Dead Omaha

Dead Omaha
By Brennen

The day started just like usual. I got ready for work just like always, I brushed my teeth, took a shower, got dressed, and told my wife and kids goodbye. That was the last time I would see them alive.
I left my house and drove toward the office building where I worked. As I was driving down 52nd street, I happened to glance towards an alley I saw what looked like someone attacking another. I didn’t make anything of it since my imagination sometimes goes wild. After I passed I got a strange feeling in my stomach. That feeling would never go away after today.
As I pulled into the parking lot at Bank of America I noticed something odd. A lot of my full time coworker’s parking spots were empty. I parked my Honda Civic in my parking spot. I then walked in the front door and noticed another odd thing. There was no clerk at the front desk, when the bank opened in 5 minutes. Actually there was no one in the whole lobby. I started to think that the whole building was closed, but if that was so, there would still be security or a janitor around. I walked to my office and checked my schedule to see if there really was work today, and there was. I checked out some of the other offices, and it turned there was no one on my floor at work today. Now things were really getting weird. After I checked all the offices on my floor I went back to my office and called my wife to see what was up. She finally picked up after three rings, and I told her to check the news. She turned it to the news station and watched the story. “There seems to be some kind of cannibalism going on around here. The mare has just issued a state of emergency. We are asking everyone watching to stay indoors and lock all your doors. The National Guard is gathering at the Omaha Quest Center to access the situation. We will stay with you and tell you any further information we find out.” Now I was actually getting a little scared. I told my wife to get the kids, lock the doors, and get to the basement.
After I got off the phone with my wife I went back down to the lobby. I walked towards the front desk and froze. There was blood covering the chair and desk. I sprinted back up to my office and called 911. The phone rang six times before someone answered. A man picked the phone up and screamed in a panicked voice “OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD! HELP ME! HELP ME!” After that I just heard screams and then there was nothing. When I heard the screams from the police station I knew something bad was happening. I ran back down stairs to the lobby and screamed. Lying at the front door was a bloody corpse. I then heard a moan. I stopped in my tracks. I turned toward the noise and spotted the source. I blood covered figure stood near the bathrooms. I screamed and sprinted as fast as I could back to my car. I jumped into my car, reversed onto the road and sped down the street toward my house.
As I passed 52nd street for the second time that day I looked down the same alley I passed just less than an hour ago. Now I looked in horror as I saw a body with a pool of blood around it. I sped up even faster and finally reached my house. I stared at my house. I was so horrified I couldn’t even move. The front door of my house was broken in and one of the front windows was smashed. After I regained control of myself, I ran toward the front door and went inside. The house was a mess, everything thing was either smashed or knocked over. The thing that horrified me most was the fact there was blood on the floor. Again I couldn’t move. The next thing that helped me regain control of myself was a noise. I heard movement coming from the basement. I had hope. I walked toward the stairs and stared down. So very slowly I walked down the stairs. There was a puddle of blood at the bottom of the stairs. Nearly weeping I made my way down the stairs. I pushed the door open and stopped. Now I lost almost all hope. My wife was against the wall on the far side of the basement behind an overturned table. She was sitting with her back against the wall and not moving with blood all around her. The door I opened was blocking the rest of the basement and I was almost too afraid to look. The thing that made me most horrified was the noise. There was a crunching, chewing sound coming from the side of the basement blocked by the door. By then I had to see what the noise was. What I saw almost made me pass out. My “son” was crouching over something and gnawing on it. The basement was dark so I couldn’t see much, but I could still see the outline of a body under him. I took a step back and stepped on a piece of glass which made a crunching sound. My “son” stopped and turned. It was then that I really lost all hope. My “son’s” mouth was covered in blood and there was a huge open wound on his right shoulder. My “son” ran at me and jumped on me, he tried to bite me but I held his head. I then did what I never could have even imagined doing. I threw my 6 year old son against the wall and hit him and the head with a glass vase. Just after, I heard another movement to my left. My wife was getting up. She started moaning and walking towards me. I ran toward the stairs, slammed the door behind me, and slid to the ground sitting with my back against the door. Something then hit the door with such force I flew forward. I knew what did it and I couldn’t stand to think it. I ran back to my car and cried. I then drove towards my mom and dad’s house. I had to see if they were ok. On my way I saw lots of bodies on the sidewalk and even a couple of car crashes.
