All This Time

Seven hundred and thirty days.

2 years.

It had seemed so long ago when the world became infested by 'shamblers'. The name always made you scoff. They were zombies plain and simple, but the C.D.C and the W.H.O apparently thought no one in a higher position would take them seriously with their warnings had they gone with zombie. Turns out using a thinly veiled term that at least eighty percent of the world could see through wasn't such a smart idea either, so while the Army had tried to do its best in neutralizing the threat, most civilized portions of the country refused to follow instructions, causing major tensions within the cities themselves being occupied, and leaving the Army to only be able to effectively combat the new zombie outbreak in uninhabited stretches of road and desert.

This was not where many zombies were likely to be, as it turns out, and soon the outbreak that most of the nation had scoffed at was terrifyingly real. No one knew of what many films loved to refer to as patient zero, no one knew if this was a mutated foreign disease brought over willingly or unwillingly, or an experiment by the government gone wrong, and at this point, it didn't matter. The country itself, in a delicious sense of dark amusement, was in shambles. With what little army remained, armored cities of resistance were formed, but the rural folk hardly had a chance. Some made it to the cities. Most were lost. Others survived by sheer determination and found other rural families, banding together to form pockets of resistance of their own.

You were one of the lucky ones, having been living in the decently populated city of what was now known as the Great Mid-America Resistance. You and many others knew it still as the greater St. Louis area, and still called it as such over unofficial channels of communication. You were not considered part of the Army, but you did work for them. Your job, with many others, was expansion and supply retrieval. Every day, the army sent several cells of a mix of soldiers and contracted civilians to unprotected areas of the city. The soldiers jobs were to set up a safe perimeter to expand the city, and the eventual goal would be to span over the whole country, neutralizing the zombie threat.

Your job was to raid abandoned business and homes for any useful items. Food, clothing, electronics, books, you name it. Anything that could soothe the restless civilians and keep them nourished was your goal. Chief among these were portable generators that many homes and a few small businesses adopted before the outbreak got serious. This was where you were now actually. Others were spread out down the street searching homes, but you and a few others were checking the local McDonald's/gas station combo. If you were lucky, there would be two separate generators powering this place.

You weren't lucky.

In fact you were supremely unlucky.

Normally, zombies stayed away from generators. Something you guessed had to do with the smell and the slight change in the charge of the surrounding air. This was not a normal time. You were busy disconnecting the generator when you heard it, a low guttural groan followed by a slight shuffle. Cursing yourself for getting snuck up on, you drew your pistol and turned to face the decaying creature. It was horrifying really, half of its face was hanging on by thin strands of sinew and grime, massive chunks had been taken out of its torso. Its leg was bent backward and dragging behind as it made its way in your direction. It probably would have been faster than that without the bum leg, so you thanked your lucky stars, took aim at its head, and pulled the trigger.

...
...
Nothing.

Just like that, the rest of your luck, and your stomach, plummeted. The gun had jammed. You smacked the bottom of the clip after turning your gun to the side, noticing a shell had failed to eject and letting gravity do the hard work as you racked the chamber back again. You looked back to the zombie, who had gotten closer than you expected and fired. This time the gun discharged, but due to being unable to take decent time to aim, it was only hit in the shoulder. Swearing aloud this time, you fired another round, but the aim was still too low, and the bullet went straight through its neck. You had one chance left before the zombie would be upon you.

*click*

The epitome of frustrated, you threw your gun down and let the adrenaline take over. Your partners had likely heard the shots judging by the thudding of footsteps you heard in the distance, as had any nearby zombies, but even then it would have been too late. You weren't going to go down like this. Sure the others would have to shoot you, but you weren't going to become one of these rotting sacks of shambling flesh unless it was on your own terms. Shouting, you charged at the zombie and rammed it into the far wall. You noticed the damn thing didn't even have the decency to look surprised. Without thinking, you sank your own teeth into what remained of the creature's neck.

It tasted like rotting meat and motor oil, but to your surprise the creature, who hadn't let out a single noise when you shot it twice, howled in pain. You backed off, confused. Out of the side of your peripheral vision, you spotted your comrades, two of them pointing a gun at you, but hesitating to follow through, and a couple more just standing in shock. You spit out the residual fluid and viscera from your mouth and watch as the zombie dropped to the floor. What happened next, despite previously having seen and heard others torn apart with little remorse, had you vomiting on the floor. The sounds of cracking bones filled the air, as did the horrid shrieks of the creature, and its flesh began to warp and explode around the once missing pieces of itself. Once you emptied what remained of lunch, you cast a glance over at the zombie.

What you saw caused you to fall back on your behind as she opened her mouth.

"W-what happened? Where am I?"