April 25

April 25

By: J.R. Hodgson

This is my rough draft 1,







March 24 2012

"Stop... Stop." Sarah softly whispered to Cody.

"I think I hear something outside. Go check."

Cody's in his mid to late 20s, a thin man with a bald head. Shaved down everymorning for the past 10 years. He has many tattoos and loves to drink, you might say he is a bit of a partier, a bit of the ladies man. Though he has been with Sarah now for 5 years. They met in high school, but, afterwards parted ways, as he did a small stint in the Navy. They recently decided to get married and her Dad owns the cabin they are currently in.

They make it out to this cabin about once a month and enjoy a weekend together alone. Not this weekend as they have decided to celebrate their engagement, and bring several friends with them this particular weekend.

"Come on Cody." shes says jokingly as he gets off of her naked body and puts his own cloths on.

"I am, I am, I think everyone is asleep, but, maybe someone is just taking a piss or something." He replied as he buttoned the last button on his shirt. He sat at the foot of the bed putting on his shoes and slowly lacing them.

The room was dark, the only light was revealed thru the window by a half moon and stars. No light under the door into the hall way led Cody to believe everyone else was asleep. He gazed at his watch waiting for his eyes to focus enough to make out the hands of his watch. Two in the morning.

"Jesus." He thought to himself. "Its gonna be a long day tomorrow."

He slowly opened the door, taking care not to wake anybody. He crept out into the hallway and made his way to the front window. He looked outside the window only to see the rustling of leaves on branches, and the sound of scraping of those branches against the side of the house. He could only make it out because the house is white and the branches looked black against it.

Small traces of midnight fog still lingered on the ground from a few hours ago.
"Nothing. Absolutely nothing." Cody thought to himself as he went to close the shade of the window. Something caught his attention in the back ground.

Small deliberate movements far away, down on the road. The light from the moon was enough that it shed light on something down the road. Movement that looked like human movement, like someone might be walking up the road.

"That's funny." he thought "Two in the morning and someone is walking on a private road to the only cabin within miles, Its to late for Sarah's dad to come out and check on us. He either needs help, or is gonna go Charles Manson on us. Either way I don't wanna deal with him."

He stared out the window some more just to verify his thoughts. Sure enough the image got bigger as it slowly moved and swayed closer to the cabin.

"Everyone wake the fuck up." Cody flipped on the lights to reveal Juan and James (Cody best friends and best men), Their two girl friends Jennifer and Shawna respectively. James still asleep on the couch, lightly snoring.

"Wake the fuck up." Cody thew a pillow, hitting James on his head. James lethargically opens his eyes. By this time the others had opened there eyes, adjusted to the light, and were making their way to sitting upright.

"Someone is outside coming up the road this way. I don't know who the hell would be coming up this late at night, but, I really don't wanna find out." Juan made it to his feet and cracked the shades to peek out side. He saw an image of a small framed man, about 50 yards from the door. He was creeping along very slowly as if he was catching himself with every step. His feet would slowly stomp one after another. With each step would support his weight. He was slumped over and his head was down. But, he just kept pushing slightly forward.

"This shits fucked man." Juan added. By this time Juan was finishing buttoning his pants. He grabbed his jacket and a baseball bat that was hidden behind the front door for such occasions. Cody walked back to his bedroom to tell Sarah what he had seen. He pointed in the other girls direction. "Girls, go into the bedroom with Sarah and lock the door. Don't unlock it until one of us tells you , Okay?" He then pointed his finger at the bedroom. He stopped in his tracks, yelled "Sarah, the girls are coming in, lock the door, Okay?"

"What's going on?" Sarah yells back

"Don't worry about it, Ill explain later."

The three men open the front door and mostly barefooted stepped into the cold night and toward this strange ghoul of a man coming closer to the cabin.

"Juan taking the lead walked ahead of the others and approached the man, who gave not even a response to any questions, nor didn't flinch with any threats.

After a few questions the man became closer and closer until he stopped. Dead in his own tracks, right in front of Juan, within arms reach. Juan took a few steps back and stuttered a little when he spoke "Gget the hell outta here, tthis is private property."
The man said nothing, he slowly began to raise his otherwise limp body. Looking at his face he had no expression, no personality, his eyes were pure black but he didn't look at any one particular thing. He raised one arm up, as to touch Juan. Juan again takes a few steps back. By this time Cody and James were inching closer to help their good friend.

The man stared right into Juan's eyes, Juan was frozen solid, Cody and James rushed to their friend. About this time the man started back slowly toward them, making his way, he quickly lunged at James, biting him on the forearm, James used his other arm to punch the strange man in the face, releasing his bite. The man stood still for a moment drooling a mixture of saliva and blood.

Juan at this time made his way around and also lunged at James but Juan falling a little bit short, fell to the ground by tripping on a rock that was by his feet. Juan though begins to make his way to his feet.

"Juan what the fuck?" James yelling, obviously pissed off at the whole situation.
Cody walks closer to Juan, but, Juan now with the same blank face and blank stare as the stranger they confronted, begins to come closer to James. Juan opening his mouth now in a strange look that was hunger and survival.

"Lets get inside." Cody points to the cabin. The two men run inside and close the door, locking it after them.

"What the fuck, what the fuck happened to Juan. Who the fuck was that guy?" James was saying panting from being out of breath, and trying to dress his wounds.

There was a light tapping at the from door and the window to the right of the door.

Cracking the shaded reveals the strange man and Juan, slapping their hands effortlessly against the door and window. Any light that they could see attracted them to that area. So Cody and James where very careful as to which lights were left on in the house.

