Chapter Eight (8). Despair.
The red sun shone it's blaze.
In the community subdivision, a bus coated in orange print exited the place filled with crowded houses and passed by the subway.
Inside the bus, a young man was awoken by the flaming hot sunlight brandishing against his skin.
He was a bit tipsy since he had fallen asleep so late last night and had to arrive early to ride the bus. He still felt sleepy for he had not gotten enough sleep.
He also had to come to this hidden community to decrease the workload of the bus driver of going back and forth to fetch him.
The inside of the bus was not crowded yet, John was the fourth passenger, the rest had yet to come.
John rubbed his eyelids which were dropping down incoherently, sticking out his hand to cover the bright red rays coming at him intensely.
"Weird..." He muttered, halfway unable to comprehend that the sun which he used to spy outside the window was veiled red.
Neither his companions realized this fact, the bus driver even laughingly joked about how hot the sun these days were due to global warming and people needed to stop going for plastic surgeries.
The students in the bus went along his joke, but Sim thought of it as the driver went too far, and well... John didn't pay attention anymore, he diverted his gaze back to his phone and plugged on bluetooth.
Not long after, a pair of lovers arrived.
The bus pulled off a stop and the door opened, a blonde western girl hopped in first before a black haired man came after. Their hands were clasped together, signifying their relationship.
When John cocked his head and saw the blondie, he was mesmerized and longed, however, he knew he had no chance with the girl.
He had already tried to court her before she had a boyfriend yet failed.
Moreover, her current boyfriend is Van. A mixed blood; half–british, half–Japanese, half–chinese.
He was a very handsome youth who was both athletic and smart, compared to him, John was naught.
Although John was rich, he was not comparable to the former. He was mediocre in appearance, and had certain health issues: he was weak and cowardly, to make sure he won't die young, he had to live in caution.
As John was in dismay, Van abruptly glanced at him and he felt his bones trembling from trauma.
Last week, he had pestered Van's girlfriend too much that he had to face a fist and broke a few of his bones. The attack threw him into being hospitalized and it made him stun in fear upon the thought.
And yesterday, he didn't mean to but he tried to put a green hat on Van. Luckily he managed to leave without injuries due to witnesses and vigilance.
Olivia, the blonde's name, also glanced at John. But unlike Van's frustrated glare, she worriedly furrowed her brows as she silently told her apologies for yesterday using her gaze.
"There's nothing to apologize for, Olivia." John shook his head, resignedly. "Im the one to apologize for the misunderstandings."
Hearing his response, Olivia didn't push any further. Her arm was then pulled by Van and the two lovers sat near the back, a few seats away from John.
John lowered his head in disappointment, he silently leaned back and stared at the scenery outside the window.
He became observant of each tiny details, after the bus left the crowded building area, John caught a glimpse of the red sun. He was now aware that it was vastly different from how it used to be.
He stared at it, then moved his gaze away.
The light from the sun was blinding and hurting his eyes, occasionally black spots appeared in his view and he could only rub and blink his eyes.
After a few stops, the bus was ready to enter the mountain where the field trip would begin.
Although it was in the middle of December and Christmas around the corner, the field trip had to proceed.
Anyhow, the students didn't contain any regret nor complaints due to they have already been told for the trip's purpose and others view this as a free vacation.
But before that, the teacher inside told the driver to visit a convenience store first to buy some breakfast for those who had forgotten to eat theirs due to the hurry.
The teacher then went to pick a few candidates who raised their hands willingly to buy themselves food.
John was picked halfway trough, however, the teacher decided to skip him and pick another after seeing his state.
Three were picked and they readied themselves to buy some food.
The three students stepped out of the bus. But when the person leading them hopped off with a thud, they suddenly heard a creepy noise creeping through the background.
It was a mixture of a beast's growl and the breathing of a predator eyeing their prey. That was simply not human like.
Olivia shivered, she hugged her boyfriend tight to seek protection. Van embraced her back, he then patted her head and asked: "What's wrong, Olivia?"
Olivia replied while her being shuddered with fear. "I may be hallucinating but I may have heard a beastly sound. The one were animals growl. It was eerie, and disturbing, there seems to be something wrong within...the city."
As she said the last part, she leaned back and looked out of the window.
There, she saw that this part of the city were strangely deserted. Especially that this place was famous for having a lot of people during early hours (day time) but there was no pedestrians crossing roads nor cars driving around!
Upon hearing Olivia's words, John removed his hands that were constantly rubbing his eyes.
John was curious, he looked outside but nevertheless, the sun was still on that position and stung his eyes again.
He hurriedly ducked down, John did not notice an eye tainted with blood staring at him with delight and hunger.
"Ahhh!"
Contrast to him, the others were a bit unlucky to see the frightening gore of those scary creatures around them.
Van's hold of his girlfriend strengthened, as he was tense in fear upon seeing four eyes looking at him outside the window.
It was inhumane. The way those eyes would response and the stiff yet quick movements of the dead, without thinking any further, it was concluded that the person outside was a zombie.
Just that, nobody wanted to believe it was true.
The leader of the group outside who was tasked to buy food from the store jokingly leaned towards the 'living corpse ' and giggled. "Bro! You totally freaked me out. You cosplayed nicely and your look looks very realistic!"
He even patted the crook of the neck of the 'cosplayer', thinking that the person was completely harmless. But fact proved him wrong—his hand who went closer to the cosplayer's neck was grabbed and pulled towards the bloodied person's mouth.
*Crunch*
It resembled the sound of crispy flakes being crunched. Beautiful and melodious; but the person dressed like a zombie who was covered with both foul and fresh blood destroyed the lovely asmr.
"AHHH!" the leader screamed till his breath was hoarse, his eyeglasses shaking off his nose bridge and falling into the ground.
The pain was unbearable, it wasn't ants biting him nor stabbing his foot on a glass or nail—It was as if he was skinned; his body slowly turned colder, and his manhood being crushed by a pointed tip continuously that it was impossible to not scream.
It was like a thousand headaches and a toothache was ravaging on his bitten arm. Blood sprayed like a sprinkler as his blood veins were torn apart, not to mention that his hand bones and muscles broke as the zombie digged it's nails and teeth crazily into his flesh.
"HELP! NOOOO!" The glasses wearing boy did not expect it at all. He wanted to take his hand off from the lunatic but he was of no avail.
He was late in realizing that the cosplayer in front of him was a real zombie, in front of many eyes, two more zombies appeared out of no where and began attacking him. It did not take any longer for him to be halfway devoured and killed.
"HEEIKK!!!! A–,A, A Zombie!"
Nobody could retain their calm.