The Rot

Chapter 11

The whole street was clogged with corpses and there was nowhere Cynthia and I could escape to. The both of us had no choice but to sit in the gas station and wait things out.

Panicking, Cynthia whispered to me, "Reid, if just one of those eaters see us..."

"Cyn, I know. Keep it together for me. We just have to lay low and let the dead things pass us by," I responded.

Cynthia looked all over the station, "Where in the hell can we hide?"

"Shh," I whispered to her. Cynthia was starting to shake somewhat. The only cover that the gas station offered the two of us was the counter area. I grabbed Cynthia and ran around behind the counter.

Me and Cynthia ducked down and tried to wait out the gigantic mob of undead creatures. Curiosity got the better of me and I just had to look through the gas station window to see how large the swarm, or horde, or whatever its called of eaters was.

"Holy shit," I muttered when I saw the sheer number of dead things outside lumbering down the road. I'd have better luck trying to explain quantum physics than trying to count all of the eaters that were out there. Before one of the dead things spotted me, I ducked back down beside Cynthia and hoped that none of those corpses would wander off from the mob and make their wait into the gas station.

As the swarm grew closer and closer, the moaning and snarling grew louder. The noises the corpses made drowned out everything else in the area. Beside me, Cyn was shaking like a leaf.

I held Cynthia's hands, "Relax," I mouthed to her. I didn't whisper it for fear that the corpses could hear me.

I heard the sounds of feet dragging on pavement, and it was growing louder and louder. Judging by the terrified expression on Cynthia's face, she had heard it too. It sounded like one or more of the dead things were heading towards the gas station. I decided to crawl around the counter and check out the front door. The silhouette of the eater appeared behind the cracked window glass and I knew Cyn and I were fucked.

"Cyn, roll under the counter and don't breathe," I whispered directly into her left ear.

"What?" Cyn whispered back to me.

"We've got company."

Cynthia covered her mouth to keep herself from gasping. The door to the station opening caused the both of us to jump. Her and I rolled underneath the counter to get as much cover as we could.

To me, it sounded like only one of the corpses had entered the gas station. It was dragging its feet along on the ground as it headed towards the back of the building. I guess the eater saw that the freezers were empty because it turned around and started to head back towards the door.

"That's right, just walk on out of here," I thought to myself. But, the eater didn't leave the gas station. It bumped up against the counter and began to walk around it, heading right for Cynthia and I.

I held out my hand and pointed to the metal pole that Cynthia had been hanging onto, and motioned for her to hand it to me. She slid her weapon over and I waited for the eater to get closer towards us. When the corpse rounded the counter, it saw Cynthia right away. Before the dead thing could charge in and attack, I got up to my feet and rammed the end of the pole into the right side of the dead thing's skull.

The eater stopped moving and I eased its lifeless body down to the ground. I didn't want to just drop the thing to the floor in case the mob outside heard us. The eater was a woman wearing a long, black robe. Most of her scalp had been chewed away revealing the top of her skull. I had the unfortunate task of sliding the weapon free from the corpse's head and when the rotted brain matter started to seep from its wounds, it filled the gas station with a putrid odor.