A mass of corpses from the area wandered into the wreckage of the plane, attracted by the roar of the huge machine falling to the ground. Barely a dozen hours had passed since the confirmed outbreak and the corpses were already in the hundreds, a good portion of them former passengers of the plane. The survivors covered all the windows they could in the house and waited. The only sound they could hear was the corpse groans of the freshly formed horde that was walking down the street. Miko?aj tilted the blind slightly, looking out at the street. Emil, meanwhile, unpacked the provisions he had managed to get. He heard his sister's muffled crying from the upstairs room, and went to see if she was okay. He opened the door slowly, Kaja was lying on the bed with her face snuggled into the pillow. The boy walked over to the bed and sat on the edge of it.

  "Kaja, take it easy. It will be fine."

  "It won't." She continued crying, not feeling like talking. Her face did not leave the pillow.

  "We will be fine. We have a big group, you just need to be strong."

  "But what if someone turnes?" she finally looked at her older brother with tears in her eyes. "I don't want that."

  "I don't know, little one. I could lie to you, but I don't know. As long as we're careful, we'll be fine. Lie down, maybe listen to music."

  Emil got out of bed. He hugged his sister on the way out then headed for the door. He left the room, leaving his sister alone. He went downstairs where his cousins were thinking about the strategy for their next moves.

  "If it's a passenger plane then there could be suitcases."

  "If there weren't these dead bodies, we could take a fire truck and put out this fire." Dariusz commented while sitting on the couch, with his hands folded behind his head. "And we could take a lot of equipment too."

  "Storm clouds are gathering so maybe we won't have to put out anything." David replied, pushing the blind aside and watching the movement of the horde, while glancing up at the sky.

  The small village had a volunteer fire department, to which the two brothers belonged. They knew what equipment they could use and they also had easy access to it all, all they had to do was get there and that was no easy task, especially after the plane crash.

  "And where did the plane hit? Because if it hit the firehouse, there was nothing to the plan." Miko?aj added.

  "From a distance I saw that it hit the bus stop on the other side of the village." Emil interjected, coming down the stairs. "The fire station is fine, but I don't know how far the fire has spread."

  "We can't do anything now anyway. It is necessary to wait."

  ><

  Minutes passed, it was even approaching an hour. A massive downpour was in progress and lightning strikes could be heard in the distance. Everyone sat as if on pins, wandering their thoughts in search of good memories. Isabella counted the food, wondering how much they would have enough for, Judyta and Anna sat in the kitchen, stressfully smoking cigarette after cigarette, the cousins with Emil discussed the plan. Everyone was doing something to occupy their heads. Eventually the horde broke up into smaller groups. Miko?aj watched the cloud of smoke from his son's room, which had a window perfectly facing the wreckage. The rain that had started falling some time ago had helped put out the fire. The man began to think that the fire truck, however, might no longer be needed, just as David had suggested. When the shadow of safety was certain, the stockpiling group consisting of Emil, Miko?aj, Dariusz, Dawid and Klara went out into the street. Their earlier guesses turned out to be true, the corpses went directly to the plane wreckage and the part of the street where the house stood was completely empty. For them this was a plus, they could easily leave the shelter. At first they wanted to take the car, but they did not want the noise of the engine to attract them to the house so they decided to go on foot. After making a few dozen meters, they noticed a cloud of corpses in the distance. From this distance they blended together, but there were definitely more than forty of them in one place. They stopped for a moment, preparing their equipment. Emil held his hatchet, Dawid and Miko?aj walked with axes, while Dariusz and Klara had knives.

  "The plan is, we collect supplies from houses in the area and will be able to hole up for a while." Miko?aj adjusted the bag slung over his shoulder. "We take what we can. Try not to get too close to them. We don't know how it will be transferred."

  And they split up. They set themselves a time of 30 minutes or so to gather supplies. Enough to gather a lot of stuff from the houses. Emil went again to the vicinity of the store because he had not yet gone further since the confirmation of the epidemic. Klara walked in the same direction, the girl gathering supplies with the thought that she would soon be gone. The night before, her mother had called her when the lines momentarily became active and announced that with no traffic jams or obstructions to let people through, they should be there today, she wanted to be ready for that. However, she was also convinced that she could not leave until her boyfriend found her and he lived much farther away. She was afraid of the fights between him and her ex that might happen.

  "Shouldn't you bury her?" He might have sounded nosy or rude to some degree, but that was not his goal this time. When he didn't hear an answer, he stopped and looked at the girl, who was staring at her house with a sad expression on her face. "Sorry. Wrong question."