As I pulled into my mom and dad’s driveway I was relieved to see that the house looked normal. I jumped out of my car and ran to the front door. I knocked four times. After about twenty seconds I knocked another four times. Finally my dad opened the door, shotgun in hand. We hugged then went inside. My mom, dad, and I talked for a while, then, they agreed to come with me to find somewhere safe. My dad handed me his spare shotgun, fifteen shells, and a hunting knife. After that we got in the car and drove, looking for a safe place to stay. After a lot of arguing and suggesting we finally decided on the Quest Center arena. After a long drive we finally made it to the quest center. We saw a lot of cars and we thought that was a good sign. We walked to the main door and went in. We didn’t see anyone. I told me parents to stay put and I walked over to one of the arena doors and looked in. There was blood everywhere. There were also hundreds of sick looking people walking around. One of the closer people ran at me and I shot him with the shotgun. I turned and ran back to my parents and told them we have to leave immediately. Just then we saw dozens of sick people outside heading our way so we couldn’t leave. The doors were automatic so we couldn’t keep them closed. We all ran up the stairs looking for a safe place to stay. We kept running until we finally found a security room with a lock on it. We went inside and locked the door behind us. We then looked around the room. There were monitors with the security camera videos playing, and lots of cupboards. My parents started looking through the cupboards for anything useful. I looked at the security videos to see how bad the Quest Center had got. It turned out this was probably worst place in the city we could have gone. There were sick or dead people in almost every room. In the cupboards, we found a knife, and some food. After that we heard something hit the door hard. Then it moaned. After a minute we heard another moan join the first, then another. The moans added up to six after ten minutes. After twenty minutes of hearing the moans we decided to take action. We couldn’t stay here. We told my mom to get back and then we got ready to shoot. I opened the door and quickly stepped back. The sick people rushed in and we shot. Three went down fast but the last three didn’t go down as fast. Two rushed toward my dad. They both jumped on him and started biting. I shot the one coming at me and knocked the other two off my dad and shot them too, but the damage was already done. My dad had bite wounds to his shoulder, chest, and arm. He handed me his shotgun and told me to take mom and go somewhere safe. He then told me to do something that I couldn’t stand. He told me to shoot him. I listened. My mom and I then ran downstairs and to the car. We made it alright after having to shoot two sick people. We started driving down the street trying to think of a safe place to go. We started to drive toward the outskirts of town and learned the National Guard had set up road blocks on every road out of Omaha. No one could get in or out. This city was now under quarantine.
My mom and I turned back toward the city. We decided to drive around looking for other survivors. While driving past a Shop-Co we saw a woman and a man running away from three sick people. I told my mom to take the wheel. Then I shot the sick people. They fell down and a pool of blood quickly surrounded the corpse. The man and women quickly scrambled away from the bodies. Next I told them to get into the car. After they got in we talked for a while about each others survival and losses. They had lost a son. We asked them where the safest place to go was. They didn’t know anywhere safe either. Their house had just been invaded, which is why they were running. We just kept driving.
We learned that the man’s name was Ben and the woman’s Angie. They were at home when the invasion hit. They stayed there until the sick people broke into there home and there son didn’t make it. After that they ran and that’s when we found them.
The streets were quiet. It was starting to get a little dark. There were almost no cars on the street. Every time we saw a car it was either abandoned or had been broken into. We saw only one moving car. At an intersection a car sped past and we heard screams coming from the inside.
When we learned we were almost out of gas we tried hard to think of a safe place. When we couldn’t think of one, we decided to go to the nearest gas station and get gas, food, and water.
