The Matthias Chronicles
What If… The Dead Came To Life?
By Wraith and Shockwave

Part 1: Generation of the Living Dead

Sara hated November 15^th. November 15^th was forever emblazoned into her mind as the day her father; Jason Wyndgard (aka Mastermind of the Hellfire Club's Inner Circle) lost his 3 year long battle with the Legacy Virus. It was 10 years ago to the day that her father's heart monitor went from faint beeping, to the heart-wrenching, dull, single tone that signified Jason Wyndgard's passage into the great hereafter. Here she was with her older brother, Kyle, in his 1985 black Topaz heading up the steep road that led to the cemetery where their father was interred. Once they reached the end of the paved road, Kyle parked the car and he and Sara got out and continued to walk towards their father's grave.

As usual, the two walked in silence, as times like this were rather uncomfortable for the two of them. Kyle didn't hate his late father, but it was very close. He never knew why his father was always so hard on him, he suspected it was because Jason always wanted a daughter, to be daddy's little girl. Kyle was almost 5 years older than Sara, so when their father died he was old enough to understand what his father thought of him, but Sara, was much younger, so she was more innocent and didn't know that she was daddy's favorite.

As they approached their father's grave, Kyle noticed a drunk stumbling amongst the nearby tombstones. While Sara placed 3 Chinese Hibiscuses (Wyndgard's favorite flower) on his grave, Kyle kept looking at the drunk, making sure he didn't get too close. He might've hated his father's favoritism, but he loved his little sister with a passion, and wouldn't let anyone interfere with her moment with their father.

"Dad, I know that you're watching and listening right now and I hope that you're proud of me. I don't know if I'm gonna stay on and become an "X-Person" with Xavier and all of them, but I do know that I will do my best to make you proud no matter what I do. Mom misses you…a lot. She hardly dates anymore, even though you gave her your blessing before you… well before you left. It's been 10 years and she still misses you more than anything in the whole world."

Kyle noticed the drunk stumbling even closer. "Jesus, for the money they charge to bury people here you'd think they could get some decent fuckin' security," he mumbled under his breath.

"Well dad, Kyle and I gotta go. My classmates and teachers are at an old farmhouse a couple of miles away so we can have some privacy to practice. And besides we were all going stir crazy from being in the biosphere all the time. I gotta get back, but I'll be back next year, same time, same place." Sara cracked a weak smile at her last comment. She then bent over to kiss her father's tombstone. "I love you daddy." Sara then felt a gentle tap on her shoulder.

"C'mon sis, I gotta get you back or your teachers are gonna get pissed at me. Besides this fuckin' drunk is creepin' me out." As the two started to walk back to the car the drunk came up to Kyle and knocked him down. "Jesus man! Get the fuck off of me!" But the drunk kept pinning Kyle to the ground and started to grab his hair. As he pulled a clump of hair and scalp from Kyle's head, Sara shrieked and grabbed a stone from the ground and beat the drunk over the back with it.

"Get off of my brother you bastard!"

The drunk ignored Sara and began to feast upon the now-exposed brain of her brother. It was too much, Sara had to vomit. She was in shock; she couldn't believe what was happening! She thought of her powers, but the only one she perfected was animal empathy, as it was rather passive. The only animals she'd perfected morphing into were small rodents; like chipmunks and mice, little help against a 212 pound insane drunk. And if she tried to heal Kyle (even though she figured that with half of his brain gone it seemed like a moot point) she might've actually made him worse. She, instead, did the only thing she could think of; she ran back towards the car. Once inside she rolled up the windows, locked the doors and tried to start the car. Of course, Kyle had the keys on him. As she looked back at his corpse, she noticed 3 other creatures feeding on Kyle's corpse. She decided that since the car was parked on a hill to try her luck and disengage the breaks and straighten out the wheels as best she could. The car began to roll down the hill, slowly at first, but soon it began topping out at 15 miles per hour; the car then hit a tall stone pillar at the entrance to the cemetery. After the crash, the car was totaled, however Sara was only 3 miles from the farmhouse, so she decided to run there. Along the way Sara noticed at least 5 other creatures similar to the one that attacked and killed Kyle. She noticed that the creatures, quite literally, looked like death warmed over. They were half rotted with skin missing and even falling off in clumps. They almost looked like animated corpses, but that was impossible, right? She also noticed they were unearthly slow, they dragged their feet as they stumbled to-and-fro.

