I was absolutely exhausted. Fred had tested me over hundreds of various topics, each with varying levels of success. The testing had continued long after lunch, only finishing when it was dark out. Thankfully, it was over with, and all the I had to do now was a few physical tests.

But that was neither here now there. Right now, all I wanted to do was sleep. So I stumbled into my apartment, barely bothering to take off my shoes, and collapsed into bed.

When I woke up next, it was still dark out, and I felt like I had only slept a few minutes. Like yesterday I was awoken by loud staccato noises from outside my door; unlike yesterday it certainly wasn't someone knocking. Instead, I heard the unmistakable sounds of gunfire.

I stumbled out of bed, unsure of what was going on. As if in answer to my question, I heard people yelling from far away before being drowned out by a siren.

Something was definitely going on, the gunfire all but confirmed this wasn't a drill, and the siren told me it was dangerous, but I wasn't exactly eager to stay here.

I could have easily barricaded the doors, hunkered down, and prayed whatever was going on would end soon, but that didn't sit right with me. For some reason, the thought of staying here didn't sit right with me. I didn't like the idea of dying defenseless, holed up in some flimsy house like a coward.

Mind made up, I went towards the exit, but to my surprise, the siren cut out. Was it really over that quickly? No, it wasn't. The yelling had been replaced by screams, and the gunfire had even gotten louder. Whatever was going on out there, it had only gotten worse.

I slowly opened the door trying to see what was happening. A soldier was running in my general direction, the fear in his eyes told me he wasn't running to something but, rather, away. When she saw the door open she changed course, eager to get out of the open.

She never made it. A black shard the size of a knife pierced through her gut, shortly followed by two more: one in the leg and one in the chest. It took her a moment to realize what had happened, but when she did she let out a scream of pure pain.

I closed the door just enough so that only my eyes were visible to the outside. allowing me to see what happened next. Her momentum carried her forward a few more steps, but before she fell, something pounced on her from behind.

Something vaguely humanoid landed on her, pushing her to ground. As I watched it leaned down toward her head and its jaw dislocated. With a practiced motion, it swallowed her head whole before standing up and spitting it out like a piece of used gum.

As it stood its features became more apparent. It had long gangly limbs and a bulbous head, placing it firmly in the uncanny valley. Its legs were abnormally long, splitting off at the ankle into two parts. The front looking like a normal foot, but the back where its Achilles tendon should be was a wicked obsidian spike.

Its arms were long too, at their full height they reached down below the things knees. Its hands had recessed all the way up to its elbows, and in place of the forearms were three long claws, made of that same obsidian that seemed to permeate every facet of this thing's body.

Its head was the least human part of it all, It was much thinner than a normal human head, but where its face should have been, there was only a gaping maw. As it turned I realized that its head extended behind it ending in a curved point, again made of the obsidian like substance.

The thing was completely naked but lacked any kind of sexual organs. Its flesh was covered in obsidian shards, sometimes on its flesh like armor other times sticking out like spikes. Wherever it wasn't covered by the black matter it instead had pinkish skin freckled with spots of blood.

As I watched it raised its head up, and let out a terrifying screech. Then it turned and ran back in the way it had come, likely searching for its next victim. It moved quickly, not quite as fast as the pouncer I was familiar with but much faster than a human had any hope to.

When I was sure it had gone, I opened the door slowly and stepped out, head on a swivel. If the amount of gunfire was anything to go by there were at least a dozen of these things around.

I couldn't see anything nearby, in fact, the entire area around me looked completely deserted. I moved over to the decapitated corpse, constantly looking around me. I had seen a rifle when she was running towards me, and I desperately wanted some kind of weapon.

I flipped the corpse over off its stomach and took the rifle. It was some kind of M-16 variant that came with a strap that I put on my back. It was fully loaded, she hadn't even bothered to fire before she ran. As I reached for her service pistol I hesitated.

This woman had been running towards me mere moments ago and here I was looting her still-warm corpse. I shook my head, banishing any thought of morality. It wasn't like I was taking her valuables to trade at my local pawn shop. She held the keys to life, my life, in her hands; I'd be damned before I let those slip out of my grasp.

Moral crisis averted, I took the pistol and shoved into my back pocket. It was an old 1911, continuing the theme of American weaponry. Something to ask about later I supposed.

Done with the corpse I took another look around me. Still clear. Now that I was closer, I had a better view of the woman's head. It looked like it had been crushed and there was a hole in the back of her cranium. I shivered, it was a horrible way to go

I moved back over to the wall of the apartment and edged my head out into the main street. There were a large number of corpses scattered about the street, most of them decapitated. The only two that weren't without a head were similar to the creature I had seen earlier.

I needed to make a plan. The way I saw it, there were two options. Either get the hell out of here or help exterminate these things. The main gates were closed and I couldn't be sure the woods were clear of these things either.

I guess I was staying put for now. That meant I needed to find somewhere safe, where I could wait out this whole mess without the fear that something might break down the door.

A scream from behind me interrupted my thoughts. A woman had come from around the other side of the apartment area. She was limping towards me, wearing nothing but a t-shirt and her underwear.

From behind her came an inhuman screech, and suddenly something shot from behind the corner, its momentum carrying it out into the middle of the street.

Without hesitating, I fired a burst of bullets into its torso. The thing dropped into a roll before springing back up with a wail. Its previous prey forgotten; it turned towards me.

