This is the End

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire...like literally. The town of Thomasville, Georgia was like it was in the devil's cage. The town's sirens were shouting as loud as a whale. It was five minutes past midnight and I couldn’t figure out what was going on. Everyone in the neighborhood was running wild all over the streets like loose baboons. I decided to step further into my driveway to see what everyone was freaking out about. 

“Hey you. What’s going on,” I asked as some man that ran by.

“Out of nowhere something huge fell from the sky and some type of gas was released. Everytime someone would breathe it was like they turn into zombies. I know it sounds crazy, but just we have to go back inside and watch,” said the man. He looked to be about in his early 20’s, just like me, and was wearing a muscle shirt.  His muscles were as huge as they could ever be. He was wearing black and white basketball shorts that were a little higher than his knees. His shoes were black Nike Air Forces to match his shorts.  

He pulled me by the arm and took me inside my house. We went to the window and pulled back the curtains just enough to fit both our heads. You could see the gas begin to fog up and it swallowed all the houses on the street. There were a herd of people running out of it.

“We have to help those people,” I said as I ran to the door.

“No! Don’t! Those aren’t people,” he screamed.

As I opened the door, I saw everyone running, but when they got closer I realized that something was off. Then I realized that they weren’t people. The guy ran and shut the door.

“What we’re those?”

    “Like I said they were kinda like zombies."

He began to look around the room and I couldn’t figure out why. In the middle of the living room I had a bookshelf and he ran towards it. He began to push it and yelled at me to help him push it in front of the door. Finally, we were able to get it really snug to the door.

“Can I know your name,” I asked.

“Robert and you are?”

“Jessica.”

We went back to the window and saw the zombies running towards us. The speed that they were running was definitely a whole lot faster than the ones you would see on tv. He looked at me and it was like he read my mind. We bolted to push the sofa in front of the door.

Minutes later you could hear the zombies pounding and growling on the other side of the door. Shortly, the couch began to budge little by little and we knew that it wasn’t going to hold for long.

“We definitely have to get out of here. Do you have any weapons?” Robert asked with a frightened look on his face. 

“Of course I do.”

I ran to my room and opened my closet door. Inside I had two shotguns. He grabbed one and looked at it. Meanwhile, I opened my safe and pulled out the bullets we needed and threw them into a backpack. I reached up to the top shelf in the closet and grabbed the flashlights I put up there.

“Hurry!” Robert said as we heard the couch move farther and farther.

“I have everything, let’s go!”

We bolted to the back door and we heard the door smash open and the growls of the zombies get louder. He opened the door and shut it.

“We have to go to my house.  I have to grab my sister. It’s not that far, just down the street.”

Robert took off running and I followed.  We snuck into the alley and bolted to his back door. He pushed open the door and a little girl ran to him. 

“I was worried that you weren’t going to come back,” the little girl said as she cried.

“What, you thought that I would leave you here alone by yourself?” Robert replied while hugging her. He pushed us inside and shut the door..  

“Who is this,” asked the little girl as she hid behind his legs.

“Oh, this is Jessica. She’s my friend. Jessica this is Sara.”

Sara looked like she was around six or seven years old.  

Robert raced to a room in the house and asked me for help.

“Here we’re going to need these,” he said while handing me some jackets.

I hurried and put one on and the other was small enough to fit Sara. I helped her put it on and zipped it up.

“What’s the plan?” I asked.

“We can get into my truck and go somewhere where those things won’t be,” he said signaling that he doesn’t want Sara to know what’s going on.

He finished what he was doing and opened the door. Then he bolted to his truck and we followed. Sara fell behind and I didn’t realize until I heard her scream. I looked back and saw a zombie had grabbed her by the hair and was pulling her towards them. She was struggling to get loose and I couldn’t help her in time.

Out of nowhere the zombies head slid off and blood splattered all over Sara. The body fell and a woman, with what looked to be a machete in her hand, stood behind Sara with blood all over her face. 

“Oh my god! Thank you so much!” said Robert as Sara ran to him.

“Of course,” said the woman. “I’m Kara by the way, but we need to get out of here now.

Kara looked behind her and saw zombies running our way. We all bolted to the truck and made it just in time and Robert drove off.

“What are those things,” Sara asked.

“Don’t worry about it right now and go to sleep.”

She laid her head on my lap and quickly fell asleep. 

