The current thoughts running through his head were that he was tired, hungry, dirty, stressed out, pissed off, and most of all scared shitless. That last part he admitted to himself freely and often. He couldn't believe how screwed up the last week had been, everything went to complete and utter shit almost overnight. Last week he was happily employed as the manager of the human relations team at a state run office which controlled all the social services departments in the state, an important job, now he was running for his life through these damn trees and bushes looking for a safe place to go.

He muttered quietly to himself as he unsnagged his suit jacket from a thorny bush for what seemed like the fiftieth time today, "How did it all come to this?" Of course the coat ripped. He screamed in his mind, "Stupid coat, stupid bushes, STUPIDSTUPID STUPID..." He wanted to fall down and cry, and thought to himself, I still might as soon as I feel safe enough to do so. He was heading what he thought was South, the sun rises in the East... is that right? Who cares, just get anywhere away from the city.

A week ago he had been at the office when screams sounded from the reception area, multiple screams of pain and shock. He thought it was another of those office shootings so he immediately locked his office door, turned off the light, and hid under his desk hoping he wouldn't be noticed. He quietly grabbed his desk phone and dialed 911, only to get a computer telling him all circuits were busy and they would get to him as soon as they could. The screams continued, and he wasn't proud of the fact that when something large slammed into his door he pissed himself like a frightened child. He heard running, shouting, screaming, smashing, and it was all happening at the same time. He heard someone, a woman, yelling, "GET AWAY FROM ME! NO! NO! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH." That last scream seemed to go on for hours, sounding like a siren fading in and out, over and over.

He waited for the police to show up and take him out of there. That was their job. It was what they were paid to do. They would come save him. If he only waited for them to get there. He heard sirens, outside his window, so he knew they were on their way. He also heard what he would swear were gunshots at one point, and more screams right outside where the parking lot was. Then the slamming of car doors and the roar of cars speeding off.

He was wet, and cold, and scared out of his mind.

He stayed hidden.

He stayed quiet.

He had eaten his lunch during the night in the glow of the parking lot lights, hardly making a sound as he did so in fear that whatever was out there would come through his door. The city sounded like it was falling apart outside. He urinated timidly in a darkened corner of his office, trying to be quiet by letting it course down the wall to the carpet, the whole time only thinking about how embarrassed he would be when everyone found out. He knew they talked about him behind his back, and this would just make it worse. He could smell it and wondered if when the police got there they would see and smell it too, but he wouldn't dare spray air freshener because of the noise it would make.

The next day he heard nothing more from outside his door for hours. He wasn't sure if he had slept or not, but he had watched the room lighten from under his desk as the sun came up.

The police had not come... Why?

He listened for any noises. Any people saying anything that would mean he could leave his office. But there was nothing, just silence outside his door. Out in the city he could hear gunshots, cars speeding off this way and that, sirens far off in the distance, a helicopter overhead moving fast, a car had even crashed somewhere close. Once he even heard an explosion! He was terrified. He silently wondered, what is going on? Why is this happening? When are the police going to get here?

He waited until midday, then he decided he could carefully risk a look outside his door. He steeled himself for anything, ready to slam the door shut at the least provocation. He cracked the door open, just a tiny fractional amount, barely enough to look into the hall, and saw... nothing. He waited, straining to hear anything, he heard and saw nothing. There was nobody at all left in the office. He debated what he should do, standing at the door, for almost an hour, thinking, watching, listening, finally coming to the decision that he should at least look down the hall. So he looked, still saw nothing but the normal office décor, even if it had been deathly silent and not the usual hustle and bustle of his typical office day. He moved into the hall, ready to bolt in a second back into the safety of his own office. Quietly he moved down the hall, determined to see if he could leave and go home, so he had chosen to head towards the exit and not deeper into the office. He peeked around corners, into cubicles, and back behind himself constantly. It wasn't until he got to reception he knew something very bad had happened here, there was blood everywhere. Blood on the walls, floor, doors, desk, and when he looked behind the desk, a body.

He screamed and ran out through the front doors to the parking lot in a blind panic. He thought he saw a few people in the parking lot, one of whom may have even called out to him, but he focused only on getting out of there. He didn't care, he wanted only to go home to his apartment and lock the door where he could be safe from whatever had happened in his office. He ran to his car, started it, and in full on flight-or-fight mode he slammed the gas to the floor and roared out of the lot barely noticing the figures in his rear view mirror. They can find their own ride, he thought. Besides, he couldn't let anyone see his stained pants, they would know what he had done then.

