Only fear survives E-Book

Sebastian Schuster

• Herausgeber: novum publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 350

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

Chris, a light-hearted person, is enjoying a visit with friends in the United States. But when he wakes up one morning, everything has changed. Something has transformed people into bloodthirsty beasts overnight. In panic, he flees the city. His hope of escaping the horror and finding normality in a different place quickly fades. Soon, it is only a matter of survival. On his escape, he meets Sarah, who seems better able to cope with the situation, and decides to join her. On their arduous journey into the unknown, both are confronted with fear, hatred, love and betrayal, and are put to a crucial test.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Imprint

The day before

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Day 4

Day 5

Day 6

Day 7

Day 8

Imprint

Any inconsistencies in the text are due to the fact that it was translated using computer-aided technology for a company-wide study.

© 2025 novum publishing gmbh

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The day before

A ray of light fell on my face. I blinked, but immediately squeezed my eyes tightly shut again. What time was it? How long had I been asleep? I didn't know. Sleepily, I reached for my cell phone and groped around blindly next to my bed. My pipe, lots of cables, something rustling. Oh boy, there was a lot of garbage lying around. After half-blindly collecting all the empty packaging, I finally found my phone and tried to switch it on. Just release the keypad lock and I know what time it is. Simple, hmm. Not a chance. It was like the USB stick. The chance of getting it right on the first try is fifty-fifty. But I'd never managed that before. I turned the phone awkwardly in my hand and switched it on. 9:13 a.m., that still worked. It felt like it was almost noon. I pulled off the blanket and sat up. I need coffee, lots of coffee, I thought, rubbing my face firmly. I couldn't be spoken to in the morning without this stuff. It wouldn't matter, because it was Monday and I was alone in the house. So there weren't many morning grouches who could step on my toes. I got up, dug fresh clothes out of a drawer in my closet and strolled into the bathroom as if by remote control. I looked terrifyingly horrible in the morning. I had a pale face with deep, blue circles under my eyes. My green eyes were barely recognizable as they were still trying to adjust to the harsh bathroom light. I turned to the shower, pulled the curtain so far closed that only my arm could fit through it and turned on the water. It had to be warm when I got in. In this house, however, it took some time to get up to temperature. Yes, I'm a hot showerer, so what? While the water rained down into the bathtub, I tried to undress. With one leg firmly anchored to the floor and the other pulled through my trousers, the floor suddenly took on a huge slant. I looked up and instinctively leaned against the wall so as not to lose my balance. With my pants at half-mast and leaning against the wall, I rubbed my face again with my other hand. "Holy shit," I whispered quietly and straightened up again. After I had succeeded in my second attempt to free myself from my clothes, I fumbled for the water again and stomped into the shower. It's fucking hot, I screamed at myself in my head and arched my back to avoid burning myself. A little later, on my way to the kitchen, I tied the waistband of my jogging pants and tugged on my shirt with CLASSIC ROCK emblazoned on it. There was loud scratching, banging and the sound of rattling metal. There was still a faint smell of coffee in the air, but it had been over an hour since the last person had left the house to go to work. I turned into the kitchen and with an elegant sweep of my arm, I switched on the coffee machine as I passed. The knocking and scratching got louder and a whine whistled through the air. I smiled, pushed open the metal latch on the screen door and was immediately overrun. It hurt and with a loud "plop" my bony bottom landed roughly on the floor. I picked myself up again and despite my aching backside, my grin grew bigger and bigger. "Hi Doggy!", I said with a big smile as the dog hastily stomped over me and hurried into the living room. While Hans, yes they really called the dog Hans, jumped wildly across the carpet and pounced on one of his toys, I returned to my coffee. Waiting for coffee after getting up while you already have the smell of it in your nose was like torture. I already have a hard life, I joked to myself, and with a flourish I grabbed my cup so that a little spilled over and almost scalded my hand. While the cup tinkled from the stirring, I strolled into the living room towards the sofa. Still very sleepy and armed with my coffee, I plopped down on it and switched on the TV. The red light from the LED at the top of the remote flickered wildly and the news appeared on the big screen. I flinched as the sound started and, startled, I spilled some coffee on my pants. "Man, I was scared," I grumbled and stroked the coffee stains on my pants. I turned the volume down until the loud drone of the Channel5News announcer was reduced to a low whisper. I put the mug down briefly so I could lounge on the sofa when I saw a shadow to my left jumping towards me. I raised my hands in front of me protectively, but it was too late. A sharp pain ran across my chest, from my collarbone to my waistband, and it felt like a blade was slicing me open lengthwise. I was thrown back and a wet dog snout hit me right in the face. "Han ... HANS ... stufffff ... stop trying to ... ppfff ... my face," I hissed through pursed lips and threw the pit bull standing on top of me to the side. When I opened my eyes again, I saw him jumping towards me again. His tail wagged wildly back and forth like a whip as he licked all over my face. I had to laugh out loud, it tickled me so much, which only made him even happier. This was our daily morning ritual. I try to drink my coffee while he tries to stop me. After the very long greeting was over, Hans made himself comfortable next to me. Resting his head on my lap, he watched something on TV with me. It was still on very low and the voices were barely audible. It was absolutely impossible for me to understand what they were saying in English. All I could see was the speaker shouting excitedly into the camera with a microphone in front of her face. She was standing in front