7 months later…

Various showers of exploding projectiles began falling onto a quarantined city complex that was infested with flesh-eating humanoids. These creatures were the by-product of the successful release of the special pathogen set in motion by the world leaders several months ago. More than half of the world’s population had become zombies. The vaccines weren’t introduced to the sheltered public until all hell had broken loose. The capital of Destiny had already been overrun. It used to be a wonderful city of human interaction known as Merriland. Out of all the states, it had the most infected, thus by common standards its name was switched to Monsterdam.

The terrifying sounds produced by the blasts that barraged the dilapidated city caused many zombies who were further away from the impact to be attracted. These infected bodies had no relationship with fear as they rushed towards the blast zone apace. Some were much slower to be attracted.

At the farthest reach from the blast where an Armageddon of destruction had passed through long ago; a sense of silence permeated that area, so much so that the opening of a broken supermarket door caught the attention of a few zombies who were lurking close by. They quickly assuaged their sense of alertness as soon as they recognized that the creature that came through the supermarket door was just like them— an infected.

As the zombie teetered further away from the supermarket’s entrance, its rotten body and half-eaten face became more visible to a survivor who kept himself hidden behind a toppled military vehicle.

“Geez, disgusting.” The survivor scoffed at the grotesque figure that was staining his eyeballs with its maggoty appearance.

The survivor was a burly man in his early thirties. From his ragged attire, one could deduce that he hadn’t had a proper shower in weeks. His apparel was laden with blood as well as raw entrails that must have gotten on him after he bashed a few zombies’ heads in. Visible scratches were present all over his face and forearms.  It was almost as if he previously had himself supine on a chopping board and a master chef failed to fillet him properly.

Unable to withstand the terrible funk that the nearby zombie was oozing, the burly man slowly picked up his bags filled with canned products and started sneaking his way around the toppled military vehicle.

“Easy does it…” While he tried his best not to be spotted by the sporadic hoard of zombies in the vicinity, he failed to realize that the strap on his bag got hitched onto a protruding compartment of the vehicle. This slight mishap caused a can to fall onto the floor, creating a thud noise.

“???” The zombies were now alerted towards the survivor’s position. He had no choice but to start making a run for it.

“Dammit! This is just not my lucky day today! I decided to make this run for the food and now I’m being chased by a hungry hoard of flesh-eating monsters!”

As he continued to flee from his hungry pursuers, the man hollered out for help. However, his shouts only served to attract more zombies towards his proximity. “Shit, there’s more of them coming up ahead.”

“ARRAAAH!” A zombie intercepted the man just after he jumped over a crawling corpse plastered on the side of the road. 

“You’re not going to eat me today!” The zombie almost chewed the man’s face off had it not been for his quick reflexes to use his bag to slap its head off. But in so doing, he lost all his canned goods in the process.

“Dammit! My loot!” Knowing that he would be attempting suicide if he turned back towards the hoard of zombies to retrieve his lost canned goods, the man decided to rush ahead. He dodged another hungry zombie that lurched at him. It had parts of its intestines exposed. Shortly after his evasion, the man realized that the zombie was a reanimated soldier who had a pistol strapped to its waist.

“That gun will be very useful. Come here you!” The man used the zombie’s intestines as a lasso to tug it towards him before slamming it into the side of a collapsed building. He quickly retrieved the gun from the holster, checked if it was loaded then began shooting at the zombies closest to him.

“Die, you stinking bastards!”

While the man continued to make a run for it, he came upon a street that still had functioning speakers situated at the lateral region of a pole. These were mainly used for emergency broadcasts. At first, he perceived a wave of static followed by vague echoes.

Directing his attention towards the speakers, the man thought to himself, “Those emergency speakers are still operational? I thought the military had already bombed this city into the Stone Age. I can hear a faint message trying to relay.”

Wondering what might be broadcasting over the speakers, the man tried to get closer to it. However, due to the large number of zombies situated in that area, he found it to be impossible to go any further. Thus he picked up a stone from the ground and toss it at the speaker, hoping that it would knock it into functioning properly, and lo and behold it did. Not only could he hear with clarity what was being broadcasted over the emergency speakers, but the zombies heard it too, which meant more of them started crowding that area.

