i was lucky, in my haste, i almost hit dave, the bullet whizzed past him and planted into the woman's chest. she shrieked, blood dribbled out of her mouth and she looked up.

i took aim, i took a few seconds, the next bang wasn't as loud, and the flash was nonexistent.

i saw the hole appear on her head and she went down, this time for good.

"thanks, man."

i didn't respond. you really never forget your first, and with a face like that, its even harder.

i walked past dave and i heard him sigh. i doubt it was out of anger, but i needed to throw my friend a bone, after all, as far as we know, we're the only people left in the area.

i finally pulled myself together "come on, man. that noise is gonna bring them all over, we need to find something, anything, i dont know how many bullets this thing has left."

we were careful, our floor was full of bodies and many of them had their mouths open and were torn up. we kept our legs and feet away from their mouths.

i led on, i had the only weapon we could find on the bodies, at least the only usable weapon. there bats, hockey sticks, there was even a frying pan in the mix. teeth and blood stained the walls. the blood spatter on the remaining lights gave the hallway a sick red glow. i almost fell down the stairs.
blood and people bits coated them.

i almost regret leaving the apartment.

dave looked back, there was shuffling noise coming from where we were

"we need to leave, jay."

i thought to myself

"just a few more flights..just a few more flights..."

it's been too long, way too long.

dave and i decided to leave the house and look for food. not only were we motivated by our nonstop and shared thoughts of hunger and even my desperate idea to eat a corpse.

"jay, think about it, what killed those people?"
"the zombies"
"good, how did they kill them?"
"tearing them up, biting-"
"biting them. how doe this spread?"
"shit."

sometimes, you need your best friend to talk a little sense into you.

we tried to leave the house, and wouldn't you know it. the door was blocked by a few corpses. the ones who were trying to force themselves in and had been killed because of us. their bodies, at least what remained blocked our way out.

we thought of the fire escape, but we realized that the "corpses" on the floor were still alive. many of them were people i recognized from my building. they had jumped out when they were cornered and then partially devoured. with their legs broken they were pretty much defenseless against whatever zombies were on the ground. there were a good 20 of them crawling around. surely the noise that dave and i would make coming down the creaky fire escape would bring them all here.

i heard dave kicking the door hard, pushing the corpses blocking the door aside.

"dude!" i yelled at him, it was the first time i raised my voice in awhile, and it felt good.

we both left the apartment, foolishly, we werent holding anything. i guess hunger makes you stupid.

we heard shuffling around a corner on my floor.

dave kept watch for it,i kept looking at the corpses on the floor, i was careful not to touch them, God only knows they could wake up at any second depending how they died.

one had a bullet hole in her head. i recognized her. it was laura, the indian girl from upstairs. she had a gun in her hand.

"laura, why here?"

the gun stood in her hand. i put my foot on her head and reached over to her weapon.

"sorry, dear, but i think i need this" i whispered to her. my hand was nearing hers.

"jay, i hear something" dave sharply whispered

i felt a twitch in laura's neck and almost gasped. she didnt move after that, maybe it was my leg.

i managed to pull the gun out of her hand, it felt heavy. i am not sure how to use these things so i just hoped it had some bullets left.

showing dave the gun and taking pride in his approving nod, i turned the corner.

fuck.

it was some woman in her nightgown. she was covered in blood, she had no visible bite marks. she had her back to us.

"there's no one here, n-no one, i'm all alone, alone" she muttered slowly under her breath. she shivered when she spoke.

i held the gun at her, i had it trained to her head.

please God, let this thing have bullets, but please, even more.
dont make me have to use them.

"miss, are you. are you okay?"

"it's so dark ,so dark, i can't see, who's that? who are where?" she began to make less and less sense. she faced the wrong way when she answered dave.

she slowly turned around. dave jumped back, i lightly squeezed the trigger

she turned to us, her face , what was left of it, was horrifying, she was missing both eyes, her teeth were missing from her bruised mouth. her sockets weren't clean. they were ripped. maggots were in them.

she turned to dave's direction and ran at him screaming at the top of her lungs with her arms out stretched.

i had to, God forgive me.

the white flash from the gun seemed long, the noise was louder than i could ever imagine.

i took her life.

The noises are not as loud, but much more frequent. the running that we would hear is pretty rare, many have banged on our door and tried to kick it down to get away from the creatures.
what did dave and i do?
We pressed our bodies against the door, making sure they couldn't get in. We did not say a word to each other when we did this, or to the person to stop. We held the door shut and made sure it didnt fall, we only stopped when we heard them scream, heard them go down, and heard them get back up and shuffle away onto the next victim.

did we hate ourselves for it? not as much as we should have. which scared both of us, maybe me more. dave has been pretty quiet, as have i. i mean , we're both scared to talk.

we both have lost weight though, we haven't eaten in a few days. the water runs though. we drink hot water to stave the hunger for awhile, but who knows how long we can do this

we need to get out of here

or else, we're not going to make it past the week.

silence

My apartment feels like a prison. The days have been killing us slowly. Dave and I barely say any words to each other. Not because we are upset with one another, but simply because we don't know what to say. What CAN we say?
Hey man , this sucks, your neighbors are trying to eat us har har? No, it's not that simple. We dont know what to do. We just don't know.
Could it be that we're afraid to talk to each other? Those things seem to be attracted to noises. None of us really had much of an encounter with them after that night.
We hear them, everyday, more and more shuffling, we hear them moaning in some unholy excitement and then we hear the scratching.
I don't know what's worse, the scratching or the moaning. What i've learned is that, when they moan, they know something is up, that's the give away, but when they find you and scratch at your door, moaning nonstop. you are done. they won't stop, not until they get you and probably eat you. None of us bothered to find out, but I have a feeling that they don't stop with one bite.

One floor up, we heard the scratching and moaning, getting louder and louder. Whoever was up there, i think, mrs. Ramos. she started screaming at it loudly, and then she started praying, and then she started crying. eventually, we heard the door open, and there was a small struggle. we heard things falling down, glass breaking and the screaming.
Shit, the screaming. It was so full of pain and crying, jeez. I can't stop thinking of it, I can't get it out of my head. I closed my eyes, and pretended it was a bad dream, I closed them harder when i heard flesh being torn from her. The sickening squelching noise. Her cries turned to gargles.

I jumped a second ago, Dave grabbed my shoulder.

"Jay, we're out of food."

...Fuck.

They.scratched at my door just now. Dave and I.stood quiet. Someone whimpering next door caught its attention. It.went away and has been at theirs for awhile.

For the past few days we've heard a lot of screaming and the crying through the walls. A lot of falling down and shuffling. Dave wanted to help them. I'm scared

The power has been sporadic as of late. The.tv just scrolls the names of evac centers. I cant believe this is happening. This can't be real.