Decay (Book 1): Civilization by Linus Locke Page A

out in the street. Bradley hopped from the ladder onto the roof of the garage. “Hurry up, guys,” he urged Roger and Guillermo. Both men scrambled to make it up the ladder. A black woman limped past the garage out in the street followed by four fiends.
    The woman appeared to be in her thirties, but it was hard to tell anyone’s age anymore. She wore a long black skirt suit with a black jacket the sleeves have been torn off of for comfort. Her long black hair was in a loose pony tail, and she had black-framed glasses. At the bottom of her long legs her feet were bare.
    “I’ll see if I can help this woman,” Bradley said.
    “I’ll go with you. If that is fine with you of course?” Guillermo pulled his blade from his pack and jumped from the garage before Bradley could answer.
    “Can you wait here with Emalynn?” Bradley asked Roger. “We will be right back.” Bradley jumped down from the roof and pulled the handgun from his belt.
    Emalynn felt terrified to know she had once again been left alone with Roger. She stepped back to give him room to climb through the window. Smiling at him, she hoped he would keep his distance. His face no longer seemed to be drained of color, but he still looked like he lacked his humanity.
    Bradley caught up to Guillermo just as he had chopped into the skull of the closest fiend, a teenage boy who was wearing a torn Call of Duty t-shirt. He went down to the concrete hard, landing on his face. His front teeth shattered against the street. The fiends moved slowly, but the woman was injured and not moving much quicker.
    Aiming his pistol at the next fiend, Bradley realized how bad of a decision it would be to continue firing. The woman had fired a few shots and somehow not attracted an entire horde, but Bradley didn’t want to risk it. Instead, he unsheathed a large hunting knife he had found in the bait shop, jumped on the fiends back, and drove the knife into his head.
    The third fiend went down after Guillermo’s blade sliced through the back of her neck. Her body stopped working, yet she kept her eyes on Guillermo. Clack . Clack . She bit at the air. Guillermo swung the blade to the right, connecting with the face of the last. The blade was buried in the fiend’s head, entering at a slight downward angle that sliced through both eyes.
    “Ma’am! You can stop now. You’re safe,” Bradley shouted to the woman.
    She slowly came to a stop and turned to them as they came up to her. It was obvious she was out of breath. From the looks of her she had not eaten in days. The deep bite marks on her thin left arm spewed blood along with a foamy white substance that dripped onto the concrete. Bradley knew from the experience of the initial attack that anyone who was bitten would not last much longer.
    Her southern accent wasn’t thick, but it was enough to confirm she wasn’t from around here. “Three children are on the roof of the super market just a few blocks from here. They are waitin’ for me to return with food. I can’t go back to them like this, but they will starve to death by themselves.” The words she spoke were carried with forced breathing.
    “We will get to them. Are you the one who fired the shot?” Bradley asked.
    “No sugah. We heard it, so I moved to the roof thinking it meant a chance at being rescued. Will you promise to get the children?” Her face was wet with tears and blood.
    “We will get to your children. I promise.”
    “They ain’t my children, but I couldn’t leave them by themselves. I saw what those characters did to my family, and I couldn’t let that happen to them poor babies. Promise me right now you will get them and keep them safe.”
    “We will go for them now,” Guillermo said reassuringly.
    “Thank you kindly.” She looked up into the sky. “It’s time for god to take me to see my own family.” Before she could be stopped, she put her gun to the roof of her mouth and pulled the trigger. The gunshot rang through the street.