They both ran to the bedroom. They loudly banged on the door as Sarah answered, "What the hell is going on? And where the hell is Juan."

Cody replied "Listen, that noise you heard was just branches on the side of the house. But, their was a man out there, and he did something with Juan, and Juan is still out there with that guy,." Sarah quickly interrupts "You left him out there with a stranger?"

"Listen you don't understand, its not like he was'nt himself, hell he attacked James, fell flat on his face, and kept coming. Who ever that guy is, he turned Juan into something."

Sarah now laughing in disgust "Your kidding right?"

"Look for yourself." Cody takes Sarah by her hand, and guides her down the hall. Jennifer, Juan girlfriend now in shock, is just sitting catatonic on the bed after hearing this whole conversation take place.

Cody carefully cracks the shades again, only this time to reveal nothing. No body, there was nobody out there. Nothing, just the leaves on the branches, and the tall grass in front of the cabin.

"That's impossible, where the hell did they go?" Cody now running to various windows and peeking outside, but, finding nothing. Not a soul.

"I don't know what's going on, but, what the hell happened to Juan?" Sarah snaps at Cody.

"Guys wait a minute, look out here." James had been quietly peeking out the kitchen window. "does it look like more people are coming?" Cody rushes to the window to see what James was talking about. he looked outside to see more small specs of movement out in the distance. By this time, the moons light was more revealing and showed down more, enough to make a shadow if you were outside.

"Holy shit bro." Cody said to James. Shawna and Sarah now joined the two men in the kitchen. "Whats going on? Now what? We don't have any reception out here, and there isn't any phone lines. What do we do now?" Shawna asked to Sarah. Sarah not saying a word just looked at Shawna and nodded her head no.

"Ill tell you what were going to do for the time being. Were gonna lock up the doors and board up the windows, and wait it out till morning."

CRAAASH, A window from the bedroom smashed on the ground.

"Shit." Cody said while running to the room, "Girls stay in the hall, where there are no windows." Cody made his way into the bedroom to see Juan, breaking into the cabin, but, not really getting anywhere, as he was just to slow. He tried to climb into the window but seemed to just not have enough strength. His eyes where black and he drooled heavily. His face had no expression and he reached his arm out to Cody.
James rushed into the bedroom where Cody was. he grabbed a steak knife from the counter on the way in.

Juan seems to keep trying to walk thru the wall toward the two. All the time drooling and chomping the air in front of him, as if he smells a nice steak and cant wait to get his hands on it. He keeps extending his arms at the two, and making grumbling noises.

CRAAASH, another window in the laundry room breaks.

James rushes to the room. He sees a small window, at ground level broken, and a lifeless arm waving around. Upon closer inspection, he sees a man, he has never seen before, with the same eyes as Juan and the other man, and a face which has lost all expression.

It then dawned on James, "Its the eyes..." he thought to himself. "Guys, guys", he rounded the others into the hall. "Guys, its the eyes. Juan looked at that guy in the eyes, and the guy took his soul, or made him a zombie or something, But, its gotta be the eyes. So DONT look them in the eyes."

James looks down at his own wound. "I hope i'm right, and I don't turn into one of those."

"We need to board up all the windows and doors like I said, and wait it out, there more of those things coming and I don't wanna meet them face to face."

They all pitched in finding a hammer and some nails, and using wood from tables and other doors to board up everything they can.

Every now and again, James would look out the window, only for a glance, and would see more and more of those "things" out there. They worked what seemed like hours but, was really maybe half hour and was able to board up every window and door, and they all felt relatively safe. the only exposure was a small slit in between two pieces of wood by a small window out front. Just so they could look outside and size up the situation.

Each time one would look outside, more and more of those zombie like creatures would be there. And at this point there were about 10 outside trying to get in. But, they were weak, they didn't have the strengthen or energy to just bang down the boards.

The others inside found in safe enough to maybe take naps in 15 to 20 minute intervals until the sun was out and they could maybe have a better chance to make it out of there and to safety.

They decided to have one person go into the bathroom and try and sleep for 15 minutes or so. This proved to be imposable.

"I mean who can sleep at a time like this." Sarah stated.

Which Cody replied, "Yeah your right, I couldn't sleep thru this shit, I just wanna make it thru."

With more and more time, came more and more of those creatures, so as time elapsed, there was a lot more noise coming from outside, more scratching on the walls, and pounding on the doors. All the windows have been broken at this point, but, were secure because of the wood boarding them up.

Cody, James, Shawna, Jennifer, and Sarah, all sitting in the hall way huddled together, looking at each other with sad but hopefully eyes, listening to the moaning, and scraping, and banging coming from out side. James looks closer at the crack. He is on all fours, crawling towards that window. Tears began to run down his face. He sees the first sign of the sunrise from over a mountain top. Sunlight slowly starts creeping thru the cracks. The shadows from outside move around but slowly start to disappear. James takes a closer look, to see these zombies walking away from the cabin. The light now brighter, shines thru the crack.

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April 25 2012,

The local news paper reads:
"James Smith, wanted in the slaying of his 5 friends in a family cabin in the woods.

Five bodies were found dead, decomposing and partially eaten in a cabin about 25 miles outside the city. Evidence of fowl play included struggle marks from all the victims. Mr. Smith strangled them and stabbed them numerous times with a household steak knife. Mr. Smith then cut the bodies up and boiled them in a soup and it is thought then consumed the bodies in the soup. This is the first case of murder and cannibalism in this area reported ever.

Mr. Smith is assumed to be armed and dangerous. Do not attempt to catch him, call the local police."