Outbreak

Brian's POV

I didn’t dare look back. I just kept running. I didn’t think about where I was going. All I knew right now was that I had to get away from those things – whatever the hell they were. I ran… and ran… and ran… until I was almost out of breath. I didn’t want to die out here. I had to find a place to hide in.

“Brian!” I heard someone call out.

I stopped and looked around. Where the fuck was the voice coming from? I couldn’t stand here for long; they would catch up to me.

“Over here!” the voice shouted out again.

I looked over to my right and saw one of my good friends, Matt. He beckoned me to go follow him. I quickly ran in the same direction he was heading. After what felt like an eternity of running, he said that we had finally arrived. I looked up and realized that he had brought us to a church.

“Really now, Matt? Your answer to all that’s happening right now is to sit in church and pray?” I raised an eyebrow at him.

“No dipshit,” he said defensively, “I brought you here because there are other normal people here.”

My eyes widened a bit, “There are others?”

He scoffed and acted as if it was the stupidest thing he’d heard in his entire life, “Of course, you dumbass. What’d you think? We’re the only ones tough enough to have ran away from those things?”

I shrugged.

“Come on; let’s go inside before one of those things gets us.” He suggested. He walked up the stairs of the church and knocked on its door. I was surprised to see one of my buddies, Jimmy, open it.

“Jimmy!”

“Brian,” he said before closing the church’s doors behind him.

“You’re alive,”

“Of course I am!” he snorted as he barred up the doors.

“How many are we in here?” I asked him.

“As of now, there are seventeen of us.” He said as he led me to where the other survivors were.

“Seventeen? That’s all there is?” I asked in disbelief.

“That’s all there is,” he repeated before nodding.

“Well shit,” I mumbled.

I looked around the room and saw a few familiar faces -- Johnny, the Berry brothers, the Dibenedetto twins and Father Blithe – the others were strangers entirely. They all looked up at me when I entered the room, as if it were the first time they’d seen a person in years. I just smiled at them and sat with Matt, Jimmy and Johnny. I looked around and saw that they’d barred up the windows and all the possible entrances of the church. What the hell were we really dealing with anyway?

“What do you think they are?” I asked the three of them.

“I don’t know… no one knows, really.” Matt admitted.

“I do,” Jimmy said, “I know what they are.”

The three of us looked at him simultaneously.

“What?” his forehead creased, “Don’t you guys watch movies?”

“Of course we do,” Johnny said, “What the hell has that got to do with the things trying to eat us?”

“Jesus Christ,” Jimmy muttered under his breath, “These dudes are always in horror movies, y’know?”

We still didn’t get it.

“Zombies!” he blurted out.

“Are you serious?” Johnny didn’t look like he was buying it.

“What? What else do you think they are?”

“I don’t know. I just think they’re sick people.” Johnny mumbled.

“Are you serious?” Jimmy retorted.

Johnny opened his mouth to speak but then we heard a loud bang… followed by scratches and low moans.

“Shit. They’ve followed us here,” Matt stood up from where he was seated and walked up to one of the church’s windows. “Shit,” he mumbled before heading back to where all the others were.

“There’s a whole flock of them outside.” He said nervously.

The banging and scratching got louder. Whatever they were, they really wanted to get through those doors.
“Jesus, they’re gonna stop at nothing to get us.” I said as I looked out one of the windows. One of them looked me in the eye and it sent cold shivers running down my spine.
​
“We’re never gonna get out of here, are we?”