  Emil managed to ransack several abandoned houses within a dozen minutes. He felt a little uncomfortable about it, but the feeling quickly passed when he remembered the situation they were in. The owners had either fled or died, it didn't really matter to them. He rummaged through everything he could find, his backpack was stuffed full. Somewhere nearby there was still Klara, who was searching the houses across the street. The rain had stopped and the sun's rays were breaking through the clouds. It was beginning to warm up, it was late summer but still warm. Emil was ready to go back, but he heard some voices. They were distorted. "A radio?" He wondered, listening in. The voices were coming from the attic, and there he went, putting his backpack against the wall beforehand. He slowly climbed the stairs and when he was at the door, he opened it abruptly and even ran inside, holding his hatchet in a ready-to-attack position. The attic was small, room for only a few larger boxes, but Emil noticed an old radio standing under the window. It was still working, the voices suggested that it was a local government radio station, reporting on evacuations. The boy walked closer and his heart stopped for a moment when, inches from his face, he saw the hand of a corpse, aggressively pressing into him. But he couldn't move, he was tied to a beam that prevented him from getting closer. His heart was pounding, and he had to calm down. It scared him so much that he felt weak.

  "Holy shit..."

  Somewhere in the southwest, in a dense forest, a mother with a three-year-old child was on the run, looking for a future for her little one. Without her husband, who managed to save his daughter from being bitten before he died, but paid with his life himself. This is how the heroes ends, tied to a beam, trapped in their own decaying bodies.

  Emil, standing for a moment, heard a message on the radio. Its contents surprised him.

  "Entering DW615 from the north, M?awa was overrun by them. All civilians on the road to Ciechanów, please come out of hiding so we can identify you and take you to a safe zone."

  The signal broke off. However, it gave Emil hope that they would get rid of the problem of dead bodies in the village. He wanted to get the word out to the rest as soon as possible, while the army had not yet arrived. He ran downstairs quickly, taking his backpack with him, and ran out of the house. He walked to the other end of the street, to the house where Klara was busking.

  "The army will be here soon. Get ready." he leaned out from behind a grapevine.

  "What, seriously?" the girl was frightened when the boy came at her suddenly.

  "I heard the message on the radio. They should be here soon."

  After a few minutes or so, a loud engine sound resounded. Emil thought it was already there, but he was mistaken. Something was coming from the opposite direction to the one indicated by the soldiers. Emil and Klara leaned out and saw a car under the girl's house.

  "They're finally back!"

  The girl's good mood immediately seeped through. Emil also, although reluctantly, subconsciously felt that everything could return to normal. He also knew that the return of her parents meant her leaving, he was glad. Klara ran quickly to retrieve a bag full of various supplies left on the ground. Emil, meanwhile, watched the street. Klara's parents' car had turned off, but the sound of the engine could still be heard. Only after a short while did the boy realize that it wasn't the car making the sounds after all. He looked out into the street, toward the wreckage of the plane and there he saw an army jeep coming from his side toward Emil and the rest. A horde was wandering behind them. The boy had no idea why the military was leading the corpses, but he wanted to be as far away as possible at this point. They were too close, however, for it to be safe to flee into the village, which would have required going into the street. He hid behind bushes and trees. When Klara was about to go to her parents, he stopped her. She didn't understand what he meant, but when she saw the corpse-like figure, she understood. She was concerned, however, that her parents might be harmed. Moments ago, Klara's parents got out of the vehicle. At first they thought the military would help them. At first they didn't notice anything strange about the "people" wandering behind the army, since it was only the second day and in the countryside the effects of the epidemic weren't that noticeable.

  "Excuse me? Do you know what is going on?" asked the man in a loud voice to the soldiers, who were several meters away. Only now did he look at the people they were leading. "Honey, got into the car."

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  The jeep accelerated, leaving the corpses behind for a moment. They did this to talk to civilians.

  "What's going on? Why are you leading..." The man approached the jeep, but one of the soldiers pointed a rifle at him. - "We are not sick."

  "We are not sure. We would have to undress you and check you but there is no time." The soldier looked in the front mirror, analyzing the situation.

  "But you said on the radio that you would help." Klara's father said, confused.

  "You have your own car, this is your chance. We can drive you to the zone."

  "We need to find my daughter and my mother-in-law. We just got back." The man was already slightly concerned. During the conversation he glanced from time to time, then at the horde, then at their family home.

  "It's not safe here. If they were in the house, I think they would have already left? Sir, I do not want to spoil hope but-"

  "Base to all troops. Abort the mission right now! The zone is falling, they are encroaching! Holy shit! Shoot-!"

