Apocalypse Welcome.

It was always worse when it rained. It would churn up the mud, making it slippery and in this world right now slippery was dangerous; one wrong step lead to a twisted ankle. And in a world of deadly hide and seek a bad ankle meant you would probably die. 

 Rain also brought landslides, mounds of loose earth covering things with teeth underneath. When the sky opened up and sent this grey veil down upon the land below; trees became wavering silhouettes, branches became reaching hands. You could mistake a tree for something else – or something else for a tree. 

This was a world of survival. The weak either latched onto the strong, leaching from their strength or they died, simple as that. Fight or flight; human nature brought back down to the bare basic instinct. 

I was glad of two things on this misty, rainy day. 1- that I had a house which was locked down tighter than my grandma’s biscuit tin. 2- I also had food. Safety and food, a rare luxury!

I was sat on the window seat, peering through the gap in the curtains as the occasional stooping, stumbling figure wandered in and out of the grey haze outside. With the heavy weight of my machete on my lap, hand gun strapped to my hip, bow and quiver leaning on the wall within reach; I chewed on my out of date cream cracker. 

Welcome to the Zombie Fucking Apocalypse.

There were two types of people in the world now (aside from the strong and weak); the Loners and the Groups. I'd been part of both so far. I started off as a Group, random people on the street we all banded together for a few days. Then we each started breaking apart; finding new people to go with. So long compadres...

I was alone for a long time after that.

I finished my out of date cracker and picked the crumbs off my shirt- waste not, want not.

Being alone taught me some things, like how to deal with rainy days; I'd either climb a tree- not the best but better then being out in the open- or on the ground. The best by far was finding somewhere to haul up that had a roof and four walls; less surprises that way.

A floorboard created and Warren came to sit on the window seat with me. Both of us looking out at the cursed rain as it pelted down into the street. Warren; a man built like a 'Brick Shit House' (one of my friends would have said) but with the kindest blue eyes and smile, which should not have been allowed in this apocalyptic world. He was in his late 30s early 40s? Probably ex army or police with his weird way of standing and his kick-ass survival skills. He never said though, and I never asked.

Warren found me, alone, bleeding in the middle of the road, in the middle of the summer heatwave. I was dying, ready to die and have it all be over and done. He took me from that road and fed me.

Think of me as the stray dog you're told not to feed because it will follow back home.

Funny thing though, Warren didn't seem to mind having me around much. I think he was lonely. In this world you never ask a person about what happened before. Never. The only thing I knew for a fact about my oversized ginger companion, was that he was a survivor and that he had turned me into one.

Back to watching the devil's rain storm outside, I offered him an out of date cream cracker from my packet. He took one and without another word we sat in silence and followed the rain drops as they ran down the window in wet vines.

A big foot pressed down on the toe of my boot. I glanced up to see what he wanted, raising my brows in question.

"How many?" He asked.

"Ten," I grinned. It was a game we played; who killed the most undead sons of bitches while out on their supply run.

"Not bad" -he'd just got back from his run, I could still see the brains on his boots and pant leg- "I, however, got twelve."

"Only two more!" I faked surprise "my, my you must be losing your touch." I nudged his boot back with my own.

"Ah fuck off," he took another cracker. We resumed our vigil, watching shadows stumbling through the rain. Who knew when the rain would stop? It had started chucking it down about -I llooked at my watch solar powered watch- ten minutes ago and it could go on for days yet. Warren must have worn his coat out, he didn't look very wet, maybe damp. He reached in his pocket and took out a well worn pack of playing cards and started to deal two hands out. I picked mine up and asked what we would be playing. "Run and a pair?" He said. I turned away from the window and we started the play.

After the first round with no conversation, I started to get restless. I opened my mouth not knowing what I was going to say, "my grandma taught me cards." Warren stopped and stared at me with his trained assessing look which I called his 'Interrogation Stare'. "Your pick up." I gestured to the draw pile resting on the window seat between our pulled up knees. He took his card from the pile and discarded an '8' of clubs from his own hand. Yahtzee! I grabbed it, discarded my 'Jack' of diamonds and showed him my '2-3-4' of hearts run and my pair of '8s'. "Chips!" I proclaimed and begun gathering the cards up and shuffling them. As I was dealing the cards back out he spoke up.

"I taught my little boy poker," He said softly. I didn't know what to say, so I finished dealing.

"Your start," I said, and if my voice cracked he said nothing about it. We played another round. "Chips!" I won again. Warren kickd my shin. "Ouch!" He had that evil, smug smile.

I guess this wasn't the worst way to spend a rainy day.

The End