Sara finally reached the farmhouse, but noticed no one outside, where everyone was supposed to be exercising and working out. She ran in the front door, and slammed it shut behind her. After putting the deadbolt lock on, she looked around the first floor of the 4 story house, but noticed no one there eiether. She immediately thought the worst, assuming that the others were all dead, or left her there.

"HELLO! IS ANYONE HERE?!? Paige? Jono? Chris? Penance? Mr. Cassidy? Ms. Frost? Anyone?" No response. Sara sat down on the floor and began to sob. Suddenly, there was a crash at the back kitchen door window. Sara ran to the door to see if someone had heard her. She opened the door without seeing who was outside first, and the creature outside forced it's way in. Despite the relative lack of strength the creature possessed, it easily tackled Sara to the ground. Sara couldn't fling the beast off of her! Just as she resigned herself to her fate she detected the distinct scent of ozone and was nearly blinded by the burst of electricity that broadsided the creature off of her. The rotting corpse was knocked across the room and split in half at the waist.

"Sara! Thank God you're alright!" Chris's hands were still smoking from the discharge that saved his classmate's life. "I left on my own to go look for you. I saw that the car was wrecked and thought the worst. I think the others are all holed up in the basement."

Sara couldn't contain herself, she jumped up and hysterically started hugging and kissing Chris. "Ohmygod ohmygod!! Thank you so much Chris! I thought that you all had left me, or were dead. We gotta get outta here!"

"Calm down Sara, take some deep breaths. We can't leave yet. The RAVENa is really damaged bad, those creatures out there attacked it."

Unbeknownst to either Sara or Chris, the creature that just attacked Sara was still alive, losing its lower torso was simply a minor inconvenience.

"Fuck the RAVEN! Let's just leave!" Slowly but surely the un-dead being dragged its upper body towards the two mutant teens.

"It's not that simple Sara. Only Cassidy and I can fly, there's no way that we could carry everyone else. Besides, Penance is hurt…bad. Somehow, one of those things bit her leg in a spot where her skin was softening, and she got infected. Cassidy and Frost don't wanna move her yet. The wanna wait till morning, so we can get a plan together." The animated corpse continued its slow trek towards Sara's ankle. It opened it's mouth wide and bit into her ankle.

"AHH!" Sara screamed as she felt the pressure upon her ankle. Luckily the work boots that the school issued were rather thick and all the creature's mouth caught hold of was a huge chunk of hard rubber sole.

"SON-OF-A-BITCH!!!" Sara screamed, and stomped the mushy, soft skull of the creature into a spot on the unpolished hardwood floor. It ceased to move.

"Jesus, Sara! Calm down! Look I need you calm and clear headed right now OK. Now, I'm gonna go get Cassidy and try to convince him to get us all outta here ASAP. Sara listen to me!" Sara wasn't listening. She was kneeling, staring at the smudge on the ground that a few seconds ago was the skull of the creature that attacked her, crying, and hyperventilating. Her rapid breathing was scaring Chris, he didn’t know what to do, he thought she would have a heart attack. So, he slapped her. Hard. "Dammit Sara I'm serious! I need you to get it together! You can't help me if you're gonna be freakin out. OK?"

Sara's breathing calmed down after the hard slap to her cheek that left a red mark on her pale skin. "Sorry, Chris, but I just saw my brother killed by one of those things and I'm still freaked out, but I'll try to help, cus I just wanna get the hell outta here."

Chris helped Sara to her feet, wiped the tears away from her face, brushed her blonde hair from in front of her eyes. Chris re-locked the kitchen door and pulled a small table from the center of the room and blocked the door with it. The table was so small, lightweight and cheap that it would do little to actually bar any future attempts to enter the house, but it did give Sara and Chris a more secure feeling. The teens then walked through the den and dining room to reach the living room. In the near corner of the room was a small wooden door leading to the basement.

