Zhou Rong held a gun in one hand, hiding behind a transformer box in the alley corner, licking the scrape on the back of his hand from falling from the second floor, exhaling a tired breath.
In the road not far away, zombies gradually emerged from the darkness, shuffling in groups and emitting growls.
“Si Xiao Nan…” Zhou Rong panted and muttered, “Give me a little more courage, please.”
The zombies seemed to have discovered something, turning simultaneously and squeezing into the alley. Zhou Rong gritted his teeth, rose from behind the transformer box, and pulled the trigger, dropping the first few zombies. More undead, however, eagerly crossed their fallen companions’ bodies, rushing forward.
Zhou Rong ran desperately, roaring with almost all his strength: “Si—Xiao—Nan—!”
·
“Si Xiao Nan—!”
In the messy rental room, Si Nan suddenly twitched in his coma, his eyelashes trembling about to open.
The first ray of daylight passed through the window frame, revealing zombie bodies dismembered and walls splattered with rotten blood and brain matter. An electronic clock flickered with a green light under the overturned desk.
6:12 AM.
Daylight gradually clarified, spreading into a dark, narrow light band on the floor. At the band’s end, the bloody tooth mark on Si Nan’s wrist slowly dried, scabbed, and began to peel off. Fresh skin emerged beneath the scab, quietly bathing in the misty morning light of a new day.
Si Nan tightly closed his eyelids, then opened them again a few minutes later, sitting up in a daze.
“…Is anyone there?” He looked around, hoarsely.
The rental room was dead silent, with no response.
“Zhou Rong?” He asked softly, “Rong Ge?”
Si Nan got up, his head somewhat dizzy, walking unsteadily to the window. Between the city buildings, the first rosy light suddenly flashed on the eastern horizon, causing his pupils to contract unexpectedly.
Like lightning splitting his muddled mind, everything that happened in the past twenty-four hours flashed quickly before his eyes – the collapsed concrete slab at the construction site, Yan Hao’s twisted wrist, Zhou Rong’s urgent calls, the endless, bustling zombies…
The final frame in his memory: searchlights sweeping across the city sky, helicopters roaring and breaking through the clouds, flying towards the distant south.
