(Rose)
Ann is waking me up by shaking my shoulder quietly. Not as hard as if something was wrong. She looks tired, not afraid. Nothing happened she says.
Alright then. We're switching roles. She goes to bed and I stand guard by the window, listening.
It's still the middle of the night. I see the stars. I listen to the wind and the house. There is nothing alive but us...
There is naught but death around us. Everyone is dead... And you can stillfeel it in the air.
I wonder if I miss the thrill of fighting monsters. A little perhaps. I can't honestly say that I miss fighting to the death for my life. Feeling brave of victorious however, maybe a tiny little bit. It had a strange taste to be physically prevailing.
I watch the night and wonder about what might come. What if nothing comes? What if even the daiûa is nowhere to be found? What if it doesn't exist? I'll have to think about it then. I might have made a mistake after all.
It's not as if I could pretend I fully understand this world I recently came to be in.
I saw grey clouds darken the sky, hiding the starts. It might rain soon. The clouds are moving fast but I don't hear the wind anymore. It's something else... I call Ann to wake her up. Something is approaching.
I step back from the window as the clouds hides everything outside. It's darker than night.
We hear some voices around us. Whispers. Children?
- Are you coming back to me mother?
That voice. I've heard it before. It makes me shiver down to my core. I think Ann is screaming.
- Welcome back...
The door is broken. The window is broken. I see a flash of light and a very loud noise scares me.
I think Ann shot at the door. She screams. Something howls in the room and she's panicking. I grab her wrist and throw her with unexpected strength against the window so she avoids, something.
The walls are crumbling apart. I can only see shapes, but I see the exit. I know what is below the window. I help Ann and jump right after her.
She accidently fires a shot at me when she hits the mud below. I'm not sure where I'm hit exactly but it hurts a lot. I land in the mud and against her.
We quickly step away.
We're surrounded, though they still are far. Human shapes. Dogs. Cattle too? Some are further away. We run in that direction.
Ann is shooting a little randomly at some of them. I don't know if she hits them.
The black cloud is moving too. It flies away from the crumbling house, passes above us and goes further to land into the field. A white lightning strikes the ground there too at the same moment, but we don't hear the sound of thunder.
I change our direction, to avoid meeting what landed there.
A bull or a cow is charging us we realise. I manage to react swiftly. Stop running. Feet on the deck. Breathe. Unlock. Aim. Stop breathing and shoot.
I almost didn't hear my gunshot nor felt much recoil. But the beast fell down a second later, still at a good distance. I'm impressed but we have to run again. I put the lock and safety back.
We run toward the next house. A swarm of shapeless beasts is after us. And the black cloud too. I saw it again, hiding the stars above us.
We get inside this time. Ann shoots fiercely the last bullets of her clip against our pursuers. I'm nowhere to judge, but find her behaviour awfully aggressive.
I close the door while she reloads. The door is broken in a single thrust and I hit the ground.
I turn around. A beast is over me already. Since I can still move, I grab my knife with a compass and stab it.
Blood is spilling over me. Its head comes to bite mine off. My left hand and the glove I wear protect me in time but it still hurts.
I think Ann shot it in the head. I had forgotten how violent this place could be...
I barely stand up and we need to run again. We exit the house from behind. The night just began. Welcome back...
~
We're running in the nearby woods. It's about where we met, just behind. The monsters don't run at the same speed altogether. We're taking them down one by one while fleeing.
But Ann already wasted her ammunitions, and I'm low too. She was a bit trigger happy.
Stay calm. Think. The train is not far. It's a sturdy building. We could defend ourselves a bit better inside. Unless it's their nest of course.
It's still quite a run-away though. We're tired from running and fighting our way through.
Strange people are running after us. They look like savages, naked, angry, and quite eaten by diseases. Or decaying. Or both. Biological monstrosities.
The black cloud is following us silently. Sometimes it falls and strikes the ground with a silent lightning, away from us. I wonder if it's something similar to the shadowy shape shifting creature?
We pass what's left of other scarecrows from time to time, random bits of corpses lying there. It's been a slaughter, and we're running right in the middle of it.
A humongous cat without hair is jumping at me and biting my foot like a stray dog.
The pain and panic make me act rashly and I almost shoot my own foot. The few bullets I shot at it pierced its head and entered the ground, spraying dirt around.
It's so easy to kill, it's scary. I pray that I won't ever need to wield such a weapon after tonight.
It's not power, it's corruption. I really don't like that. I feel bad suddenly. But I obviously won't throw this rifle away just now. I'll think about morality and useless concepts like honour once I have ensured my survival. I'm not a soldier after all. I don't have to believe in honour or bravery...
Or so many things, once you need to fight for your life. The night is far from being over yet.
We pass the stream outside the woods and climb the muddy hill.
The monsters stopped pursuing us in the woods I think. It's calm when we look back.
We reach the top. The cloud lands again a little further. A human voice is calling us. A childish voice...
We follow the train track that are just further. Soon we will be able to see the train. We walk swiftly.
We hear a little girl's laugh behind us. We turn around and only see darkness.
- You came back for me, mother?
It laughs. Ann screams again. She has hiccups now.
I saw a childish shape, but it's gone as soon as I look directly at it.
I saw a head. Its arm somewhere else. Ann began to say something and begins to suffocate. I'm stepping back. I don't see a body to aim at.
I manage to shoot the head, the human, decaying head. It still moves.
It turns into something more solid and rushes at us. At Ann? I shoot it repeatedly.
It suffers. It managed to punch me out of its way, as it heads toward Ann. I'm knocked out and slide down the hill.
Ann is left defenceless with it.
~