"HEY! Anyone down there? It's Chris and Sara!" Chris screamed downstairs after he opened the door. He waited a few minutes and heard nothing. However, just as he was about to close the door, Jono's foot got stuck in the door. Paige, and Sean soon followed Jono.

<<Sorry we took so long but we didn't know if it was you or not. Ms. Frost gave us the OK after she checked.>>

Paige picked up where Jono left off, "We ran into the basement, because those things started getting closer. We didn't want them to see where we were, so we all ran into the basement."

"Why didn't you guys come up when you heard us talking and fighting?"

"Chris, lad, ye need to understand our position. We dinne know if it was ye and Sara up there, or some looters. The floors aren’t that thin lad."

"Chris, Sara, you know we wouldn't purposely leave you to die, we're all family. But we couldn't risk clueing some looters, OR any of those…things as to where we are."

Chris looked into Paige's eyes after her minute speech. He didn't know whether or not he resented the fact that Jono had his arm around Paige's waist. Nor did he know if he resented the fact that Paige was apparently enjoying it. All he knew at this point was that he wanted; no, NEEDED to get out of this claustrophobic farmhouse and away from those creatures outside before he lost his mind. "Look, at this point I don't care about anything that isn't directly related to us leaving this God-forbidden place. So let's say we just concentrate on leaving this place as far behind us as we can."

"Chris, ye know we can't be leaving till Penny is feeling better. Ms. Frost is down there with her now, trying to stop the infection and the pain from spreading. You and me are the only two that can fly over any long distances. The last time I looked the RAVEN was totaled, so until we get a car, or some other way to transport all o' us out o' here at once; we're staying put." The finality in Sean Cassidy's voice told his students there was no debating the point. They all left at once, or not at all.

Chris sighed, resigning himself to the fact that he would, indeed, have to stay a little longer. "OK, well anyone have any ideas?"

Jono "spoke" and put in his two cents, <<I guess the best thing to do, would be to think of anything we could use to get out of here.>>

Chris rolled his eyes and thought to himself "Gee, glad we have you around to grace us with your superior intellect, Mr. Wizard." Out loud, however Chris had an idea he thought was a pretty good one. "Until we have a plan, why don't we bar the windows and doors with wood, so we have some time to think."

Paige disagreed, "There can't be that many of them out there can there?" In order to answer her own question she went to the front door and opened it a crack and looked out. She saw between five and ten creatures stumbling across the front lawn and even on the large porch. Feeling justified, Paige said, "See? There's only about 7 of those things out there. We don't need to worry."

"Paige, honey. Not to contradict you, but when I ran in here like a mad woman, about ten minutes ago, there were none," Sara spoke up. "Which means that these things are coming at a rate close to one-per-minute."

Cassidy agreed with Sara and Chris, "Aye, we do indeed need to block off any and all entrances to the house on this floor. Chris, Jono and myself will grab all the heavy wood and break them down into usable planks and such. Sara, ye and Paige look for nails, hammers or anything similar to either so we can nail the wood over the doors and windows." No sooner did he finish giving his orders then Sean Cassidy glanced around the three large rooms that made up the ground floor. He noted nine rather large windows and two doors. He hoped there was enough wood to get them all boarded up. He also hoped it could get done before dark, not only would it make an already unsettling situation even creepier, but if Sara's estimation was right, then by dark this place would be crawling with the creatures.

*********************

It took the group of 6 a good hour and 15 minutes, but they got every window and door on the first floor boarded up. However, they were still idea-less, but at least they felt safer. Their 75 minute-long hammering session had attracted the attention of every stumbling creature within a five-mile radius, as the cold night carried the sounds of activity across the near-barren farmland surroundings. But the students and their headmaster did their damnedest to make sure that the wood kept secure and nothing had given way. Yet. From the outside, the three-story farmhouse looked more like an abandoned inner-city brownstone, with planks of wood horizontally covering every window, not allowing light, or undead beings in. Cassidy sat on an antiquated, dusty couch with Jono and Sara. Chris stood at one of the windows looking out a tiny sliver in the planks at the front lawn. He saw at least 50 of the creatures as far away as the RAVEN and some so close he could smell their decaying flesh. Paige was pacing back and forth trying to think of anything that would help them get out of the house and to safety. Suddenly she had epiphany.

