Life is a Death Road

1. One Hell of a Road Trip

"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I – / I took the one less traveled by, / And that has made all the difference." - Robert Frost, "The Road Not Taken"

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Jaime flung a crushed soda can across the empty store in frustration. It crashed into the dirty glass of a darkened refrigerator and clattered next to a mound of rotting paper. He stalked out of the aisle, shoved his hand into his hoodie pocket, and scowled around the gas station.

Dust floated in the air; a faint yellowish color with the rising sun streaming through the broken windows. Shelves that once stood like soldiers had long since had their ranks broken; thrown against the doors, tipped over, spilling their contents over the floor. Jaime picked his way to the cashier's counter. The window to the ice cream freezer was pulverized. Glass as fine as snow crunched under Jaime's shoes.

As he searched, a smell lingered. It was faintly sweet but had terrible undertones of blood and fungus and decay. He paid no mind to it.

By the time he had returned back to the refrigerators and the can he had thrown, Jaime had still found nothing of interest. He kicked the can again - just for good measure - and looked to the front of the building. As he analyzed the shelves gathered at the doors, he tried to envision what had happened here.

He imagined the panic, the sound of metal on tile as they desperately dragged the shelves to barricade the doors - rotting hands grasping through the cracks already. Blood on the floor, its smell overpowering, accompanied a sweetness of fungus. The windows trembling under the weight, the light dimming as they piled up, up, up, until...

Something moved in the distance and Jaime was jolted from his nightmarish daydream. Two hunched figures were wandering in the morning mist between the palm trees. He watched them, pondering.

Crunching of glass underneath footsteps. Jaime whipped around, gripping a heavy frying pan in his hand. The crunching stopped. His heart leaped in his chest as he scanned the station. It was too small for anything to be hiding, wasn't it? He had circled it more than once. He had checked everywhere, everywhere except -

The men's bathroom door was open. Chills were traveling up and down Jaime's spine. He gripped his pan and tried to snap out of it. Keep it together, Jaime, it's probably just one. You can handle one, right? Don't be a wuss.

Yet he stood, rooted to the spot, and waited for the footsteps to return.

That smell of death. He noticed it, now. The more he thought about it the stronger it seemed to become, until his head was swimming with it. Jaime felt dizzy.

It is probably just one, and it's morning, they're all lazy in the morning, you can probably catch it by surprise, it probably doesn't even know you're here. He hefted his pan and crept towards where he'd heard the noise. He vaulted over a tipped shelf and was presented with the gaping opening of the men's bathroom. Public bathrooms were even more awful now as they'd been before the collapse of civilization, except now they were not only smelly and dirty but dark and cramped. Bathrooms were death traps. He avoided them if he could.

He could see nothing but some gross urinals, a broken mirror, and some gross sinks from the doorway. Having second thoughts about searching it, Jaime turned his back to the bathroom.

It was right there. Jaime nearly screamed, but slapped his hand over his mouth and instead made a kind of strangled wailing sound in his throat. The figure turned slightly towards the sound, but stood still.

Its had no eyes, just wide, black, empty sockets. The golden light of the sun did not touch it where it stood - the shadows seemed to draw closer to it, gripping it slimy gray skin, hiding in its dangling jaw. Its clothing was tattered and hung about it loosely, kept there just by the stickiness of its decaying flesh.