Story below is basic zombie storyline written by Rhari. I don't write often, much less share it so please be nice. :3
1/3 illustrations.

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Kumon pounded up the pavement, it wasn't too far from her. She'd set the first time delay nearly 30 minutes ago, and she could feel the clock in her mind ticking away each passing second. She had to each the Cliff before the hour was up, or it would all be in vain. They'd made it this way, specifically so that they could save themselves and no one else could ever ruin the experiment.

She panted along the wooded trail, so unlike the labs. If anyone had known, had guessed what lay behind the labs, they would have never allowed the company to proceed. It had bee a fail safe, should they ever need it. And by the gods, they needed it now. Her heart pounded in her breasts, each breath a gasp. The detonator was an easy 10 minutes by ATV but of course, after the lock down, no vehicles had been able to be brought out. Even now, she could see the three large buildings an orange haze above the treeline. She panted hard, stifling tears before running onward. It wasn't long now.

They'd never meant to let them out. Of course, they hadn't known that feeding them would increase their strength. They were called Subject Z. A group of carrion eaters that seemed unphased by anything. They weren't successful hunters but in large numbers... well... the company just hadn't known what they were doing. They fed Subject Z and overtime they became too much. The first lab attendant to be bitten had gone down within minutes, sweating and chill before he passed into a coma, and death. And this is where it started. In the morgue, the lab attendant had come back.

It had swept through the morgue, infecting the coroner, his assistants, before anyone had known what had happened. And the company had just started their research. Subject Z were pack animals, linked only through the pathogen in their blood, still they thought together, were of one mind and lived only for each other. Ku stopped, looking over the city below, there were already fires burning in the neighborhood nearest the labs, by their calculations it would spread through the city before the night was out.

She had one more stretch of path, a near vertical slope to the plateau and then it would be over. She started at a crack in the woods and began scrambling up the loose gravel climb. She had been sure that they'd been left behind at the labs, nothing had followed her and they weren't known for their cognative ablilities. Then it happened, something, huge, burst from the treeline, bearing right down on her, it's eyes blue and glassy.

She screamed.
It screamed back.

Scrambling and tripping over herself she half ran, half tumbled up the ravine. The creature behind her, what had once probably been a gator or croc, followed suit, more deliberate and with much more obvious power. She hit the top of the path before he had made it half way, drawing the gun from her side. This was a speciality she had picked up long before her stint with the company. And lord was it coming in handy now. She aimed downward at him, pointing into his foreskull, aiming and firing. The satisfying crunch of bone and squelch of grey matter met her ears and she sighed. It was one of the few ways to end a Subject. The brain, the pathogen needed it and with the Subject being deceased there was no way to heal it. She breathed a sigh of relief and ran. She would not stay around for something else to become infected and come after her.

The button was not long off and she could hear the dull beep of an initiated sequence, all she would have to do it push the button and it would be over. There would be a time delay of 3 minutes and then it would go off. The only way to escape would be air ways. She would have no hope. Then she saw it, the little grey box half burried in the earth. She tripped, falling on her hands. She grimaced at herself, salvation only moments away and she falls short. She snorted at herself and reached for the button, pushing down on the little red circle.

Immediately the whail of air sirens. This had not been what she'd expected. The company and the labs had never told her they would warn the people. She looked over the city and grimaced. The light of pre dawn was just tinting the sky and she began to cry. She'd wanted to commit her crime anonymously, the unknown savior, the unknown crminal, Now they knew, they all knew they were going to die.

Artwork © Shayley "Rhari" Duval