Mwahaha! Look! I actually did something sorta in accordance with the title! Bet you didn't think I would do that, huh? =^_^=Dane looked down with empty soulless eyes. His target had been destroyed, and it hadn't been his doing. He slanted his eyes in disgust at the desecrated pile of what had once been something....no, not something, it had once been someone, then it had turned into something. Now? Now it was barely fit to be considered existing.
Dane sighed, only out of tiredness though. He was always tired, so tired. But, what was he to do? It didn't matter. He had to fix this mess he was in. He hadn’t been able to stop this depraved thing from happening, so now he had to stop it from continuing. He turned and walked away from the pile of unknown ashes or whatever had happened to the thing.
He was tired, his small body ached, and his mind screamed for rest. But it didn't matter what he wanted, it stopped mattering a long time ago. He looked at his small hand; it was no more than a child's. He clenched the small hand into a fist and walked on, ignoring the broken glass that lay on the path, that had once been able to be called a street. He didn't want to look at his reflection; it wasn't like anything ever changed anyways. It was always the same; a small body, belonging to that of a child, and eyes still seemingly large and wide, as if innocence could still exist within them. But it was all a lie. His body never changed, and it never would. Until the day he died, he would be stuck in this form. He had forgotten long ago what it was called, the reason why his body did not grow or become more. He had lived almost long enough to have a grandchild. But still the wide slate grey eyes haunted him, with the dirt and grime darkened locks falling in ragged clumps about his for head and ears, framing his young nine year old face. The only thing that showed his true form was the age in his eyes...
His body went rigid as his hyper sensitive instincts suddenly kicked in. He dropped to the ground and rolled to the right. Half way back to a standing position, he whipped out a pistol from a hidden holster and shot off a rapid round of fire. He didn't stop to look and see if his target had been taken down. Just as fast as he had taken out his gun he whipped out a blade, it shone with a cold light and sliced as if it had been fresh off the whetting stone.
In the time it takes you to blink twice, Dane had sliced and destroyed his assailant. Blood, half blackened, had splattered on his face and now was dripping off of his blade hand. An indescribable corpse lay at his feet. If one were to examine it close enough, one would find that it had once been what would be called human. But L.I.F.E had gotten to it. Lester's. Inphobic. Frantic. Eccles.
Mindless living dead that was in no way predictable like the zombies of kids fighter games or off of horror movies. It didn’t all just want to eat brains or mindless killing. Anything and everything that they did was erratic, and it always ended up in death. Either of an innocent or another LIFE mind.
Dane stiffened, but it was too late, the next thing he knew he felt a tear in the flesh of his shoulder and he was flying across the room. His head hit the wall with a crack. He felt a sudden warm trickle start crawling across his scalp, and heard the roaring sound of his blood rushing in his ears. He sat up and blinked his eyes rapidly, willing them to refocus on his unknown assailant. His heart was beating wildly and his body wasn't responding fast enough for his liking. So, without hesitation, he brought up a second pistol, squeezed his eyes shut, prayed for a lucky shot and.....pulled the trigger.
“What was that?” Kelsey shared a frightened and confused look with her partner. A shot had just been fired, and she didn’t know where it had come from. Last thing she knew, this part of the city had been completely devoid of proper human life. All the ones who had not contracted the disease had been safely evacuated to sanitary safe houses across the nation.
Kelsey bit her lip and fought back tears at the thought of how far this calamity had spread. Just two weeks ago it had been isolated to just a small handful of states, but it hadn’t taken long for the weird LIFE strain to get loose and set the whole country in pieces. Millions had died, and millions were still roving the abandoned places, infected. Sadly, it was only proper to say that thousands were the surviving numbers.
But back to the mystery at present, the gun shot. Where had it come from? And who could have set it off? Kelsey shared another look with her partner, Cale. He had large hazel eyes and a shaggy mop of reddish brown hair crowning his head. He was only in his mid-twenties, but the half haunted look in his eyes made him seem much older. He shrugged his shoulders slowly, as if in response to her unspoken question. Should they check it out or continue on their way? For all the new it was some not completely lost LIFE mind trying to kill itself, or someone else. But, then again, it could be a person in trouble.
Going against the instinct to save herself, Kelsey decided to head in the direction of the shot. She wouldn’t be able to live with herself if she just walked (drove) away and she could’ve helped. Carefully maneuvering her Yaris on the debris filled streets, she made her way to approximately half a block from the direction she had heard the shot come from.
“You sure you’re ok with this?” She asked, turning once more to Cale. He nodded silently and got out of the car, reaching behind the seat and grabbing his sword before closing the door. Kelsey took a breath to steady herself, grabbed her 30mm, and followed Cale’s lead. Moving cautiously, they made their way forward, an old, decrepit looking building looming up in front of them. It had once been what looked like a butcher’s shop? Kelsey wasn’t sure, all she knew was that there was what looked like a few bullet holes in the front glass of the shop. Sure, it was a wild shot, but she had to check there first.
Cale and her moved as one, both ready to protect each other’s fronts and backs. Senses on fire, they jumped through the open door way of the shop, and froze. Kelsey had to stifle a scream of shock, the only sound from Cale though, was a sharp intake of breath.
There, against the far wall, slumped on the floor, was a child, with a LIFE mind slumped across his legs. Without thinking, Kelsey ran to his side, with Cale hard on her heels.
“Leave him,” Kelsey looked up sharply at Cale who was eye the LIFE corpses warily.
“How can you just stand there and say that? He’s a child!” she glared at him and proceeded to check the little boy’s life signs.
