ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 2

                                    

                                          
Burn, fire. Footsteps?
Moaning, bawling, shuffling.
He opened his eyes.
Yes, fire. Oh yes, lots of fire.
Then blood, lots of blood. Hopefully not his.
Then he saw his car, or at least what was left of it. Damn, he would be dead if he were still in there, he would be sticking to the seat as a mixture of skin and blood, melted onto the plastic. Meter to one piece with the plastic, he would've become one with the seat. 
He slowly rolled over onto his back, his eyes burning from all the smoke, as did his lungs. Everything was full of smoke, impossible to breathe. 
Then finally more noises got through to him, and reality slowly got through to him again too. Now he recognized the people whose footsteps he heard all the time.
They knelt over a corpse and ate its flesh. He wanted to twitch, he wanted to get up and run away, but he stayed still on the ground. They probably thought he was dead or wanted to save him for later.
He moved and propped himself up, then a deep sharp pain stabbed trough his shoulder. He reached for it and felt shuddered. Something was stuck in his shoulder he could feel it doing more damage to his flesh when he moved. 
Stab wounds training.
Injury training.
He had learned all of this. Clean the Wound. Disinfect wound. What then? He did not know it anymore.

He should have paid more attention in this course. He never was interested in medical stuff like this. And now he was gonna die because of it. He placed his hand carefully around what looked like a piece of gals. Without hesitation he pulled on it as hard and straight as he could, and it made a scraping noise. He groaned in pain and immediately reached for the wound. Warm blood spilled out of the wound, ran down his fingers and dripped onto the floor. He enjoyed the warmth of his own blood for a brief second but then he realized that his pain attracted the zombies across the street. Their hideous faces turned towards him one by one and slowly but surely they all began to limp towards him. He knew his way around Raccon City well, as he had often been here in his free time, and he had also had to submit reports to the police station further south from time to time. He knew his way around, that was the main thing.
Groaning, he forced himself to his feet and held the wound closed with his right arm. He had to go to the RPD.
He had been there a few times and he had to find his way there.
He ran through the alleys, dodged zombies, fell down and picked himself back up. He started to feel dizzy and slowed down. Just once to the left and twice to the right and then he would be there, it would be right in front of him, the police department. So he ran and he didn't stop. There it lay.
But not only that lay ahead of him, but also a chase between burning cars and buses. To get to the entrance gate he dodged some zombies. As he almost reached the gate, a huge hand grabbed him from behind.
"Shit," he whispered, hitting with his good arm back somewhere where he thought the attacker was. He hit something, and it let him go. He heard the zombie hiss and growl. He just lost his meal. He just lost it. What a shame. 
He immediately ran towards the gate, gripped by fear. Then a cold shiver came over him. Sweat ran between his eyebrows. The gates were closed. He didn't even think about screaming for help. He was just gonna attract more of them and alarm everyone on the police station that a new meal was waiting just outside. 
He knew there was a second entrance somewhere here. He ran to the right and felt his way along the fence of the police station. There were zombies everywhere and he almost lost his life several times. 
Not much was known about how the virus spread and he didn't want to find out. 
Finally, he arrived at the small iron door and almost fell into the small garden. He quickly pushed the rusty latch forward and fell to his knees. The fat zombie who had been chasing him the whole time and didn't let up, now reached through the bars and tried to grab him. His dirty fingers were about
10 cm from his face. What a stupid idiot.
He groaned and laughed. "Haha, you fucker, can't get me, huh?" he said and lay down on the grass. 
It was night and the stars shone in the sky, they shone far too beautifully for a night in which he almost died. 
The quiet night was interrupted by moans, zombie moans and this time it didn't come from outside, no, this time it was close to him and he got up again in pain. "That can't be happening, damn it," he whispered, lifting his shoulder from which blood was still oozing when he made jerky movements. 
Yes, it was happening, about 5 zombies shuffled up the stairs. One of them particularly stood out; he had a bolt cutter stuck in his head. "You're messing with me," he whispered. 
The zombie had difficulty keeping its head up with the heavy weight in its skull. He waited long enough until all the zombies were away from the stairs, then he ran. He jumped over graves that seem to have been dug for those who have already died in the police station and run down the stairs. He stopped at the bottom. There was a door locked with an iron chain.

Ah, that's why there was a bolt cutter.

He looked up the stairs annoyed; he had only just made it past. He sighed and ran back upstairs, the zombies were already on their way here again, the one with the bolt cutters in his skull was right at the front. Someone must have defended themselves with that thing. But he needed it now. He approached the zombie horde and the closer he got to them, the louder they got. They raised their hands, ready to grab him. He took a quick step and grabbed the bolt cutters. The zombie also grabbed him, and they both had each other in their hand when he pulled him away from the crowd towards the stairs. "Let go of that shit and I'll let you live," he cursed and dragged him down the stairs while he tore and pulled at his clothes. When they got to the bottom to the door, the bolt cutter hadn't moved an inch. 

He looked around and the rest of the group was already coming from above. He felt his pulse in his ears and finally took out the bolt cutters, along with the zombie, and smashed everything violently against the wall. He heard a crack and the zombie fell to the ground, hissing. He now stood pretty vertically above him and tried to pull the bolt cutters out of his skull. The zombie grabbed his legs with his hands and scratched deep holes in his pants. He looked up the stairs once again, sweating, and his friends were almost with him. He lifted his foot as high as he could and crushed his skull. 
There was a crack, then it sounded like someone was dumping a bucket of water, but the sound wasn't water, but blood mixed with brain matter. He now had the bolt cutter in his hand, without the zombie, and his shoe was covered in brain. He almost vomited and he immediately headed for the door. It stank of death and decay and his skull was cracked open like a rotten avocado.