She squeezed past Arely in the narrow kitchen, knocking over the glass of water by accident. It fell to the floor and shattered. Already in motion, her foot landed on the jagged pieces. The sharp edges cut through the worn soles of her shoes, and she screamed as they pierced her flesh.
Immediately, she cut off her cry of pain and clamped her lips shut. Through tear-filled eyes, she stared at the oncoming horde, praying they hadn’t heard her. After a couple of seconds, she heaved a sigh of relief. The infected kept moving at their usual pace, but her relief was short-lived when she noticed her shoe was soaked with blood. It’s worse than I thought.
“Rikke, are you alright?” Arely asked, her eyes huge in her thin face.
Rikke gritted her teeth together and hobbled toward the nearest seat. She fell onto a leather-clad bench that curled around a breakfast island and clung to the edges. Pain lanced up her leg with the slightest movement, but she strove to look normal.
“Don’t worry about me, Arely. You need to close those last few curtains,” Rikke said, waving her hand toward the windows in the back. “Make sure they’re shut properly, especially the big one in the back.”
“Okay, but what about your foot?” Arely asked, hesitating.
“My foot can wait. They won’t,” Rikke answered, pointing toward the advancing horde. “Now go.”
Arely rushed off to obey while Rikke lifted up her injured limb with a pained grimace. A big shard of glass stuck out from the bottom and leaked blood in a steady stream. She gripped the edges of the glass with shaky fingers. “Damn it; this is going to hurt.”
She pulled as hard as she could, and the edges grated against her flesh as it pulled free. A gush of blood followed, and she was left feeling dizzy and nauseated. After a couple of seconds, she scraped together the courage to remove her sock and almost passed out. The cut in her foot was deep. A long gash that nearly bisected the tender flesh in the middle. “Dear God, this is bad.”
She rummaged in her backpack until she found a roll of bandages and duct tape. It was all she had, and it would have to do. By rights, she needed stitches and disinfectant, but she had neither.
A hand tapped her on the shoulder, and she looked up into the somber eyes of Eli. He held out a bottle of bleach, and she took it with numb curiosity. “Bleach?”
“For the infection and the smell,” he signaled.
“The smell?” Rikke asked, confused for a moment.
“The zombies. We don’t want them to smell the blood,” he answered with silent intensity.
“Good thinking,” Rikke muttered. Squeezing her eyes shut, she doused the wound with the bleach. The moment the liquid touched her exposed flesh, it kindled a raging fire that burned through her nerve endings until she wanted to scream out in primal agony. But she couldn’t. Instead, she bit down on her jacket as tears streamed down her cheeks.
Within seconds, Arely was there. With efficient care, the girl wound the bandage around Rikke’s foot, following it up with the tape until it was as stiff as a board. Eli mopped up the blood on the floor, tossed the bloody sock and cloth into the washbasin, and doused everything with more bleach until the RV reeked to high heaven.
Less than a minute later, the horde reached the vehicle, and the three fugitives inside fell into a state of frozen fear. The sound and smell of decaying corpses filled the interior until it became all they knew. Their hearts jumped in their chests, and their minds quailed beneath the assault on their senses. An assault that would last for hours.
As the worst of the pain faded away, Rikke opened her arms and gathered the kids close to her. There they stayed, huddled around the tiny breakfast table as thousands of zombies streamed past them. They broke upon the vehicle like a wave on a rock, surging around the sides. The RV rocked back and forth, the suspension creaking beneath the onslaught. Thankfully, the brakes held, and so did the door. As long as they remained hidden, they’d be safe. For the moment, at least.
***
Savannah, Georgia; 10:31 pm
Tamara raced down the sidewalk, her entire being focused on gaining the corner up ahead before the horde spotted her. It was past midnight, and dark clouds obscured the moon. She used the brick wall of a nondescript office block as her guide. The fingertips of her left hand brushed against its rough surface, and she prayed there weren’t any obstacles ahead to trip her up. If she fell, she was done for.
The thick rubber soles of her sneakers muffled the sound of her footsteps. It was the only thing saving her so far: that, and the poor visibility. So far, the zombies hadn’t spotted her because they couldn’t see or hear her. It could change at any moment, though. The smallest mistake: a cough, a stumble, a beam of bright light from the moon above would be enough to doom her.
She reached the corner of the office block and dashed around it only to come to a screeching halt. The clouds above had shifted, revealing a sliver of the moon. It illuminated the street ahead enough for her to make out the barest details. Infected filled the opposite end of the block, a vast body of roving predators. A shapeless mass filled with teeth and claws, searching for a helpless victim to rend limb from limb.
Tamara ducked behind the nearest object, a minibus that had crashed onto the sidewalk and clung to its crumpled body. It was a dangerous position, open and exposed. She had to move, but