When we pulled into the gas station we all noticed one thing, the windows and door were not broken or smashed. Ben and I took the shotguns and walked inside the station. There was nothing unusual. I told Ben to grab all the food and water he could get while I looked around to make sure there were no sick people. After I checked the whole store I helped Ben get the food and water. All of a sudden we heard screams coming from outside. We ran outside and realized the screams weren’t from our car. They were coming from somewhere else. We looked around and saw the source. A lone teenage girl was running from one of the sick people. Ben yelled for the girl to come here and I got ready to shoot. When the sick person was dead we all turned to look at the girl. She had a nasty gash on her arm. All five of us went into the gas station to try and treat the wound. The girl said her name was Sarah. She had been at a party with her friends when the invasion happened. She ran with a group of her friends when the sick people broke into the house. Her friends and she got split up, and only Sarah and another girl were together. They ran but the other girl didn’t make it. So Sarah just ran and finally came to us.
After we treated Sarah’s wounds we all got back into the car with our food and water and headed toward a place Sarah thought would be safe, the school.
When we pulled into the school’s parking lot we were scared. The school looked like something out of a horror movie. The windows were dark, there were no other cars in the parking lot, and there were some sick people walking around the building.
Ben and I went first into the school. We were ready to shoot at anything that moved. We moved toward the first door. Looking through the window we saw that it was a classroom. Ben opened the door. The classroom was the science lab. There was a skeleton to my right. There were jars and cases all over. We left that classroom and went to the next door. This door was the teacher’s lounge. This room was even creepier then the science lab. After Ben took the first step into the room we heard a moan. We froze and scanned the darkness looking for movement. Just then one of the sick people jumped at us. We dodged it but it flew into the hallway where the girls were standing. The sick person went after Angie first. It started gnawing on her arm. She and Ben screamed. Ben jumped onto the sick person’s back and tried to tackle it. It tried biting Ben too but I hit it with the butt of my gun. Then I fired, the sick person’s head exploded and turned into a bloody mess. Ben got up and scrambled toward his wife who was now pouring out blood. Ben was trying to comfort his wife, but she was still screaming. Just then I noticed Sarah wasn’t there. But before I could worry about her we had to get Angie stitched up. We took Angie around the school until we found the nurse’s office. I told Ben to help Angie while I went to look for Sarah. I walked out into the dark, creepy hallway. By now it was pitch black outside, and it looked as though we were staying the night there. I was too scared to yell out Sarah’s name, so I whispered it as I walked. I walked around an overturned table and screamed when something hit me from the side. I fell over and looked to see what hit me. Sarah was sitting next to me. She was obviously sick just by sight. Sarah’s eyes had no pupil or iris. Her face was grey, and her teeth were sharp. Sarah jumped at me and just then a flash. I turned and saw Ben with his shotgun aimed in my direction. Just after, Angie walked out of the darkness. Ben didn’t know it but she was also obviously sick. I grabbed my gun and screamed for Ben to move. He didn’t. Ben died from his wife. Angie attacked Ben from behind biting his neck first. I could only stare, frozen by fear. After Ben stopped struggling I ran. I ran all the way outside the school in the dark until I found the car. I got in. I didn’t know what happened to my mom and I was ashamed for leaving her there even if she was dead. I sped out of the parking lot and down the street. I didn’t know where to go. Everywhere we had thought would be safe had turned out to be dangerous. There might not be anywhere in the city that was safe. I started to drive toward the outside of town just to see if the National Guard would help me. When I got to the outside street I stared horrified. A National Guard truck was tipped over and on fire. There were bodies all over and no National Guard units in site, except on the ground. I drove around looking for anyone alive, no one was. I drove around the road block and out of town. Even though I was finally out of town I didn’t feel any better. The smell of death was still in the air.
I didn’t know where to go. I saw a farm and decided to see if any of the sick people had gone there yet. As I pulled into the driveway I saw a farmer feeding some chickens and I was relieved to see no sick people had gotten here yet. I drove up to close to the farmer and got out. I asked the farmer if he knew what was happening in Omaha. He didn’t. The farmer thought I was crazy and made me leave. I felt bad. The farmer and any family of his will probably be killed. I still didn’t know where to go. I decided to head toward Lincoln. I had a brother living there.
