Untitled Zombie Apocalypse Parable [language + gore]

[Yoda]

Prologue


Luke awoke in response to the turbulence the plane was experiencing. He checked his watch and, to his disappointment, discovered he'd barely been asleep two hours. It was fairly dark, but he didn't need to press the illumination button to see its digits stating the time was half past twelve in UK time. Time zones had always confused him, so he had no idea what time it was where he was, or where he was at all.


All he knew was that everyone else was asleep and he ought to be, too. But the constant whirring of the engines, with the occasional stutter from the one on the other side of him, were keeping him awake; besides that was the snoring and fidgeting of all the others on the plane. There must've been somewhere between thirty and fifty other people on the plane, and Luke wondered why there were so few present. Luckily, there were no children or wailing babies.


Luke and his family had managed to get onto the row at the escape door nearest the back. Luke was sat on the end near the isle of the three-seat row, and on the other side of the aisle sat his older brother, then his parents. His parents were asleep, but his brother wasn't - and he'd notice Luke wake up. He nodded to him, then closed his eyes and turned over. Luke didn't understand how it was possible to both sleep and listen to music at the same time, however he didn't argue. Everyone was different.


Luke was especially so; not many fifteen-year-olds were outdoors junkies. He loved camping, and he'd go into nearby forest areas to camp almost every weekend. He walked every day, and when he wasn't able to do so he'd be reading survival guides of various titles and situations. Luke even had a small target for using his longbow in his garden. Nature was a love shared by his whole family, and it was what they'd come to the USA all the way from England to do. They were going camping in the Cohutta Wilderness for the week.


His other interest was of zombies. His brother thought it was stupid, but Luke told him that he'd be sorry, and that he'd be the one in trouble, when it happens. Not only was he prepared for nature, but he was also prepared for zombies. An important thing he'd noted was not to have too strong bonds with anyone. Because of this, he wasn't very close to his parents or his brother. But he knew that if there was an outbreak his whole family would rely upon him and he would have to take care of them. They may die, and Luke would have to live with that. Luke had a plan for almost every situation, and he was rather proud of that. He only hoped that he'd be able to put it to use one day.


The engine on the far side of the plane stuttered again. He'd never experienced turbulence this bad before, but he rarely travelled by airplane. Luke was glad his mother was asleep beside the window as she had a fear of flying. In fact, he was rather surprised she'd actually gotten to sleep. He thought the bumping and thrashing of the plane through the cloud-less sky was enough to keep anyone awake. Luke reminded himself that sleeping was difficult in his own bed, he must have been exaggerating. He slowly allowed his eyes to close, taking over his consciousness.


Suddenly, as if he'd only been asleep for a minute or so, all the lights came on. The pilot's voice was speaking into his machine, telling us something about an inability to contact the Hartfield Jackson airport in Atlanta, and that they were going to land in Chattanooga Metropolitan airport instead. They'd almost landed but decided against it, and instead contacted the other airport and decided to land there instead as the pilot wasn't sure what was going on in Atlanta. He finished saying that the plane was going to increase its height a little more as it was fairly low.


At that point, the man near the window to Luke's left had groaned and obscenity at the pilot, half-asleep. He'd probably chosen the best seat in case of an emergency as he was able to jump out of the plane if needed. His mother had an equally useful position, although he doubted his mother's willpower to make such a jump. There was an empty seat between Luke and the man, but after studying and memorizing the safety slip repetitively for about an hour out of boredom, he knew that if the plane crashed he'd need to be correctly positioned to keep safe; not lying over two seats for sleep.


The lights were turned off again and Luke decided that he may as well put his feet up onto the chair beside him, so he did.


This time, however, he would not get the chance to sleep, as almost instantly after an enormous stutter of the engine on the other side of the plane the lights had returned. The entire plane felt as if it were tipping downwards, and the few passengers on the plane began panicking. Luke sat correctly.


Luke's mother awoke with a start and began gasping. She was the only one doing so, but it was evident that something was seriously wrong on the plane. His father forced himself into calming her down, but she wouldn't stop. The pilot's voice once again appeared over the passengers' heads. The plane was beginning to balance.


"Ladies and Gentlemen, I'm very sorry to have disturbed you once again, but I would like to ask you to ensure that your seatbelts are securely tied. We are going to have to make an eme-"


The plane made some whirring and crashing noises and tipped a fair amount to the left. It must've been the engine on that side of the plane finally dying. Luke knew it didn't sound healthy.


"An emergency landing as soon as possible. Please could the cabin crew remain seated and not attempt to help passengers. We suggest all passengers refer to the safety slip in the seat in front of you to ensure a safe landing. We're going to land in the Cohutta a Wilderness." There was no further commandment from the pilot. Chaos was present throughout the front of the plane, however towards the rear end, where Luke and his family were, the mood was not so intense. The man to Luke's right was sweating.


Luke turned to his left to see that his brother was trying to get his attention. He held out a book to him: the Zombie Survival Guide. Luke took it everywhere and could recite almost all its contents. For the plane journey, he'd allowed his brother to read it, and he was returning it to him at the worst time possible. Luke slid it down the side of his chair in hope that it wouldn't ruin or go missing in the crash.


Although he had a few minutes to spare, Luke was already in the safety position suggested. He stared at the simple, repetitive patterns of red and blue on the carpet at his feet. With another shake of the plane and a scream of his mother, he pulled his belt a little tighter. He remembered that G-force was tripled every centimetre of slack there was. He told his brother, then his brother told their parents.


