Survival Instinct Read Free Page B

if the woman didn’t make it.
    “Run! Come here- I’ll pull you in!” Nadine shouted and her voice was rusty from lack of use. The woman gestured with her free hand that she heard and began making her way to the window in a serpentine fashion, trying to dodge the grasping hands of the undead. Nadine ducked back inside long enough to grab a long-handled hoe and then climbed back up, swinging the tool down on the heads of the closest bodies. She managed to clear three of them before one of them raised an arm for her and managed to dislodge her weapon. It startled her for a moment, but the woman was less than ten feet away now and getting closer by the second. She snatched another hoe from the pile and repeated the process, not caring about anything but getting the woman to safety.
    It would be good to have company, she thought as she took out another two of the shuffling corpses. She’d been alone for too long, and in the creepy silence of the night she often wondered if she was the only one left alive. She knew it wasn’t true, but thoughts of that nature always seem to be more realistic after dark.
    The woman was now only two feet from the ledge of the window Nadine leaned out of, and they could almost have grasped hands at this point. A quick look showed her a woman about her age with dirty, matted red hair and a pretty, dirt-streaked face. She was wearing the tattered remnants of a grey tee shirt and jeans, and a pair of startlingly new boots, not unlike the ones Nadine had been eyeing in the sporting goods store. Her thin arms were nonetheless strong, the small muscles standing out in sharp relief as she swam through the horde and towards Nadine’s outstretched hand. She reached up and their fingers touched. The woman let out a high-pitched wail of agony, and Nadine watched in horror as the creatures fought over the leg they’d ripped off of her. Stunned, she let go, dropping the woman to her death as the mass swarmed over her, their mouths dripping blood and saliva as they ravaged her body.
    Numb, Nadine scrambled down from her perch and sat against the wall under the window, unable to understand what happened. The woman had been safe- Nadine was so close to pulling her inside. What the Hell had gone wrong? She sobbed, trying her best to stifle the sobs with her hands as the icy shell that protected her from the horrible sight shattered. She’d never learned the woman’s name. She cried- for the woman she never got to meet, the life the woman wouldn’t live, but she was also crying for herself. She almost had someone to travel with, another woman who might be a friend to her, and support her in her pregnancy. Now she was back at square one, alone, afraid and doubting her own survival for the first time.
    What did the future hold for a woman like her? How the Hell was she supposed to raise a baby during the end of the world as she’d known it? God, would she even be able to hole up somewhere and deliver her child, or would those things get her while she labored? The image of those things that were once people performing an impromptu caesarian section tried to rise to the forefront of her mind, but Nadine forced it down ruthlessly. She couldn’t fall apart- not now. Later when she was safe she could indulge in all the hysterics she wanted, but for now she had a broken window just waiting for one of those creatures to get lucky and find a way in. Dull slaps resounded against the brick wall behind her as they sought a way in after her. Something must be done, quickly.
    Nadine found a hammer and nails in the backroom and thanked God that they’d once worried about such mundane affairs as tornados and hurricanes. It took her twenty minutes, and she panted lightly as she returned her the nest of sleeping bags she’d so recently vacated when she thought she might be able to save a life and make a friend. With one fist pressed tightly to her heart and the other clenched to her mouth, she cried herself to