I had been driving for almost an hour when I finally saw any human contact. I was about 20 minutes away from Lincoln when I saw a mini-van heading east toward Iowa. I tried following, but they were speeding and I didn’t want to get too far off course. I was getting worried about my brother. I had seen no cars on the road and the only one I saw was speeding away from Lincoln and Omaha. I still kept heading toward Lincoln because I didn’t know anywhere else to go.
When I first got sight of Lincoln I sighed of relief, the city looked normal, but as I drove onto the first street of town I was not sure weather the sick people had reached the city yet. The city looked empty but normal. All of a sudden a dog ran out in front of my car. I swerved to avoid hitting it. My car rammed straight into a street light. I looked out to see if any of the sick people were around. When I saw none I got out to inspect the damage. As soon as I saw the front end of the car, I felt sick. I knew the damage was too bad to even drive the car. I went back to the car and got all the food, water, and ammunition that would fit in my pockets. I walked to the front of the nearest store. I didn’t see anyone. I looked around before I went inside. The city felt very wrong.
As I walked into the door I didn’t notice anything out of ordinary, but as I took a step in I heard a rustling noise behind the counter. The store was dark so I couldn’t see very much. I took aim with my shotgun and “Don’t shoot!” someone yelled from behind the counter. I lowered my shotgun and waited. After a couple of seconds four people cautiously walked out from behind the counter. They didn’t appear to be sick but I wasn’t taking any chances. I told them to stop and I then made sure they weren’t bleeding. I then told them they could come closer. We all sat down and told each others story. I felt like it had been weeks since I first went to work the morning before. I learned the other four were from Lincoln and had been friends since elementary school. The two guy’s names were Josh and Rick. The two women’s names were Suzie and Jenna. Josh and Suzie were married and Rick and Jenna were friends. We talked for a little while more and then the kid named Josh said we should make a barricade in front of the door and make the store secure. We pushed a couch in front of the door and put a lounging chair in front of the back door. There were two large glass windows right next to the front door, so we had nothing to block them with. We were just securing the back door even more when all of a sudden glass seemed to explode in the front room. I was the only one with a gun, so I went to the front room to see what the noise was. It was obvious the noise had come from the front window, since the whole thing was shattered and spread out all over the floor. I walked out all the way into the front room. I saw nothing. “Its all cl” something rammed me on my shoulder and knocked me down. I turned to face a huge, sick-looking Doberman standing beside me. It was red. It had chunks of flesh hanging off of it, and had a big chunk missing out of its side. The dog snarled, showed its teeth, and lunged. Right as it met me, I grabbed its head. It kept growling and trying to bite my throat. I was losing my strength and the Doberman was almost to my neck, when Josh tackled the dog off me and stabbed it over and over all over its chest and neck. The dog was obviously dead but Josh was going crazy. He kept stabbing it over and over even though it wasn’t moving. Josh’s wife, Suzie finally went over to him and put her arms around him to calm him down. Josh started crying after that.