  The signal went off. Everyone was stunned. Emil and Klara heard the message or rather the shouting of the people on the radio. Hope disappeared faster than it appeared. They remained quiet because a cluster of corpses was just passing them. The squad leader shouted to the driver to move, without saying a word to the civilian. The soldier immediately pressed on the gas. Clara's father simultaneously wanted to continue the conversation, and as he took a step forward, his foot awkwardly found itself in the line of the jeep's wheel. The vehicle ran over his foot, it happened all too suddenly. He screamed in pain and the panicked soldiers simply ran away quickly, leaving dead bodies behind.

  "No!" Clara's scream was muffled by Emil, who closed her mouth with his hand. She rushed out, wanting to run to them. One of the zombies heard this and began to push against the fence, watching the youngsters through the hole, they were cut off.

  Klara's father awkwardly ran to the car, but the corpses were already dangerously close. He opened the door and even jumped inside but before he could close the door it was one of the corpses that threw itself at him, blocking it from closing. A scream was heard and a zombie bit into the man's left arm, biting off a large chunk of flesh. The panicked wife had no idea what to do, she beat the corpse on the head but it did nothing. They surrounded the car, depriving them of the chance to escape. Emil held tightly to a shocked Klara, who had to watch her parents being devoured. Not even a minute passed when it was all over. The screams caused Emil's relatives who had been gathering supplies in the village to be alerted. Dadid and Miko?aj watched confused from a distance when they suddenly heard Darius screaming from the lot a house away. They ran immediately to the gate, Dariusz at that time ran like a shot out of the house. He hit the door with such force that he almost broke it.

  "Here! Run!" Miko?aj shouted to his fleeing nephew, who was chased by a group of three stiffs from the house he was searching.

  "Fucking screams woke them up!" He fell to the ground, stumbling over scattered garbage. He growled in pain, leaving blood stains on the ground. This alarmed them.

  "What happened?" Miko?aj said to Dariuzs. All three went running to their safe house, avoiding the corpses.

  Emil pulled Klara to the back of the lot. More and more corpses were pushing against the old fence, which finally caused it to be knocked over. The situation in the village was terrible, and they had to flee if they wanted to survive. They were cut off from the road to Emil's house so they ran in the opposite direction, deep into the plot where there were sown fields. They ran out the back gate. Emil closed it fighting against time, Klara handed him a plank, which the boy used to block the gate. Miraculously they avoided death, opposite them behind the gate were about twenty stiffs. However, they had no peace because more and more of them were coming from successive directions, lured by the noise of the creaking gate and the pounding of a group of corpses against it.

  "What are we going to do?" Klara, all in tears, looked around frightened.

  "I don't know!" turned on his heel looking for an escape route. He looked into the distance and saw a forest on a hill. The first thing that came to his mind was to run away there, but he hesitated for a moment. There is no time! - he shouted in his head. He grabbed the devastated girl by the arm and pulled her towards the forest.

  ><

  Emil stabbed the stiff axe in the back of the head, overlapping him with a noiseless step.

  "I'm sorry." He said to Klara, turning away. "Really."

  She did not answered, she only glanced fleetingly at Emil, who continued walking. They had been walking like this for almost an hour. Every now and then they had to stop because of the dead bodies in their path. Emil longed to see his family, especially young Kaja. What will she feel if I don't return? - He wondered, walking through a path in the woods. It was the road to a small settlement, called the new one. They figured it might be a good way to get home by avoiding the corpses.

  "They are not behind us." Emil slowed down wanting to even his stride with Klara. "I hope nothing bad happens there."

  "Emil." She said to him after a long moment of maintaining silence. The boy, looking blankly ahead, listened to her. "What's next? The dead come back, the police and the army will not help anyone. We are supposed to slowly lose everything and what? What next?"

  Emil stopped, looking with a confident gaze at the girl. His gaze dropped to the ground for a moment. He mused, imagining in his mind life a few years from now in the apocalypse. He would be fooling himself if he said he wasn't attracted to life in the apocalypse, but with each passing day he questioned his desires.

  "If it's the end of the world, it's already over." He returned his eyes to her. They exchanged a momentary glance until it was interrupted by Klara walking forward.

  Finally, after another ten minutes, they arrived at the new housing estate. It was empty. They were convinced that if any corpses were here it was most likely that the soldiers had lured them to the other end of the village with their jeep. However, they were aware in the back of their minds that entering beyond the shelter gate might be difficult if at all possible. They did not stop, wanting to get there as quickly as possible. Once they were near a store about 100 meters away from the shelter, they saw the horde wandering by the house. Emil wanted to walk down a side path to enter the lot from behind, but out of the corner of his eye he saw Klara standing still.