“What do you mean, how can I say that? For all we know he could be infected now. Frankly, the best thing to do for the child would be to shoot him where he lays, so he won’t have to go through the horror of becoming a LIFE mind.” Cale ended on a silent note, knowing that it didn’t matter what he said. Kelsey wouldn’t leave the child there, and was likely to shoot him before she let Cale point a gun at the boy.
Cale sighed, “At least give me your gun, blasted woman, you won’t be able to use it, carrying him.”
Kelsey smiled thankfully at him. Once she had ascertained that the child was alive and nothing serious had happened to him, she handed Cale her gun and lifted the boy. He was a weight, but she had dealt with worse.
Cautiously they made their way out of the shop, their senses even more on the alert now. Who knew what would attract a LIFE mind. Once at her car, Kelsey jumped in the front passenger seat with the boy still in her arms and Cale took the wheel. Once seated and strapped, Cale started the ignition and got out of that place as fast as he could without totaling the car.
Once on the out skirts of the town they were able to breathe just a little bit easier. Kelsey looked down at the child in her arms and felt her heart ache. He looked so young and had nasty claw like gashes in his left shoulder. What on earth had he been doing in that god forsaken place? Maybe he had been looking for something. A parent, or sibling? Perhaps any sign of something he once knew. He could’ve been wandering aimlessly in search of who knew what. Luckily for him that he had been able to shoot that gun…The gun! Kelsey mentally kicked herself, how could she have been so stupid as to leave it behind? She and Cale could use all the weaponry they could lay their hands on.
“We almost there?” she asked, looking over at Cale who had been very silent since they had gotten the boy.
“Almost,” was his quiet and closed response. Kelsey winced, she knew not to probe any farther, and she could understand his lack of sentiment. For all she knew she’d have to shoot this child the instant he woke up. It was probably futile, but she couldn’t help but always hope for something good. It’s all she could do to keep her sanity and not just decide to kill herself after all that had happened to this hell wrecked place. Glancing in the rearview mirror, she felt a shudder creep up her spine. Dallas…they had been in the deepest outskirts of that once great and amazing city. Everyone knew about Dallas, and the Dallas Fort Worth metro-plex. Now…now it was a desecrated ruin, over run by filth, animals, and an unknown amount of LIFE minds.
Closing her eyes tightly and hugging the child to her, she tried to suppress the memories from coming back to her. Everything had been so horrible, all the screaming and bloodshed. The children crying and the mother’s screaming in horror. Everyone, everyone and everything. It was…it was so-...
“We’re putting him in a room the instant we get back, got that?” Cale’s quiet voice broke into the swirling ride of terror her mind had been taking her on. She glanced over at him and noticed that he wasn’t as tense anymore and that he had stopped clenching his jaw. She leaned slightly forward and held the child fiercely, hoping, always hoping. Her only response to Cale was a muffled grunt. This child would be ok, he had to be…
Dane came slowly awake. The last thing he remembered was the LIFE mind coming at him and that all he had been able to do was let off a wild shot. Had he hit it?
Consciousness came slowly back to him and with it was confusion. The last place he had been was a dilapidated old butcher’s shop. But as he looked up at the off white ceiling and smelled the (clean?) air. He knew he was not where his memory had left him.
Before doing anything, he slowly flexed his muscles, seeing if there was resistance, when there wasn’t he proceeded to sit himself up slowly. He winced slightly as the bandages shifted on his wound.
Wait..bandages? Looking at his shoulder he felt his eyes widen. Yes, bandages, his arm was bandaged. But, how? Had there been someone else in that pit of hades he had been wandering in? It was then that he noticed his clothes was different. The grey slacks and dirty coal black polo he had been wearing were replaced with clean, slightly worn blue jeans, and a soft cotton button down shirt, which had been left open.
Looking around the space he was in, he noticed it was a small room, a mirror was on the far wall from the bed and there was only a door as a way out. He instantly recognized it to be a rough made holding room. The kind used to test to see if someone had contracted the LIFE strain.
“Hey there you! I see you woke up finally, sleepy head,” Dane’s head snapped around in the direction of the mirror. His eyes widening slightly at the sound of the cheerful woman’s voice.
“Wow, aren’t we a smart one.” The cheery voice continued, “realized where you were instantly, huh?” with the last statement, a light was turned on in the room behind the mirror, and Dane was met with an unexpected and pleasant sight.
A young woman sat on the other side of the glass. Her rich, ebony black hair was cropped just below her ears, and framed her strong, heart shaped face. She had large, almost turquoise colored, eyes, with a small nose nestled gently between them. Her smile was warm and welcoming, and all in all, her whole presence was a shock to Dane.
Someone like that could still exist within the world of carnage he had been living in? He found himself just sitting on the bed, staring at her, at a complete loss for words.
After a few moments of silence, her smile turned a little nervous, and thus she decided to speak again; which only brought more surprise to Dane’s senses. The woman’s voice had a slight drawl to it, with a chipper twist thrown in.
“Sorry you have to be in there by yourself, but it’s only as a safety precaution, we have to make sure you’re alright before we let you out, ok sweetie?
We? She had said we, could that mean she had more people with her, or was she only using the word relatively?
Throwing out any thought of etiquette or manners, Dane spoke straight to the point.
“Do you mean ‘we’ as in there are more than just you watching me? Or perhaps you are only using it relatively? Please, do tell me. Am I dreaming or have I died and once again failed?”
At the sound of his voice, the lady had stiffened slightly, but he saw the strange emotion of relief flit across her face.
“well, you can talk, but what an interesting way for one your age to speak. My, you must’ve been the brightest in your class.”