Luke was surprisingly calm. He must've been the only calm one on the plane. The man by the window to his right was out of his seat, retrieving his bag. Luke wondered why, as sitting with a bag strapped to his back would be difficult. Not only that, but he was also in a rush. Luke thought he'd explain the situation to him.


"Sir, the plane isn't going to land for a while, and why have you got your bag?" He had to raise his voice a little, as the worry at the front of the plane was fairly loud.


"I'm not waiting for the plane to land, kiddo." The man shook his head adamantly.


Luke realised the man's intentions and a wave of panic surged through him. "Sir, you're not supposed to jump out! You'll die of the fall. You're more likely to survive on the plane, honest." Luke was doing his best to convince the man not to open the escape door beside him. His father didn't have his seatbelt on yet as he was trying to get the oxygen out of the ceiling for his wife.


As the man turned there was another heavy bump from the engine on Luke's left and a gasp from his mother. Then there was complete silence from it. The man had fallen over, landing in the middle of the aisle.


"What was that?" The man asked, worried.


"That was probably the engine fa- nothing." Luke realised too late that he was scaring the man even more.


"Fuck this!" The man shouted, getting up.


Luke knew he wouldn't be able to stop him, so he instead shouted: "Seatbelts!" Luckily, his father heard him and sat down immediately. His mother, along with some other women towards the front, started screaming again.


The man was in a black and white suit with a pair of bright-white, expensive-looking trainers; probably on a business trip somewhere. Now, however, he wouldn't reach whichever meeting he was going for. The plane was still a long way from the ground. If he somehow survived the jump and, say, landed in a tree, he'd be stuck out there in the night. He'd certainly be wounded and in need of treatment, and nobody would be able to help him. Also, he'd be lost in many miles of forest and mountainous wildlife, unable to find his way to civilisation.


Being as he was a businessman of some sort, Luke doubted his chances of survival. His high forehead and receding hairline were drenched with sweat. Luke remembered that the man more than likely would not be able to breathe due to air pressure, and he'd be very cold.


That reminded Luke that he would also not be able to breathe and he reached up to summon an oxygen mask. He extended his foot to trip up the man to buy him a little more time, shouting: "Oxygen masks!" He was lucky he remembered.


"Fuck you! I'm getting out of here!" The man screamed at him. It shocked Luke a little: people were stupid when they were afraid. His mother was still gasping the oxygen from her mask, despite not needing to. He wondered why she was afraid of airplanes. He hoped that she wouldn't be afraid of zombies, too. By that point, all of Luke's family were watching with anticipation. He noticed that his father hadn't put his mask on yet, so he moved his hand up to remove his mask in order to talk to him, but it was too late. The man had grabbed the hatch.


It didn't open. The man stepped back, gasping for air, then shouted obscenities at the door, kicking at it. Luke's mother was screaming, but she slowed after she saw he couldn't open it. She may have been hyperventilating, although Luke couldn't tell. His father was safe, luckily. All the passengers were still filled with panic, running up and down the aisles to be with loved ones and to trouble the flight attendants.


The man swore again, then sat in his chair and put his head between his legs. Luke noticed that the man didn't have his seatbelt on, so he told him what he knew about G-force and slack. He then continued by wondering what would happen when one wasn't wearing a seat belt at all, and the man told him to shut the fuck up rather angrily. Luke didn't reply; instead he returned to the patterns between his feet. They were thin, yellow, horizontal stripes going through a red-and-blue background. In order to pass the time, he counted the number of yellow stripes from the heel of his boots to their tips. He was oblivious to the panic occurring throughout the rest of the plane. Luke was calm.


He returned to reality as the pilot spoke into the speakers: "Ladies and Gentlemen, we will be landing in about two minutes. Please brace for impact."

 

[Yoda]

Chapter 1



Until they landed, Luke decided it was best if he didn't communicate with anyone. He closed his eyes and waited, still in his braced position. Initially he could hear his mother wailing, the man to his right breathing heavily - despite his anger at Luke, it seemed he understood that Luke knew what he was doing and followed his lead, copying the way he sat - and the few others on the plane Luke didn't know were either singing, praying, crying, or a mixture of the crying with one of the other two. Luke tried not to focus on that, because he didn't want to listen to people die.


Within about a minute Luke had managed to tune out of the chaos surrounding him, and was listening solely to the hum of the only working engine. He was relaxing a fair amount, and he felt he may even be able to go to sleep like that. To help concentrate on other things, he imagined a planet without human constructs. It had no cities, villages or buildings at all. The only person in the world was Luke.



He was in his forest, longbow by his side, walking along his favourite track. It was the most open part; where, in the earliest part of Autumn, he would camp out in the very middle of an open area surrounded with trees. A small track over the roots of trees would lead to there - the deeper one went into this forest, the more vibrant the colours of the leaves on the floor and above him. It was rather thick; one couldn't see the sky through the treetops, but the sun was able to come through onto the ground. It was magical.



The exception to this was the centre of the open area, in which the sun would shine through and shroud his tent, but a decent amount of sky could be seen. Luke always pitched his tent right in the middle, but not only so the sun could glow onto it, but so he could stare up into space at night. There was no industry, no cars, no other lights than his torch there: he could admire the stars' true beauty uninterrupted. The human race affected stars they couldn't reach, stars the were light-years away. Stars that could already be dead, and humans preserving them was the opposite of the truth.



But in both Luke's imaginary and the real world, the stars remained glistening in the pitch darkness of the sky. Luke would stare at them for hours, and he was doing so on the planet he had created. He didn't try to count them or remember constellations, that was pointless; he accepted them. The one thing Luke didn't categorize or memorize was the stars.



