The world I inhabit now is not the one I once lived in. It’s a gray, hollow echo, stripped of its warmth and color, a ghostly mockery of what was. The sky hangs heavy, perpetually overcast, as if even the sun refuses to shine on this broken place. My mind mirrors this desolation—fractured, splintered into fragments of memory that slip through my grasp like ash on the wind. Yet, some refuse to fade. They are jagged, searing reminders of what I’ve lost. They cling to me, piercing through the fog of my undead existence, relentless and unforgiving.

  The church looms in my memory, a shadowed monolith of dark stone and cold judgment. It had stood silent, imposing, its spire clawing at the heavens like a cursed finger pointing to nowhere. I remember emerging into the pale light of day, the stark contrast almost blinding after the dim interior. Charlie was at my side, his face a mask of grim resolve.

  “We’ll split up,” he had said, his tone clipped, his words as precise as the man himself. “I’ll get John. Stay here.”

  I didn’t argue. I never did—not then. Charlie was the pragmatic one, always calculating, always three steps ahead. It was what kept us alive, or so I thought. So I had stood there, rooted to the cracked pavement outside the church, shielding my eyes against the pallid sunlight. The street before me stretched out like a scar, leading to the Weeks Bridge and beyond it, Brighton—my home.

  My apartment.

  The thought anchored me, however tenuously. I clung to it as if it were a lifeline, whispering Greg’s name like a prayer. He had promised to protect them—my family. He had Rachel. He had the guns I left him, the spare ammo. But as the moments ticked by, doubts began to fester. Did he know to aim for the head? I never told him that. How could I? At the time, even I hadn’t known. Would he have figured it out? Did it even matter?

  The street remained empty, eerily silent, save for the occasional rustle of wind through brittle leaves. Time stretched thin, every second taut with unease.

  “Isabel!”

  Charlie’s voice cut through the stillness, sharp and urgent. My name—my full name. He never used it unless the situation was dire.

  My stomach plummeted, a lead weight dragging me down. John. Something had gone wrong.

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  I ran, my pack jostling against my back, the weight of scavenged supplies threatening to throw me off balance. The slap of my boots against the pavement was deafening in the unnatural quiet. As I rounded the corner, my fingers scraped against the rough brick of the church, steadying myself as I skidded to a halt.

  The scene before me froze my blood.

  Charlie stood at the far end of the block, his face carved in stone. At his feet lay John’s rifle, its once-pristine surface now scuffed and smeared with dirt. The sight of it—a weapon John had carried with such pride—twisted something deep inside me. Nearby, the bushes lining the sidewalk were bent and trampled, their branches splayed outward as if something had burst through them.

  And there, stark against the cracked concrete, was the stain.

  It glistened wet and crimson, a pool of fresh blood spreading outward in a viscous bloom.

  I couldn’t breathe. A soundless scream clawed at my throat as my legs moved of their own accord, dragging me closer. The world around me narrowed to that dark, accusing blot on the ground. My training whispered cold, clinical truths—arterial spray, recent wound, rapid loss—but my heart screamed louder, drowning out reason.

  The scuff marks and streaks of red led away from the rifle, vanishing into the hedge beyond. I followed, my body trembling, my mind a maelstrom of denial and dread.

  The first body I saw wasn’t John’s. It was hers.

  She was crumpled against the base of a lamppost, her faded floral dress a grotesque parody of its former cheer. Her face—what was left of it—was a mess of torn flesh and exposed bone. Her mouth hung open, frozen in a scream that would never end. The black hilt of a knife jutted grotesquely from her cheek, the blade buried deep.

  John’s knife.

  I knew it instantly, the jagged handle unmistakable. He’d shown it off the day he found it, laughing as he practiced twirling it between his fingers. But now, its presence was an accusation, its angle whispering truths I didn’t want to hear: he’d struck upward, a desperate, final act.

  I stumbled back, bile rising in my throat. The world spun, the weight of realization pressing down on me like a vise.

  “Where is he?” My voice cracked, a hoarse whisper barely audible over the pounding of my heart. I didn’t want the answer, but I needed it.

  Charlie’s silence was the loudest answer of all. His face, etched with sorrow and something else—guilt, perhaps—was a mask I couldn’t bear to look at.

  I don’t remember much after that. The memory fractures, twisting into blurred fragments that refuse to align. Or maybe I’ve forced them into the dark corners of my mind, unwilling to face what came next.

  But I remember the growls.

  Low, guttural, primal.

  And the screams.

  High-pitched, piercing, human.

  Then the darkness consumed me.

  Now, I walk in that same darkness, my legs dragging beneath me as if bound by invisible chains. I don’t know where I’m going, only that the hunger pulls me forward, relentless and unyielding. My mind replays the past, a cruel loop of everything I lost.

  Isabel Anderson. A name. A life. A hope.

  All of it gone. . .

  Just like John. . .

  Just like everything else. . .