“Attention! Attention to all survivors… I repeat, if there are any survivors out there, please make your way towards the barracks located in the city centre. We have food, vaccines and shelter. The government has finally sent reinforcement to our settlement. Keep on the lookout for military presence. They are…”  

Before the rest of the message could be broadcast, the zombies surrounding the emergency speakers had already taken down the pole. Now that the static no longer attracted them, they directed their attention toward the man who kept fleeing.

“This place is swarming with those nasty bastards. I can’t even find a place to hide anymore. Reinforcement has come to the city, but the town centre is a good distance away from here. I don’t think I’ll be able to make it on foot, besides, I’m almost out of bullets.”

After emptying the last bullet in his gun, the man ran and ran until he found himself stuck in an alley. “A freaking dead end?” Among the increasing cacophony of zombie cries, the man heard a loud ‘caw’ above him and looked up. He saw what resembled a 10-foot long crow.

“That’s one huge ass bird. Huh?” It was by pure luck that he directed his gaze above him because just a few metres above his head was a ladder waiting for him to climb. “I can’t reach it from this height.” Quickly scanning his environment, the man saw a dumpster close to the entrance of the alley along with incoming zombies.

“I better get to that dumpster first.” Making a rush towards the dumpster, the man picked up a long piece of wood along the way. He tossed it at the zombies which caused them to stumble back a bit so that he could get hold of the dumpster. He rushed with it back to the area where the leader was situated. Just a few metres behind him, the recovered zombies were giving chase.

“Damn these persistent bastards! They are right up my ass!” After pushing the dumpster in place, the man quickly hopped up on it and dashed onto the ladder. He climbed the ladder as if he was sliding downhill.

“I made it up top.” Looking below him, he saw the zombies also forcing their way up the ladder.

“These rotten corpses don’t know when to quit do they?” Seeming out of breath, the man picked up his legs and began running around the rooftop trying to find a route of escape. While doing this, he heard a peculiar crying sound.

“Is that a baby crying?” Investigating the cry, he made his way over to the other side of the roof. Hiding behind an AC unit, he discovered a little girl drenched in blood and brain matter, moreover, within her arms was a crying naked baby.

“Stay back!” The little girl pushed forward a rusted machete towards the man’s crotch. He had to take a few steps backwards and tried his best not to startle them.

“It’s ok little girl. I’m not one of them flesh-eating monsters. Look at me. See?”

“Huh?” Even after confirming that the man was indeed uninfected, the little girl was still very cautious and wouldn’t lower the machete. However, he had no time to waste due to the incoming hoard of zombies who were scaling the side of the building.

“Are you alone little girl? Where are your parents? Are they around here somewhere?”

“…”The little girl shook her head in response to his inquiry.

“My name is Murdock. What’s your name?”

“I…” Just as the little girl was about to give her answer, a flesh-craving zombie successfully made its way onto the rooftop.

“Dammit! There is no time for introductions.” Murdock became alerted by the zombie’s intruding presence. “Give me that machete little girl. Give it now!” He quickly grabbed the machete from the little girl’s hand and used it to chop the zombie’s head off. Blood spewed all over his face; also on the rooftop.

“Dammit! I think some got in my mouth.” While Murdock was busy spitting out blood, he wasn’t aware of the other zombie that was sneaking up behind him.

“Mister behind you!”

“Huh?” Murdock was alerted just in time to swing his machete around and impaled the grotesque zombie. It slithered further down the blade of the machete to get a bite of Murdock’s neck.

“Piss off you ugly shithead!” He kicked the zombie off the roof before it could bite his neck. Looking down, he saw just how close the other zombies were to reaching the roof.

“They are coming up.” Murdock ran back to where the little girl was hiding with her baby brother. “Listen, it’s not safe here anymore. You got to come with me, ok? I’m not going to hurt you or the baby. Trust me. Give me the baby and hop onto my back.”

