dazbizkit

I made i quick short story, feel free to critisize, its the only way I'll learn.

We were in here; they were out there, preventing us from leaving. They’ll break their way in soon; petrol stations weren’t built to withstand a horde of zombies.

Everywhere you went wreaked of rotten corpse. You would gag every time you took a breathe. I’m used to it now though, like a smoker is used to the smoke of a cigarette. I’m not half surprised; I’ve been here for months now. All the ‘important’ people were conveniently able to be evacuated from the city while the rest of us were left here to try and survive.

It was getting dark and the clear figures outside were turning into silhouettes. They clawed at the window continuously and they don’t stop chasing you, talk about persistency. We only came to this little store in the petrol station for some supplies. Even though most of the food has passed its expiry date but beggars can’t be choosers.

I looked over at Vince, the poor kid was shaking. He’s only sixteen. We found him while we were checking a building for anything remotely useful to us. Vince had barricaded himself in an apartment. When we broke through his barricaded we found him clutching his baby sister while curled up in the corner. He hadn’t eaten in weeks so we gave him the rest of our food but sadly there wasn’t anything we could do for the baby.

More gathered outside and all we could do was stand still, shitting ourselves. I don’t get it, you’re scared of the danger around you and all you can do is nothing. Fear takes control over your body and permits you to do anything. Its like your being punished for something you’ve done and you’re being made to wait for what you deserve.

“Let’s gather what we need and figure out how to get the hell out of here” insisted Sophia.

It’s when the silence is broken by words that you need to hear that bring you back to reality and get your body moving again.

I took a deep breathe of the polluted air and continued to fill my backpack. Everyone soon began to do the same. We were all grabbing everything we could when suddenly there was a smash. I looked over my shoulder to see the dead pouring through the broken window, falling over each other. When they have you in sight they keep their eyes on you while they drag themselves back to their feet. I pulled out the pole I had sticking out of my bag and readied it in my hands.

“We’ve got to find an exit” Sophia shouted while dragging Vince through a doorway into the back room of the store.

Paul, Martin and I stood still, waiting for the living dead to draw near with our weapons in hand. A portly, rotund zombie staggered towards me like a drunk. I lifted the pole in the air with both of my hands, and a roar I slammed the pole down upon its head. Brains and black blood splattered everywhere, I was covered in it. The body stayed standing for a while before retiring to the floor. More approached and Martin began swinging his crowbar around recklessly hitting anything in his way. From the blood flicking everywhere I could see he was doing some damage.

More windows began to smash and more dead were spilling in, there was no way a couple of mêlée weapons were going to hold off all of these monsters.

Sophia came running through the door.

“There’s a way onto the roof up here!”

She ran back through the door again, I followed. I climbed these narrow stairs to find Sophia at the top trying to kick the door open.

“I can’t get it open!”

Paul came up behind me.

“Watch out”

He barged passed and pounced shoulder first into the door. It flung open with aggression and we exited on to the roof.

“Where’s Martin?” asked Vince.

“He should have been behind me” replied Paul while rubbing his shoulder.

I peered down the stairway. Martin shot round the corner at the bottom of the stairs, an extreme look of panic covered his face.

“Hurry up!” I shouted.

Hundreds of pairs of hands reached out and clutched onto his clothes. They pulled him toward them and began to scratch and bite on his flesh. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a handgun. With his free hand he tossed the gun up to me. I caught it, barely, and aimed it at the dead gorging on Martin. Just as I was about to fire he shouted.

“No! Shoot me!”

“What?!”

“PLEASE!”

It seemed inhumane but it made sense, he couldn’t be saved and we both knew it. I just didn’t want to lose another. I aimed the gun at Martin as best I could. He was screaming blood curdling pleads at me to shoot. I closed my eyes and pulled the trigger.

He stopped screaming.

“What the hell just happened?!” shouted Paul.

“Martins gone get that door shut now!”

We closed the door and placed my pole underneath the door handle like the good old ‘Chair by the door’ technique.

“That’s another one of us spent! We’ve lost four of us now!” cried Sophia.

“There will be none of us left before long!” added Paul.

“Get it together!” I yelled.

“Guys – look at this” Vince said while backing away from the edge of the roof.

I walked to the edge and stared. The entire petrol station was surrounded with zombies. It would seem we were the only ones left with the amount of attention we had gripped.

“What are we gonna do now?” asked Paul.

Without answering him I looked around for ideas. Shooting the pumps wouldn’t do us any favours; it would just cause a huge crater in the ground. I looked around further and I noticed a small alley leading to the street behind us, it was clear of any danger, besides from the height of course.

The door began to bow with the weight of the zombies pressing up against it.

“We’re gonna have to jump down here” I said while pointing to the ground.

“What? And then we will attempt to escape with broken limbs shall we?” proclaimed Paul.

“You’re welcome to stay up here and eventually get mauled by those fuckers! Choose now!” I argued.

He didn’t say anything but replied with a nod as if to say I was right. The door was straining and gaps were starting to appear around the door frame. I could see hungry eyes glaring at me as I stood.

“Okay let’s go!” declared Vince.

We stood on the edge staring down at the concrete when the door swung open, the pole rolled and bounced until it leaped off of the roof. The dead began walking toward us. I pulled out Martin’s gun and got prepared to fire when they moved too close.

“Women and Children first!” said Paul.

