'use your head, he who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day...'
Day One
Using those precious moments before the disoriented zombie oriented itself, Dion searched for any thing he could use as a weapon.
For his own safety it had to be something long, preferably sharp, but he would still appreciate a bludgeoning tool if that was what he saw. His eyes darted frantically around the room, desperation seizing him, until...
There!
With a quick step or two he picked up the broom resting on the wall, then he hurriedly raised his foot and brought it down forcefully on the area where the wooden length connected with the plastic head.
But...
It absolutely wasn't like it was in the movies, the broom was wrapped in a decorative and protective nylon like encasing, so when Dion stomped on it the wood broke but the nylon didn't, as a result instead of a sharp pointed wooden, Dion held the broom with its broken head flapping about within the confines of the nylon covering.
"Sh*t! Sh*t! Sh*t! Sh*t! Sh*t!"
Dion was swinging it back and forth forcefully in the air out of panic, trying to force the nylon to give.
"Cut! Cut you bastard! C*cksucker!"
In his moments of panic, Dion alternated between watching the rapidly recovering zombie and the demon-like material the craftsman used to prepare the broom, it was in one of those moments that he was caught off guard.
His eyes which were on the broken broom he was waving about wildly suddenly looked towards the struggling zombie, and his heart almost escaped from his chest.
"Jesus!!!" he screamed.
It was in his face.
So close.
The zombie was flying at him, it's good arm outstretched and it's mouth gaping. By the time Dion realized it it was already too close, just moments from tackling him.
He was about to die!
In panic he threw up the broom in between them, not enough time to worry about his exposed fingers.
The wooden length of the broom deflected the arm, while the plastic head handled the mouth and being pulled by inertia the zombie brushed its shoulder with Dion's and tumbled across.
The light contact made Dion feel disgusted, but at the same time he staggered due to the superhuman force behind it, his right shoulder feeling numb.
That didn't stop him though as he hurriedly raised the broom and struck the dangling head on the floor, the force tore the nylon casing and revealed the sharp edge of the broken wood.
A smile broke out on Dion's face as he briefly admired his work, then he triumphantly turned towards the zombie, but he immediately froze and his built up courage rapidly departed him.
The zombie had recovered quickly and was rampaging towards him, the way it threw itself into motion and clawed at the floors to get to him, there was a certain violent and rabid-like patternlessness to its movements that scared Dion, it scared him sh*it less.
So...
He turned and ran.
"Chineke!*" he screamed.
He knew it was unwise, even stupid and idiotic to turn his back on the zombie and run when there was no exit to be taken, but he was scared, terrified, at this moment his fear out muscled his reasoning and his legs moved on their own.
Honestly Dion felt the reason why various motivational speakers spoke of embracing your fears was because they had never been in such situations, f*uck this sh*t, if there was anyone who would embrace this monster...
'I would shave my hair'.
There was no way Dion could outrun this zombie, it was just too fast, and the broadcasting room was way too small for a sprint anyway, so in a second Dion had covered the room and in that second the zombie had almost caught up with him, another second away from taking a bite out of the back of his head.
But at that moment Dion arrived at the broken desk with the zombie hard on his tail, he quickly jumped over it and rollled to the other side, his movements only broken when he impacted the wall painfully. But the zombie in its limited wisdom didn't scale the desk too, instead there was a harsh collision.
THWACK!
The zombie looked up emotionlessly, it's dead eyes turning in the direction Dion lay, it opened its mouth and roared.
ROAR!!!
"Nimpo, stick no jutsu!"*
But it was at that moment that Dion acted, as swift as a ninja he climbed the unsteady desk, drew his arm as far back as he could, and then he shoved the sharp end of the stick straight into its left eyeball with all his might, there was a slick sound as the stick weaved it's way through the eye socket, the mutant brain, and then out the back of its head.
Everything ended so suddenly, one moment it was unleashing a beast like roar and the next it grew still, forced to grow still.
It's arms twitched weakly for a moment before falling lifelessly at its side.
Surprising as the stick shattered it's eyeball and went through its head, blood didn't flow, but maybe it wasn't so surprising, afterall...
"Corpses don't bleed," his voice was heavy but surprisingly calm, from the moment he saw an opening a certain sense or confidence had enveloped him.
Dion's breathing was hard and ragged, his limbs were trembling and his heart had not yet stopped planning its escape from his chest, he swayed and his leg gave way beneath him, and he fell in a not-so-graceful manner, his behind hit the desk and he fell off the unsteady desk, tumbling widely down till his head hit the wall.
"Ahhhh!" he exclaimed, spasms of pain shooting at him from the point of impact.
"Damn!"
He rubbed the spot feeling grievous, forgetting his previous fears he even glared harshly at the zombie's corpse... well, proper corpse.
"Well, at least no one saw," he said.
A smug smile gradually forming on his lips as his confidence returned in waves.
"You okay?" a voice called.
He froze.
1. Chineke: Igbo language, means 'God' or more literally 'God who creates ', although it is also used unassumingly sometimes as an exclamation.
2. Nimpo stick no jutsu: Go and watch Naruto 🙏😔😙😆