This Beautiful World - Book #1 (BxB)

Chapter 19

I couldn't believe what I was seeing. There were so many zombies running our way, too many for me to count. Why was this horde attracted to the house? Besides our encounter with the other undead, it wasn't as if we were making much noise. From what we learned, these things were attracted to loud noises. They wouldn't have heard us from here.  

Then it dawned on me. The scream that zombie let out when it couldn't reach Arin and me. If my theory was correct, that scream served as a signal to the others. That was the only explanation that I could come up with. In any case, there was no way that we could stay here now. If we lingered, then we would surely all lose our lives. We needed to get out of this place. 

I pulled my sister away from the window. Caitlyn had to be thinking the same thing as me. She said, "We should get out of here. Now."

Caitlyn wasted no time running towards the door. Seeing her spring into action made the others follow, except for Riley. Riley stopped at the door, her eyes landing on her mother. She had her hand pressed up against her mouth to suppress a cry. As much as I wanted to console her, we didn't have time. The longer we stayed in this house, the more likely we wouldn't make it out of this place alive. 

I put a hand on her shoulder. "Riley, I'm sorry, but we can't stay here. We have to leave. Those monsters are coming for us."

She finally tore her eyes away from the body to look at me, but it seemed as if she didn't truly see me. Her mind was still on her mother. It was barely a whisper when she said, "This is my fault."

"No, it's not. None of us knew that this was going to happen. You can't blame yourself for something that you had no control over. We're still figuring out how these creatures work and if something happens because of them, then you can't take the blame for it." I was starting to panic. Too much time passed as we discussed this, and those things would be here any second. We might not be able to escape them at this rate. I begged one last time, "Riley, please."

Riley didn't listen to me, but she came to her senses when her father made an appearance. He came up the stairs, alarm written on his face. When she saw him, Riley finally broke out into tears. She ran to him, then threw her arms around him. I saw him look past me to his wife who lay on the ground, before quickly looking away from the sight. 

He grits his teeth, and says, "We don't have much time left. Let's go, Riley."

Her father was able to accomplish what I could not. Though she was still shaken, Riley listened to her father. I followed the two of them down the stairs, where the others were waiting for us. They looked relieved when we finally joined them, but now it was time to make our escape. My sister was the first one to the front door, ready to get out of here. I didn't know how much time we had left to get out of the house. So many things could happen when we stepped foot outside, but staying here wasn't an option. Staying here meant death. At least outside, we had some hope of an escape. 

"Ready?" my sister asked, but it wasn't as if she was going to wait for a reply. 

Whether everyone was ready or not, my sister was already opening the door. She was taking the lead, which did surprise me. I never expected my little sister would take on the role of leader. I didn't want Caitlyn to make reckless decisions.

I also saw that Caitlyn was holding a crowbar. I didn't know where she got that weapon, but I assumed that Riley's family might have gathered what weapons they could around the house. They would have needed to defend themselves when things went awry. 

A monster had already reached the front door by the time Caitlyn opened it. Without hesitating, my sister swung the crowbar at the zombie's head. It didn't kill the zombie, but the impact was enough to stun the creature for a moment. This allowed Arin to knock the zombie over, which gave the rest of us the opportunity to flee the house. I noticed the look that Caitlyn shot Arin when he helped her. She made it very obvious that she was interested in him. It made me feel a bit overprotective of my younger sister, but this wasn't something that I had the time to worry about now. Getting everyone out of here safely was the main priority. 

I grabbed Caitlyn's hand and pulled her away with me. While I thought her swing against the zombie was impressive, I was afraid of her getting hurt. One bite or scratch seemed to be all it took for a person to change. I glanced back for a moment as our group ran away. The creatures were swarming the house; the place they were alerted to. It still confused me how these monsters worked. They seemed to be blind, but they were able to reach the house just fine. Were they able to use some sort of echolocation to reach the house? I wasn't sure, and this wasn't something that I would be able to figure out on my own. For now, at least it seemed we were able to escape from them. 

Though we were able to put some distance between us and the zombies, we didn't stop running. We kept going, only stopping when we were out of breath and far enough away from the monsters. My lungs felt like they were on fire after exerting myself. More now than ever, I wished that I was a little more athletic. I highly doubted that I could run again any time soon if we were forced to flee again. We were still out in the open, so we couldn't stay here for long. We didn't know what else could be lying in wait around one of these corners. It didn't help that this city was covered in darkness; our only light source came from the moon. 

After catching his breath, Riley's father quietly said, "We should find shelter for the night. We shouldn't try to find your hideout until morning."

That was probably the best option for now. If we tried to find the apartment building now, then we would only find ourselves lost in the darkness of the city. I also wasn't fond of the idea of running into any more zombies tonight. One life was already lost. I didn't want to lose anyone else in our group. When I glanced at Riley, I could see that she was barely holding herself together. She had her arms wrapped around her body as she looked down at the ground. She bit her lip to try to hold back the tears. 

Her father gently put an arm around her shoulder. He lost his wife, yet, he was trying to hold himself together for his daughter. "Come on, Riley."  

The next step was finding shelter until daylight. We tried each door that we came across until eventually, one of them opened for us. I was worried about staying in an unknown location, but it was the best that we could do for the time being. It was either that or facing the outside world and whatever it threw at us. 

----

I cannot guarantee when I'll be updating this book, so apologies if it takes me a while. I started working a full-time job recently, and I pick up overtime when I'm able to. Life is getting a little too expensive, so gotta do what I have to in order to survive ^^;; At this rate, I can probably get out a chapter a month. I know it's not a lot, but it's what I can manage for now.