Sixteen

In the kitchen, I drink a little water from my meagre supplies. I keep the stuff in a variety of bottles and jars scattered over every surface. There's enough still to last me a couple of days, provided I use it just for drinking, but soon enough water too will become a commodity in short supply. I've already emptied every pipe and tank and cistern I've been able to find in the building. Perhaps, I think, I could set up some sort of rainwater collector on the roof. I'd have to figure out some way of filtering out the dust though...

As near as I can work out this flat once belonged to an elderly couple. That's what I guessed from all the pictures I found beside the beds and on the mantelpiece: pictures of an old man and woman on holiday on a beach somewhere, sepia images of a long-ago wedding, and framed prints of some kids that must have been their grandchildren. That was one thing I couldn't stand: having those pictures staring out at me, accusingly, as I lived in a home that was not mine, ate food and drank water that was not mine, slept in a bed that belonged to a dead couple. On my third night in this place I gathered them all up and stuffed them out of sight in the cupboard beneath the sink.

Now, I stand facing the front door of this small apartment. It's locked and bolted from the inside, and as an extra measure I've pushed the heaviest piece of furniture I could find (a solid oak cabinet) up against it. I don't believe for a minute that it will stop the Creatures if they come for me, but it makes me feel just a tiny bit safer.

I tuck the gun into my belt so that it will be within easy reach. Then, with great reluctance, I set about moving my barricade. Five minutes later I'm creeping down the stairs, wincing at every footfall. At the bottom I come to a lobby area. The front doors have been blasted inwards and so I simply step through the gap and into the world outside.

For a moment the strangeness of my situation takes my breath away. It's one thing to look out at the destruction from a second-floor window. It's quite another being down here, in the midst of it. Across the street there's what remains of another set of flats, a building that might have been the twin of the one I now inhabit. It's nothing more than rubble now, a mess of bricks and concrete compressed down to the height of a single storey.

But, I remind myself, there's no time to dwell. My stomach growls emptily at me. Get moving, David. Find some food.

And so I set off, gun in hand, into the world of the Creatures.