Deadland Roleplay

Limbo (Chapter 1)

LIMBO: The First Circle of Hell

For weeks on end, I've been hearing about a weird strain of virus that's been gripping the entire country. Normally, that's exactly the kind of thing I'm interested in hearing about. Dreaming of becoming a surgeon in a few years, medical mysteries are exactly my kind of thing. But since I was busy with school work, being a graduating student and all, I didn't particularly listen to the details the news reporters have been rattling off all day.

Out of principle, I kept the television on as I thumbed through my worn textbook and nodded my head in time to the music on my headset. I muttered to myself about the steps in transplanting hearts, highlighting the medical terms that mattered, until a blood-curdling scream pierced through the still night air.

I dropped the highlighter in my hand and tugged the ear buds from my ears in surprise, my senses instantly in high alert. Watching Supernatural marathons during spare times sometimes does that to a person; makes you suspicious and a whole lot more prepared for crisis. I didn't know it then, but Dean and Sam Winchester probably saved my ass that night.

Keeping an eye on the front door as I padded barefoot to my kitchen-not hard to do if you have a condominium unit as small as mine-I fumbled blindly for the registered gun I kept on the roof of one of the cupboards that housed my glasswares and took the safety off.

My heart thundered in my chest wildly and I found it laborious breathing without succmbing to hyperventilation, but I fought hard to keep my hands steady and my head clear. I was pretty certain I'd need it.

There was another burst of scream, this time by a little girl. The front door to my unit rattled as if there was some struggle and I very nearly dropped my gun. I hesitated briefly. I didn't know what I was gonna find behind that door, and quite frankly, it scared me. Deciding that this is one of those times when I should just do and stop thinking, I took the five short steps towards it and threw my door open.

The sight that greeted me was beyond gory. A man-if I can even call it that-was chewing on what appeared to be a little kid's legs, blood dripping down his chin and onto his equally bloody dress shirt. A woman' s and a child's mangled corpses lay on the carpeted floor directly in front of him, his back against the wall opposite my door. My stomach dry-heaved in response.

It, for the lack of a better term, suddenly snapped its head up and sniffed the air, his cloudy eyes settling on me a second later. It emitted a low guttural growl that raised the hair on the back of my neck. It must have meant to lunge for my throat the same way it did to that poor woman and girl, but it was slow, uncoordinated, and it only ended up stumbling on the bodies in front of him.

Instinct took over. I aimed for its head and pulled the trigger, flinching from the recoil.

I watched with morbid fascination as it sank back to the floor, thick dark blood oozing from the bullet hole on its head. My hand immediately flew to my nose as the smell of decomposition and death hit me. Gross. From this close range even the weak 9mm bullet pierced right through its skull.

I just killed a man...something, I thought numbly. No, you protected the defenseless, I told myself reproachfully as my heart tried to relocate itself in my throat, my eyes flickering back to the woman and the girl.

I'm used to blood. It comes with the territory. But nothing in my studies prepared me to see this kind of carnage. I wanted so much to help the woman and the kid, but I knew deep down, there was nothing I could do for them. Even if I could miraculously get the both of them down to the basement and into my car, with this much blood loss, they wouldn't even reach the hospital alive.

Racking my brain for anything I knew about cannibalism, I re-entered my unit as if in a daze. I shot a man and I couldn't wrap my head around it. My eyes strayed to my cell phone resting on the coffee table and I wondered if I should turn myself in now. That ought to count for something.