Snippet #1753784

Kyle Jaeger.
Day six, 7:45am.
Residential Suburbs.

Kyle carefully peeled back the thick, black felt he had taped in place over the only other entrance to the basement in which he was staying: the window. It was small, slim, ground-level and led out onto the side path leading from front to back yard. There was a thick fence separating it from the other garden and it allowed for relatively safe, stealthy entering and exiting to his temporary hideout.

It was strange to think that eight months ago, he wouldn't have even fit though that. But now look at him! He slid through like some sort of athlete; peering out to ensure that there were no Dead out there, then quietly opening it, grabbing the edge, pulling himself up and sliding through and onto the path beyond. If the dead found it, they wouldn't notice. The black Felt completely distorted any view they would have had to the inside and even if that somehow came undone, he highly doubted these things were smart enough to actually lower themselves to the ground, open the window and then slip inside.

The other entrance to the Basement was the door at the top of around ten stone steps. It led into kitchen of the house above and every morning, he routinely scouted it out to make sure his most immediate area was safe. Today, it was. He always closed the doors and windows and if anything got in, they would be open. He was just as wary as survivors nowadays as he had always been; people... He felt like he had a bad relationship with them. Yet, the basement door was safe. He wasn't so foolish as to leave it open to any wanderer who came passing by. He had locked it, then done so twice. A heavy padlock with a thick chain he found in the drawers of the Kitchen. He had also pushed the fridge and other unnecessary cabinets he could find in front of the door in the house itself, leaving his small basement dwelling quite spacious.

He had been there for two days already... This was the third. He was contradicting his own survival strategy. The one that said 'the horde moves, so you should too'. Perhaps he thought he could hide and let them past? Or perhaps the fact the previous owner had put a mattress and bedding on the carpeted floor down there was quite appealing to him. Indeed, his underground bunker had been a bedroom at one time. It even had a computer, which he hadn't dared touch. Light, noise, these were things to avoid.

Anyway! Back to the business at hand!

Kyle was equipped with a small sports back pack, a small construction hammer (held so the claw end pointed downwards - he had discovered this was more likely to take a zombie down quickly than the blunt side) and the clothes he had been wearing for the past week. Today on the agenda: he was going scavenging. A good nine hours of daylight lay ahead of him, at least. But he planned to be back in his safe haven and holed up for another 18 hours by midday.

He crept through the front garden and to the road outside, peering both ways. He saw nothing. Just cars strewn about from where people had tried to escape and the occasional splatter of blood. He shivered, morning chill getting to him while he crouched behind a car and began to peer inside through the windows. This one was clear, so he moved on. Another car checked, staying low, staying behind them, staying quiet, so as not to be found. That one was clear too. So were the next three. Before he knew it, he was at the end of the road, where it curved around and led down towards a local convenience store and a community centre. Yet they weren't his objective today, the house before him was.

It was a neat place, situated on the corner and with a large, neatly mown lawn. The door was wide open; bloody hand print on the door knob. Likely, something was inside... So he turned tail, switching his objective. There was another house, similar, but with a lawn that had not been cared for. A slob, with one of those 80s cars in the driveway that looked like it had been put through a car wash loaded with McDonald's sauces. This house was closed, windows even looked as though they had been barred. Perfect! If anyone had holed up there, their supplies would remain.

The door swung right open, quietly... Unlocked, leading to an empty hall that had three doors. One at the end, one on the left and one on the right. He went for the kitchen first. And it was heavenly! Cupboards alive with tinned food, with long-lasting goods, with tins of drink, bottles of water! This was enough food to last him two weeks, at least. To be perfectly honest, there wasn't even that much. Just four or five of each item carefully packed into the cupboard to conserve space, yet to a survivor, to a hunted of the Dead, it was like forcing himself through the desert and stumbling across a Water Park; he wasn't sure if he was hallucinating or ridiculously lucky.

He went to the fridge next, but something was off... There was some kind of smell. Mild, so mild he couldn't recognize it... But it was there... He reached out, taking hold of the grey door with delicate fingers. He stopped for a moment to look at the pictures upon the fridge - a large man, a slob clearly, with his son. The two looked quite happy, leading him to believe that whatever the owner's imperfections, he wasn't the worst man around.

That is, until he opened the fridge and came upon the remains of the very same boy. Head on the top shelf, guts, limbs, fingers, neatly wrapped in clingfilm and packed in together with at least one other body. Had this been his wife? The second was a woman. Those thoughts... He turned around and leaned over; a wave of uneasiness coming over him. His body went through the process of hurling, but nothing came up. He just shut the fridge, then leaned against his own knees while trying to overcome this sudden panic attack...

Then, from outside, a car alarm started blaring... And a door on the first floor, whose user had been surprised by the noise, opened and closed it on his way downstairs...