He drove for home through a city gone mad, it did not take him long to see something was seriously wrong. He drove past several cars that had smashed into either other cars and in one case into a building. He wondered aloud, "Where were the police? Why aren't they here at these accidents? Where are the people?" He saw nobody at first, then he watched as a man came around a corner and staggered right into the street towards him. He swerved to avoid hitting the man and kept going, yelling, "IDIOT! Watch where you're going! MORON!" Not that the guy would hear him in the car as he sped by, he would never actually yell out the window where a person might hear him and confront him, but he did feel better when he yelled things like that in the safe privacy of his car.

He was headed out of the city towards home, he couldn't afford to live in the city but hoped to do so someday, he saw more and more disturbing things with every passing block. Things like that car smashed onto the sidewalk with a body obviously under the front wheels. And there was a baby carriage with what looked like blood smeared over it tipped over on the side of the road. He saw people walk out into the road behind his car as he passed, but no other cars moving and he was not going to stop until he was home unless he was pulled over by the police. He stayed at the speed limit but that was the only traffic law he followed, only slowing for the stop signs. He slowed to a stop when he caught a red light, looking around nervously. He saw several people start walking towards his car. He nervously spoke, "Hurry up you stupid light... cmon... cmon... CMON!" BAM! Something hit his car in the back! He looked and saw a man smash his hands onto the hood of the trunk! Ye yelled, "What the HELL? What are you doing?!?" BAM! As he struck the car again. "Get away from my car! STOP THAT!" BAM. BAM. BAM. All as the man walked around towards the driver's door of the car. He was denting the trunk, and now the roof probably. There were about five or six people, including the man, all walking towards his car now, several of them moaning like they were hurt. He pissed himself again as he looked closer and saw a woman who had her arm mutilated with only a raw red stump sticking out of her dress on the right side, slowly walking to his door from the side of the street. "Screw this!" He yelled as he stomped on the gas and the car shot forward. "What the hell is going on?!?!" He hit the radio button looking for answers.

A male announcer was speaking in a calm steady manner: "...State emergency management officials issued the following statement this morning: There have been outbreaks of violence throughout the city. There have been hundreds of reports of people attacking others with extreme violence. The CDC has issued a warning stating that if you are approached by any persons who appear to have suffered any bite type of injuries you must avoid all physical contact. The Army National Guard has been called in by the Governor to assist local police to ensure public safety, protect property, and to evacuate people to secured areas. National Guard members are currently manning checkpoints at strategic locations throughout areas around the city, if you approach a checkpoint, you will be stopped and checked out by personnel. Failure to comply with orders will be grounds for detainment, deadly force has been authorized.

American Red Cross disaster workers arrived in the area this morning to assist residents with evacuating. Anyone in need of assistance can contact the American Red Cross at their nearest emergency shelter. Military vehicles are being used to support evacuation missions from established secure areas to safe zones outside the city. Immediately make your way to the closest emergency shelter if it is safe to do so. Do not attempt to shelter in place no matter how secure or well supplied you feel you are.

Again, a state of emergency has been declared in the city, there have been outbreaks of violence and rioting throughout the city. As of 8AM the Governor has declared the city under Martial law. A curfew of 7PM has been put into effect and any citizen out between the hours of 7PM and 7AM will be subject to arrest and detention without council. All reserve, military, and law enforcement personnel are ordered to report for immediate deployment. All emergency, firefighting, and medical personnel have been federalized and are to report to their nearest station of duty to be deployed as required. State emergency management officials issued the following statement..."

The same statement looped twice more before he shut it off. I have to get out of here, he thought, where is the closest shelter? I don't know this area... I'll just keep going home, that's outside the city, I'll be safe there. I'm not going to be attacked. I'm not stopping for anything. Those people back there were the ones the radio warned about, the ones attacking people.

As he drove, he saw a woman screaming "HELP ME!" run from a building into the street in front of his car. She saw him and pleaded with him to stop. He drove right by her and watched in the rearview mirror as she was mobbed by three attackers. Not my problem he thought to himself, as long as I'm safe. He headed out of the city as fast as he could safely go, her screams fading in the distance.

An hour later he was frustrated because several times the road was blocked, either by accidents, stopped empty cars, or those "sick people" mobbing the streets. He backtracked and tried several roads out, but only gained a block or two for every three he had to go back. He only needed a clear street, he only needed to go a few miles and he would be safe. He finally had to abandon his car when he was stopped for a wrecked truck that had collided with two smaller cars, blocking the road. He couldn't go back because the road was filling with those creepy, slow moving, moaning sick people who seemed only to want to hurt him. So he ran.

He had seen people running, and others that were driving that he attempted to flag down and get a ride from and he could not understand why they did not stop and give him a ride to safety. It made him furious that they would leave him behind to run and hide while they were safe. They had room in their cars for him, he could see it when they rushed by. One even tried to hit him as he stood in the middle of the road to get them to stop. He had to dive to the side to avoid being run down. "Asshole" he thought, but did not yell out because what if they heard and stopped to threaten him? Then what?

