CHAPTER 3 - Signs, Symptoms, and Sights

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STILL A YEAR AGO BEFORE THE APOCALYPSE

Eden is still writing urgently and frantic in her journal inside her apartment.

Sometimes she looked around from her door to the windows as if expecting something to break in and attack her.

When there's nothing that she seemed to have heard or sense, she went back to writing, her dominant hand moving fast as if she's in a hurry to get this over with.

Also, it's almost as if she's writing a fictional story in her journal but in a grim truth, the story-like entry she's writing is not fictional at all.

And sometimes Eden hoped that it was and it was just some horrifying nightmare she had dreamed in her sleep.

But she couldn't deny the reality when she had seen it and witnessed it firsthand, even though somehow she managed to make it through and escape alive.

She kept on writing vigorously with her gaze focused but her mind drifted as if immersed in the dark memories she had experienced and had gone through before in those sudden horrifying days.

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JOURNAL ENTRY: 7TH DAY, 1ST MONTH JANUARY, YEAR 2XXX

It was so surreal.

I had hoped at first that it was just a coincidence or something.

But I couldn't even deny the obvious signs even if they were right in front of me in large prints.

I'm sure you're wondering what it is that got me so panicked and frantic about like some madwoman who had just gone nuclear-like crazy frenzy.

I'm going to just write it all down here in my journal personally so that anyone who might find and read this will understand.

It's also in case I might not make it out alive if ever that might be the case for me when that happens.

Anyway, I'm rambling on.

This is how it happened, when and where it started, and how I've been there and seen it all through until I managed to come back and return home to my apartment.

It was just my first day at work, during the day as a part-time office assistant in a small firm situated in a very high-rise building in the city.

It was fortunate for me that I'm a quick learner and I managed to do a good job working on the first day, milling around in the office and following the orders given to me by my supervisor and superior, almost feeling like a robot designed to serve its master to the fullest.

This would be offensive to some people at first but you have to admit it's funny because for me I've always been some kind of docile type and knew better than to listen and respect my superiors even if they're mean to me and just follow and do what they say.

I didn't mind this at all because all I want is just be on the sidelines quietly and give no complaint whatsoever over any nonsense even if it's for yourself.

This job pays well and of course, I need the money despite that I do have money saved for myself.

You never know that in the future your money would run out so quickly and your normal life will instantly become a difficult one.

Anyway, moving on, this is when I noticed during lunch break the first signs that something was wrong.

I didn't bring a packed lunch with me and the canteen food is worse when I saw it so I didn't buy them. I was standing by in a room where they served coffee and took one, and as I drank halfway from my cup, I saw it.

One office employee was coughing hard in his workstation and he seemed to be looking worse. His face was looking dark red and seemed to swell and he also looked to have trouble breathing.

I remember that when I just entered the building, I had met that same employee and he was normal and healthy-looking before and didn't have the slightest symptom that he was going to be sick.

Well, right now he is, and it's strange and weird to me that the guy was sick so fast that I thought he had contracted the hidden plague or something.

I didn't know that my outrageous thoughts were true in the future.

And then the sick employee suddenly lurched forward as if he was going to vomit but instead he just collapsed in a heap on the floor, startling his other workmates and the others reacted to check on him.

I didn't go to see if he was alright because a large crowd was instantly forming around him and it wasn't long before someone finally called for help and then two medics swiftly came into the building at the workspace and took the fallen sick employee away.

I was a little surprised at seeing the medics already there even when I noticed that one of the people in the crowd was about to call for an ambulance through his cell phone but there was already medical personnel assigned in the building and they seemed to be prepared for this.

It strangely got to me and also had a bad feeling that something is up.

But I didn't think much of it when my lunch break was over and I went back to work.

I finished the day at my part-time job and almost had forgotten what I've seen before at the office when I was rushing to my next part-time job for the night shift which is as a cashier at a small grocery store.