"Mr. Cassidy, sir! When we ran in here earlier we didn't take any time to check the second floor for any phones! There might be some up there!"

"Paige lass, I looked before we came in, and didn't notice any telephone poles or cords anywhere near here."

"In this day and age, sir, there might be a cell phone in here."

Sean sighed, "I seriously doubt it, but at this point I've no right to deny anyone's idea till I get some of my own. Jono, you and Paige check upstairs for phones, or anything else for that matter."

Paige started to head up stairs first, but Jono cut her off. <<Sorry Paige, love. But there's no way in hell I'm letting you up those stairs before me.>>

"Jesus Christ Jonothan, this is no time to decide you want to act chivalrous! Just let me up the damned stairs!" Paige pushed her way past Jono, but he grabbed her arm roughly and held her.

<<I'm serious! I'm going first. If anything attacks me, you just scream as loud as you can to let the others know.>> And with that, Jono walked up the stairs to the second floor.

Upon reaching the second floor landing, Jono signaled for Paige to follow him upstairs. On the second floor there were three rooms, two bedrooms and one bathroom. Jono looked at Paige and sent "spoke" to her. <<Paige, you check the bathroom, I'll check the smaller bedroom. We'll meet back out here in 2 minutes, no later. And no matter what, keep the door open! Once we meet back here in 2 minutes, we'll search the larger bedroom together.>> Jono then walked into the far room.

***********************

Emma Frost placed the damp cloth back onto the forehead on Penance. The good news was that her fever had stopped increasing. The bad news was that at 106°, all that meant was that poor little Penny wouldn't spontaneously combust. Emma was slowly dying, watching her student valiantly fight off the effects of the infection ravaging her body. It seemed like fate's cruel joke on the girl. Just as her diamond hard skin was beginning to soften, it betrayed her, allowing one of the creatures outside to bite Penance's heel and break the skin; infecting her with some sort of disease. It had already spread past her calf and was moving rapidly. The infected area looked and smelled like decaying flesh.

"Don't worry Penny. We're all going to get out of here. You'll be just fine!" Despite her optimistic voice, Emma was extremely worried, they'd never get out, and if they did, it would be too late for Penance. "Penny? Honey? I'm heading upstairs to see how Sean and the others are doing, O.K.? I'll be right back, I promise!"

Emma then got up and headed upstairs. Upon reaching the first floor, Emma heard the sounds of a television news report. "Where did you find a TV?"

<<Paige and I found it upstairs while looking for a phone, Ms. Frost.>>

Cassidy was adjusting the "bunny ear" antennae, trying to get a decipherable image through the snow and static; but stopped and handed the job off to Chris, so he could talk to Emma in private. Sean took Emma by the shoulder and gently led her into the empty den.

"Emma, how's Penny holding up?"

"God, she's burning up Sean. I'm so scared she might not make it through the night, much less however long we're in here. We've got to get out of here and get her to a hospital, and soon!" At this Emma began to quietly sob. Not so much for fear of Penance's well being (though that was a significant part of it), but more out of frustration over the situation. Sean saw Emma's tears and lovingly wiped them away.

"C'mon now Emma. Ye must keep a stiff upper-lip. The children can't see us losing it. We must be strong! For the children!"

Emma sniffed away her tears and straightened up. "You're right Sean. We must keep our heads about us."

Jono called from the other room, <<Cassidy, Frost! The news report is naming rescue stations. They're turning schools and other large buildings into Red Cross Aid centers.>>

Emma spoke up, "Sean, if we could get Penny to one of those Red Cross centers, then she'd have a good shot of getting over this infection."