“Does anyone know anywhere we could go,” Robert asked.

“A few years back there was a prison that was closed down. Maybe we could go there,” said Kara.

It was about 1 o’clock in the morning when we reached the prison. 

“I will go and make sure there aren't any of those things in there,” said Robert.

Moments later you could see Robert leaving the building and waving at us to come in. We grabbed our backpacks and went inside the building.

“Everything’s clear. There's a dark corridor that has the jail cells.”

We all pulled out our flashlights and went into the dark room. You could tell this place had been abandoned. Inside there were two levels of cells. In the middle of the room were big long tables. Most of them had been turned over. The walls were covered with all different colors and kinds of graffiti.

Robert and Sara went into a cell and went to sleep, while Kara and I went to another and kept watch.

I must’ve dozed off, because I was awakened by a loud bang and Kara was shaking me. When I opened my eyes I saw that it was morning.

“Hurry, you have to get up,” said Kara with a frightened look on her face.

“Why? What’s happening?”

“The zombies made their way to the prison and they’re starting to break into the building.”

When I got up Robert had Sara by her hand and in his other was a shotgun. I got up and put on my back pack.  

“There is a back door down the hallway, but the courtyard is drowned in zombies,” said Robert.

“Zombies” asked Sara.

“Sara I don’t really have a long time to explain, but zombies are now real.”

BANG! I went out to the doorway and saw that they had broken down the door. We went to the door and you could see all the zombies roaming the courtyard. Not too far from the door we could see Robert’s truck. There weren’t many of them by it and we knew it was our chance to make it to the truck.  

“Jessica you take Sara, while Kara and I cover you.”

I grabbed her hand and Kara opened the door and went out. We followed and the zombies must’ve heard the door shut, because they all turned and began to run at us.  

We finally made it to the truck, got in and locked the doors. The zombies kept pounding on the windows and doors.

Robert tried to start the truck, but it kept sputtering.  He looked back at me and gave me a look I couldn’t understand.  

“We have to do something,” said Kara.

Robert then looked at her and she shook her head like she understood what he was saying.

“Jessica, you have to take Sara and go to the forest and we will be there soon,” said Robert.

Robert and Kara opened their doors slightly and began shooting and slicing zombies here and there. They finally had enough room to open their doors and get out. I could hear the sounds of the gun going off and Kara’s knife slicing smoothly through the zombies. Moments later, Kara had opened my door and I got out. I picked up Sara and we ran for the forest. 

As we got farther and farther, the sound of gunshots got quiet. We found a fallen tree and hid behind it. A couple minutes later we could hear the leaves on the ground rustling. I sat up hoping to see Kara and Robert. Instead, it was a zombie. I could see that his eyes looked like a foggy glass and his skin was pale as sand. Sara began to sit up, but I pulled her close and layed back down. My heart began to race faster and faster as I heard the crunching of the leaves get closer and closer.  

As the sound of the leaves being smashed got quieter and quieter, I sat up and saw the zombie was gone.  

Moments later I could hear footsteps coming our way. I poked my head up and saw Kara coming our way.

“Over here.”

She turned her head and by the look on her face I knew Robert didn’t make it. Sara lifted her head up and saw Kara.

“Where’s my brother?”

“Umm...Sara. I have something to tell you,” I said. “He...he..”

“He didn’t make it,” she asked, starting to cry.

“I know this is a bad time, but we need to go,” I said as I could hear the hoard of zombies begin to get closer and closer.

Sara and I got up and followed Kara through the forest. Out of nowhere we heard gunshots by a road nearby.

“We have to help them,” said Sara. “I can’t let what happened to my brother happen to them.” She then began to run towards the screams.

“Sara, no,” I said as Kara and I ran after her.

When we reached the edge of the forest I could see about seven zombies surrounding someone as they shot their gun. Kara and I looked at each other and knew we had to listen to Sara and help.

“Sara stay here while Jessica and I go help,” Kara said as she handed her a small knife. “Here, just in case you need it.”

Kara ran out to the middle of the road as I followed.  

“Hey, hey over here,” she yelled.

As she yelled the zombies turned and looked. At this moment I knew it was about to be mayhem. Kara and I looked at each other and began to run toward the zombies. When Kara was killing the last one, I realized who the person that needed help was.

“Jordan, is that you?”

“Oh my god, Jess! Thank you so much!”

