The first screams started around noon.
We'd been monitoring the radio for hours, tracking the official story as it evolved from "civil disturbance" to "public health emergency" to ominous silence on certain frequencies. The screams came from two blocks over—high and terrified, cutting off too quickly.
I moved to the window, scanning the street. Normal at first glance—cars parked in driveways, lawn ornaments catching the afternoon sun. Then I saw her.
A woman in a bathrobe, running barefoot down the middle of the road. Behind her, three figures shambled with the unmistakable gait of the infected. They were gaining.
"We can't just watch." Rain was at my shoulder, shotgun ready. "We have to—"
"We have to survive." The words tasted bitter, but they were true. "If we go out there, we attract attention. Attention brings more of them."
The woman stumbled. The lead zombie tackled her before she could recover. The screams intensified, then stopped.
I turned away from the window. The others were staring—at me, at the scene outside, at the reality that had just shattered whatever illusions remained.
"It's spreading faster than I expected." I moved to the kitchen table, where Kaplan had spread his map. "Downtown is probably gone. The suburbs will follow. We need to think about getting out of the city entirely."
"And go where?" Matt's voice was hollow. "If this virus gets out—"
"It will. It already has." I traced routes on the map with my finger. "The question is whether we're ahead of it or behind it."
"Highway's that way." Kaplan pointed east. "But if everyone else is thinking the same thing..."
"Traffic jams. Panic. The perfect environment for infection to spread." Alice had been silent since the screaming stopped, but her eyes were sharp. Processing. Planning. "We need to move at night. Use smaller roads. Avoid population centers."
"That's twelve hours away." Rain checked her watch. "Can we hold this position that long?"
My senses reached outward, mapping the neighborhood. More signatures now than an hour ago, most of them wrong. The infection was spreading block by block, person by person, transforming suburbs into hunting grounds.
"We need to reinforce," I said. "Board windows, block doors. Make this house invisible."
"And if they find us anyway?"
"Then we fight. Same as always."
We spent the afternoon fortifying our position. Kaplan and Matt boarded first-floor windows with furniture and found wood. Rain and Alice set up defensive positions at key chokepoints. I coordinated, conserving energy while my reserves slowly rebuilt.
Spence worked silently, moving furniture when directed, avoiding conversation. His guilt was visible in every motion—the way he flinched at screams, the way his eyes couldn't hold anyone's gaze. He knew what was happening. Knew it was his fault.
Should I confront him? Would it help?
The answer was still no. We needed unity, not division. There would be time for truth later—if there was a later.
By evening, the house was as secure as we could make it. We gathered in the kitchen, eating another meal of canned goods by candlelight. The power had gone out an hour ago, taking the radio with it.
"I keep thinking about the mansion." Rain's voice broke the silence. "All those people in the Hive. Scientists, guards, administrators. They had families. Kids waiting for them to come home."
"They made choices," Alice said. "They worked for Umbrella. They knew what the company did."
"Did they? Did they really know about the zombies and the monsters and the bioweapons?" Rain shook her head. "Or did they just take a paycheck and not ask questions?"
"Does it matter?"
"It matters to me."
The conversation died. Outside, somewhere close, glass shattered. Footsteps shuffled across pavement. The world was ending, one neighborhood at a time.
"I was a cop," Matt said suddenly. "I mean, I pretended to be a cop. My credentials were fake. I infiltrated the mansion because my sister worked in the Hive."
The admission hung in the air. I'd known, of course—remembered Matt Addison's story from the films. His sister Lisa, infected during the outbreak, transformed into something inhuman. But the others didn't know.
"Your sister?" Rain's voice softened.
"Lisa. She was a scientist. Not the bad kind—she was trying to expose what Umbrella was doing. Leak the research, prove they were developing bioweapons." Matt stared at his hands. "I was supposed to meet her. Get the evidence she'd gathered. But then the lockdown happened and..."
"She didn't make it out," I finished.
"No. She didn't." His eyes were wet. "I've been lying to all of you since we met. I'm sorry."
The silence stretched. Then Rain reached across the table and squeezed his hand.
"We've all got secrets," she said. "Yours doesn't change anything."
Her eyes moved to Spence. Just for a moment, too fast for most people to notice. But I caught it. And so did he.
Spence looked away, his face pale in the candlelight.
She suspects. She doesn't know, but she suspects.
The moment passed. We finished our meal, assigned watch schedules, and settled into the tense waiting that came before action.
Sleep wouldn't come. I sat in the dark living room, rifle across my lap, listening to the sounds of a city dying. Distant gunfire. Car alarms. Screams that started and stopped like radio stations changing.
Alice found me there around midnight.
"Couldn't sleep either?"
"Too much in my head." She sat beside me on the couch, close enough that our shoulders touched. "I'm remembering more. The training facility. The procedures. The things they did to make me what I am."
"How much do you remember?"
"Enough to know I was never really human. Not the way they wanted me to be." She turned to face me, her eyes catching the faint moonlight through the boarded windows. "You're like me. Enhanced. Changed. But you remember being normal. You remember what it felt like before."
"Yeah. I remember."
"What's it like? Having both? The old life and the new one?"
I thought about Thomas Harrison, dead in a training accident at Fort Benning. About Marcus Cole Harrison, who'd worked for Umbrella without knowing what they really did. About the stranger I was becoming, with powers I barely understood and knowledge I couldn't share.
"It's like carrying two people in one body," I said finally. "One of them knows what's happening. The other one just wants to go home."
"Home." Alice laughed softly. "I don't think I have one of those anymore."
"Neither do I."
We sat in comfortable silence as the night wore on. Partners in transformation. Survivors of impossible circumstances. Whatever came next, we'd face it together.
The first light of dawn crept through gaps in the boards, painting stripes across the living room floor.
Time to move.
Author's Note / Promotion:
Your Reviews and Power Stones are the best way to show support. They help me know what you're enjoying and bring in new readers!
You don't have to. Get instant access to more content by supporting me on Patreon. I have three options so you can pick how far ahead you want to be:
🪙 Silver Tier ($6): Read 10 chapters ahead of the public site.
👑 Gold Tier ($9): Get 15-20 chapters ahead of the public site.
💎 Platinum Tier ($15): The ultimate experience. Get new chapters the second I finish them . No waiting for weekly drops, just pure, instant access.
Your support helps me write more .
👉 Find it all at patreon.com/fanficwriter1