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Hours later he made it to his apartment. It was getting dark. He remembered the curfew and wondered if he saw a patrol if he should get help from them. They were the government, they would have to help and take him to safety. He decided if he saw a patrol he would demand they assist him. But as he watched from behind his curtains, he never saw any patrols. And not many other people either. He did see groups of people who moved slowly down the street though. He knew they were the ones hurting people though, so he did nothing to bring attention to himself. He did turn on the TV and saw only an "Off Air" background with a scrolling text message that basically said the same things he heard on the radio earlier. It did list shelters to go to, so that was different, but none of the ones listed were near his location. His apartment was in a small converted house with three other apartments, but he heard nothing from any of them. Either they were all gone, or they were staying silent like he was. The phone was dead, no help there either.

After dark he couldn't see much outside any longer, the shadows on his poorly lit street did not help. He had complained to the city several times but they never did anything about it. He whispered aloud, "Maybe now they will do something." He ate some cold dinner and decided he would stay on the couch listening for any type of rescue. He heard drawn out moaning several times during the night, some far off gunshots, then at around 1:30AM a frenzied banging, suddenly a crashing breaking noise, then frantic screaming from a house down the street. After that nothing close by. He stayed quiet, sleeping in fits, the smallest noise jarring him wide awake with fear coursing through him.

He awoke in the morning with a start when a truck drove by at a high speed. He was only able to hear it go as by the time he looked out the window it was past his view. He saw nothing else and decided to eat and change since he forgot to do that last night, sleeping in his dirty clothing for the second night. He wanted to shower, but was afraid of the noise so settled for dampening a towel and wiping himself as clean as he could. Then he heard them. A lot of them out in the street making their way slowly by, following the same direction as the truck had. He got a good look this time. He was now thoroughly terrified. All of them were torn up in one way or another with horrific looking injuries on most of them. Missing chunks out of arms, legs, even faces! They looked like they had been attacked by animals, as most were covered in bloody gore. A few were missing limbs and it seemed like they didn't even notice or care. What was wrong with these people?!? He watched, frozen, in silence, waiting for them to go away. It took three hours for them to walk or crawl out of sight. He had watched every minute of it, not daring to move, hardly daring to breathe. This was unreal.

He sat back down on the couch wondering what to do when he heard it, another truck! Wait! At least two trucks! Coming towards him. I have to get outside, they have to save me! He threw on his suit coat and ran outside. There were THREE trucks! Military looking ones! He watched as they turned off his street in the distance. "Oh NO!" He said out loud. He started to run up the street where they had turned, knowing he would not make it anywhere close for them to see him. He desperately ran on anyway. They never stopped. He suddenly realized that now he was out here... With THEM. In a panic he ran back to his apartment, tears streaming down his face, praying to a God he didn't believe in for safety. He made it back inside and locked the door.

He stayed there for four more days, waiting, watching, listening.

The power went out on the 4th day.

The water stopped on the 5th.

Half way through the morning of the 6th day, he decided he had to leave and make his way to one of the "safe zones" that the TV talked about. He had seen no other people, trucks, helicopters, or anything other than the slow moving sickly looking people outside since those three trucks days ago. He was almost out of food. He had only two small bottles of water left. He had no choice, he had to seek rescue. He knew the way out towards the closest safe zone, but he did not know exactly where it was. But he knew one should only be a few miles from his home, maybe six miles he thought. He watched out the window for over an hour, while thinking all of this, before he gathered his things into a small gym bag and left when he decided it was safe enough.

He quietly and quickly made his way down the street constantly keeping his eyes open for any signs of trouble. He saw a few of the sick people, they were looking really bad, moving even slower and stiffly. He avoided them, and they never saw him. After about two hours and several different streets, he made it to one of the main roads out towards closest the safe zone, but had to abandon the road almost immediately due to the sheer numbers of sick people along it. There were stopped cars bumper to bumper as far as he could see down the road. He could not go that way. He left the road and started walking through the industrial areas, never seeing another person. He went around buildings and fences, climbed over fences when he had to, always heading in the direction he thought he needed to go. This area of the city was more trees, dirty trash blown lots, and industrial type areas rather than residences. He kept going. He would make it somewhere where he could be safe.

