Free Dead Quarantine by A. Rosaria Page A

for him to see. He slowed down. For all he
knew, he had been walking in circles. No, not circles. He had taken
care in keeping the pit to his back, but he could have walked the
wrong way and be miles away from the lights he had seen from the
hill.
    He stepped on something hard instead of the
dirt and foliage he been walking on. He knelt down and felt with
his hand. The road. He had stumbled upon it. To his left would lead
back to where he came. He couldn't go there. He turned right.
Walking on the road at night could be dangerous, but he was sure
that today there would be no cars coming. Soldiers must have made
it clear someway or another that the road was closed. He walked for
about another hour when he got a definite answer to that. The road
was blocked with traffic fences and a sign that the road was
closed.
    Far away, he saw lights shining. Ralph ran
toward the town, laughing and whooping as he went. He would finally
see people again. Get help. Call home and check on his mom and
Ginny. There had to be someone willing to help him. Maybe someone
would lend him a car. What if they were dead and walking? He
stopped running and hollering. Staring at the lights, now much
closer, it didn't feel so inviting anymore.
    No movements, sound, anything. He could see
shades of buildings. The streetlights cast eerie shadows over the
walls of the houses. He walked closer, keeping to the side of the
road in an effort not to stick out. If he had to flee, he could
bolt into the darkness of the wilderness surrounding the small town
and hope that the zombies were not the fast-moving kind or that
they could see in the dark.
    The lights inside the houses were off. Was
the town also quarantined? Its inhabitants could have been the
first to go down after the pit. He got closer and saw there was in
fact one house with its lights on. The town consisted of a few
hundred houses, he guessed. The row of buildings was split by the
road that coursed through the town. He hugged the wall of the first
house. It had no fence or garden. He crept along it toward the
closest window. He peeked inside. With the little streetlight
coming in, he saw an empty room with walls that still needed
plastering. The houses were recently finished. He walked around the
corner. A for sale sign was stuck in front of the house. In fact,
they were in front of all the houses, but the one with its lights
on. He was in a new subdivision, recently finished. It wasn't a
town; it had more of a gated community feel to it, but on a smaller
scale, or it must be a small project in a larger one. Either way,
the inhabitants were one family; plus one if you counted him.
    There was only one family he could ask help
from. If they turned him down, he would have to seek it somewhere
else, and there might not be a somewhere else—not anymore. The good
thing was that he didn't have to worry about zombies. This family
would have been secluded from the infected, living in such a remote
location. He sighed in relief and followed the road to the house.
It couldn't be more than two hundred yards to the house, a small
distance compared to what he must have walked already.
    The houses on each side of him stood in
darkness like empty husks waiting to be filled. But with how the
world was falling apart, they would likely stand dormant for some
time. He passed a house still under construction, one of five all
neatly rowed next to each other that formed a nice block. The last
houses waited to be finished. A construction van was parked next to
it. The windows had to be put in and the walls painted; the job was
almost done. It was a perfect place to seek shelter if the need
arose. He would not have to break in; he could just get in one of
the open windows. Maybe even through the door. How likely would it
be locked anyway? He was tempted to check, but thought better of
it.
    Turning away, he continued to the occupied
house with its light illuminating the desolate darkness. Ralph
glimpsed some movement in the