Sean whispered into Emma's ear, "Remember what I said about staying calm, love?" Sean then turned to Jono, "Jono lad, what are they saying about the going ons? Do they have any idea what's causing this?"

<<Sorry Mr. Cassidy, but all they mention is the rescue station locations over and over again.>>

Chris, who throughout the whole ordeal held his ground by the window staring out of a crack in the wood, suddenly shouted, "Jesus Christ! I don't believe it! I've been standing here close to a goddamned hour and didn't notice it till now!"

Sean the others all rushed over to Chris. "What is it lad? What do ye see?"

"Mr. Cassidy, Ms. Frost, I've found our way out. Look at the far end of the farm, to the northwest."

Chris stepped out of the way and let Cassidy look out the window. "On me sainted mother's grave! It's a pick-up truck! It's one o' the newer models, so the cab can fit four people, two more on the flatbed and we can all get out o' here at once! O.K., Chris ye fly Paige to the truck and both o' ye pull up in front of the porch."

Jono got exasperated and spoke up, <<Why Paige? Why Chris?>>

"Jono, lad, if Paige were to get bit by one of those beasties, then she could just rip her infected layer of skin off. And Chris can fly her there. I'll stand guard and run interference."

<<Sir, if it's no problem, I'd like to accompany Chris and Paige. Three heads are better then two right?>>

Against his better judgment, Sean agreed. He didn't usually allow emotions (of either himself or his students) influence his command decisions, but this was not a usual situation. "Aye, lad go with them. But for the love of God, be careful. All o' ye!"

******************

"SHIT!!!! I don't fuckin believe it!"

"Chris, calm down. What's wrong? "

"'What's wrong'? Paige, what's wrong is that this FUCKIN GAS TANK IS EMPTY!"

Chris lost it. He started kicking the tires and bumper. Jono thought about blowing away Chris' head to shut him up, however he resigned himself to simply chewing him out a new one. <<Look, Chris, I didn't just do the bloody 200 yard dash through rotting corpses that are somehow walking, just so you could lead those damned biological mistakes RIGHT BACK TO US!>> Jono began to apologize for screaming, until he realized that he could only "speak" in psychic terms and he seriously doubted that the creatures had the brain power to pick up his "words". <<Besides, there's a gas pump a good 20 yards back, I noticed it when we ran to the truck. Lets just use whatever gas is left in the truck to drive back to the damned pump, fill it up and get out of here.>>

"Jono's right Chris. Lets just fill this truck up and get the hell outta here."

"Fine, less talk, more push. Paige, you get in to release the brake and steer, and Jono and I will push for a jump-start."

"Alright fellas." Paige got into the driver's side of the cab, reached down, released the brake, sat up and straightened out the wheels. "O.K. I'm ready when you--AHHH!!"

Paige screamed in shock and horror as an undead creature slammed it's ripe, rank hands on the passenger side window. Chris and Jono both heard it and ran to help her. Chris reached the corpse first and blew its head off of its shoulders. "Jono, do you think you can handle pushin' that thing by yourself, cus it looks like you were right about my yelling," Chris said nodding his head towards the oncoming mob of rotting flesh slowly meandering its way towards the teens. "I can hold 'em off if you two can get that gas."

<<Right! No problem, we'll be back in a minute. And Chris…thanks.>>

Chris said nothing, instead he rolled his eyes in to the back of his head, as he usually did when he was charging his body like a battery in order to fire several controlled rapid shots of bio-electricity.

Jono pushed the car for 20 feet, then jumped into the trailer, as Paige frantically kept the wheels straight and aimed for the gas pump. As soon as they got a good 5 feet from the gas tank, Paige sharply turned the steering wheel to stop the rolling truck. Upon a full stop Jono hopped out and grabbed the gas pump handle without looking and attempted to pull it towards the car, but it wouldn't budge. Jono looked at the pump, it was locked! Whoever owned this farm, didn't trust anyone to leave his gas untouched and had a padlock and chain on the handle and the base. Jono thought to himself, <<It doesn't look that thick, if I concentrated, I could cut through it.>>

Meanwhile, Paige noticed some creatures approaching. Apparently, Chris was doing such a good job at taking out the creatures, several were avoiding him altogether, and making a beeline for the truck. Before she knew it, she was blind-sided by a creature, she screamed for help. Her scream caught Jonothan's attention and he turned to see what was wrong. Once he saw the creatures swarming on Paige, he lost control of his emotions, and his plasma blast.

