushed the thoughts to the back of his head and limped towards the car.

However, an obstacle popped in front of him—a zombie wearing a tattered red football uniform suddenly got in his way.

A head taller than him and muscular despite its decaying skin. Its left eyeball still dangled from its socket with a foul smell so bad Finn wished his nose was the one broken instead. A type of smell that meant business and at that moment, its business was to drill a hole into his nostrils.

The football zombie’s hand landed on Finn’s shoulders, it stopped him from moving.

‘What are you doing? Go away! Just go away!’ Finn screamed inside his head. ‘Just go away, please!’

It didn’t.

Instead, it lowered its head to look at him. Finn had to summon all his willpower to stop himself from flinching, zombies don’t flinch, so he shouldn't as well. But thanks to the zombies’ innate stupidity, it decided Finn wasn’t a human and let him go. Only that instead of walking away like a normal zombie would, it somehow decided the best course of action was to shove him to the side.

Its hand landed on Finn's exposed ribs that only had a thin, unreliable cloth protecting it. It resulted in Finn crashing to the asphalt road, instinctively raising his hand to protect his head as he shrieked in pain—too much pain he started to spasm uncontrollably, his eyes rolled to the back of his head.

“Arg! Aaaaah! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” And with that shriek of his, he allerted all the zombies in the area, announcing to all of them where he was, arousing their insatiable hunger. 

They started to head to where he was, but of course, the first to get to him was the football zombie. It lunged to him and sat on his waist, locking him.

The next thing happened so fast. His mind blanked, his vision flickered back and forth, then there was the light. A tiny, silver light that resembled closely to an electrical discharge, pulsating at the back of his head. He could “see” it very clearly.

‘It tickles,’ he thought.

He didn’t understand it himself but he suddenly felt power surging through him. He stopped thinking about the pain, his vision turned red, and his body felt light.

‘Huh?’

Next thing he knew, he was ripping apart the football zombie, literally, with his teeth and all, like an animal would.

‘Stop. What is happening?’

More zombies coming his way.

With a growl, he charged towards the horde and with his dull knife, he effortlessly tore through their decaying bodies. Blood and limbs flew in all directions.

‘Knife? Yes, I did brought from that apartment but… eh?’

One by one, the undead creatures fell and Finn still didn’t know what just happened.

‘No. Stop. What is happening?’

And he stopped. Nothing was attacking him anymore. A circle of zombies with some of them still flinching on the asphalt road, the smell of decay, and him in the middle. Such an ominous thing to see if there were any witnesses.

Then he slowly sauntered to the car, opened the door, and got inside.

***

August 6th, Sunday, 11:19 a.m., Cedar Avenue.

“Jimmy, why are we here again?” Asked Adara.

“Beats me.”

She scooted next to him and whispered to his ear, “Oi. Don’t you find him weird?”

“Who?”

“Who else?”

“Ah! Well, a coping mechanism?”

“I don’t think so, though.”

“Hmm…”

They turned to look at their oldest who was in the driver's seat, looking through his binoculars.

“Why aren’t they here yet? Should be about time.” Franklin muttered, more to himself than to anybody else.

“You waiting for someone?” Asked Jimmy.

“Yeah.”

“And… who are they? If you don’t mind sharing?”

“An acquaintance and… the one that would save us all.”