Trigger warnings: A bit more gore than the first chapter xD xD

"Sky!” I yell, snatching the crowbar from the ground and rushing after the monster dragging her away.

Dragging her away from me and my beating heart.

I only run a few feet when something thick wraps around my ankle and yanks me backward. Throwing my arms out in front of me, I land on them. Acute pain slashes through my forearms, but at least my head isn't smashed against the pavement. The raw skin on my hands scrapes across the uneven cement before I’m flung up in the air and thrown on my back. Air whooshes out of me at the impact, but I still hold tight to the crowbar. I watch the blind fucker crawling toward me as its tentacle or whatever the hell it is tightens its grip on me. Slight pain travels up my leg.

Looks like its other senses have finally activated.

With a grunt, I swing the crowbar at it. The creature shrieks as my hit creates a sizable dent in its extended arm, but its hold doesn’t loosen. Sky’s screams from behind me fuel my rage, and with one swift strike, I sever the tentacle. The part of it wrapped around my ankle falls to the ground, withering into a black, shriveled up jerky with wisps of gray smoke floating from it, the overpowering stench almost enough to make me gag. The part still attached to its owner flails, spraying black ooze all around before swinging at me. Dodging it just in time, I jump back to my feet and grip the weapon in my hand. For a second, I glance at Sky who is still struggling on the ground, with the other creature’s ugly extended, snake-like limb coiled around her body like an anaconda.

It’s now or never.

I lunge at the monster in front of me, swinging the crowbar at its head. Black blood flies out of its exposed jawline, splattering onto the rock boulder in a messy line. It lets out a piercing howl. My ears ring from the noise, but I ignore it. I lodge the end of the weapon into its eye. Black liquid floods out, the monster’s body going frozen and crashing to the ground. The tentacle flails around a few times before dropping and withering just like its counterpart. I’ve never seen anything like this, but I don’t have time to observe.

Yanking the crowbar out of its eye, I briefly glance at my surroundings. For some odd reason, all the other monsters are preoccupied with other people. Some are dragging themselves on the ground with their lower halves missing, until a monster catches up to them and tears their remaining top bodies into bloody, gut spilling parts. Or rather, I should be glad.

Then why do I feel a heavy feeling of dread dragging me down like an anchor?

Gripping the weapon in my hand, I rush toward Sky, whom the monster is holding up in the air. She is hacking away at the tentacle wrapped around her waist, only managing to cut halfway through. The creature is nearly twice taller than the previous one, making it at least twelve feet.

Fuck, now would be a good time to take one of those pills I was forced to take back then in the army.

“Hey, you fugly piece of shit!” I yell, just loud enough for the monster to turn toward me and snarl, black goo from its mouth splattering onto the ground. Its slimy limb holding Sky drops just a little, and it's more than enough for me to leap up, grab her legs, and crash to the ground on my back with my arm wrapped tight around her as I sever the tentacle with the crowbar in one swing.

Shrieking, it uncoils itself from my girlfriend, who coughs in short gasps. Her body trembles violently against mine as I sit up, pain coursing through my back in violent waves.

“Are you okay, cupcake?”

She weakly nods, her fingers still clasped tightly around my knife stained with the black, thick liquid.

“Good.” Pressing a quick kiss to her temple, I stand up. “Now hide behind that boulder.”

She shakes her head. "I'm not lea–”

A piercing howl ensues from behind me. I turn around to face the monster just in time for it to swing its tentacle at me. It slams me into the fence. Sky's faint yells reach my ears. Pain jolts through my entire body as I fall face first to the ground, dust seeping into my mouth. Coughing, I struggle to climb back to my feet.

It again swipes at me, only this time I dodge just in time and, grabbing the crowbar, throw it at its exposed face. Lodging itself into the monster's eye, it wails in pain. It lashes out its tentacle, nearly missing Sky who is still standing in the same place. She screams and scrambles backward. The snake-like limb helicopters several times in agony while the creature falls to one knee, its other arm clawing at the weapon.