  "What are you doing?" He whispered to her slightly aggressively. She was staring at one spot, tears once again flowed into her eyes. When the boy looked in the direction where she was looking he saw her dead parents among the corpses. He sighed protractedly, he felt strange, despite not knowing these two people he felt an inner sadness. "Damn."

  The girl was paralyzed with despair and fear. She didn't respond to Emil's voice, and cried in the middle of the street. She was already all confused about what was going to happen to her. Her sobbing caught the attention of several stiffs, who started walking toward her. Emil felt that there was nothing to save her since she wanted it herself. He thought this for a moment, but gave in to his empathy. From his run, he decapitated the corpse by striking with all his might with the axe blade. He no longer hesitated over the killing, he knew they were not the same people they once were. He pushed the next one away with a kick before pulling Klara forcibly into a side alley despite her indifference.

  "If I have to, I'll drag you across the fucking ground!"

  "What do you want from me! I don't want to go there!"

  Without hesitation Emil swung his axe at Klara, who closed her eyes in terror. She heard it slam into something and when she opened her eyes, Emil's hatchet was embedded in the skull of a stiff one who had cornered the girl from behind. He was one step away from biting her.

  "If you don't want to live for yourself then live for them. They would want you to live. They came back for you, idiot!"

  They were loud enough for those in Emil's plot to hear them. Isabella, Emil's aunt, opened the gate quickly, shouting to them to move. The youngsters ran inside and Isabella immediately closed the gate and told them to move away from the fence.

  "It should hold, but we need to get out of their sight." The corpses pushed against the netting, greedily waving their arms in an attempt to grab someone. Emil directed his gaze to his aunt, who looked at the boy and grimaced. "What?"

  "Dariusz. Him... Oh god." She grabbed her head, snotting.

  "What? No. No..."

  He immediately ran into the house nearly breaking his neck, dodging Klara. With a bang, he ran into the building. Seeing Dawid in the hallway, in which anger mixed with sadness was bubbling. He himself was also seething with fear. There was hell in his head, he didn't want to believe that this could be true. He passed Dawid in silence, his older cousin only nodding to him as a sign to enter the room. The door from the guest room was open, and he saw the silhouette of Dariusz lying on the bed. Outside the room was Miko?aj, wandering in thought. Silence. This was the only thing that permeated the room or rather the entire house. The ticking of the clock gave the feeling that time was running out. Emil's slow steps brought him closer to the guest room. He swung the door open more, peering inside. Dariusz was lying on the bed covered with a blanket that was leaking blood. Emil walked closer, taking a closer look.

  "W-What happened?" his voice broke when he looked into his cousin's face.

  "I lost my vigilance. And they got me."

  Dariusz was turning pale, having lost a lot of blood. The silence was constantly interrupted by the loud ticking of the clock.

  "Can we...?" He asked, hoping that perhaps they would be able to get rid of the infected part of the body, but when Dariusz tilted back the blanket Emil broke down.

  "No." He nodded his head negatively showing the bite. He had a sizable wound on his abdomen, bleeding profusely despite the pressure.

  Judyta, Dariusz' mother, entered the room with another material to stop the bleeding. As a mother, she felt tremendous pain seeing her son in such a state. She was a nurse, so she was familiar with such things. Despite this, however, Emil saw a lack of hope in her eyes. The boy at that moment cursed himself for suggesting this outing for supplies. He wiped his eyes from the tears that were already flooding his face. He had to leave the room because he felt he couldn't stand it. He went quickly with a lowered head to his room and locked it.

  Hours passed, everyone sat like on pins praying for Dariusz' life. Emil was heartbroken, he was not ready for such a situation. At one point the light went out. It was certain that the electricity had stopped working. However, Emil was not moved by this. Thousands of thoughts were pouring through his head. While waiting for the unknown, the household members lit candles to give any source of light. Emil, however, remained in darkness. The boy lost track of time, listened to the clock ticking continuously when suddenly there was silence. The clock stopped ticking. He looked at it. The time was 9:11 p.m. The clock stopped at that hour. Emil subconsciously sensed that this was the end. Having witnessed several times when the clock stopped during the death of a person, he thought it was the same this time. And well, he was not wrong. He got out of bed, walking to the door. When he was at them he heard Aunt Isabella's voice.

  - He's gone.

  The words caused a tremendous pain in Emil's chest, although it was probably only mental pain.

  Anna crossed the threshold of the room where her nephew lay and approached the table next to the bed. The light from the candle illuminated the face of the dead Dariusz, who looked as if he had fallen asleep. She leaned over and blew out the fire, extinguishing the candle.