After the Doberman had broken through the window, we knew that we weren’t safe here. We didn’t have any idea where to go, and none of us had cars. We decided to take a big risk. We were going to walk to the military institute in downtown Lincoln and hope for the best. The most danger would be while walking there. The only protection we had were two hunting knives and my shotgun. We got everything ready, the women carrying the food and water, and the men carrying the weapons and ammunition. We walked out of the store and the first thing that we saw was a body in the middle of the street. That did not help the fear that was filling up inside us. We walked down the street to the first intersection. There was no one or nothing in sight. We took the first left and walked east toward the military institute. We walked halfway down the street when we found out that walking was not going to be an option for much longer. There were dozens of sick people surrounding a shop and we heard gunfire coming from the inside of the shop. We all felt sick because we knew the people in there did not stand a chance. We turned the other way and saw a whole bunch of sick people heading our way. We all quickly decided to take a chance and go into the nearest building. The nearest building turned out to be an apartment complex. We walked in and looked around. There were things smashed all over the place and blood on just about everything. We looked into the first apartment. The door was cracked and looking in, we could see the place was a mess. We walked farther into the dark, creepy hallway. There was a body lying halfway outside of a door. We could only see the legs of the body, lying in a puddle of blood. Rick walked forward to take a closer look at the body. Right as Rick stepped into the doorway, he was tackled from one of the sick people. I couldn’t shoot it in case I accidentally hit Rick. I went up and hit the sick person off with my gun. I shot it while it was away from Rick. When I looked down, the knot that had been in my stomach for days got much tighter. Rick’s throat was torn apart. He was bleeding so bad I knew there was no way to save him. I took one step back and shot Rick in the head. I don’t know to this day why I shot Rick without even thinking it, but I glad I did because of what I found out later in those horrible days still to come. After we all mourned Rick’s death, we moved on. We walked up the stairs to the third floor. We were looking for a way to get to the roof. We finally saw a staircase leading to the roof on the far side of the hallway. Just after we saw the staircase, we heard many loud moans and thumps coming from downstairs. We all ran toward the staircase and looking back I saw that the sick people had already reached the third floor and were running after us. Halfway there, I knew we wouldn’t make it. I yelled for the others to go ahead while I cover them. I turned around and fired. Three of the sick people fell down right away, but about five more kept coming. I fired the semi-auto shotgun again and again. Finally the last of them fell down. Suddenly I was exhausted. I sank to the floor. I knew I had to get to the roof with the others. I started to get up when, Bam! One of the sick people flew out of a doorway and knocked me down. The sick person was on top of me, but I had but shotgun holding its head away from me. I was holding it off, but just then, two more sick people walked up the stairs. As soon as they saw me they started to run. I knew I was going to die. The sick people were halfway down the hallway when the one on top of me suddenly flew off of me. I turned and shot it while still lying down. I shot the other two just after that. I looked around wondering what miracle had knocked the sick person off of me. Josh was standing next to me, hunting knife in hand. He helped me up and I thanked him over and over. I was going to die if he hadn’t showed up. Just as we turned toward the stairs to the roof, we heard the most horrible scream either of us had ever heard. I turned to face the stairs and took aim with my shotgun. I saw something moving but I couldn’t see it clearly. The thing reached the top of the stairs and all I could do was stare in horror. A very skinny lady was standing there. She was only wearing a bra and underwear. Her skin was grey and she had claws almost a foot long. I almost screamed, but held my breath. The thing did not appear to see us so we did not move, did not even take a breath. Just then, one of the girls called from the roof. “Is everything ok down there?” The thing turned toward the stairs and screamed that horrible scream again. It ran toward the stairs. I thought I was going to die right there, but the thing ran right past us up the stairs. We could here the girls scream horrible screams of pain as the thing tore them apart. Josh ran upstairs to help his wife. I couple seconds later I heard him scream too, and I knew I couldn’t save any of them. I ran downstairs turned the corner and ran straight into a little girl. The little girl flew backward and landed face down. I was too scared to turn the girl over. She got on her knees, but she was still facing away from me. She turned toward me and this time I did scream. She had blood all over her mouth and a huge wound on her neck. The little girl jumped toward me, but I shot her in mid-air. Her head exploded and blood flew everywhere. Blood got all over me and the whole room. I ran outside the door and froze. There were hundreds off sick people swarming toward the apartments. I ran back inside and went up the stairs to the third floor again. I smashed the door to the nearest apartment, but dreaded it immediately. A family of 5 was sitting over a body. The nearest person, a teen, looked toward me and I screamed in horror. His face was covered in blood. I ran out of the room into the hallway. The apartment beside this one was unlocked. I went inside and locked the door behind me. Immediately, I noticed a rustling noise somewhere in the apartment. I spun around. The noise was coming from behind a door across the room. I still had my shotgun and I aimed it toward the door. I walked toward the door cautiously. As I approached, the rustling stopped. I reached for the doorknob. I opened the door slowly and right as I did, a sick person ran out and jumped on me. The force of the blow sent the shotgun flying across the room. I held the sick person by the neck to keep it from biting me. I grabbed an empty pot next to me and slammed it into the sick person’s head. Just as the sick person flew off of me, the front door started to crack. I ran for my shotgun that had slid across the floor and aimed for the sick person who was now running after me. Just as I pulled the trigger, the front door flew opened and the family that I had seen just minutes before was now running in at me. I fired three times and then “click, click, click”. The gun was out of ammo. I ran for the nearest window. I didn’t have time to look so I just jumped. I smashed through the window and started falling. I landed right on my back, one story below. I had landed on the balcony of an apartment. I couldn’t move for almost 15 minutes. I finally tried to get up and found that I had broken a rib and probably couldn’t run if I needed to. I leaned against the railing and looked into the door of the apartment. The apartment was trashed and there was blood all over. I was lucky one of the sick people hadn’t broken through the glass door as I couldn’t move. I knew that I had to leave and the only way to go was through the apartment in front of me. I didn’t have a weapon and I was injured. I got up slowly. I could only limp. If I need to get away from anything fast, then I would be killed.