Not too far from this small open area was another sublime place: Luke would take a small track through the thickest part of the trees, through the brambles and stinging nettles to get to his other favoured part of the forest. It was on its edge, and in early Summer Luke would spend most Friday and Saturday evenings there. He would lean himself against a tree and allow himself to slide down a small, grassy decline into a field. On the other side of the field, the sun set. Colours were thrown onto the clouds like the sun had spilled paint onto them. Red, orange pink, purple, yellow and blue all mixed together to make one amazing mess in the sky. In Luke's world, every day was a Friday or a Saturday, and every season was Spring.



Luke wasn't ready for the landing, it shocked him out of his daydream and back into reality. As the plane hit the ground he heard the final screams of each passenger before their deaths. It had landed towards Luke's mother's side, meaning they'd feel the impact most. He wondered if their deaths would be painful as well as horror-filled. He hoped it was quick and that whichever god took them away did so peacefully.



Luke was being pushed and pulled by the plane's velocity against the friction of the Earth's ground and trees that were being ripped from their roots. He closed his eyes and tried to reach his dream world once again; but the screams and the crashes and the various other horrible noises kept him there. He couldn't escape, and listening to the suffering alone was more painful than the physical damage that could be caused to him.



Everything became cold the moment contact was made with the ground. It must have destroyed the plane's body and made a hole into the plane. The fresh night air forced itself into Luke's lungs as he realized he'd been holding his breath since he began daydreaming. The dream itself felt like years, Luke had completely lost track of time. In fact, Luke had no idea for how long the plane had been dragging along the ground. He wondered how bad the initial malfunction must've been in order to cause the crash.



As the plane began to slow, Luke noticed it begin to tilt forwards. I gained momentum and Luke figured it was going downhill. It picked up speed, and the volume of the passengers increased from their sighs and moans of relief to gasps and shouts of further fear. It wasn't over. As one final kick to the stomach, the plane had began to slide down a hill. Before the plane hit too high a velocity, it crashed, hurling the passengers forward. Luke felt his weight shift entirely onto his belt. The plane was almost vertical, he realised after a few moments of hanging.



He needed to understand his situation before taking any action. For the first time in a long while, Luke opened his eyes. The carpet was still exactly the same. Still the same pattern, still the same stripes. His feet, however, were suspended in the air. He moved his hands from around his knees and put them on the armrests to support himself. He shivered.



Lifting his head he saw what was really going on: people hanging by their stomachs from their loosened Seatbelts like ragdolls; an air hostess lay on the wall beside the door to the cabin. As Luke began to study the blood protruding the back of her head onto the brilliant white of the inside of the plane, a man fell past him. He was one of the two one seat behind him, and as he fell by Luke rather inelegantly the woman who had sat beside him called out a name. The man himself was also shouting out some words he didn't hear properly. It was at that point Luke realised he was temporarily deafened.



He continued to watch the man fall. His leg was caught between seats two rows in front of him and it appeared to bend in some way it was not meant to. His face, although difficult for Luke to see, was blooded at the nose - he must've knocked it against a seat as he fell by. His mouth was open and he seemed immense pain. Luke looked to his right and saw the man in the business suit undoing his seatbelt. He landed on the row of seats a little in front of him, but he would not have not have been able to do this had his row not been beside a door. He landed rather soundly, however struggling to balance correctly. He moved over to below Luke.



He was going to climb down the aisle by the chairs, and Luke wondered if anyone would land on him from above. He could still faintly hear the woman crying behind him. She sounded like Luke's mother. His mother! Luke looked left.



It was there that the hole in the plane happened; Luke felt a chill. He looked to where his mother was sat, but instead of a seat with a panicking woman he saw nothing. It was as if her seat had been removed from the plane by a digger. She had gone, and Luke doubted her chances of still being alive somehow. Her oxygen mask hung along the ceiling from one chord; the other broken off. Luke bet that the engine had disconnected from the wing when the plane crashed, dragging into its side and forming a giant tear.



Luke, still in shock, continued along the row: his father's seat was still there but he was not. He must have fallen out at the same time as his mother. He supposed that was a suitable fate - the two dying together - but he knew that at that point he was barely thinking correctly. Both his parents were dead and he'd barely reacted. He felt like an outsider looking into the plane through a window. Before looking at his brother, Luke turned to his right and, blurring, saw a small amount of light in the distance. He couldn't tell if it was fire or the sun.



He slowly span his head around and saw the man peeking down the aisle, preparing himself to climb down. Luke doubted he'd want to climb past the man with the broken leg, and he thought the man may die needlessly if he tried to. Half-thinking, Luke tapped the man on the head with his foot, then lobbed his copy of the Zombie Survival Guide towards the door. The man watched this, then nodded frantically in thanks. His face was still red and sweat-covered, his suit must be ruined. As the man fiddled with the door handle, Luke looked to his brother.



Luke's brother was in the same position as Luke: holding himself up with his arms by pushing against the armrests. He was staring directly forward, obviously in more shock than Luke. Wondering at what he was staring with such fear, Luke looked to the seats below his brother and saw precisely what it was: a severed leg.



Luke accidentally let go of the armrests in shock and fell onto the seatbelt. The feeling of falling through the air returned him from shock, and he was now aware of all that was going on. People were screaming and gurgling. Lights were flickering and sparks were jumping from them. Two seats in front of him, a man was hanging by his leg in between chairs. Luke undid his belt and landed on the seat below him, about to help his brother down. The chair collapsed below him, landing onto the next chair. That chair did not collapse, but it knocked the man free.



