The horse neighs frantically as it hobbles down the road. I’m slumped on Jet’s derriere as I cling desperately to Sloan’s chest. The restaurants and cabins zoom past us in a blur and the scraping clouds that hover over the skyscrapers loom closer. We arrive at a large, multi-laned bridge that carries a huge fountain in the center. An infestation of Eaters has been dwelling idly over here, waiting for any signs of life to approach. Jet screeches to a halt, hindered and utterly flummoxed by the beastly labyrinth of grating Eaters. A hungry crew of them has taken special notice of us and are running towards us with their hands clawing the air desperately. Sloan shoots a good handful of them but this only inspires more to join the bloody tumult.
“A pistol! Gimme a pistol! Hurry!” I shout imploringly.
Sloan offhandedly swerves me a Desert Eagle pistol. My dad worked for the Palvalla police department, so I’m not completely foreign to guns. It doesn’t take long for me to take load and start shooting. Angry wisps of smoke flush out of my gun as gunshots pang out of my gun. Nothing but booming sounds and carnivorous rasps rent the air for about the next ten minutes until we can finally see a path clearing up.
Jet neighs in freedom and kicks his hooves in the air. We are blasting through the road again and the wind gathers with it. I close my eyes, enjoying the carnal bliss of the breeze. It makes a change not having to think about blowing zombie guts.
We arrive in the heart of the sprawling, skyscraper-filled, desert metropolis. There are a lot of tall glassy and tan buildings here as well as the usual palm trees that infest the streets. What’s most prominent is the number of strip malls, salons, and high-end restaurants that are clustered here. There are a lot of cars that sit behind in traffic, many with their horns blaring, but I doubt any is actually in them. A lot of them have left to preserve what’s left of their doleful lives and have either fleed the city or have found somewhere hidden and completely reclused from the Eater-infested city. Speaking of Eaters, we make like lizards and just scatter around those damned creatures. Hopefully, we don’t encounter a whole ass family reunion of them. I’m not sure we would have enough ammo to spare.
We come across a flat beige bricked building that reads Rehabilitation Center. The parking lot is empty and the building looks completely barren, thank the heavens. But the hollowness is lingering and eerie. There are nothing but cracks in the windows and a few dust balls that fall out of it.
A melancholic lump rises in my throat. “I kind of want to do this alone,” I tell Sloan.
“Well that’s mighty fine then ain’t it. I gotta get Jet a drink anyway,” Sloan pants.
The dun horse and the gun-strapped cowboy flee back into the heart of the city. I amble toward the front entrance, legs wobbling. I hesitantly open the door and it creaks open, releasing a lethal whispering smoke into the empty building.
There’s a receptionist desk vindictively waiting for me as I walk in but no one is there to attend it. The flickering room is palatial and empty and the dim corridors are long, winding, and looming with silent, hissing doors. I feel a cold blue obstruct my inner warmth. This has to be the loneliest rehabilitation center ever.
I see a girl standing in front of a door to the corridor on my right. I recognize those beach blonde pigtails, bulging green beetle eyes, and the striped-green turtleneck.
“Amelia?” I whisper.
Amelia glances at me and proffers a forced smile. The bulbous green eyes shimmer in the dimmed hallway. “Oh hey, Reyes. You’re here to see your mother too?”
“Yeah,” I mutter distantly. I look at the door she’s facing. It’s designed where the windows look like jail cells and through it, you can see the person in the room. Amelia’s mom is a plump wrinkly woman dressed in an orange jumpsuit. Her body is teetering, her voice is hoarse, and her eyes are gleaming those all too familiar milky colors. Amelia’s mother (including the rest of the patients in this rehabilitation center) has turned and joined the tragic tale that many before her have ungraciously fallen into.
“I’m sorry,” I whimper.
“Eh. I kinda expected it honestly, and it was only a matter of time. It just…sucks ya know?”
“Yeah. Are you ok bestie?” I ask. That question encompasses everything because every time I’m around Amelia, I get a cold stoic vibe and I just feel sorry for her. The thing about Amelia is that she’s a school friend of mine and she has ADD. We both went to Paradise Valley school together and she was always categorized as the “disabled kid” because she took some special needs classes. She sat with the special needs kids at lunch, and no one ever really talked to her, except well…me. I even sat with her at lunch sometimes when I could spare the time. My old friends never approved it though, obviously.
“What? Oh yeah, I’m fine,” says Amelia. “Your mother is on door 108 by the way. If you’re curious to know.”
“Thanks and umm…hang in there,” I tell her. Amelia nods appreciatively.
I walk five doors down until I find the jail cell door that gleams 108. I notice the familiar knobby-faced, curly-haired mixed woman I’ve come to know as my mother glares at me through the window. Her infectious rasping is unbearable and almost tear-jerking.
“I’m sorry this happened to you mom. I know you never wanted any of this, especially after dad…” I try to find the words but I hold back, afraid of the teary lump in my throat. My mom is clawing her hands at me but I step back. “It’s ok. It’s ok. You’ll see him in heaven. I know you will. Thanks for everything you’ve done for us.”
I fling out the silver Desert Eagle, press the trigger, and release. The deafening booming sound is the only confirmation I need to know that all is finished. Suddenly I hear Amelia’s screech fly through the halls.
“Amelia!”
Her mother is banging her head against the cell until blood is trickling out. Unexpectedly the cell window breaks open and Amelia’s mother goes in for the long-awaited chow. The bone-crunching, flesh-gushing menacing sound is too much of a morbid cacophony for me. I round the bullets and put a few into Amelia’s mother’s skull. She crumples down, releasing her grip at last.
“Amelia,” I whimper. I hold the girl’s limp body as it slips to the floor. Blood is leaking profusely on her forehead, and her eyes are oozing white and red, nearly popping out of her skull. Tear swell up and I start bawling. Amelia was innocent, she never deserved any of this. She was a struggling ADD girl trying to make it through life. She never deserved any of this! But that’s the thing. It hits me. Eaters don’t care about who you are and what you’re going through. They just want to eat and infect as many people as possible. Munch munch munch.
“Amelia, no…no. Please...” I choke.
She groans something faintly before falling into the confines of death. Hun? No, shut the fuck up Reyes, you know it’s not that.
“R-Run,” Amelia coughs. Barely able to catch a breath. And then she falls completely limp.
I look around the corridor and discover a few corpses limping out. The scurvy, milky-eyed demons have spotted me and are quickly rallying a screechy call. Some of the doors hadn’t been fully closed before the apocalypse. It’s now occurring to me that it’s open season for them. Plus the sound of the gunshots would surely have rung a call. I hear a horde of screeches behind me and I just buck it. I burst through the entrance door, falling on my knees. I get up and hide behind a dumpster. Once I’ve caught my breath, I run into the streets.
“Sloan! Sloan!” I screech out. I hear the familiar pattering of hooves behind me.
“Hop on you idiot!” Sloan shouts.
I jump onto the back of the dun horse and I’m dragged away from that living nightmare. We gallop a few more paces before noticing a sign.
“What’s that?” I pant.
Sloan reigns Jet back and the horse starts to prance toward the humongous sign. It’s a large black arrow pointing straight ahead in the direction we’re headed.
Sloan is just as confused as I am. “What’s an X-Zone?” I breathe.
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