It started towards me, but before it could get up to speed I put another two rounds into its mouth. That seemed to do the trick because it went down like a sack of potatoes. I let out a shaky breath, and then I put another round into its head for good measure.

Turning back to woman, I saw she was lying against the wall to my apartment, clutching her leg. I jogged over to her, throwing my rifle onto my back.

As I approached I could hear her whimpering, almost crying. There was one of those black spikes sticking out of her thigh. The poor thing looked like she was on the verge of tears, and she was breathing way too fast to be healthy.

Now that I could see the wound up close, the spike looked just like obsidian. It was about the size of my thumb and about a foot long. It had pierced all the way through her thigh and was visible on both sides. There was only a bit of blood at the moment, but I knew if I tried to remove that would change.

I put my hand on her shoulder and started talking to her.

"Hey," I whispered reassuringly. "I'm going to get you someplace safe ok? Do you think you can walk if I help you?"

At first, I thought she hadn't heard me, but eventually, she nodded and started speaking in a pained whisper.

"I can walk. There's a safe room under the lab I was working at, we should be safe there."

A safe room, that was just what I needed. The only problem would be getting both of us there. At that, a thought wormed its way into my head: I wasn't responsible for both of us getting there.

No, I squashed that idea before it could develop further. I knew that trying to save her would only slow me down, but I couldn't bring myself to just leave, especially after I had already promised to protect her.

"That's where we're heading then. Let's get you out of here."

I pulled her up, careful not to let lean on her injured leg. Instead, I let her lean against my left side, trying my best to act as a makeshift crutch. Using my right hand, I pulled the 1911 out of my pocket and we were ready to go.

We started slow, partly due to fear, and partly due to her injury. We barely spoke as we moved to the lab, only talking when I paused to ask for directions. She seemed confused at that but didn't voice anything. She must have thought I was a soldier.

As we walked I noticed that the gunshots that had once rung out constantly were now diminished to sporadic bursts, often accompanied by a wail from one of the creatures.

The lab turned out to only be a few buildings away, and we were able to make it there without incident. We entered through a back door that led into a cold storage room, filled with numerous monstrosities of varying sizes.

After that, all we needed to do was go the end of a hallway and down a flight of stairs into the saferoom. I closed the door to the storage room and stepped out of the entrance into the hallway. When my eyes reached the end of the hallway I froze.

One of the creatures had found its way inside, and it was crouching over the corpse of a man. His head was lying off to the side, already removed from his neck by the creature's powerful jaws.

The creature was turned away from us, and it had one of the man's arms elbow deep into its mouth As I watched it bit the arm clean off at the elbow, swallowing it whole.

I glanced at my newfound friend whose eyes were wide open in terror and she looked like she wanted to scream. Thankfully for us both, she wasn't that stupid.

I put a finger over my mouth in the universal sign for don't say a fucking word and started lowering us both to the ground. Without making a noise I put the pistol back in my pocket before reaching over my shoulder for the rifle. In one smooth motion, I took aim and fired two bullets into the back of the things head.

Only to realize that whatever crystal-like substance made up most of its body was bulletproof. Because of fucking course, it was. Turning towards me the creature reached for one of the many spikes adorning its body and yanked it out before throwing it at me.

I dropped into a crouch, barely avoiding the incoming spike which sunk into the wall behind me. I shot another burst at it, eager to hit its relatively unprotected face. Instead, my bullets bounced off the thing's arm which it held in front of its head like a shield.

It started running at me completely arm still held in front of it, blocking any means of an easy kill. Cursing, I readjusted my aim to its torso and fired until I heard the hammer click. The fucking thing only stumbled before it jumped at me, claws outstretched.

I rolled to the side, letting the rifle fall from my hands and dangle at my side. When I got back on my feet I wasted no time pulling the pistol out from behind me.

The thing had sailed past me and the prone woman and was lying face up a few feet away from us. Now though, its face was unprotected. I fired three shots into its head, watching in satisfaction as it stopped moving.

I turned back to the woman and pulled her onto her feet again. Pistol in hand, we started towards the end of the hallway.

There were four doors in the hallway excluding the one we came out of, two led to bathrooms, one to the lab itself, and one to the stairway. I moved past each of them first, looking for anything that might want to jump out and kill us.

When I opened the door to the stairwell all hell decided to break loose. I heard the sounds of multiple glass objects breaking coming from the lab, shortly followed by crashing sounds and a cacophony of fierce screeches. The damn things had come in from the windows.

At best, I had five bullets left in my pistol, not nearly enough to kill however many things were coming for us. With a small whelp, I threw the woman next to me into a princess carry and started running down the stairs two at a time.

When I hit the bottom of the stairs, I heard them bust through the door at the top. My heart racing, I sprinted down the length of the hallway, eventually ending in a vault door with a keypad.

Without even being told, the woman in my arms reached out with shaky hands and entered a six-digit code into the pad. When she was done the vault door started to unlock.

The moment it was wide enough, I threw the woman inside ignoring, her cries as her leg hit the floor. I stepped inside behind her, pulling the door closed as I went.

My last view of the outside was three scrambling over each other at the bottom of the stairs and then the door shut. Just as the locking process finished I heard them scratching at the door and tearing at the door. When they realized the door wasn't yielding easily they let out a collective screech of sorrow.

A monitor above the door was connected to a camera at the opposite end of the hallway. The bastards weren't even making a dent in the door. When I noticed that I let out a sigh of relief. We were safe... at least for the moment.