What he did when he landed on the air hostess was something Luke didn't know how to react to: he began to bite into the woman's arm, ripping the flesh and ligaments away.

 

[Yoda]

Chapter Two

Nobody else had noticed what the man had began to do, and Luke could've stared down that aisle for eternity, watching his dream come true bite by bite. When the woman sat behind Luke tried to climb by him, however, he had to look up. The drop from the seat below her and Luke's chair's new location looked extremely dangerous. Before he had time to move out of her way she had fallen, grabbing onto Luke's chair, horror and despair flooding the makeup from around her eyes.


Unluckily, she didn't land safely. For a moment she was able to suspend her upper boddy by grabbing onto Luke's chair, but it quickly began slipping out onto the aisle. As this happened, he span and jumped onto the other chairs beside him, landing on his front and almost jumping into the man in the suit. The woman had grabbed Luke's leg as the seat fell from beneath her and onto another person in a Hawaiian-style T-shirt attempting to climb down. That person gave way to the chair above them, and whoever else in the way was pushed downwards, crushed.



Despite hearing those screams, Luke had another thing to concentrate on. The woman's grasp began to slip; she would fall onto the panic at the cabin door if he waited any longer before helping her. He used his right hand to grab the chair he was on, then looked down and lowered his left hand to try and grab the woman's. She was too close to his foot, he'd have to release his right hand and spin around to grab her.



He waited a moment to plan out his actions, then: he released the chair below him and span around onto his front; he sat up and extended both his arms to grab the woman's wrist, slipping out into the aisle unstoppably. He'd got her hand in his, but at this rate they were both going to fall. As they slipped over the edge, Luke hoped he wouldn't die too painfully.



The man in the suit had decided that neither of them would die, it seemed. He had put his arms between Luke's and pulled him back up, giving the woman time to hold onto the seat and begin to bring herself to safety. After Luke was safe, the man proceeded to help the woman to her feet.



She didn't seem much older than 25, although Luke could never tell a person's age. He decided instead to ask their names, as it was easier than discerning them by their appearance. Neither wanted to answer him, and the man said they'd get out of trouble first. He picked up his bag and tried to open the door with the woman sat in the corner wailing. Luke looked up and saw his brother still sat staring at the leg, his face a pale white, and his headphones still in his ears.



"Ben!" Luke called out his name, but he didn't reply. It was going to be hard for Luke to jump up to grab him or get his attention, so he left him be for a moment. He wasn't moving to anywhere - he was still staring at the severed leg. It was their father's leg. Luke looked away and focused on helping the man open the door.



The woman was sat beside it with her head in her hands, probably crying. The man asked Luke why everyone was so panicked although the plane had crashed and the threat was over while he looked out of the window. When Luke told him that people were turning into zombies, the man turned from the window, and told him not to joke arou- his face went from angry to horrified. The woman looked at the man and screamed. She got up, pushed Luke out of the way and jumped down into the aisle.



People did stupid things when they were afraid. The man motioned after her, but he was too slow. After her screams had stopped, he peeked over the edge of the chair and saw someone ripping her neck open with their teeth; he put his hand over his mouth, probably about to be sick. While he did this, Luke had opened the door but didn't have the strength to push it open. He waited for the man to finish whatever he was doing: something like his mum's fast breathing. Luke wondered why they hadn't simply left the plane from the hole beside his brother.



Luke waited for the man to face Luke, and said, "My name's Luke." He offered his hand, and for a moment the man stared at it as if he didn't know what to do with it. The man, rather unsure of himself, told Luke his name was John and hurriedly shook his hand. John took another peek over the edge, probably checking however many there were down there devouring each other. He asked Luke if they'd get up to them and he said they wouldn't.



As John span around, grabbing the baggage compartment which was now no longer attached to what they perceived as the ceiling but to the side of the plane to pull him towards the door, Luke decided that getting his bag was just as important to their survival as getting out of the plane. He looked up and saw that it'd be very tricky to open the hatch to get it. He told John that they should go out through the hole in the plane beside his brother. John remarked something similar to "screw that, then" to the door and looked up at Luke's brother and the leg Ben was staring at.



To Luke's surprise, John jumped across, pulled himself up and was standing underneath Ben before Luke could tell him how dangerous it was. Ben was still staring down at the leg on the chair beside John. Ben gasped when John, rather drastically, kicked the leg over the side. As if he had awoken from a nightmare, Ben was covered in sweat - although the air coming through the hole in the plane was chilling. He accidentally released his grasp on the side of the seat and allowed his seatbelt to punch into his guts.



He was sick, and he would have covered John in it had he not jumped to the side. In fact, John almost fell out of the plane, but he grabbed onto the armrest of Luke's father's chair above him. Ben undid his seatbelt, landed on his hands and knees in the mess he'd created, and gasped for air. John was looking out through the side of the plane, most probably to find the easiest way down. Ben was shivering.



Luke, now alone on his side of the plane, looked down to the ever-continuing chaos. Bodies - and zombies - were piling up near the bottom, and Luke was sure that falling down would be a death trap. He didn't think jumping over to them would be a good idea anyway; he could push John or Ben out if the plane by accident, or he could miss and fall down to the bottom. Yes, it would make more sense to get out on his side and meet the other two round the front of the plane or something.



He called to John: "John! Take Ben outside and meet me at the front of the plane! I've got to get my bag!"



For the first time since the crash, Ben looked at Luke. He was about to cry, but Luke wasn't sure how to respond. Ben shook his head, but was pulled from his fearful gaze when John put the coat-part of his suit onto Ben's shoulders. Ben turned and regarded him with thanks, then they turned and began to climb out of the plane. This was where the difficult part began for Luke. He had to both open the escape door and get his bag from the overhead compartment without falling onto a pile of undead.