*******************

Chris heard the blast before he felt the heatwaves from it. He turned to look, and saw the fiery mass that was once the group's only hope of getting out alive and at one time. Chris instinctively started to run towards the inferno to try and save anyone still alive, but Emma contacted Chris telepathically. <<Chris, don't bother, there's no one to save. They…they're…gone. Just get back to the house quickly. We'll think of something once you get back.>>

Chris walked back through the field towards the house. Along the way he was wondering why he didn't feel worse about what just happened. Sure he felt bad that two classmates and were gone, but wasn’t Paige supposed to be more to him? Maybe he knew they'd grown apart since Jono's return, but neither said it. If this accident had happened a month ago, he probably would've been inconsolable, now however, he didn't feel as bad. He felt strange, despondent, detached. Here he was in the middle of a waking nightmare, and he was questioning his last romantic relationsh--

"Chris! Lad snap out o' it!"

The next thing Chris knew, he was back in the farmhouse living room with Cassidy and Sara. "Wh-what happened?"

Sara answered him, "You just started walking back towards the house in a sort of daze, at first we thought you were one of them. But when you got to the doorway, you looked fine, so we let you in."

"Lad, we saw what happened, there was nothing you could do." Sean looked down at the ground in an uncharacteristic moment of guilt. Guilt for letting those three out there alone. Dammit! It was getting down to the line. It was fight or flight time. Chris and he could hold off a good many of the beasties, but Emma, Penny and Sara would all be vulnerable. "Chris, I think you and I can take out all of the ones around here. Sara, you hole up downstairs with Ms. Frost and Penny. C'mon Chris let’s go."

Chris, however had different plans. "What the hell?!? Oh, so now I'm just supposed to blindly follow you? Well pardon me if I don't exactly trust your judgment at this point, Cassidy." Chris got up from the floor and started for the den, but Cassidy grabbed his arm, firmly.

"Listen to me lad, we are going to defend this place to our dying breaths!" Cassidy's eyes were two balls of pure fire. Seeing two of his students die in a blazing inferno, only to have their charred remains become carrion for undead vultures galvanized his steel will even stronger. Cassidy was convinced no one else would die under his command tonight.

"Get your fuckin hand off of me Cassidy!" Chris was just as adamant that Sean Cassidy had given his last unilateral demand. "Look, if you wanna go out there and play hero, knock yourself out. As for me, I'm stain' in here 'til we can think of a plan that will get us all out of here at once."

"Mr. Storm, this insubordination is unacceptable and furthermore…"

At this point, Sara snuck out of the un-barricaded front door. She had enough of their fighting and decided to try to make it to a rescue station by herself. She knew she'd be able to make it there quicker by herself. If she got surrounded by those thing, she'd just morph into a fieldmouse and hightail it to the nearest rescue station or a phone. But she'd be damned if she was gonna just sit there and watch such a juvenile pissing contest. As Sara stealthily sulked southward, she turned back and looked at the farmhouse again and saw a distinctive blue-white electrical spark that told her that Chris had just elevated the shouting match. That farmhouse was becoming a madhouse.

