“They’re inside!” Someone shrieked, and my heart skipped a beat. It’d do about as much good as the “duck and cover” method against a nuclear bomb, but it was better than nothing.Ī loud crash echoed over the sirens, and the building actually trembled. Now the girls did as they had been taught, propping the army regulation cots on their sides to block the windows and doors.Ī girl pushed me out of the way and shoved her cot towards the nearest window, as if it would protect us any better than the glass. To prepare us for the possibility of an attack, some government officials had set up weekly training with arbitrary safeguards. I shared the room with twenty-five other girls, ranging in age from ten to twenty. Now the government kept the uninfected stashed here, quarantined off from the zombies. Once, not that long ago, this had been an ordinary high school. Bright flashes lit up the darkness as guns fired, but I couldn’t hear anything over the sirens.Ĭhaos enveloped the room behind me. Armed guards and barbed wire lined the perimeter, but when I looked out the window into the night, I couldn’t see any soldiers. I jumped up and ran to the large windows. Then the emergency sirens started wailing.Įven though it was well after midnight, I laid wide awake on my cot, still fully clothed. With almost constant blackouts, we were lucky to have power at all. When the lights first went out, filling the former classroom with frightened gasps, I hadn’t thought much of it. This is the way the world ends – not with a bang or a whimper, but with zombies breaking down the back door.

Hollowland by Amanda Hocking