He turned to join me holding his bat in his hands. I glanced over my shoulder to see Sophia and Vince still standing there. We were being overwhelmed.

“GO JUST JUMP!”

They steadied themselves and then stepped over the edge. I couldn’t see if they landed safely. I began firing at the dead approaching us with the bullets left in the clip. Sprays of blood were appearing in the crowd but it didn’t seem to have any affect. Zombies that fell to the floor just pulled themselves back up and continued to move closer.

“Now it’s our turn” said Paul

We backed off toward the edge of the roof. It must have been at least twelve or thirteen feet to the concrete, but I couldn’t really tell, it was getting to dark to see anything. There wasn’t much space between us and the living dead so we briskly stepped on the edge and then dropped off. We both hit the floor pretty hard, I was okay but I noticed Paul was refraining from standing on one of his legs.

“You okay?"

“Yeah I guess I’m not used to jumping off of rooftops"

I don't get him sometimes, we've almost been ravished by a crowd of flesh eaters and he still finds time to make jokes. it manages to keep my morale above sea level.


"Where are the others?”

I looked around but I couldn’t see them. We started moving toward the exit of the alleyway. Zombies were following us off of the rooftop. As they fell, bones were breaking and snapping on their landing but they still continued to drag themselves toward us.

I heard a roar of an engine and a car pulled up at the exit. The headlights illuminated the alley and you could see every bit of broken bone, blood and flesh on the dead. Not a nice sight. I then realised how dirty I was too, haven’t had a decent wash in days. Not another nice sight.

Vince leaned out of the car window beckoning us on.

“Come on hurry!” he shouted

We tried to run as fast as we could without straying away from each other, I wasn’t gonna leave Paul staggering by himself. We were metres away from the car when a zombie walked out in front of us from a whole in a fence. I ran straight into him and we all fell backwards. Paul’s baseball bat tumbled into the crowd of walking dead behind us.

The zombie stood back up and began walking toward us. We were trapped, fighting zombies barehanded is hopeless. All we could do was wait till they could gorge on us.

I looked over the zombie’s shoulder to see Vince climbing out of the car. He ran toward us picking up a piece of broken fence on the way. He smashed the zombie in the back of the head and it fell to the floor. He began frantically smashing the head with the piece of wood.

Blood was flicking everywhere as he raised the fence panel and slammed it down repeatedly.

“Okay you can stop now!! Vince!”

He eventually stopped, out of breath and threw the wood down on the floor.

“Lets go!” he insisted

“Way to go kid!” said Paul while we stepped over the mutilated corpse. It was about time Vince learned how to kill.

Sophia opened the car doors for us and we climbed in.

“Where did you find this?” I asked
“It was backed up into a lamp post” she said while smiling.

“Lucky find” laughed Paul.

We all laid out heads back and sighed with relief. What was a quick stop for food turned into another escapade where we lost yet another friend.

tomo_the_third

Hey dazbizkit I've just read through your story. You've set up a nice scenario here and the action flows nicely as the characters move onto the rooftop and make their escape via the allyway. Unfortunately, other than that there's very little else to the story. There's no depth to it. For example, the characters are hardly developed - how can the reader interact with a just a name. At one point there is some expansion of the character "Vince" when you say "It was about time Vince learned how to kill" but you don't explain this at all!! Because the reader doesn't no who Vince is how can you expect them to relate to this?

There's also a very confusing atmosphere/mood to this piece. At times I was confused as to whether this was a comedy or a horror. Here's a few examples:

" “Watch out” Paul said rudely. " - it seems slightly bizarre to suggest Paul is being rude when he's about to be eaten by zombies don't you think?

" “Women and Children first!” said Paul. " - Oh dear. Again...would you say that if under attack from zombies? Or was that humour?

"I then realised how dirty I was too, haven’t had a decent wash in days." - humour?? Seems a little random again.

A couple of typos/grammer errors:

"with stand a horde of zombies" - withstand is all one word

"When they have you in sight they keep their eyes on your while they drag themselves bag to their feet." - that sentence doesn't make sense, is it "back to their feet"?

"I reached into his pocket and pulled out a handgun. With his free hand he tossed the gun up to me." - if you've just taken the gun, how can he throw it to you...?


Phewph! Sorry to go but thats my views. Keep working at it, you've got a good scenario there, you just need to deepen the story to make it more interesting for the reader.

dazbizkit

thanks for reading it Tomo, there are a few typos in the story, i should have given it a thorough read through. for example:

"I reached into his pocket and pulled out a handgun. With his free hand he tossed the gun up to me." it is supose to be "He" instead of "I"

and

"When they have you in sight they keep their eyes on your while they drag themselves bag to their feet." lol yeah it is supposed to be "back" instead of "bag" and "your" is suppose to be "you".

and

microsoft word had "withstand" as incorrect :s

there was a small section i took out before i posted it. as they escape off of the roof, Paul said “Yeah I guess I’m not used to jumping off of rooftops. Where are the others?” i added afterwards:

I dont get him sometimes, we've almost been ravished by a crowd of flesh eaters and he still finds time to make jokes. It manages to keep my morale above sea level.

if you noticed it was mostly Paul who brings the funny comments etc. its because paul is the sarcastic and humourous character in the story.

i didnt think it is very necessary to add too much depth to the characters when there is action or panic going on, i think it would stray away from the situation. but maybe your right though.

i will edit it now......