*********************

Emma heard the raucous from upstairs and decided to leave Penance alone again to see what was happening. Even though she hadn't used her mental powers to eavesdrop on what was being said, she had a pretty good idea as to what happened. Combine Chris's confrontational personality with Sean's stubbornness, and mix in two dead friends, stir craziness, and a situation straight out of a bad horror movie; it was a small miracle that the inevitable fight had been held off till now. After she closed the door to the cellar, Penance started to moan in pain. The infection ravaging her body had just about reached its breaking point. What was happening to her was the same thing that happened to every victim the creatures bit into, she was slowly dying, only so that she would return as one of them. It was the most painful feeling she ever experienced, as her skin and internal organs, one-by-one simply shut down and her flesh rotted. First her left foot, where the bite was. It originally just felt tingly, almost as if it fell asleep. But after a few minutes it felt as if her open wound had been dipped in a solution of rubbing alcohol, salt, and citric acid; then it felt like nothing at all. It literally felt like nothing was there, it was predominately numb. The same condition that had attacked her foot had spread throughout her entire body. Once it reached her brain, she would turn completely, and if the rest of her body was any indication, she had a good five minutes before her brain succumbed to the poison coursing through her body. Penance didn't know what would happen when she converted completely. She didn't know if she'd attack her friends or not, all she knew was that if she did turn, she'd try her damnedest to resist attacking her friends. Little did poor Penny realize the ravenous hunger that would rack, not only her stomach, but also her entire body. Resistance would be futile.

Meanwhile, upstairs, Emma was physically and psychically holding Chris and Sean Back from tearing each other's throats out. Neither Chris, nor Sean noticed that their fight had knocked out boards from the carefully barricaded windows, allowing the hundred or so creatures that gravitated to the farmhouse like moths to an open flame, access to the inside.

<<DAMMIT! Will you two stop acting like PRE-SCHOOLERS!?!>> Emma shouted inside of Chris and Sean's minds. <<We have to work together if we're going to get out of here alive.>> Emma looked around and suddenly noticed something was horribly wrong, <<Where's Sara? For the love of God, where's Sara?!?>>

In the melee, Cassidy and Storm didn't notice when Sara snuck off. "Ms. Frost, not to sound too insensitive, but at this point I think we should start worrying less about Sara, and more about us."

At this point Chris, nodded at the two windows flanking the front door, all three were open. A crash from behind the living room, in the kitchen, got everyone's attention. Apparently, the animated corpses had found a weak spot in the back door and since they were left alone for the better part of two and a half-hours they were able to break it down.

"Storm, get back to back with me, that way they can't sneak up on us. Emma, ye, barricade yureself and Penny in the basement. Me and Chris will hold off these beasties!" With that said, Sean began screaming , the way only he could, and Chris began firing off shots of electricity from his hands at the creatures. Both men knew it was a losing effort, as there were literally hundreds upon hundreds of the creatures pouring into the house.

Emma ran into the cellar and grabbed a large chair from the top of the steps to block the door. She then ran into the basement and held Penance tight.

"Don't worry Penny, we'll get out, I promise."

At first, Emma didn't question why she wasn't being cut to ribbons by holding Penance as tight as she was. However, as soon as Emma actually looked down at Penance, she knew why. Her skin was gray and rotting like the creatures outside and her mouth was open wide. Emma tried to scream, but Penance bit into her neck and ripped out a huge chunk of flesh, including her voicebox and windpipe. The last think Emma saw before dying of asphyxiation, was Penance's blank eyes and open maw, as she feasted on her teacher's brain.

*******************

Sara has been running as a mouse for close to an hour before she saw any sign of a rescue center. Once she saw the lights of the converted YMCA, she found a bush to hide behind and morphed back into her human form. Once she got inside she screamed at the top of her lungs. "Please, my teachers and friends are trapped in a farmhouse, one of them is hurt bad, will someone help us!?"

A group of college-aged boys (though none of them finished high school) who were looking for some action, of the monster-hunting kind took up her offer. So Sara sat next to the oldest boy in one pick-up as he drove according to her instructions. With another 3 pick-ups holding 6 more boys each, all toting rifles and shotguns.

When they got to the house it was near dawn, and the boys got out and started shooting every one or the creatures they could find. Meanwhile Sara got out and ran towards the house. Once inside, she noticed several charred corpses and corpses missing heads strewn amongst the rubble that once was a conservatively decorated farmhouse living room. She didn't see Mr. Cassidy, Ms. Frost, Chris, or Penny anywhere, she only hoped the got out O.K. She was about to head out when she heard a noise behind her. She quickly spun around to see Emma, Sean, Chris, and Penance all descend upon her, rotting flesh, hungry eyes, and all.

END