I sat on the cool floor of my foster mom's house, staring at the TV in awe. The reporter was sweating and flustered, trying not to panic, and breathing far too heavy in his microphone. He looked as if he had just gotten very bad news. He stood in front of a hospital, which he very clearly did not want to be near. In the background I could see people being rushed in on stretchers. He looked around nervously. "W-we just got word that there is some s-s-sort of viral... outbreak... here in n-northern Florida. Authorities are a-asking all citizens to-"

The reporter took a deep breath, composing himself. "Authorizes are asking everyone to stay indoors and lock all doors and windows until more information is given. The hospitals are reporting an extremely high volume of patients, and ask that the hospital be reserved only for truely life-threatening injuries or illnesses. The police are asking anyone who sees suspicious behavior from a person, such as aggression, to stay away and call your emergency number immediately and report it."

Behind the reporter a man stumbled onto the screen. The man looked distraught, and had blood from his arm. The reporter turned around immediately and backed out of the screen, and there was inaudible yelling. The man grunted and fell to the ground, and began to convulse. There was more yelling and the camera faced the ground, then switched back to the news room.

The man and woman newscasters sitting at the round table looked pale. They were quiet for a moment, listening into their earpieces. The woman shifted to nervously fix her skirt and looked at the camera. "It looks like we lost connection from Tom. Um, John, what do you think of all this?"

The newscaster next to her cleared his throat. "Well, Janet, I'm not going to lie. This is very worrisome. We have had many people calling in saying they think this is a sort of zombie apocalypse. There's been people telling us that they have seen someone bite another person, which seems to fall in line with the aggressive behavior the authorities are warning us about."

My eyes grew wide and I started researching "zombie outbreak" on my phone while still listening to the news.

The woman nodded. "It does seem rather odd. I definitely would not jump to zombies right away, of course. My first thought would be, maybe, rabies." She laughed nervously.

My step mom barged through the doorway and stood behind me, watching the TV for a moment. Then I felt a crack of something hard hit the back of my head. I cried out and clutched my head, rolling over onto the floor. I felt the wetness of a small amount of blood.

"What did I tell you about watching this stupid conspiracy shit? You're 15 and you're already retarded enough as it is. Get up."

I sat up quickly and got dizzy. I peeked out to try and see what she hit me with. There it was. Her heel. I stood up slowly, wincing.

"Hurry up. You want me to hit you again? Turn it off."

I went to the TV and shut it off, and went straight to my room before she got more mad. I went into my phone again to continue my research when I got a text from my only friend, Ayla. I began texting her.

>AYLA: You see the news???

>ME: Hell yeah. Think it's really zombies?

>AYLA: Duh. The police are just not saying it because they dont want to scare people. What's the Bitch think?

>ME: She doesn't know yet. She saw me watching TV and thought I was watching SciFi again.

>AYLA: *eye roll* Hey. I have an idea.

>ME: What?

>AYLA: Don't tell her. Maybe she will hit one with one of her heels and it will bite her.

I laughed out loud, then winced in pain.

>ME: That's funny.

>AYLA: Funny, but sooo true. Sneak to my place tonight. Just be careful. If this is what I think it is, you're better off over here than with the Bitch when shit hits the fan."

I felt the back of my head, then sighed.

>ME: You got it.