Until the Bitter End
Rating: PG-13 just in case
Genre: Apocalyptic, Angst,
Author’s Note: For tumblr user sosukes. Hope you enjoy! (warning - character death)
Steady. Aim. Wait. Fire.
It was a routine that was becoming monotonous and empty. Lining up lifeless shells of a body in the crosshairs of his gun has been the majority of Onew’s days for lord knows how long now. Every day was filled with the same routine. Find a place to survive for the night and fight off any and all un-welcomed visitors.
Painful memories try to fight their way to the surface of his mind every now and then as he lies wherever he can deem safe enough to call home for the next few hours, maybe a couple of days in a row if he’s lucky.
Having to watch his parents get gradually sicker over time before having to take their life; things like that one doesn’t really recover from quickly. Shaking his head suddenly, pushing the thoughts away, Onew gets up and packs away his gun, a nice sniper rifle good enough for him to do some long range cleaning.
After packing up he heads to exit the rooftop. The store the zombie he shot was in had enough supplies to last him for the next week. Maybe even more if he’s could find decent shelter, a necessity that was becoming far more rare than a scarcity.
He laughs to himself bitterly. Before the breakout he came to Japan in hopes of feeling safe and unimportant in one of the most populated areas in the world. Now he’s cursing himself for choosing such a populated place.
Ammunition is becoming harder to find and he keeps the thought in the back of his mind, his luck got him into this situation, and maybe if he prayed hard enough to whatever deity existed out there, his luck would see him out of this.
Maybe…
Arriving in front of the store he walks through the doorway, the door being destroyed in the pandemonium. Painfully, memories of the first days after the break out come flooding back to him; blood-curling screams from those devoured alive, heart-wrenching cries of those who lived long enough to see their loved ones turned into living dead and even worse, the horrible sinking feeling that this wasn’t fake, it was in fact real…very real.
As he scoured the desolate remains of the once quaint convenience store he smells something odd: the smell of rotting eggs. Having lived this long has told him to assume the worst and in this case, there was probably a gas leak somewhere within the building, or what was left of it. Figuring he had gathered enough he left before something ended up exploding.
The sun begins setting in the horizon, a sign that he should get out of sight soon. For some reason, most of the activity of these creatures took place at nightfall. It’s a fact he has not taken time to question but has accepted nonetheless.
Suddenly he hears it: that unmistakable, inhuman howl. The nightwalkers were coming, and fast.
The nightwalkers were the more unique and troublesome zombies. From reports broadcasted in less heavily affected places, Onew had learned that the virus had been around for much longer than thought. Some people hosted it for longer, and when the trigger (whatever it was) became activated, those who had been infected longer evolved into creatures more capable than those who were more recently infected.
The point is that some had become more than mere nightmarish zombies, but super speed enhanced demons. Back when the rest of his survival team was alive he managed to gather Intel about them.
Their shriek was unlike nothing you had ever heard before, thus making them easily detectable. They developed a sense to be able to detect and prey on anything living; their shrieks almost acting like kind of an echolocation for hunting. Basically if you could hear them they were already on their way to kill you. Getting underground was the only known survival tactic.
It didn't take but a few seconds before he could see them on the horizon, at least forty or fifty coming. He didn’t have time to go back to his safe roof and most of the buildings around him were.
Thinking quickly, he decided to do the only thing he could. He couldn’t out run them, and with all the desolate and destroyed buildings he knew he wouldn’t be able to find a basement in time. So, he ran back to the ruins of the convenience store.
Judging the distance they were from him, he estimated that he had about two minutes left before they were in the town. Frantically, he looked around the store, there had to be something to start a fire with somewhere. Digging around and throwing boxes and shelves around he desperately looked.
His luck succeeded for once as he found a matchbox, buried under some debris. As the volume of the shrieks increased, he sprinted towards the back of the store ruins. Following his nose, he made it to the source of the gas leak. Judging by how strong the stench was he reasoned that it had been leaking for at least several hours. A growling sound from behind him caught his attention and snapped him back to reality.
Turning around he saw that majority of them had entered the building. Fear shot through his spine and resounded through his body like lightning. However just as suddenly he was overcome with tranquility.
“I guess my luck has finally run out,” he said with a sad yet serene smile. Without putting more thought to it, he took out a match and lit it.