Firstly, Luke looked down; they would be unable to climb up, but it didn't seem as if anything would survive falling down. The woman that Luke and John had tried to help was laid face up at the top of the pile, zombies around her scoffing her intestines and neck. Mixtures of makeup and blood covered her face. She still had fear in her eyes.



Once again, Luke found his mind wondering down the aisle to the people who once inhabited the bodies crawling around the lowest part of the plane. Maybe they were like him at some point, maybe they were nice. But they'd died, which means they might have been afraid; and if they were afraid they would not be able to survive properly. Now, Luke had the advantage: he would survive where others would not because Luke knew what he was doing and he was not afraid.



He was startled when another living human showed herself: a young girl, who appeared Luke's age, dressed in a blue fleece and waterproof trousers. She span around her seat and grabbed onto the overhead compartment, pulling her rucksack out. It was almost as if she were the same as Luke, but female. Once she had her bag, she slung it around her back. The closest exit to her was beside Luke, so she prepared to start climbing up.



Luke's first instinct was to turn away so she wouldn't see him, but she already had done. She was about eight rows below him and was climbing impressively. Nobody followed her and nobody led her: she was alone. Luke readied himself to help her up as he had nothing else to do. She could help him get his bag afterwards. A few of the dead at the bottom had noticed her and were reaching up rather menacingly, however she was many rows above them.



There was further threat, however, because a hand had clenched the girl's arm. Luke couldn't tell if it was an undead or a living person, but after a second or so of struggling to push it away, the girl span around, leaning onto the opposite seat, and kicked whatever it was a few times. She hesitated for a moment, waiting for it to move - it did not. She continued climbing as if nothing had happened, and when she reached Luke he pulled her up.



She asked him if he could open the door, to which he responded with "almost".

"What're you waiting for, then?" she asked.

"What's your name?" Luke countered. After this he'd ask her if she'd help get his bag - she seemed like a candidate for his group, too. Although where he was at this point it'd be hard for him to pick members - and considering his age he doubted he'd take charge of any adults.

"Name's Amy," she responded. She had the first American accent he'd heard on the journey so far; John's was plain English like Luke's and Ben's. Amy dropped her bag onto the chair below her feet and began push at the door. Luke told her his name and asked if she'd help him get his bag down.



Amy jumped across to the other side of the aisle and supported her hand on the luggage compartment above Luke. "Is this it?" Luke nodded and stood with one leg on both sides of the aisle, ready to catch the bag. As she opened the compartment the lights went off.

 

[Yoda]

Chapter 3


For a moment, the ever-continuing moans of the zombies were finally given their time to be heard properly. They were without breath or, at least, at differing intervals of stopping. It was hard to understand what the moans were like emotionally - they sounded empty but with some sorrow - regardless, it sounded to Sam like she'd heard them do in movies. There were no more screams. Only moaning and the squelching of a woman's guts being shoved down a hungry undead's throat. The chill of the outside made Sam's hairs rise; the cold is colder in darkness, and no sweaters could prevent that.


Sam had managed to keep the bag from falling out of the compartment by slamming it shut as soon as the lights went off. Suddenly, everything felt bigger - there was more space for her to fall, and to be eaten alive. She hoped she wouldn't be, because she wanted to save her parents who were in Atlanta. It was more than likely a long shot by now, she thought, but it was something to live for.



Sam's History, English, and a few other teachers, whom she didn't like very much, had taken her to England along with about fifteen peers for a big school trip. They'd gone to visit England and had travelled across the country, however Sam's father had been taken ill after a car crash - some idiot standing in the middle of the road at night - and Sam was bought a flight home by her parents. Obviously someone had to go with her, so the English teacher had also been bought a ticket. However, she was more than likely dead, as a chair had landed on her as she was trying to climb up the aisle to an exit.



Sam took that as a warning and decided it'd be safe for the passengers to complete their shenanigans before she put herself at risk. So she waited for hours in her mind, listening to the screams and the shouts and the crying. It was horrible, but she had to let it by else she'd end up like Mrs. Stewart. She remembered seeing the bloodied face of the first man fall by. He'd probably not been in whatever the safety position was called when the crash happened.



Sam had been, and so had Mrs. Stewart; the difference was that Sam wasn't panicked. Sam knew what she was doing. Of course she was scared - the first zombie she saw was in the opposite row: head twisted around, nose broken, staring into her eyes hungrily - but she would be safe if she stayed calm and wasn't fearful. The zombie with the broken neck had tried to reach out to her, and had been the entire time Sam was sat there, but it was in the furthest seat and its belt was holding it back. Sam tried not to pay attention to it.



Once there was no more screaming, Sam checked to see if anything was coming down from above her: she saw the face of a boy staring to the bottom of the plane. She looked down and saw why he was in so much awe - there was a pile of bodies, all waving their arms around, clawing at one body at the top. The female body had been torn apart and the undead were devouring her. Sam could see the fear still in her eyes, the only part of her not covered in blood.



As Sam climbed up the rows of seats, a hand grabbed her. The undead was strapped into its seatbelt, but it was beside the aisle and therefore able to reach her. Without thinking, Sam did what she thought she had to do, and after she had kicked it in the head a few times she stopped; she had just killed someone. It was a zombie, but it had used to be someone. When she thought of it, it didn't matter because it was dead properly now. Amy turned away and continued to climb.



