Emily felt paralyzed. Her dad had Spencer to bring her home, but now, with all these blood drenched murderers roaming the streets, he wasn’t there himself. Her knees felt weak and almost bucked as she gasped, “Oh no,” again.

Chris snapped her back to the present by yelling, “Come on, we can’t just stand here. The more of those things that see us head into your house the worse it’ll be. You have keys, right?”

“We both do!” Spencer yelled and started to race forward, until Chris grabbed him by the arm. “Hold on, cowboy. Let’s go up as a group. Let me have those keys.”

Spencer reluctantly handed them over, as Emily’s head jerked from side to side. There were less cannibals here, but more than enough to make her want to get into her house. For a moment she watched them. If they could run, the small group would be overrun in moments. Instead yellowed eyes glared with a mixture of vacancy and hatred.

They can’t stand us—want us to be like them.

“I hate you too,” She whispered. “And if I find out you did anything to my father, I’ll kill every last one of you.” A bald head bobbed as blood dripped from its half torn away chin. It reached for her with a drawn out moan and Emily ran to catch up with the others.

* * *

Fists banged against the front door before she even had a chance to catch her breath.

“When they move to the windows, we’ll be in serious trouble,” Chris said. “Where are all those guns you keep talking about?”

“My dad keeps them in a safe. I…I don’t have the combination.” While Emily answered the man, she watched blood drip from his gory axe onto their new carpeting. It had been a point of pride with her mother to keep it perfect, the whole house perfect. Part of Emily felt relieved that she was gone so her mother wouldn’t have to witness any of this. See the blood spreading across her perfect carpet.

“Maybe we should move the kids into the middle bedroom. It might be the safest,” Jewels said, as checked made sure all the windows were locked.

“We aren’t going to be safe at all unless we can get some guns.”

Jewels shot him an angry glare while saying, “Just help secure this place and then we’ll worry about-”

The loud ring of the land line interrupted her. Both Spencer and Emily leapt for the phone, but Emily’s long legs proved faster and she snatched up the phone before the third ring.

“Dad!”

“Yes, Emily it’s me.” She started to say something, but he broke in. “Emily, you need to listen to me. The traffic’s terrible, and these evil things are all over the place, but I’ll make it there as quickly as I can, even if I have to walk.”

“I saw them, dad. It’s horrible.”

“Good, then you know how serious this is. Now listen very carefully.” While her father talked, she heard the banging growing louder. More of the infected people had joined the first ones who had seen them. “Emily the combination for the safe is right to my birthday, left to your birthday and then right three times until you get to Spence’s birth day. Got it?”

“Yeah dad, they are two adults here with us.”

“Good give them guns too, if you think they can be trusted. Give Spence one too. This is that serious, and one more thing…”

With the loud hammering against the house, it took her a couple of seconds to realize the phone had gone dead. “Dad, oh no Dad!”

“Tell us some good news, kid,” Chris yelled at her while he propped the kitchen table against the living room’s wide front window. A second later, a huge crack ran up it. Chris hurried to move two sofas in behind the table. “What about the guns? That won’t hold them long!”

As if snatched out of a daze, she yelled, “The safe,” and raced toward it with Spencer on her heels. Sarah quickly joined the other children as Chris and Jewels continued to fortify the front of the house.

The front window shattered and Chris quickly changed to a more aggressive defense and chopped at them with his axe while pushing them back out the window with his make-shift shield. Jewels attempted to hold the table on place with her shoulder, but she was losing that battle.

Emily did her best to push back the horror and focus on the safe. Her first attempt failed. “It won’t open!”

“Try again, try again,” Sarah screamed.

During her second attempt, she heard glass shattering in the back of the house.

“The sliding doors,” Spencer said, with his eyes filled with panic.

“Come on Emily,” she said to herself as she began her third attempt. “Come on. One, two, three…got it!”

The safe swung open and that was the exact moment that a foul faced man with a beard of blood and torn flesh appeared behind Sarah and yanked her back into the kitchen by her hair.

To be continued next Saturday…

You can discover where Emily and Spencer enter the Eternal Aftermath Here!