I quickly catch a bus heading to the next job location I'm going and when I reached my destination, I went straight to the back of the grocery store and dressed up in my other work clothes from office shirt, skirts, and heels to cashier employee shirt, pants and shoes.

I wasn't late nor was I early but I came right on time to meet my night-job superior at my night part-time job and learn what I need to do and start working for the night.

Even though I knew I would come home late and would get a few hours of sleep and work the same as always with these two part-time jobs from now on and beyond, I didn't mind at all as long as I can do it and keep on living normally.

It was also fortunate for me that I have weekends as the off days from my part-time jobs.

However, I didn't know that everything was going to change when the time passed by and days go by until the 7th day when I finally realized that everything is falling into chaos and the whole world is already falling into the depths of Hell itself in a literal sort of way.

Within those 7 days, as I worked and went home back and forth as usual and normal, I noticed signs, symptoms, and also sightings that I wish I could shake off as mere coincidence or just imaginations that were made up in my head from being almost overworked.

During the daytime, more office employees had gotten sick suddenly and the workspace I was assigned on was about to become so empty it was like it was the holidays or there was a job strike going on.

I was getting unnerved about this but I kept on working as normal and usual as always.

Then there were more that started to happen during the night.

I had noticed unusual symptoms from the buyers in the grocery store I'm working at during night shifts. Some seemed to be idling about between aisles absently as if they were drugged or in a depressed haze. While some seemed to be staring intently at the frozen meat in the freezers, some stared at other people that were near them or walked by them with hungry expressions on their faces as if they haven't eaten at all.

I was glad that those people who were staring at others didn't happen to me because when I saw and noticed them approaching the cashier counter, I manage to quickly switch with another night-shift employee I had made friends with to take over as cashier and move away from their sights.

I knew it was a silly excuse to do that with one of the first friends I had made here in the city. But I was getting a little freaked out with everything that's been happening and I started feeling paranoid and selfish for myself and my life.

The only time I felt safe is when I come straight home back to my apartment.

When the weekends finally came, I was relieved but then it still went wrong and I seen and experienced it, increasing my paranoia and fear of something unknown about to come that I didn't know that it already has.

On the 6th day, I was sitting outside next to a coffee shop, drinking a cold creamy latte frappuccino to refresh myself and relax when a car accident occurred suddenly right in the street near the place where I'm at.

Two cars, one Hyundai and an SUV crashed against each other head-side, either one of them had run through a red traffic light or not.

People reacted to the chaos and some had gone to the scene to try to check on and help the injured drivers in the two vehicles.

Someone had called for an ambulance and as a crowd almost formed so many around the two crashed vehicles, it arrived an hour later fast as it was called and three paramedics came rushing to the scene to help and rescue the victims of the accident.

I stayed put where I am by the coffee shop and I almost strained my eyesight to watch from far away to see what it's happening.

That's when I noticed something very strange and so creepy that I thought the hot sun up high is getting to me and I'm having heat hallucinations.

When two of the paramedics had placed one of the two driver victims into a stretcher and one of them declared soundlessly that this one's dead, I thought I saw its corpse twitching in the stretcher as if it was on a seizure. I also noticed that the two paramedics had strapped the seemingly twitching body tight and secure so that people and witnesses close by would have thought that the body would fall off inside the ambulance and nothing else.

But I somehow knew better when I saw the twitching and I also had thought that I saw the other victim who looked to be dead as well in the other crashed vehicle, its bashed head moved and seemed to lurch sideways as if trying to lunge at the paramedic that was going to remove him from the driver's seat.

I frowned at this and then felt like leaving already as if I didn't want to see what will happen next.

I abandoned my half-finished frappuccino and left the place as fast as I can in another direction. I was having such deep bad feelings that were churning inside my gut that I felt like wanting to go back home to my apartment and stay there up to the next day.

I didn't think of writing this down the day before today because when I went home and then felt like sleeping it off which I did, it went out of my mind as if it's a normal occurrence that is usual in the city and I had shrugged it off as my imagined paranoia or fear.

