Outnumbered

Gerard had been right. They had shut down the biology research lab for quarantine.

"Let's sneak in through the back." Gerard said jogging around the building. I chased after him cautiously. "I brought these for our protection." He pulled out two white mouth-and-nose mask thingies doctors wore to protect their germs from the patients and a pair of latex gloves. We put on our safety gear and went inside the back window, which was broken.

"Oh, God, this is creepy!" Gerard said all giddy and excited.

"I don't see what your so excited about. I'm terrified to death over here." I said disapproving of his attitude toward this mission.

"You think I'm not scared?!"

"This whole time you've been so nonchalant about the idea of 'zombie attacks'. It's like you're happy about this stuff."

"Okay, one: Could you stop saying 'zombie attacks' like it isn't actually happening. Just accept that this is a zombie attack! And two: I'm just as scared as you are, I just react differently."

"You're no help. Why'd you even come?" I mumbled rudely.

"Hey, if I weren't here, you'd be alone, unarmed, and contaminated." He had a point.

"I take back what I said. I just don't wanna lose anybody else..."

"Marcie," Gerard said softly, resting a hand on my upper arm. "What happened to Bobby, Louis, and Kerli was not your fault. Do you understand me? You did not intentionally make them turn into a monster."

"You're right. I'm just...scared, Gerard."

Suddenly, I heard a rustling sound above us. I jumped and pulled away from Gerard and looked up at the ceiling. Outside I could hear rain pouring.

"Someone's here." I whispered.

"You heard that, too?" Gerard replied looking around, the bat ready in his hands.

"I think we should just stay down here, maybe start searching for some files." I said, beginning to rummage through some papers in a file cabinet.

"Good idea. But if we've got some intruders, you have to use that gun, Marceline. You have to. I don't give a care how scared you are, or how good your experience with a gun is, you better use that son of a bitch. Do you understand me?"

"Yes." I said. I lifted a piece of note paper and scanned over the words. "I found a description list." Gerard approached me and looked over the paper with me.

"Grey, festering skin, freezing to the touch, yellowed whites of the eyes, rapid teeth deterioration and rotting gums, brittle bones, slow pace, disoriented, inhuman cries, slurred speech...yep. Perfect zombie material we have here." Gerard said.

"Oh, ew." I frowned in disgust. I finally took the time to inspect the room. There must've been a struggle in this room. Papers and manila files were strewn everywhere, an autopsy table was flipped upside down, operation tools were scattered all over the floor, and there were dark streaks smudged all over the walls.

"This paper said they've named the virus Zombie Fever. How scientific." he laughed. There was a rustling sound again, but it came from the room across from the one we were in. "What the fuck...?" He cautiously neared the exit of the room we were in, motioning for me to stay behind. He quickly poked his head out the door and scanned the hall up and down, the bat ready. "I know you're here, zombie bastard!"

"Shh!" I whispered. "Shut up, idiot!"

"Calm down. Like they're really insulted by name calling. They're fried brains don't process well anymore."

"Just keep your voice down, please!"

Gerard smiled and rolled his eyes at me, turning back to the hall. I pulled the handgun from my purse and held it in front of me. I looked it over, taking in it's compartments. It was cold and heavy in my hands. I had never handled one of these before in my life, so it was a bit nerve racking to have one in my hands at the moment. I was going to ask Gerard for some pointers on how to use it, but when I looked up, he was gone.

"Oh, shit!" I whispered, trying to hold back my fear. "Gerard? Where the hell did you go?" I slowly inched toward the exit, failing to control my shaking. No crying. No shaking. No fear. There was no time for any of that. Just get in, grab all the information I needed, and get out as quickly as possible.

Like Gerard had done, I poked my head out the doorway and looked around the endless hall. I felt like a spy, which made me feel pretty cool and a little excited. I poised my gun like a spy would in the movies and jumped out into the hall. The walls were shielded by a heavy plastic. On the walls were the same streaks, most likely made by fingers and hands covered with blood. An unholy sound echoed through the halls, the same sound I've heard at least two times before. The inhuman roaring...

I tried to block it out, even though it made me scared and nervous as hell. I couldn't tell which direction it was coming from. Suddenly, I saw Gerard running at full speed from the right side of the hall toward me.

"We've got to leave! Now! Let's grab some shit and go!" he said running into the room we came in from. Down the hall I saw the shadow of something slow begin to materialize. The shadow held a lazy posture, it slurred and growled like a demon. When I finally saw it, I ran. I grabbed the papers I'd been looking over and stuffed them in my purse. Then, I followed Gerard out of the window and ran, struggling to put the gun back in my purse.

"Where'd you go?" I asked him, trying to catch my breath. "Why'd you leave me?"

"I told you to stay put!"

"You didn't say you were leaving! You could've been killed!" I began sulking this time. We stopped running once we were blocks away from the research lab and beside a long row of corn stalks. Gerard pulled me into a hug and said nothing.

Freezing rain hit us while we stood on the side of the dirt road. After a while, I felt my cell phone buzz in my purse. I pulled away from Gerard and puled it out.

"My mom's having a cow. We'd better go, now." I said, putting my phone back in my purse and walking ahead of Gerard.

Our town seemed to get emptier and emptier by the second. It was a small town, with a population of about 3,400 people, but now it seemed like it was every bit of 200 people now. How could one virus wipe out an entire town in less than a month? The entire town was eerily deserted now that this plague has come upon us.

I guess all the movies Gerard watches weren't all that fake, especially when it came to zombie attack survival. The disease was somewhat real, the description of the monsters were nearly exact, and they're grouping into mass numbers by the second.

It was time for us to finally group ourselves into a type of army and fight against these monsters. Now is not the time to fear and it's too late to ask questions. Now is the time for survival.