Ahmad Jalil (1st year MBBS)

Looking up at the sky, James wanted to say many things to his brother but could only manage 'I’m sorry'. It's been a week since he saw his brother lying there with deadmen chewing his guts. Yes deadmen, zombies, whatever you want to call them. In these days he had come close to death more times than he could remember. Before this he did not know how much he depended on his brother for his safety. And now he was gone, his brother, his best friend, his protector. Losing someone as close as your brother is one thing but to know that you are responsible for it is another. He should not have fallen asleep on his watch.

 “Damn it”

He knew that he had to be strong, his brother would have wanted that. He could almost hear him say, "buckle up kiddo, what's done is done, move on you scamp". And then would come his oh so famous laugh. The laugh that would brighten up his day no matter what's going on. So that's what he planned to do. 'Buckle up'. But a few minutes rest would not do any harm, right? He had been running and fighting the undead shit for at least two straight days with almost no sleep at all. 

He closed his eyes and there it was again. His brother's guts spilled all over the floor of their cabin. That was also a reason why he couldn't get much sleep. For everytime he closed his eyes, he saw that horrible scene- his brother being devoured by those beasts! 

James knew it from the beginning that he was a coward  He had admitted it several times to his brother. The last one was just some hours before his brother died.

“I can't do it ,Will. I mean look at the reality, I will only slow you down. I’m scared of them, Will. The way they chew you, the way they 'gnaw' at you, I mean I... I think you should go on and I will shoot myself. I will get a painless death and I....”

But Will silenced him. “Don’t you ever say that again, alright? You can do it and you will.... We'll do it together, got it?”

After Will's death he was very tempted to kill himself. To shoot himself and drift away from this horror. But he could not do it. How will he face his brother in heaven? He could not bear to see Will's disappointed face. So he kept on. And here he was, lying under a tree. His empty glock 16 resting beside him. He should have brought some ammo and food from the cabin. But no, he ran like an idiot, a scared idiot who had just seen his brother being chewed upon. 'Damn it'. He didn't deserve to be living, he thought. Will did. Will was not stupid like he was. Falling asleep during his watch , getting Will killed, then running away leaving all of the supplies he and Will had collected. He was a fool.

'TWICH'.

He heard something like someone walking on dead leaves. 'CRISP' There he heard it again. he opened his eyes and what met them was not a pleasant sight. 'GNAWW' ,he was so absorbed in his thoughts that he didn't notice three zombies approaching quite steadily. They looked like they were turned recently. Unlike many others that he had seen, their clothes were not very torn and their skin wasn't completely rotten.

'Run'. That was the only thing he could thought of ,other than trying to bust those bastards' heads with the butt of his empty pistol, which didn't seem like a very good idea. But before he could do anything he was surrounded by at least a dozen deadmen that came out of nowhere. 'Don't rest unless you have found a safe place'. That's what Will always said. How could he forget that? He was armless. There was nothing he could protect himself with. 'No God no' .He tried to run past those zombies but failed. They all fell on him like football players. 

"Help.. somebody help!"

 Tears started to fall from his eyes. He tried to get away from those creatures but failed . They were pinning him down, he knew they were hungry by the way they looked at him. Their claw like hands cutting his skin. Black colored saliva falling from their mouths. Then it happened. They started to butcher him with their teeth. His worst nightmare, being eaten by zombies, came true. He cried and cried as the blazing pain took over his body or what was left of it. So that was it, he thought. He was going to die, just like Will . This was the end. Now he would never live to the end of this terrible infection, if it ends at all. He tried to think of good things, the time he spent with his family, the happy times but all he could feel was the pain. The pain ,the blood, the gore. He could feel it, he could feel his limbs being tore away from him. Someone was crying and screaming. Then he realized it was him. He was surrounded by pain. It was exactly how he had imagined it, being eaten alive. Only worse. His whole body was burning. Those hungry monsters were digging deep into his body. He couldn't even cry anymore. He was choking on his own blood. All of his limbs were torn apart from his body, his skin peeled, and the deadmen were feasting on his flesh and organs, yet somehow he was conscious and hence in an unimaginable pain. It was surely the worst way to die. A gunshot was the last thing that he heard.

'You only ended his misery, you know that , right?' asked the sergeant, holding a telescope and looking down as their helicopter flew away. 

'Yeah...' mumbled the sniper.

Some miles away, Officer Rick Grimes awakes from coma in an abandoned hospital..