He looked overhead when he saw several military looking helicopters heading from the direction of the city and out to where he thought must be a safe zone. It was about 3PM and he was starting to worry he would not get there before dark. Off in the distance he saw a warehouse type brick building with lots of windows near some railroad tracks and headed for it. He wanted to find a place to hide before dark. When he finally got there another hour had passed. It was a huge building, that dirty reddish orange brick color bricks get after being in the weather for decades. The sides of the building had to be at least 300 feet long and had huge multi paned windows on what looked like three floors. It looked abandoned, a lot of the windows were broken. The entire place was surrounded by an eight foot chain link fence with barbed wire bent inward at an angle on the top. The gate he could see was chained and locked. No way he could climb the fence with the barbed wire on it. But there was a road at one end of the building that crossed the three sets of train tracks that ran down the side of the building that had one of those crossing guard things with the lights and road blocking arm thing warning traffic about trains that was right next to the fence! He could climb the crossing guard box, climb onto the barbed wire, and then it was only a short jump down onto the big grey electric box that powered the crossing and be inside the fenced in lot. So he did, only ripping his pant leg once on the barbed wire.

Getting into the building was a bit harder. The doors were all locked and he saw no other way in. He had to break one of the small office door windows and open the door from the inside, relocking it behind him. He hoped nothing heard the glass shatter when he threw that brick at it. He went into the office and saw the building had indeed not been in use for years, some papers left on the floor were dated from almost 10 years ago. He searched through the offices until he found one with a door he could lock. It looked like a conference room with a scarred up heavy wooden table and a few chairs scattered around with shabby yellowish imitation leather cushions. With the fading light of the sun through the windows, it was getting darker by the minute inside, so he put the chairs together and made a couch from them against the door. He thought if anything tried to get in he would be best off sleeping on the chairs against the only door. In the dimming light he ate from his supplies, drank his last water, and laid down to sleep. His last thought being, "Tomorrow I will find those helicopters, and they will help me."

He woke after a fitful sleep not feeling very rested. He was hungry and thirsty, but only had a few remaining crackers to eat. He said, "Today I will find that safe zone, and they will have better food, and drinks, and a nice bed for me."

He left the building after making sure he heard nothing out of the ordinary and watching through the windows outside. He climbed onto the grey electric box and then the barbed wire using one of the chairs from the office to get over it and down the other side of the fence without incident. Then he started walking along the railroad tracks in roughly the direction he saw the helicopters going yesterday.

He walked for about four hours when he saw that the tracks were taking him near a highway that was not a place he wanted to be. It looked the same as the road he avoided yesterday, cars and trucks stopped along the entire length of it and the sick wandering everywhere around them. He had to leave the tracks and go cross country through the woods. He was not thrilled...

My only coat and now that bush went and ripped it, he angrily thought. How will it look when I get to the safe zone? My coat ripped, my shoes filthy, and my pants ripped. I'm going to make a great impression.

It was then he heard more helicopters in the distance. They were headed in the same direction he was but they were coming from his rear left and moving to his right front. He adjusted course and kept moving in that direction, they had to be going somewhere near the safe zone.

An hour later he crested a hill and before him there was a grassy field that stretched down to a roadway and on the other side of that he there was another field in which he could see a large fenced in area with tents, trucks, and PEOPLE! It was only about another mile or so away! He would finally get the help he deserved!

He started moving in earnest, almost smiling to himself.

He got to the roadway about 20 minutes later. He crossed with no problems as the only sick people he could see were away from him further down the road on both sides. He started crossing the field through the grass and brush when he saw two men who were obviously soldiers on the roof of a large truck parked right inside the fence of the camp. They were standing inside what looked like a sandbag fort on the roof of the trailer of an 18 wheeled truck. He needed to get closer so they would see and rescue him. As he made his way through the field he could hear the sounds of his salvation close at hand.

He was about fifty yards away when he yelled to the men, "Hey you two up there! Come down here and let me in!"

The men looked at him and raised their rifles as he came through some thick brush. One of them yelled to him, "STOP RIGHT THERE! Do not come any closer! You need to make a left turn and follow the fence to the entry gate where you will be examined and assisted from there."

He yelled up at the men, still walking forward, "I work for the Governor, therefore you people work for me! You need to..."

"SIR! If you take one more step, I WILL open fire! You need to immediately make a left turn and follow the fence to the entry gate," the second soldier said.

How dare they! He knew how to handle these types, he would NOT be talked down to... He yelled back, "You WILL come down here and let me in right NOW! THAT is your JOB! Don't make me inform your superiors about how you..."

Something grabbed his shoulder in an iron grip and spun him down to the ground. Then he felt a white hot pain where his shoulder met his neck. He screamed out in agony as he realized one of the sick people was biting him, tearing chunks from his shoulder. He felt more hands on him and then a ripping and more massive pain in his right calf. He screamed until he passed out.

"Why didn't you shoot the one coming up behind him?" asked the first soldier to the second.

"Guy was a dick." Was the only reply.