With a renewed surge of adrenaline, I rush at it while it's distracted. Grabbing the crowbar stuck in its eye socket, I use my body weight to propel myself under the monster. I drag it through its body, cutting open its chest, jugular, and stomach like an inexperienced surgeon. Black blood and insides gush out behind me. When I'm behind the creature, it crashes forward before turning into its back, snarling and growling at me as it attempts to reach for me.

I walk up to it, making sure to avoid its arm weakly clawing at me. Its half-torn face, if it can even be called that anymore, snarls at me. Snapping its shark-like teeth at me, with chunks of dislodged jaw bones wedged in its tongue. Unlike the first one, its eyes are still intact aside from the one already impaled, but I haven’t noticed that before because nothing but dark, inky void fills them.

Without wasting another second, I impale its head. The obnoxious stench of the black goo leaking out makes the air almost unbreathable, but I don't care. I strike it again, and again, and again, until it's nothing else but a quivering pile of squelching bits of scalp and mush.

Leaving it to turn into an overdone barbecue, I rush toward Sky, who is crouching behind the rock boulders. Thank God she finally listened and didn't do anything reckless.

“Aria…” her voice trembles. “I almost thought — it…”

“I'm here, babygirl. I'm here.” I gather her up in my arms and squeeze her tight. She buries her face into my shoulder, sobs violently shaking against me. Despite the pain shooting up my body in waves due to the embrace, I hold onto her. The warmth of her and tightness of her embrace is more than enough to soothe the aching torturing my muscles.

“What are we going to do now?” she whispers.

Taking a deep breath, I glance around the burning buildings until my eyes land on the sturdiest construction in this town: Jack's store. Built entirely of bricks, rocks, and steel, it is meant to withstand atomic bombs. And it definitely should do the job against these—

Hold on, what the fuck?...

Every monster in the streets is standing still. Looking right at us. None of them are mutated yet, but they're all just... frozen to their spots like bloody, mutilated statues. A car near the curb explodes, its door flying in the air and slamming into one of them. Nobody even flinches as the burning creature lifts its flaming head at us from underneath the metal and continues to stare.

“Aria? What is it?” Sky asks.

I swallow down my rising panic.“They're all just… staring at us.”

“Well, yeah, I don't think they're too happy about you killing their leaders.”

This is not the time, Sky.

But a part of me does think that she may be on to something.

“Look, we just need to get to that building.” I gesture toward it, about a hundred or so feet away.

“Wh–”

I tighten my hold on her hand, causing her to wince. “You do as you're ordered. Is that understood?” I hate using my army voice on my girlfriend, but I need to make sure she understands precisely. Because each action can mean life or death.

Her eyes widen in shock, but she nods. I stand up, with her following suit, and slowly take a deep breath as I watch one of the monsters shift just a little. If we're going to make a run for it, then we'll have to make it before those fuckers catch up to us.

Gripping the crowbar in my other hand, I glance back at Sky, her face filled with fear mixed with determination.

She's my everything, my sunshine during the worst storms, my blooming flower in a field of dead crops, my fire in the coldest of blizzards, and the only person who cared enough to support me every day after everything I went through in the army.

And I'll be damned if I lose her to these bags of dead rotters.

“And no matter what happens, you do not let go of my hand.”

“Yes ma'am,” she whispers, then smiles with a mischievous twinkle in her golden brown eyes.

“Unbelievable,” I mutter, yet I can't resist to crack a smile as well. “Are you ready?” I ask out loud.

She inhales, her breath quivering. “Yes.”

One… two… three … “Now!”

And just as we run toward the building, one of the monsters lets out an ear-splitting shriek, followed by several others before the first one sprints toward us. Its limbs lag behind it, flapping against its sides as the others follow, hordes of monsters streaming down the street. Sky's grip on my hand tightens, nearly crushing my bones as we run.

And we run for our fucking lives. We'll make it. We have to.

A/N:
Did I forget to mention that this story is partially inspired by one of my favorite movie series Resident Evil?  (Yes, the 2000s ones with Milla Jovovich lol)