Side Story. The Beginning of the Zombie Outbreak
For Aiden, that day started as an ordinary morning like any other.
The loud alarm woke him up, he got out of bed, washed up, ate cereal, and drank coffee while watching TV - that kind of routine.
The only difference was the serious content flowing from the news.
"An epidemic..."
The nonstop emergency broadcast reported unsettling news that all of New York was being designated as a quarantine zone due to an unusual epidemic, and that it might spread across the entire United States.
Aiden lived in Pittsburgh, not far from New York, so he frowned as he drank the rest of his coffee.
If the New York mayor sent out a request for medical volunteers or manpower, he would inevitably be drafted.
Worried about whether he could refuse if the city sent a dispatch request, he knew today would obviously be a hectic day with many people who had escaped from New York to nearby Pittsburgh visiting hospitals in anxiety.
'Will my vacation plans be ruined?'
He was planning to travel to Europe with his girlfriend Jane, so the current situation was unwelcome.
Aiden gulped down the remaining coffee and hurried to prepare for work.
Thump thump thump!
Just as he finished preparing and was about to leave the house, someone roughly knocked on the front door.
Since there was no one who would visit his house early in the morning, Aiden opened the door with a puzzled expression.
When he opened it, he saw Jane with a pale face.
"Jane? What's wrong all of a sud-"
Before the question could finish, Jane roughly hugged Aiden and tried to drag him out of the house without any explanation.
Aiden gently grabbed Jane's hand.
"Jane, what's wrong?"
Jane's pale hand was trembling.
Aiden held her shaking hand tightly and made eye contact, trying to reassure her by conveying warmth.
Jane seemed to feel a little better from Aiden's warmth and spoke slowly, not as urgently.
"Aiden, can I explain the details as we go? We need to move right now."
Aiden got into Jane's car parked in front of the house, following her.
As soon as he got in, Jane roughly stepped on the accelerator.
Screech-
"J-Jane, calm down!"
Aiden hurriedly put on his seatbelt in surprise.
Jane took a deep breath and started explaining.
"Aiden, there's something you need to know about the epidemic."
She said that the spread of the disease had already far exceeded the quarantine zone and was rapidly spreading in Pittsburgh.
And that it's an incurable disease for now, and the administrative system is so broken that even the mortality rate couldn't be tallied.
The symptoms that appear when the disease develops were beyond imagination.
It starts with the pupils dilating and showing minor seizure symptoms, she said.
Eventually they lose their reason and can't understand human speech.
Extreme aggression appears, and only the instinct to bite and eat humans remains.
"That's... like zombies from movies?"
"That's right, Aiden. Zombies."
Hearing those words, Aiden was shocked.
But he couldn't dismiss Jane's words lightly.
Jane works at a pharmaceutical company related to the government, and her job is developing new drugs and researching vaccines.
She has a job that requires her to respond to diseases faster than anyone.
But Aiden couldn't continue speaking.
Zombies? What an unrealistic thing to say.
When Aiden fell silent, she didn't explain any further.
Because there was no need to.
They were just about to enter the city center from Aiden's house located slightly outside the city outskirts.
Jane was driving at a speed faster than anyone else.
Far ahead, a person was blocking the middle of the road, swaying.
"We, we should slow down..."
Aiden couldn't continue his next words.
The person reflected in his eyes had a terribly mangled appearance even from a distance, with half of the upper body, from the collarbone to the waist, completely caved in as if crushed by something, leaving no internal organs or spine intact.
Aiden is a doctor. A very skilled one at that.
Even to his eyes, that person's body condition was as good as dead while standing.
Yet it's moving. Flailing its arms as if craving something.
Suddenly, that corpse-like person saw the approaching car and started charging madly like a bull rushing at a matador.
"Jane! Stop!"
Despite Aiden's shout, Jane rather increased her speed and drove straight towards that person.
Thud!
Bang!
The car shook violently with an impact that felt like twisting, and that person flew backwards, splattering blood on the windshield.
Aiden quickly looked back.
Jane had hit a person. No, can it be called a human?
Because in Aiden's eyes as he looked back, he saw the completely shattered lower body trembling and trying to get up to chase their car again.
"What is this...!"
Jane was silent.
She just kept driving endlessly towards somewhere.
Aiden now began to realize that what Jane had said was true.
And as he looked forward again, he witnessed the miserable reality.
As they entered deeper into the city center, the roads were a complete mess with stopped cars.
The beautiful streets that were once the symbol of this city were littered with corpses, and on top of them, bodies that were people until just moments ago were rushing at other people.
