Free Bitten by Tristan Vick Page B

friends when she had mistakenly come over a hill in a nearby meadow, and like a herd of grazing cattle, there they were. Alyssa considered taking them out on the spot but she was low on bullets.
    So instead of wasting what remained of her precious ammunition, she slowly backed away and just kept hobbling along the road. Apparently several of them had spotted her, however, and now a couple dozen or so were pursuing her. As long as she kept her distance she figured it was no big deal.
    Upon getting to the zenith, she looked out across an expanse of nearly fifty or sixty mindless roving heads. She hadn’t anticipated a second horde just over this hill. At least not so close.
    “Shit!” Alyssa cursed, keeping her voice to a whisper. She was caught between two groups of Walkers prowling for their prey. For fresh meat.
    Quickly, Alyssa ducked down to make herself less noticeable, picked up her rifle and began loading shells into its chamber. She was outnumbered nearly ninety to one with nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. Her streak of luck had finally run dry.
    Crouching there, out in the open, she turned her head up and looked at the wretched corpse of the old woman stuck up on the telephone pole. “I take it you ran into a similar situation?” As the surrounding hordes’ footsteps encroached upon her, Alyssa cocked the rifle, and said, “Here we go again.”
     

     
    It had taken Rachael Ramirez nearly all morning just to dress herself. She was too in shock to act like the day was like any other. It wasn’t.
    Finally getting her stuff together she set out to look for her son. Getting into her Audi, parked on the side of the street, she started down the road. It was strangely deserted. It was like a mid-afternoon lull at the peak of evening rush hour, but still, not a car in sight.
    As she drove along she occasionally ran across an abandoned vehicle, but the real trouble weighing on her mind was how so many people could simply disappear in less than forty-eight hours. Where did they all go?
    With her mind on her son, Rachael drove out of town toward his private school. Deep down inside she realized he wouldn’t be there, but perhaps she could find some survivors.
    As she left the city limits, she drove around the bend of a hill outlined by a grove of trees. The twilight hour was making it difficult to see the road as she came over the crest of the hill. Out of the blue she plowed into a huge gathering of white-eyed walking dead. Rachael screamed, but instead of slowing down she hit the gas. Bodies bounced off her car as she mowed down a trail in the massive gathering.
    A few of them toppled over her hood while a few others went under the car. The tires bounced over their bodies as if they were speed bumps. Looking into the rear view mirror, she saw the one’s she had just run over start to get back up.
    Seeing a large group of the white-eyed half dead awkwardly galloping after her, she hit the accelerator and sped up. Watching the pack of Walkers shrink in the rearview mirror Rachael smiled to herself and sighed with relief.
    Looking back out the front windshield, Rachael barely noticed the single form waving frantically in front of her desperate for her to stop. Rachael slammed on the breaks and skidded to a halt, stopping mere inches away from the nose of the terrified girl. Leaning over Rachael popped open the door and shouted, “Get in!”
    The young woman jumped into the SUV and slammed the door behind her. Rachael checked the rearview mirror, and said, “They don’t give up, do they?” Slamming her food down, Rachael pushed the pedal to the metal, and with her tires squealing, the silver SUV peeled away, leaving twenty inch elevens burnt into the road.
    As she caught her breath, t he girl looked over at Rachael as if to say thank you, but before she could speak a single word she passed out from exhaustion. Rachael noticed one of the girl’s pants legs was missing and her thigh was tightly