“Wait, you know them,” asked Kara.

“Yeah, Jordan was one of my best friends in high school before I went to college.”

“Oh, wait Sara. Sara you can come out now,” said Kara as Sara came out eagerly.

“We have to go and find someplace to rest for a bit,” said Jordan.

We all began to walk up the road while Jordan and I caught each other up about our lives.

It was about 20 minutes later when we reached a deserted town. The sign was full of graffiti so it was hard to see that it said Welcome to Springfield.

“There should be houses or maybe little shops that we can stop at and rest. Maybe we could find some food to eat too,” said Kara.

We continued walking and as we got further into the town, you could see that everyone left in a hurry. It was quiet and there were crashed cars everywhere. All over the streets were trash from the trash cans being turned. On most of the buildings there was all kinds of graffiti that read different things. Like THE END IS HERE or THE APOCALYPSE IS HERE.  

“I wonder where everyone went,” asked Jordan.

“Me too,” said Sara as she clung onto my shirt.

“I say we go a little further into town to find maybe a house,” said Kara.

Once we got further into town we could hear a dog barking. As we turned down what looked like a highway the barking got louder, but it was surrounded by a herd of zombies. The poor thing must have been so frightened. It was backing up as they got closer and closer.  

“Mother of god,” said Jordan.

“Jessica we have to help it, please,” said Sara.

“Sara there are too many zombies.”

Apparently that didn’t matter to her, because she took off running towards them.

“Sara! Why does she always do this,” I exclaimed.

We all ran after her and the zombies must have noticed, because some of them turned and went towards her. She didn’t seem surprised, because she kept running to the dog.

“Does she have a death wish or something,” asked Jordan.

Kara began to scream to get their attention towards us, but they didn’t seem to care. All their attention was still focused on Sara.

As they got closer to Sara, out of nowhere there were gunshots and the zombies that were near her began to actually drop dead. All three of us stopped dead in our tracks and were looking to figure out where they were coming from. Not too far from where we were standing was a building and at the top were windows and you could see the end of a rifle sticking out.  

“Hey, over here,” whispered a random voice.

I looked over and there was a guy and a girl standing at the opening of the building.  

“Sara! Leave the dog and come on,” I yelled.

“But Jessica, I have to help it.”

“No,” I said as I ran towards her.

Out of nowhere a zombie had grabbed her by the arm.

“Shoot it,” I yelled.

“I can't, I ran out of bullets,” said Jordan with a look of fear on his face.

I looked up at the top of the building and whoever was window wasn't there anymore. Kara looked at me and I shook my head and continued to run towards Sara. The zombie that had grabbed her began to dig his teeth into her arm. The sound of her scream got the attention of more of them. By every second more and more began to grab her and sink their teeth into her. I couldn’t hold back my tears as I ran faster and faster to try and save her.

The look on her face when she fell to the ground as they ripped her flesh apart made me cry even harder. Then I began to feel a tug on my arm, as I turned I saw it was Kara.

“It’s too late. There’s nothing that you can do,” she said as Jordan wrapped his arms around me and began to pull me towards the building.

“LET ME GO! I have to help her! Her brother’s dead! I’m the only one that could’ve kept her safe!”

We finally got to the building and the people at the door let us in.

“I’m sorry about what happened to the little girl,” said the girl. “Something like that happened to our brother,” she said as she pointed to the guy standing next to her.

“Come on, let’s block the door and then we can go upstairs. There are more people up there and some food,” said the guy.  

We helped them put things in front of the door and then followed them up the stairs. There were two more guys up there. One of them was the one from the window with the rifle.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help the little girl,” he said. “My gun had jammed and I couldn’t get it unjammed in time.”

“So umm..I’m Chloe and this is my brother Rick,” said the girl from downstairs. “And that is Dom.”

CRASH!  

“The door probably didn’t hold,” exclaimed Chloe.

“Well is there another way out of here,” asked Jordan.

“About that. That was the only door that led out of here,” said Dom.

I turned to Kara and Jordan and their faces definitely read that they were scared and knew it wasn’t going to end well for any of us.  

You could hear the growls of the zombies get closer and closer as they came upstairs. We all ran and shut the door and found a chair and put it in front of it. Then, we backed up to the window and watched as the door kept moving. The chair began to budge little by little, until they made their way in.  

“Well, it looks like this is the end,” said Kara.