Cassidy croaked in her sleep and ran her hand on the bed.
" Khalid!"
She had the weirdest dream ever.
A shadow chased her into the woods in her dream. It didn't stop chasing her until she stumbled over some shrubs and fell on her stomach.
She felt her entire body being engulfed by this shadow.
She flung her eyes open and peered about wide-eyed.
She gaped uncertain and bemused whether to stand up from the bed or lie still on the giant sized bed.
The entire room looked strange ( although glamorous,) it still looked strange.
The room was decorated with colored lights that shimmered and made the background look delicate and dainty.
She was in a place that she didn't have a clue about.
" What's this place?" she uttered to herself and tried to touch her throbbing head.
Her forehead glistened with sweat and she suddenly felt like she wanted to puke.
She yelped and pulled the bedsheet away.
She galloped to the dressing mirror in the room and gaped.
Uncertain whether to breathe or scream, her entire body became impossibly still.
She was still dressed in her wedding gown...
It seemed difficult to remember the last thing that happened before now but she was certain she didn't walk down to the wedding hall.
She had fallen unconscious before it was time.... and now, she was in a different place.
Cassidy hastened to the door and pulled it.
The door didn't open. She howled endlessly.
" Anybody here??"
Her echoed words greeted her.
She feared that her family would be searching for her.
Her wedding!
Everything would be ruined.
Hot tears ran down her beautiful, long face and her eyes slowly lost its light.
She scampered away to the window and tried to flip it open, but it didn't open.
She looked out the window and watched as the clear blue summer sky transformed into a sea of blackness.
The sun got swallowed by the rapidly falling night and the sky got freckled by shimmering stars, yet she could hear the rumbling of the heavens.
It hit her that she had been unconscious for a long time.
She touched her flared nostrils and saw bloodstains on her palm.
She muttered under her breath.
She found her way to the bathroom in the room and washed away the bloodstains on her palm.
More blood dripped from her nostrils down to her face.
She washed her face with water and raised her head to stop the blood from flowing.
Cassidy walked briskly to the bed and raised the bedsheet to find her phone.
She groaned helplessly when she couldn't find the phone.
" How could I leave my phone.... it's the only way I can communicate."
She walked to an obscure corner in the room and flipped the curtain.
The door!
She pushed it open and scampered away from the room.
She click clack clicked down the stairs, each step echoing out a cry.
She suddenly stopped when she felt a stab of pain in her chest.
At the end of the large room, there stood a table with so much food on it; chicken, pickled eggs, assorted fruits....
Cassidy swallowed saliva in a gulp.
She just heard her stomach rumble. She rose her brows in a surprised arc.
If the house was not the habitation of anyone, then who could have kept the food?
Suddenly, the lights were turned off.
Her eyes darted around maniacally - looking for escape but she stood rigid and gaped - uncertain whether to breathe or scream.
A sickening wave of terror welled up from her belly.
Cassidy felt her consciousness leave her, and within the next minute, she dropped on the floor.
****
Cassidy's nose burned in the frigid air, and she squinted against the sun reflecting off the window.
She had been unconscious for a long time because the entire place was so bright that she didn't need the lights. The hot sun gnawed on her flesh ( it burned lightly.)
Her arm muscles ached as she wiped dust off her cold body and walked briskly to the window.
The environ seemed strange too.
She couldn't see anyone on the streets as she stretched her neck and glanced again.
If anyone had told her that she won't be getting married, she would have made sure that person got dealt with severely.
That day when she woke up to the sound of chirping birds, she had no idea what was in store for her.
To begin with, everything was too perfect for anything unusual to happen again.
It was one of those days when one felt good.
Here she was, in the weirdest place she could ever think of.... lost in the middle of nowhere.
She gritted her teeth and closed her eyes. After massaging her temple, she ran her hand aggressively through her hair.
She hated being helpless. It seemed like every door was locked.
Suddenly, the bright weather turned gloomy and it began to drizzle outside. The rumbling thunder made her move away from the window.
The rain falling outside reminded her of a movie she had once seen.
A zombie movie!
She could remember it vividly.... it seemed like a part of her thoughts ( she could even see it.)
In the movie, some chemicals were released into the atmosphere and it seemed like a powerful substance.
It was later discovered that the substance was released at a cemetery.
The outcome was disastrous.
It caused the cadavers to reanimate.
It reanimated every corpse interred there. This was the worst timing for the entire neighborhood where these creatures were reanimated.
Every night, they wrecked havoc.
They fed on human brains.
Attempts to destroy the creatures proved abortive as their dismembered body parts still reanimated.
After so many researches, it was found that the only ways to destroy zombies created by trioxin were by incineration or electrocution.
This movie since childhood had remained her worst.
Thinking about a zombie invasion always sent shivers down her spine. The world would surely not survive such invasion.