Chapter III

The third and final chapter of the three-part story (this is also my ninth CWP for English 11).

Diane stepped down the stairs of the hospital entrance. She glanced to the spot where she had collapsed not long ago, or at least she didn’t think it was long ago. Memories of the doctor who had saved her fluttered back into her mind: the image of him dispensing queries at her, the image of him running for help, and the image of him dead on the hospital floor. Diane closed her eyes tightly, leaving herself blind for a second or two when she opened them. She wasn’t sure what had happened to everybody and everything, but she did know that the Staph infection was not only killing people, but making people kill others, and that she needed to find safety immediately.

 

Diane started walking then, her feet carrying her miles and miles through growing country town. She didn’t encounter anything except for a few mendicant dogs whining for food, some digging their mouths into their owner’s flesh, and others collapsed in the sun, flies happily fluttering about them. There were few dead humans on the street as well, but not nearly as many as there should have been.

 

From Diane’s right came quick footsteps accompanied with a low growling sound. A second too late, Diane looked over towards the commotion. A middle-aged man with dirty hair and blood splattered all over his clothes and mouth pounced onto Diane. She fell onto her left side, quickly rolling onto her back, the man on top of her. In a reaction Diane still carried with her from before everything went to hell, she beseeched the man to get off of her. Naturally, more so than one would think, he remained on top of her, his jaws snapping just inches from her face with the smell of rotting flesh pouring from his mouth.

 

Diane didn’t know what to do. He had his hands tightly around her wrists, pinning her arms against the ground, cutting up her elbows on the pavement. Realizing how exigent the situation was compared to her previous encounters where she seemed to have some sort of object for self defense, Diane did the one thing she could. She pushed upwards against the man as hard as she could, creating a little more distance between them. As fast as she could, she drove her knee right into the man’s crotch. His howl echoed through the silent neighborhood, sounding like a slaughtered wolf. Diane pushed him off of her, rolled onto her stomach, swiftly pushing herself back up onto her feet, and began to run away.

 

The man tried to follow Diane, but he could only limp a few feet before collapsing to his knees. Diane didn’t look back, she just ran. She ran until she reached the house that headed the cul-de-sac she had just entered. She reached the stoop of the house, bent over and grasping her knees while heaving heavily. She coughed a bit of blood and phlegm for a few minutes before she finally recovered and was able to stand up straight.

 

Her eyes met a sign with large, bold letters written in a crimson red. The sign seemed to be an injunction of some sort. Diane read the words quietly to herself, “This house is occupied. Do not attempt to enter, I am armed.” Diane couldn’t believe what she was reading. Not only was there still someone else that had survived, or at least that had not reverted back to a primitive state, but the person was enjoining her to leave and find another place that would offer protection.

 

Normally Diane respected other peoples’ privacy, but in a life or death situation, there was no way in hell that she was going to let an imperious jackass force her back into the open streets.

 

Diane knocked on the door hard, pounding it in rage. For a few seconds after she dropped her fist from the door, there were no sounds. However, from possibly a room in the back of the house, Diane heard metal clatter onto a tile floor. She hit the door harder.

 

“Let me in! Let me in!” Diane screamed at the top of her lungs. Her knuckles began to bleed and leave blotches of blood on the door. Right as Diane was about to start knocking even harder, the locks on the door clicked open and the door swung inwards. A hand reached out from inside the dark house, gripping her forearm and dragging her in. The door closed, enveloping her with darkness.

 

“What the hell do ya think you’re doing? They’re still out there, and you’re pounding and screaming on the only refuge for what could be miles?!” The man whispered these words with venom, hoping to plague the woman he had just grabbed with guilt. The only thing it did was elicit a rivaled reaction of anger.

 

“Refuge? You have a sign up that demands that everyone must turn away, leaving the only ‘refuge’ for yourself!”

 

“So what? Are you blaming me for wanting to survive?!” Diane was so enraged by the man’s egotistic views that she grabbed the man by the neck and pushed him against the wall. The man struggled with her, eventually knocking her down onto the hard wood floor. A sound Diane recognized all too well shattered the sound of heavy breathing.

 

“You’ve really screwed this up girl.” The man’s finger twitched at the edge of the trigger of his .45 pistol, but right before he pulled the trigger, something caught his throat. A wet splash of something warm dotted Diane’s face and drenched the floor. A gurgling sound arose from where the sound of the pistol’s slide being pulled back came from. Diane heard the man drop to his knees, then collapse into a puddle of what must have been his own blood.

 

A coughing sound came from where the man had stood. It moved closer to Diane, its rancid breath staining the air of the house. Diane fell flat onto her stomach, reaching for the pistol. She felt her fingers curl around the base of the pistol’s grip, but it was slippery. The coughing sound was right above her, and in a split second it dropped right next to her face. Diane pushed herself forward, sliding a few inches across the floor. She rolled herself onto her back, gripping the pistol with her outstretched hand. She fired two rounds at the coughing man who was lingering above her. One bullet whizzed by him, making a cracking sound as it became lodged in the wall behind him. The second bullet pushed itself through the top of the man’s head, flying out the back and settling near its brother. The man coughed a few more times as he dropped to his side, twitching. The room fell silent and motionless with only the steam from the ejected shells dancing in the dark air, unnoticed.

 

It seemed the only blandishment that could be done in this new world was with a gun. Diane stood up, blood soaked into her shirt and pants, some matting her hair to the back of her neck. She flicked the safety of the gun on and walked towards the front door, stepping over the body of the man who saved her for himself. She opened the door, stepping out into the setting sun. The air was fresh, quiet, and for a second Diane felt like she had had a bad dream and had just awakened to the peaceful world she lived in before everything plummeted into the depths of darkness.

 

In the distance, far beyond the edge of the entrance to the cul-de-sac, a chorus of empty, soulless moans pilfered the innocent air. Diane snapped back into reality, looking out into the darkening sky. After what felt like minutes, but were mere seconds, Diane cajoled her tired feet to move away from the house.

 

While Diane ran as far as her deprived body could take her, the two shells from the .45 lay in blood, and the steam that was slowly rising from them began to die out as it rose to the ceiling, wavering next to the still fan.