The boy helped her up when she reached the top - he was dressed similarly to her, but she seemed more in-control than him. She'd become acquainted with him once they were out of the plane, she thought to herself. This didn't happen, as he insisted on knowing her name before they got anything done - and now Sam was suspended above a narrow drop to a horrible death.



She hadn't adjusted to the sudden change in light, but it seemed Luke had; he spoke slowly and calmly:

"I'm still here, don't worry. You can drop the bag and I'll catch it, then I'll get my torch to help you down." He sounded assuring to Sam, so she dropped the bag down, then noticed there was another one in the compartment before she could stop it falling onto Luke. She called for him to watch out, and tightly shut her eyes even though she could barely see anything.



She didn't hear him fall. After a few seconds of more moaning, Luke said: "That was close." rather anti-climatically. Sam sighed. She hoped he could join her group. She thought about what her group would do - would she try to help as many people as possible? It seemed logical to help herself before others, and this would be easier now society didn't expect her to be giving or anything else towards other people. She could be whoever she liked, for two reasons: there was no society anymore; nobody knew her. Sam didn't have to be the Sam she used to be.



Not that she thought that there was anything wrong with herself. In fact, she thought she'd be Sam more than she was before - besides, she thought solidarity was suited to the situation. She wondered if Luke was the same, but she hoped they could survive together. He looked as if he were similar to her.



Luke had thrown both bags to the seats beside him and got the torch from his bag. Without warning, he turned it on and aimed it at Sam's face. She looked away and laughed, "Hey, I wasn't ready." Luke told her that her brother was outside and they needed to hurry, so she climbed down to beside Luke on the seats and got her torch out. She, mirroring Luke, pointed the light from her torch into his face and he grinned.



Sam put her backpack on and jumped over to the seats opposite. She asked Luke if his brother had gone out through the hole behind her, and he nodded. Luke said he'd follow her out, so she left him and jumped onto the steep, pine forest floor, holding onto a young tree for balance. She saw the shadows of a man and a boy with their hands up in submission near the front of the plane, although she couldn't see why. She hurriedly crept along the side of the plane to see what they were doing.



Luke lit the bottom of the plane with torchlight. The undead looked so much more menacing in the almost-darkness. Luke shivered with excitement. It had actually happened. He'd only dreamed that something like this would happen. Of course, the circumstance was rather one he wouldn't have chosen, however he could work around it. He had already approximated himself and his brother into a group of four.



His parents had died instantly, more than likely, which was what Luke had wanted - Ben didn't. Luke hoped Ben would be strong, because he would need to. The rest of his group seemed fairly able; Sam would definitely be fun and useful, John seemed to have began to trust Luke after he tried to get out of the plane. Luke didn't know why John had changed so quickly, but he wasn't going to argue - he'd already saved him and helped Ben.



Luke shivered again. This time he was scared because he wanted to keep his brother safe. Luke had been thinking stupidly: he needed a reason to live other than survival. He needed someone or some people to keep safe. There'd be no point otherwise; he may as well die from starvation or something minor. He was going to help his group and they were going to survive. He smiled, then finished his daydream as the lights returned.



This would be the difficult part for Luke, he'd managed to avoid it so far. He felt nervous while he hopped over the gap onto the seats beside him. This was the part that, in most stories he'd read, that most people would die. The first weeks would be the hardest. The bits after that were emotionally challenging, but he could handle those. They'd be easy. In fact, he thought he'd have the most fun on foot in the lifeless, stock-filled towns clearing hundreds of undead.



Luke jumped out onto the steep pine forest floor, holding onto a tree for balance. He looked down the plane to find Sam and the others and saw Sam crouched by the corner of its nose as if she was hiding. He hurriedly crept down the side of the plane to beside her and asked why she was hiding. She told Luke that there was "a man pointing a shotgun at your brother and another guy. I guess it was your brother, anyway."



Luke asked Sam where they were now and she said that he'd taken them through the clearing around the base of the hill and onto a path into the forestry. He knew what they had to do; "Well, uh, let's go after them, then."



Unarmed, the two of them knew they were taking quite a risk, but Luke wasn't going to let Ben die and Sam wasn't going to let her only help getting to her parents die. Torches in hand, the two were prepared - although without weapons - for any walkers that attacked, but supposing their location Luke didn't think they'd have that problem. Whoever was holding Ben captive would be.



Sam, beginning to feel the effect of jet lag, trudged at a decent pace alongside Luke, swishing her torch's light from side to side. She'd almost completely zoned out by when she heard what must've been the man's gun go off. Sam and Luke began to run, still across the winding, pine-strewn ground as if it went on forever.



When he was camping, Luke didn't usually move around much at night. He wasn't afraid, but he knew its dangers. He knew that there could be anything dangerous that he'd see in daylight - besides, why travel at night when one could travel during the day, where they could see, instead? No, Luke preferred staying still. Once he'd rescued Ben and John, he would find them somewhere to sleep.



He thought to himself; the man with the gun had to live somewhere around the plane's crash site, considering the time it took him to reach the plane. Maybe he had a cabin: that'd be useful. But, for some reson, he had not expected his brother or John to be killed. The gun should have gone off twice, he thought - two rounds for two people.



Sam and Luke turned a corner to find an almost-old man undead, a bullet wound in his chest. John had probably snatched the gun off him and shot, then left him. Sam stopped a few feet from it as it began to drag itself over to her. "What do we do with it?" she asked. She saw Luke had already gone around it, so she followed him.

"Leave it. We're not far from them now."