of a huge building with dozens of police cars parked in front of it with flashing blue lights. People were running around in a hurry and the camera zoomed in on a man in a yellow plastic suit and a huge viewing window in his helmet slowly walking out of a building. "Look at that, Hans. A Minion has escaped," I joked to the beast on my sh. I had to laugh quietly at my own joke, because he couldn't do it. Nevertheless, I made conversation with him because I had the feeling that he understood every word that was said to him. "Hey, Hans, how about a funny movie?" I asked him, knowing he wouldn't object. The raised eyebrows when he heard his name were answer enough for me. I reached for the remote control again and switched over. This was going to be a long, relaxing day. When everyone slowly arrived home in the late afternoon, I had long since returned to my bed. With all the pillows stuffed under my back, I zapped through irrelevant YouTube videos again. The stupid things people put on the internet. Well, there are enough stupid people who like to watch that kind of stuff, I thought. I twitched my eyebrows as I realized that I had just called myself stupid. My gaze wandered around me. It looked just like this morning. Except that everything that had been just packaging in the morning was now full. I was already stocked up on dope and movies for another night. My pipe was lying on the bed to the right of me, the crumpled comforter half thrown over it. Maybe I was trying to get it out of my own field of vision, to hide it from myself. Who was I kidding? I knew for a fact that she was lying next to me. Just a handhold away from the next rush. My gaze swiveled over my laptop to the left. In the corner of my eye, I saw a pretty, blonde girl gesticulating wildly while a song by Aurora blared from the speakers. I heard Hans barking loudly through the open window. Anika was holding one of his toys in her hands and trying to tell the pit bull, who was jumping nervously back and forth, to calm down. As if that would ever happen, because this dog was really keen to chase after a thrown toy. You always had to throw it, but a pit bull is not a retrieving dog. This one especially wasn't, because after you threw it, he chased after it as fast as he could. As soon as he had caught it and was chewing on it wildly out of sheer excitement, Hans didn't bring it back to you. No, he ran into a corner of the garden and tried to hide it. The game basically consisted of throwing a toy for the dog and then getting it back yourself at the end. "Come here, Hans," I heard my cousin call. "Come here, doggy," she called in a very high pitched voice, which was meant to belittle his name. No, not a chance, I thought and couldn't stop myself from grinning. The smell of hot fat and burnt wood hit my nose. Apparently her husband had just arrived too, because I could hear Anika and Jack talking, but I couldn't understand exactly what they were saying. Apparently he was firing up the barbecue. Today was the perfect weather for it and I was also starting to feel hungry. Jack was a fantastic barbecue master. He always managed to conjure up the most delicious dishes from the simplest ingredients. Jack was a simple guy. He was always honest and never minced his words and I really appreciated that about him. Anika and Jack were a young, bright couple. Some people probably thought they were strange, but I felt right at home here. I gave myself a push, got up and went downstairs. When I arrived on the terrace, Jack greeted me with a big grin and a beer in his hand. "Hey, buddy, you hungry?" he asked me. "No, I'm Chris," I quipped back with a mock irritated look on my face. Of course, I knew he was trying to show me the delicious burgers on the grill, but I couldn't resist giving him a sarcastic reply. I liked to joke about my poor English skills to cover up the fact that I was embarrassed to only understand half of many conversations and usually interpreted the content freely from the context. Anika, who was standing next to me, choked so hard on her beer from laughing that she coughed loudly. "Dork," she stammered and wiped her chin with the back of her hand. She walked over to the table where a box of Gauloises lay, took out two and held them out to me. "Do you want to smoke one with me?" she asked, even though she already knew my answer. I went to her, took a cigarette from her hand and put it in the corner of my mouth. "Thank you," I replied quietly and lit it. I wasn't a man of big words and luckily I didn't have to be, because Anika and I understood each other blindly. We were the same type and had a lot in common. We sat down on the steps of the terrace, exchanged a quick smile and blew little blue clouds into the air together. A short time later, I took the last bite of my burger and scraped together all the remains of the mashed potato with my fork. The meal had been fantastic. Full and satisfied, I leaned back in my chair. "What's your plan for tomorrow?" I asked casually. "I'm in DC all day and have to work. I might stay there overnight. I certainly won't be finished before ten o'clock and I don't like driving such long distances at night," Jack said and took a sip of his beer. Anika looked up, puzzled. She slowly began to collect the cutlery on the table. She was used to spending the night without Jack. Not that it happened often, but his job occasionally required him to work a double shift to stay on schedule. "I have to go to the store as usual. If you come with me, you can have my car if you want. You just have to drop me off at work," she said, stacking the empty plates on top of each other. "No, I don't ' have anything planned for tomorrow. I'm going to stay on the sofa and laze around," I replied curtly and smiled sheepishly. "No, I think I'll take advantage of the nice weather to explore the area with Hans." "I envy you. You're on vacation and I have to deal with all the idiots in the city," Jack said with a laugh. "We can swap," I said, as if I had a hard, exhausting day ahead of me. I got up and put the dishes in the sink. While Jack sat down on the sofa, I cleaned the kitchen with Anika. We could hear him playing with the dog in the living room. They were always so nice together and we had great fun watching the two of them fight over one of the toys. After we had washed everything up, we joined them. The routine had me firmly in its grip. Now to watch a movie and then to my room. Where my laptop and pipe were already waiting. I'm going to smoke again today. One last time. Tomorrow is the real end!

Day 1