But then I was wrong when on that exact 7th day, in the late time of night. I had my sights on the first thing that got me crashing into a horrifying reality that everything had already gone to pieces in a very worst way.

It was on the 7th day that I stayed at home during the daytime feeling out of sorts and trying to calm myself and think clearly about what had just happened the day before when around five in the afternoon I had a call from my cell phone.

I answered it and heard that it was one of my friends who worked with me on the night shifts in the grocery store.

I heard her begging me to take over her night shift at the store because one of her family members was at the hospital and she was worried and wanted to go there but couldn't because she needed the job too.

I wanted to refuse at first because of what I'd seen before and the wild chaotic thoughts still running in my head but I felt pity for my friend and accepted and then I went and prepared myself to take over my friend's shift and work at night again, even if it's supposed to be my first weekend off.

But I didn't mind and I felt like owing my friend a favor for helping me switch when I had first encountered the strange people who were staring at others before.

I went to the grocery store at a fast pace like I wanted to get this over with and return home as soon as possible and my friend who called me thanked me so much that she gave me almost so many tight hugs before she left in a hurry to go to the hospital and check on her family.

I sighed as I watched her leave then entered through the back and readied myself to work my night shift as cashier as usual and I greeted the other employee working for the night, a young man in his late teens and almost an adult that is mopping and cleaning the floors between aisles.

I saw that there weren't many customers and only about two that looked to be searching around for their groceries and I sighed as I went behind the counter and waited for the customers to come and pay for their purchases.

It was a few hours later that something unexpected suddenly happened.

I heard a loud slamming noise and bumping thuds and I turned my head almost in an instant turn that I could've broken it and I saw what looked to be a homeless man banging his head against the entrance doors of the store.

I was startled and stunned at this and I just stood there behind the counter confused and silent the young employee who was mopping the floors stopped and went to look and check on the head-banger to see if he was okay.

But just as he had opened the door, the head-banging homeless man lunged at him and attacked him so suddenly that the two customers that were still inside the store and I just watched with shock and horror, we didn't have time to react to what we're just seeing right before our very eyes.

The homeless man opened his mouth wide as he could and chomp his dirty teeth into the young man's throat and started tearing it apart and EATING him.

The two customers that were still there reacted first with screams and yells, and one of them which is a burly man went to help the dying employee and try to pry the cannibal man off.

But it soon became a grave mistake when more of the carnivorous cannibals like the homeless man came bursting inside through the entrance, which is two more of them and one of them instantly lunged and chomped on the burly man at his arm while the other one goes for the second customer which is a feeble elderly woman who had tried to run and flee.

It took a split second for me to finally react and between the natural instincts of fight and flight, I choose flight mode.

I ran as swift as a startled fawn and went to the back of the store where the employees' room is and I hurriedly shut the door behind me and locked it, ignoring the screams and yells from outside and the munching hungry sounds from the monsters.

Then I felt myself collapse down to the ground, my back against the locked door, my bottom sitting on the floor, my legs curled up with knees near my face, and my hands over my mouth to cover and silence the cries and sobs that are emerging from my lips.

I kept on ignoring the terrible and sickening sounds I'm hearing from outside the door and soundlessly prayed myself to God for forgiveness and salvation.

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Eden stopped writing and looked like she finally wanted to vomit upon remembering the horrible and terrifying sights she had seen and the incident she went through before, which she did in a sudden dash to her bathroom and you can hear her retching and puking into the toilet, throwing whatever's in her stomach out.

Then there was a sound of the toilet flushing and Eden came out, looked to be staggering weakly and tired as she slowly went back to her desk to keep on writing in her journal.

She had to let everything out and try to erase it from her mind and have it etched and written onto her journal so that she might be able to sleep peacefully.

So she kept on writing what she had experienced and seen, all the signs, symptoms, and sights of the beginning and rise of the zombie apocalypse.

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