The apartment looked empty from the door but the front door was knocked in, so I knew I had to be careful. I grabbed the handle and pulled. The door was locked. I would have to break the glass and that would mean letting anything in there know where I was. I had no choice. I grabbed a chair that was sitting on the balcony. I could barely lift it with my wound. I swung with all my strength. I heard myself cry out as everything went black.
When I woke up, I heard a crunching noise. I looked to my left and nearly screamed, but held it. A sick person was gnawing on another person. I couldn’t move but it hadn’t seen me yet. I tried to work out a plan in my head but the pain made it hard to think. I shifted a little bit to try to calm the pain and CRUNCH. I smashed a piece of broken glass. The sick person’s head jerked in my direction. Just as the sick person ran at me, the front door broke open. I heard a lot of automatic gunfire. Three soldiers swarmed in and cleared the room. They hadn’t noticed me yet and I cried out for help. One of the soldiers examined me then yelled out into the hallway. Two more soldiers came in with a stretcher. I was lifted onto a stretcher and escorted to the street by three soldiers. It was an awesome sight when I reached the street. There were trucks, soldiers, and tanks all over the place. They looked like they had enough fire-power to clear out the whole country. I was lifted into the back of the truck. Pretty soon, four more injured people joined me. An injured soldier came in with us. We sat in silence for a couple of minutes before the most horrible noise we could have imagined echoed out across the street. Everyone stopped what they were doing for almost a full two seconds. All of a sudden people were running with supplies and heading for the trucks. One soldier was yelling “Get the civilians out, get the civilians out!” The truck I was in started and I heard the engines of many other trucks start. The convoy headed for the outskirts of town. I didn’t know where we were going.
We had been driving for almost a half hour when one of the injured passengers began to shake. The man, in his mid thirties, fell off the bench and began to shake. The injured soldier was yelling for everyone to get back. The man on the ground suddenly lunged at the nearest passenger. Just before the teeth reached the passenger’s leg, the injured soldier pulled out a pistol and shot the sick person in the head. Before the blood could spread all over the truck, the soldier threw the sick person out of the truck.
We reached our destination and passed through several guard stations before we finally stopped. More soldiers lifted the injured people out of the truck. As I was being carried on my stretcher somewhere, I looked around. I saw rows of barbed wire fences and many guard towers. It looked like a military base. I was carried into a hospital. I was put into a room where some nurses cared for me. I was fed, watered, and given medicine. There was a television in my room and I turned it on. I turned to the news. There was nothing on the first three channels I tried, but finally I got one to work. “This may have been the biggest tragedy in our countries history. We still have not gotten word on what exactly happened, but the situation is still not under control. The military is doing all they can and have cleared out many small towns. We have gotten word that the Canadian military and the British SAS are going to help the United States in this astronomical problem. These two countries may help put the country back together. As we speak, the two countries are moving troops around major cities and helping to secure small towns and evacuate anyone that is alive. Things are looking better, but the best thing to do is to stay inside and do not think that it is safe outside. This is channel 42 news.” I turned the television back off. I didn’t know what to think, were things actually getting better? Or were things getting worse. I suddenly realized how tired I was. I tried to think more about everything that has happened, but I was too tired. I finally gave up and closed my eyes.