 

[Yoda]

Chapter 4


Continuing along the muddy path, Luke remembered that he probably should have taken what he needed from the man. He was sure there would have been a few cartridges for the man's gun or something like that. He could have taken the man's coat for Ben or John. It didn't matter, because Luke was sure the man must have some kind of home or tent around where they were. Him, Sam and the others could get clothes and whatnot from there.


After they turned a corner, the two came across what Luke had expected - a decently small, wooden lodge on a low decking. A picturesquely typical hut, Sam thought. She would have liked to live somewhere like that with her parents, but they preferred city life. Or, at least, their jobs required it. Sam wouldn't have minded them having such high-paying jobs had they not put so much stress between her and them. They weren't able to help arrange trips to places; let alone go on them. That meant Sam wasn't able to leave the house much, and although she was allowed out into the neighbourhood she didn't really enjoy spending time there.



Screams came from inside the house as Luke and Sam tiptoed towards it. When beside the steps up to the decking, they waited, hidden, for the shouts and screams to end. Luke guessed John had scared a woman in there. Luke hoped he wouldn't shoot her, he'd scare Ben. On the other hand, Ben needed to see what the world would be like. He would slow down the group if he wasn't going to act effectively. This may only be an initial panic on his part, Luke thought.



Then they heard the sound of a gunshot. It was different to the one they'd heard earlier, which meant it was a different gun. The woman had a gun, too! Luke jumped up the steps to beside the wide-open door, still hidden. After that, there was another shot from the same gun. She must have killed them both. Luke suddenly felt misery inside him. He didn't show it to Sam as she moved to the other side of the door and switched off her torch.



As Luke switched off his to avoid being seen, the shotgun fired a round. That meant that one of them were alive. Luke turned on his torch again and ran into the house, calling Ben's name. Sam didn't follow him, instead she closed her eyes and hoped there wouldn't be another gunshot. After a few moments, she heard Luke and two other talking, and assumed they were safe. Once she was inside, she shut the door and flicked the light switch beside the door. The lights didn't come on.



Sam turned her torch on and shone it around the hallway she had entered. The floors and walls had similar boarding - simple vertical planks. Looking over the picture frames upon the wall, Sam thought that the people who lived here must have been happy. In one, a man is wearing full hunting gear and is holding his rifle at an object behind the camera. That must have been the man who had been shot. Because she didn't like the idea of killing living people, Sam hoped he had deserved to die. And what was probably his wife. She hoped they had butchered some people, or did something else only a maniac would do.



Beside the door to the room Luke and the others were in, a deer's head was placed on the wall. That, Sam unwillingly concluded, would have to be enough of a reason for the man to have died, even if it didn't really satisfy her. He was a hunter and killed innocent things, and his wife encouraged it. Yes. She had almost convinced herself.



Sam walked into the house's living room to find Luke, a man and a boy a little older than Luke. To her surprise, the man - who was sat on a sofa, his head in his hands - jumped to his feet and raised a shotgun. As he aimed it to her head from about ten feet away, fear nudged the torch from out of her hands and she stood silently. The torch hit the carpet with a small yet dense thud.



Sam didn't really know what to do, or what to think of. She was about to be killed. In fact, she couldn't even imagine anything else to think of other than nothing. She even tried imagining a rubber duck, but it was nabbed by a zombie and bitten in half. After deciding that was quite strange, she stopped trying to think of anything. Sam stood still as the man walked over to being directly in front of her. Luke watched in silence, his brother watched in silence. For moments, there was no noise at all, then the sound of heavy gunfire and explosions came.



As a fairly near explosion drew the attention of the man, Sam took advantage of the opportunity to survive. While the man looked out of the window, distracted, Sam pushed the shotgun's barrel from her face. Instinctively, the man fired, and the lead sprayed onto the room's wall. The man's grasp on the gun was weak, and after Sam had rocked away from the gun she threw herself onto it, knocking it from his hands and onto the floor; where on top of it she landed.



The gun went off beside her head, causing temporary deafness in both her ears: there was painful ringing in the ear to the side the gun fired. Sam examined the floorboards, still laid over the gun. She counted the number of lines each had - the lines that determined the age of a tree. She was sure there was another name for them, but she didn't know it. She felt rather relaxed, and although Luke had shouted her name and was worried for her safety, she felt as if she were unable to end the trance she had put herself into.



Luke ran over to Sam after calling out her name to no response. He kneeled beside her face-down body and shook her shoulders. There was no blood. Luke put his ear beside her face to hear her breathe, and she did. He sighed with relief, sat up, and told John that she was with them and that she'd be part of the group.



"What the fuck are you talking about? Group? You think we're going to stay together just because we got out of the plane? Jesus, kid, as soon as day comes I'm out of here."



Luke stared at him blankly. After another moment or so of silence, Ben stood up, walked over to John and grabbed his collar: "You have seen them, right? They're zombies. The kind that fucking eat you. You think you can survive on your own? You think all your friends and family are okay? Well, they're not. You're not going to find them and live happily ever fucking after. They're dead and we're all you've got right now. And you're all we've got, our parents just-." Ben frowned at Sam, then Luke. Luke knew he was regarding their dead parents, but he'd swelled up with tears before he could finish his sentence. Ben turned away.



John, startled by Ben's surprising change of behaviour, simply said: "I- I'm sorry." Luke was as shocked as John was. Ben was rarely defiant and usually rather polite and democratic regarding disagreements - but because everything was different, Ben could be, too. Ben returned to the sofa.



Luke span Sam around, onto her front, and seemingly she awoke from sleep. She sat up, initially discomforted, then glad. Luke picked up the shotgun, moved it aside, and helped Sam up. She told him she couldn't hear from one ear, and that she could barely do so with the other. Luke helped her over to the sofa beside Ben, picked up the shotgun and suggested to John that they search the house. Luke told him that he'd take the shotgun just in case, but he doubted there would be any more people to deal with.