There were also police. The desperate shouts and gunshots of those trying to evacuate citizens while shooting at approaching zombies from barricades made of police cars echoed in his ears.
The stores lining the streets were all burning or had their doors smashed, the glass walls were completely shattered, and it was a total mess as if looted.
Aiden thought.
That the New York he knew would no longer exist.
That it had become a hell where only two options remained: being eaten or surviving.
Blocked by wrecked cars, they could no longer drive.
"From now on, you need to follow me closely Aiden, okay? Aiden? Can you hear me?!"
Jane shook Aiden.
He shook his head vigorously.
"Y-yeah Jane, let's go."
As Aiden seemed to come to his senses, Jane took out an iron pipe and a metal baseball bat from the back seat and handed one to him.
"We need to go to the laboratory, there... I'll explain why I'm doing this Aiden so... trust me and follow me."
"Alright, don't worry, I'll follow you no matter what happens."
Aiden steeled himself at Jane's worried gaze.
The two carefully got out of the car and walked into an alley that seemed less populated.
Jane running forward through the alleys with Aiden following behind, the countless screams of people and the roars of zombies echoed in their ears from behind them.
"Wait!"
Jane suddenly stopped and halted Aiden in a low voice.
"What..."
"Shh!"
As Jane quickly lowered her body, Aiden followed and lowered his body too.
And when she pointed ahead, Aiden's gaze moved following her hand.
There, they saw a zombie tearing apart a corpse.
The zombie didn't seem to notice them and was endlessly tasting the corpse.
Crunch crunch
They tensed at the chilling sound.
As Jane was about to raise her body as if she had decided something, Aiden grabbed her shoulder.
"I'll, I'll do it Jane."
The Jane he knew wasn't someone to handle this kind of thing.
Because she was infinitely kind and loved meeting people, Aiden couldn't make her do such a cruel thing.
He knows. From the B-grade zombie movies he had watched for fun before, and the knowledge from his profession as a doctor, how to silence that zombie.
Grip
Aiden tightly gripped the golden bat and quietly approached behind the zombie.
Inhale!
Thud!
The strike was instantaneous.
Aiden doesn't hesitate for even a moment.
If he makes a mistake here, the consequences of that mistake will directly affect Jane too.
-Gu, guuuh!!
The zombie that was hit hard on the back of the head writhes and gets up.
Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!
Aiden swung the bat down with all his might again and again.
Brain matter and blood splatter everywhere.
Still, Aiden didn't stop the bat.
Thwack!!
Thwack!!!
Jane grabs Aiden's shoulder as he swings down as if he's lost his mind.
"Aiden, it's over now..."
"Huff! Huff!"
Jane pulled Aiden, who had become dazed, to sit down.
The two felt each other's warmth without saying anything for a very brief moment.
They move through the alleys even more quietly but quickly.
The two who had avoided countless deaths under the name of luck finally arrived at the closed research facility.
Leaving the tightly locked main gate behind, Jane holds her keycard to the emergency exit for employees installed on the side wall.
Beep.
The lock on the iron door was quietly released.
Jane looked back before entering the iron door.
She thought of the countless screams they had heard on the way here, the people who must have struggled to survive.
Jane wondered if someone had discovered them and followed, but only zombies who had lost their reason had found and followed them.
The two pass through the iron door without a word.
Thump! Thump!
From outside the closed iron door came the sound of zombies pounding on it, unable to do anything.
Jane closed the additional inner door and firmly locked it.
The two looked at each other without saying anything.
The realization that they had survived gradually filled their hearts.
Then, Jane burst into tears and fell into Aiden's arms.
Aiden endlessly patted Jane's back.
After some time passed.
Jane, seeming to have finally calmed down, broke away from Aiden's embrace and grabbed his hand.
"I'm sorry, Aiden. I should have explained more, anything. I'm so sorry for dragging you along unilaterally."
"No, it must have been very hard for you? Thank you Jane. You did it to save me."
Aiden looked at the sniffling Jane, and only then examined the surroundings of the research facility.
"Are there no more people left here?"
"No, everyone evacuated the day before."
"Everyone? But there was no official announcement... Oh..."
The government and research facility know the starting point of this whole situation.
They must know.
That the origin of the zombie outbreak happening outside right now is this very research facility.
Did they think it could be controlled? Or did the situation start without time to think?
Yet everyone fled without any warning.
Aiden couldn't ultimately say the words rising from the bottom of his heart to Jane.
No, he couldn't. He's not that cold-blooded person, and besides, isn't she the person he loves most?
Aiden swallowed the words that kept coming up in his mind.
[Jane, are you also one of the culprits who created this situation?]