When Kindness Kills

When Jealousy Turned Deadly

"Long time no see." I forced down the sting in my eyes and nodded at him.

Four simple words, yet they carried the weight of two lifetimes.

"This is my squad," I said briefly, gesturing behind me. "We're rendezvousing with the main force."

"Same here." Alec nodded. "This area's unstable—lots of mutated infected. Since we're heading the same way, let's travel together."

"Gladly."

As we talked, Eliza climbed down from the vehicle. The sight of us facing each other like that stabbed straight into her, and jealousy burned brightly in her eyes.

Even before the apocalypse, she'd had a crush on Alec. I just hadn't expected that love would rot into hatred—and that she'd end up killing him because of it.

She walked over, deliberately edging closer to Alec. He frowned, stepped back without a word, and positioned himself at my side instead. "Miss, keep your distance," he said coldly.

Rebuffed outright, Eliza bit her lip, clearly wanting to say more. However…

'Clang. Clang. Clang.'

A shrill metallic banging suddenly tore through the air.

"Shit—that's a lure!" Alec's expression instantly turned grim.

From within the green fog came countless hoarse roars. Dense black shapes crawled out from every direction, their skin rotting, eyes blood-red, surging toward us like a tide.

"Horde incoming—get in the vehicles!" Alec shouted, already raising his gun and firing.

"What's going on?! Where did all these zombies come from?" Eliza screamed, her legs going weak.

I whipped toward the source of the sound. On top of an abandoned water tower not far away, the man who'd begged for a detonator earlier was standing there, wildly hammering an oil drum with an iron rod.

"I was planning to scam a detonator and blow open a vault. Since you wouldn't give me one and got my brothers starved to death on the road, none of you get to live! I'll drag in a zombie horde and send you all to hell with me!"

Just as I thought—he was anything but decent.

"Open fire!" I snarled, raising my gun. But the horde moved too fast. In an instant, our formation was torn apart.

In the chaos, the man slid down a pipeline. Taking advantage of us being surrounded, he charged straight at our armored vehicle like a rabid dog.

"Die, bitch!" He cried out, lunging at me with a rusted dagger, stabbing straight for my chest.