The world was hazy, and confusing. Thoughts spiraling around in my ruined mind. I felt like the skeleton of a leaf, when the outer layers have worn away, and there is nothing left. I was thirsty, but could not bring myself to drink. I yearned for water, but at the same time, shied away from it. It hurt, to swallow, to breathe, to do anything at all. My left arm was numb, but the rest of me burned with a raging pain that I couldn’t control or escape. My eyes rolled uselessly in my head, and in my chest my heart was a still heavy object that slowly was being eaten away by the worms. I had to keep going, I no longer knew why. A sound came from where my throat was supposed to be, a wordless cry for help where none could possibly be given. I was one of the damned, and even as I drug my wasted form through the rows and rows of trees, I still searched for some sign of human life in the darkness.
I found it.
The little girl was standing perfectly still in the clearing beside the old farmhouse. Her dress was torn and the hem was covered in a layer of mud. Her bare feet were pale white against the green grass. She was so small, I could have broken her with one hand. I knew this as surely as I knew how many milliliters of blood coursed through her veins. She was weak, and I was strong. As I shambled closer, she looked up at me, and her eyes were wide and blue. A residual ache of feeling had me pause, and cock my head to the side curiously. Something about her was familiar, welcome even. Perhaps I had once known her, cherished her, like something precious to be protected at all costs, but now it was all gone into the haze of sickness. Another feeling gripped me, one that had my mouth watering so that the saliva dripped down and ran over the holes in my neck and shoulders. It was hunger, more powerful and desperate than anything I had ever experienced before. Suddenly the thought of swallowing her flesh in great bulging mouthfuls was all I could focus on. I lurched forward, my jaw stretching as wide as it could go, bones snapping from rigor mortis, tendons tearing loose to flap against what was left of my skin.
She screamed…
(Excerpt from zombie novel Blood Brothers Life Harvest)
Blood Brothers: Life Harvest by Brittany Sellers | Goodreads