The two nervously went by the sofa and picked up Sam and Luke's torches. Luke liked this bit - searching seemingly empty houses for supplies. On TV, searching empty houses in the dark is how people died; but he was sure that nobody else was in the house. In the hallway, he double-checked that the door was closed, then took a glance at the pictures upon the wall. Primarily, it was two fairly old people, both of which looked like the people that had attacked them. John reminded Luke that there was still a dead woman in the living room, so they went back to it, dropped the torches and the gun, and carried it outside. Luckily, it had been a very accurate headshot, but it didn't look all that pleasant. They didn't want to leave it too close to the house as it'd attract zombies, he explained to John. They threw it to some shrubbery on the edge of the clearing the house was in.



It was almost daytime, meaning that it'd be the right time to travel - but the four of them were all jet-lagged, and Sam had something wrong with her ear. While they were returning to the house from a hedge nearby, Luke asked John how tired he was. He was knackered, so Luke decided to take first watch. He wiped the blood from his hands onto his trousers, carried a rocking chair outside and sat in it with the shotgun cradled on his lap. He watched the sun rise.



Luke awoke to the sound of an explosion somewhere in the city. He couldn't see it through the forest, but he could tell which direction it was in by the massive cloud of smoke in the sky to his left, where the sound of the explosions had come from. The day was clear, and if he looked to his right everything looked normal. It all could have been a dream. The whole thing could have not happened, but it did. Luke wasn't sure why he was contemplating the possibility of it not happening, because he wanted this. He wanted this apocalypse. Didn't he?



Luke checked his watch - eleven in the morning. He had slept for probably three or four hours when he promised he'd keep watch. Anything could've happened at that point. He stood up and turned, then realised his brother was sat on the deck's steps with his shotgun. Ben turned to face him.



"Morning, sleepy. I've been here since nine-ish. The other two are asleep in the living room." The shotgun was laid beside him, and because he'd not been awoken by it meant that they'd not had any problems. Luke mumbled the word "cool" and was about to go inside to check on the other two. He'd need to wake them up soon, but it'd be good for them to stay in the house instead of trying to get into Atlanta. It was too early. Ben interrupted him.



"I'm not sure I can do this, Luke." As Luke looked around at him he saw his brother standing up, tears beginning to roll down his cheek. Luke watched one until it hit the ground. Once Ben had properly started crying, He forced him into an embrace. He was more than likely upset because of their parents, he thought. Although unsure how it'd be accepted, he made the statement to Ben anyway: "They're in a much better place than we are now."



Luke couldn't cry, he barely ever did. His mother would tell him it was because he cried so much as a baby. Whenever he grazed his knee or scraped the palm of his hand, he didn't cry. Even when his grandmother died the day after his seventh birthday, not a tear filled his eye.


Fortunately for him, the awkward situation had to come to an end; a walker had come into the clearing the house was located in. Luke had no idea what it had heard to make it go towards them, or what it had seen, but it looked hungry. It had been bitten at least a few times on its left arm, which was hanging by its side like a tail, following its right arm. Its right arm was on its way to Luke and Ben. Luke was about to release his brother when the walker moaned.



It was a horrible, hungry moan that chilled Luke to the bone. His brother heard it, turning to see the walker approaching at a surprising pace. One would think that undead were slow, but at walking speed they were surprisingly nippy. Luke kept that in mind. Ben rushed to the shotgun on the steps but misjudged the gap and fell onto the grass at the steps' base, missing the gun completely. The walker was close.



Luke was more successful; he had picked up the gun and raised it to see the walker about to converge onto his brother. He pulled the trigger. Nothing happened! Safety latch? No, no... It was empty! His brother was grunting, kicking the zombie away from it, his back to the steps. It was grabbing and growling and, most obviously, trying to bite Ben. Luke did the first thing that came to his mind - he jumped by his sitting brother and swung the shotgun into the walker's head, the handle making excellent contact with its temple.



It fell back but had not been killed. As it reached up to Luke, he brang the gun down onto its head once more. And again. And again. Just to be sure.



He continued until John had put his arms around him, ceasing him from mashing the brain of the walker anymore.

 

[Yoda]

1. Can has mor pls
2. that's it

1. Yes you may. I need to write it out first.
2. If I extend this, you may need to delete your posts.

 

[JustTooRadical]

kay D:

 

[bodejodel]

You'd better be a fast writer... can't wait for the rest!

 

[Yoda]

You'd better be a fast writer... can't wait for the rest!

Sadly, I'm not, but I'm glad you liked it

 

[CaliburofSouls]

Tehee.. Yoda the title sais Changuage instead on language~ But anyway, Great story~

 

[Yoda]

Tehee.. Yoda the title sais Changuage instead on language~ But anyway, Great story~

It's a pun used by a character in Community, my favourite show.

 

[CaliburofSouls]

It's a pun used by a character in Community, my favourite character.

Ahhhh~

 

[Yoda]

Chapter one has landed.

 

[Arken]

I love this.

 

[Yoda]

I love this.

*feels fuzzy inside*

 

[Mitch]

Yoda, this is great.
Can't wait for more.

 

[bodejodel]

Chapter one has landed.

It did a better job at landing than the plane did...

 

[Yoda]

It did a better job at landing than the plane did...

Yep!

 

[Yoda]

Next part written, proofread and added.

 

[Yoda]

I managed to do quite a bit yesterday, there might be a new part out tonight once I'm finished with it.