Toronto, Canada, 2016

Adelaide was clutching her pistol and cursing him under her breathe. "I can not believe he left me here," she repeated to herself. Of course, she should have known he was going to puss out on her. He was never much of a man and...her train of thoughts were interrupted by a series of groans in the distance. She knew she needed to leave or she was going to die. A wave of fear ran through her and she tried to push it away.

She tried to focus on the anger inside of herself. Another man had let her think that he loved her, used her up and then abandoned her as soon as things got bad. At least she had not fallen in love with this one. Love was hard for Adelaide. She then tried to motivate herself, thinking of Jason. He was still out there. At least, he had been last she'd seen. Or heard. Yes, it was heard. She had been on the phone with him. It was hard for her to remember anymore. She took a breath and stepped lightly away. The groans were getting louder. She knew this was probably it. She had three rounds of ammo left and there were more than three of the things.

The things. Oh, she hated them most of all. More than any man. More than herself. She hated them with a burning passion. She stepped further. Further. A few more steps. And then, there was light. She was out of the ruins, in the light. It made her feel better. But she knew she was dying. She looked at the sun and tried to remember why she was in the ruins. "I can not believe he left me here." But she could believe it. She sat down as the groaning got closer and loaded her pistol, but not with the intent to kill the undead.

The furnace, Browning’s crew
Sonny lead the crew in his pick up truck. He looked over his shoulder and saw the RV behind him. It contained all the other guys he was with, the O line from when he used to play football. He had no idea how they survived , or even how he survived, but they all managed it. He looked back at the road. There was no sign of the undead. There was cars on the side of the road, and walls of buildings on either side. As they drove on, he heard low mumbling.
As the moans and groans got louder, he unzipped his leather jacket and reached into his inside pocket, grasped his hand gun and pulled it out. One hand was on the wheel, one hand was grasping the gun. He pulled up to an old ruined district. On the left side of the road was an old football stadium used by the university team, and on the other side was a ruined condo.
“Pull up to the right.” He said into a walkie talkie he had found in a Wal-mart. He pulled up and onto a side walk. He turned off his truck and jumped out. He watched his men in the RV pile out, holding old baseball bats and wearing football shoulder pads. “Check each unit for weapons, food, supplies and survivors. I can heard the dead, so be on your guard.”

Adelaide heard a vehicle not too far and suddenly had hope. Maybe it was him? Or Jason? Or maybe it was someone from the safe house she had heard about before all of the communications went down. She knew screaming would be risky, but she knew if she didn't get back up soon, she'd die. She got up, sprinted in the direction of the sound of the vehicle and yelled.

"Please help! I'm here! I'm not bitten! I'm surrounded and..." She stumbled and hit her head. And then, she was down. She could not see. She could not remember. She was not awake.

The group heard the yelling, and instantly figuredshe got snagged by one of the dead heads. The group Ran in the direction of the voice. Sonny lead the group and cocked his gun. “Miss, keep talking!” He shouted out to her. He lost too many people in the past, and he wasn’t ready to lose yet another person. She was laying out side of one of the houses, unconscious. He could see the dead coming out of the house after her.
Sonny raised his gun and shot at one. He missed and hit the one behind him in the shoulder. All he’d do is piss them off. He put his gun back into the jacket pocket, then ran up to the girl on the ground. He scooped her up and held her close. He looked behind himself as his team formed a line behind him, blocking the dead with their bats.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be getting you out of here.” He exclaimed as he pulled open the passenger’s side door and put her in. Glancing over his shoulder towards the stadium, he noticed what looked like a crowd of people slowly shambling out of it.

She blinked. And then blinked again. The light came pouring in, and it burned. She groaned. Where was she? She tried to remember. It all started to come back. She blinked again and saw a man. She screamed. "Who are you?" she asked. She had never seen him. She tried to calm herself, but her nerves had control of her.

It was starting to come back to her. Her man had left her. She was alone. She was planning on killing herself and then...the car. And she had fallen. It all came back and she felt somewhat relieved but she felt she was still in danger.

Sonny ignored her question as he buckled her seat belt up for her. He then took her gun, and took the magazine out of hers, and then his, then switched them. He put her gun on the dash board and put his back into his jacket. He looked down at her, then at the horde that had seemed to have expanded all the way down the street, even surrounding the RV.
“All you need to know is that you’re safe now.” He said as he closed the door. “Now stay here. I’ll be right back.” He shouted to her. He turned his back and began to jog back to where he had first found her. It was too late. Only one man had survived, and he was missing a chunk out of his shoulder. Sonny and the man made eye contact. The man shoot his head, and tossed his metal baseball bat at the feet of Sonny. Sonny reached down and grabbed the bat. He heard the screams of his men, and ran back to the truck.

Adelaide watched everything with her lips pursed. She forced herself to think of other of things. She wondered who the man was. She focused on his scar. Her head was pounding, and she wanted very badly to scream out in pain, but she got the feeling that screaming out was not a solution or an option.

As much as she wanted to, she did not believe the man when he told her that she was safe now. That was what her lover had told her, and this was the closest to death she'd been since the day Jason and her were separated. "You're safe now." She tried to convince herself.

By the time Sonny got to the truck, he had to duck under undead arms. He didn’t have enough room to even open the door of the truck. He had to slam it into the extended arms to even get enough room to jump into the truck. He slammed the door shut and quickly shoved his key into the ignition switch.
“CONJURING THE DEAD! ANCIENT TONGUE OF SHADOWS. CONJURING THE DEAD! GIVE YOURSELF TO SATAN!” The growled lyrics blasted out of the speakers, the heavy shredding of the guitar and blast beats angering Sonny so much that he pounded his foot on the gas and broke through the crowd of undead.

Adelaide clutched her head. She felt as if she was going to puke at any given second. She could hear her pulse and she felt dizzy. "I'm going to die. You may as well leave me here," she told the stranger. It felt as if the world was spiraling around her. "I can feel this body dying all around me."