Murdock bent over to make it easy for the little girl to climb up, but she was still a bit hesitant. “We don’t have much time. Hurry! Come on! Come on!”

“OK…” The little girl eventually gave him the baby and climbed onto his back.

“Good.” By the time Murdock raised his head and looked to where he had climbed up on the roof, myriads of zombies had already made it up, moreover, rushing towards him in hungry dashes.

“KYAAH!” The little girl expressed a scream that almost exploded Murdock’s eardrums.

“Not so loud! You’re going to make me lose my balance! Dammit!” Murdock had to quickly suck up the damage dealt to his eardrums and swung his machete forwards. He slashed through several bodies of zombies as he tried to find safety.

Murdock checked the door leading to the roof but it was chained shut, probably by the little girl after she came up. He was forced to play tug of war with the zombies on the rooftop until a solution came to his head.

“Come and get me, you ugly bastards!” Murdock found it difficult to keep up with the swarm of zombies. Every time he chopped one of them, they tried to get at the baby within his grasp. 

“Is there really no way off this rooftop?” As Murdock thought of this, the little girl on his back pointed to an adjacent building complex.

“Over there, mister.”

“Huh?” Directing his eyes to where the little girl pointed, Murdock noticed a tall apartment complex not too far from the rooftop he was currently on. The roof of that building was taller, therefore, he couldn’t make the jump up there. However, he discovered an alternate route. There was an apartment in reach that had its windows and walls shattered.

“Hold on tight to me! I’m going to make a jump for it.” Murdock glanced back at the incoming hoard of zombies then dashed towards the edge of the rooftop with full speed. The little girl squeezed her eyes shut as she screamed.

Reaching the edge, Murdock jumped with all his leg strength. It propelled him along with his 2 human passengers towards the other building.

“Please make it! Please it!” A bit of fear tethered with hope played around Murdock’s emotional body as he envisioned himself making the jump successfully. His left leg landed on the very edge of the collapsed portion of the apartment complex.

“I made it.” Speaking too soon, Murdock felt the ground slipping away from beneath his feet. “Oh no! Oh no!” The surface beneath his leg shattered before he could put forth his right leg for better footing. To stall his fall, Murdock made use of his great reflexes to grab onto a severed cable wire that was hanging from the building.

“Hurry girl! Climb up and take the baby.” Murdock felt his arm muscles burning intensely. He could only hold on with one arm due to the baby engulfed in his other hand.

After climbing up, the little girl took her baby brother from Murdock’s tired arm and then lent him a helping hand, though little it might have been. “Mister are you ok?” 

“I’ll live and my name is not mister. Call me Murdock got that?”

“Alright, mister… I mean Murdock. My name is Alia and this is my little brother, Jovain.”

“Well, nice to make you 2 acquaintances, although the current circumstance isn’t all that ideal for introductions.”

“What’s the worry, we got away from the monsters didn’t we?” The moment Alia uttered these words, she glanced behind Murdock’s figure to see multitudes of zombies jumping from the roof of the adjacent building. They locked themselves onto each other as they jumped; forming a sustainable bridge for the other infected humans to cross over.

“Huh, what the hell…?” Murdock couldn’t believe the zombie ingenuity that he was witnessing, he took back the baby from Alia then began rushing towards the other end of the apartment complex. He made haste to get away from the persistent zombies who were rushing over the infected bridge.

“You got to be kidding me! How come these bastards are so creative?”

“They were once human weren’t they?”

“I supposed you’re right, Alia. But still, how are we supposed to shake those greedy bastards?”

“What about that over there?” Alia pointed to a thick metallic pipeline that extended from the apartment complex onto another building 42-metres away.

“I think that just might work. Come on Alia!” As he made a rush for the metallic pipeline, Murdock came across a sneaky zombie that lurched at Alia from behind some wooden rubble.

“Alia watch out!” Due to Alia being a couple of paces ahead of him, Murdock couldn’t get to her in time, instead, he tossed the machete forwards. It went directly into the Zombie’s oesophagus.

“KYAH!” Alia was frightened to see the impaled zombie still reaching out toward her.