Somehow the hallway was longer than she expected, much to her leg's disappointment.

She hadn't been running for very long, but she was going as fast as she could.

She couldn't slow down, not for a second.

She gripped the lead pipe in the hands that she had grabbed off of the low ceiling and prepared to jam it into the door handles on the other side of the doors she was about to slam open.

The screams of the dead behind her got louder, although it was unclear if that meant they were getting closer or growing in numbers.

She had run up several flights of stairs and entered this new hallway.

She didn't know whether there would've been doors or not when she first came down the hallway.

Soon she reached them.

The double doors slammed open at the force of Sienna's weight and she slammed them back closed as soon as she regained her balance.

The pain in her arm started to grow, but she ignored it as she thrust the pipe through the doorknobs.

The force of the horde reaching the door threw Sienna across the floor, landing on her back.

After wincing in pain from the impact she opened her eyes and saw that the doors and pipe had done their jobs effectively and kept the monsters out.

Monsters refer to the living dead or zombies of course.

She heaved heavily and grabbed her shoulder, trying to keep more blood from spilling out onto her newly scavenged shirt.

Sienna stood up, grabbed her bag, and looked around the hallway for a room she could enter.

The zombies continued to slam open the door, fingers and hands poking out from the small opening that they couldn't seem to make wider.

Some doors in the hallway were broken off, with the rooms inside being trashed or the floors having caved in.

She didn't think the hospital would be in that much disrepair, being relatively far from the city and all.

She had come to find some medical supplies for her arm after her stitches opened up again.

The fishing wire wasn't working as well as she thought, and it didn't help she had used the rest of her bandages to wrap up a dog's leg that had been sliced open, possibly from a trap someone had set up to catch food.

When she initially got in there was no sign of life, both the natural and unnatural living seem to have vacated long ago.

The hospital had once been a place for the military to bring in injured and try to keep a safe location.

Around the first few days of the zombies rising, several military groups found hospitals and police stations to set up camps to help survivors.

Of course, this doesn't seem like a bad idea at first, but it was clear to Sienna after 2 years of surviving in this world why it fell apart so quickly.

Obviously, you can't trust the government, and once it was found that the corporal for this hospital was caught hoarding food the rest of the community fell apart like a stack of cards.

Usually, when one of these shelters fell apart, there would be a lot of leftovers to pick up from.

Outsiders would circle like vultures behind surrounding buildings or nearby bits of forest.

They would wait for screaming to start, for everyone to run away, and once they were sure that nobody was left "alive", they closed in and searched for their prey.

That being supplies mostly, unless you are part of one of the groups that considers eating the dead as a way of survival.

Sienna always gagged at the thought.

Eventually, her eyes landed on a set of doors a few meters away from her.

She walked over with one hand holding her bag, and the other on her bleeding arm.

She jiggled the handle to see if it could open.

After concluding it was firmly locked, Sienna dropped her bag and began digging through it, looking for her lock-pick.

There weren't many times where she needed to use it, locked doors were rare in buildings that had been previously raided.

Sienna didn't know when the hospital was initially raided, or even last entered.

All she had known was that it was far enough away from any big city for her to have reasonable doubt that anything would be in it.

Of course, she was wrong, and there were about 50 zombies within the supply room she wanted to get into on the first floor, and here we are.

Sienna grabbed her lock-picking kit and began to fiddle with the lock.

After some struggle, she eventually heard it click.

The doors moved open and she fell slightly into the room, she didn't realize she had been leaning on it.

After picking herself and her bag up, she looked around the room.

It looked like it was locked before the military even got here, judging by the lack of blood, bullet shells, and the smell of death.

Sienna breathed out, realizing she was holding her breath in anticipation.

She threw her bag on the empty bed which looked like it had waited years for a new patient to lay on it.

The shelves were clean aside from dust, and the floor was similar aside from the occasional dead bug.

The window blinds were still attached to the wall and were closed.

Sienna decided against opening it for fear of someone seeing her from outside and because she didn't want to see the outside world for a little bit.

The room reminded her of the world before the living dead.

When cars were machines that moved around rather than colorful boulders stuck in the ground.

People would enjoy coffee dates downtown rather than fight over who gets to eat the dead raccoon.

She would walk down the street with her mom and count the number of people who were walking their dogs.

She was glad that her mom had died just before the apocalypse.

She hadn't ever come across a dead person that she knew before.

Not that it would be easy to gather any identifying detail on their faces.

Usually, their cheeks were sunken in or their flesh had rotted so badly that you could see the bones underneath.

The way the zombies still decayed after death was both fascinating and disturbing at the same time.

She once saw a zombie's arm fall off, the muscles simply eaten away by maggots and flies.

The zombie had made a sound similar to pain, but it never felt its arm or looked at it.

It just kept walking toward her.

Some zombies were just skeletons, without their muscles they couldn't move, but if they still had some of their organs or brain intact, you could see them breathe, eyes following you, or even the head flinch a little.

It was hard to tell if those moments were a trick of the mind though.

Sienna shook her head, she didn't want to think about zombies right now, not in her perfect little room.

The shrieks of the zombies kept reminding her of the real world, so she quickly closed the door and locked it.

Another look around the room revealed a small sink and even a mirror.

It wasn't a full-length mirror like one she might have in her room, but it would do to inspect for any other wounds she might've gotten.

Out of reverence, she took off her muddy shoes and left them by the door.

After realizing that her socks were indeed, equally as muddy, she took those off too.

She slowly walked to the shelves and looked at her face in the mirror.

She looked like one of the girls in horror movies that would climb out of a TV and kill someone.

She realized that it had been so long since she had seen her face, that she had forgotten what she had looked like.

Sienna brushed away her hair, dropping small twigs and grass that were stuck inside.

Was her hair always this brown?

She remembered it being brighter and more milk chocolate colored.

She turned toward the sink and hesitated.

There was a good chance that there would be no water, water systems were increasingly unreliable as sewage pipes had been used to throw out the remains of the dead.

It was the most effective way to clear them out with little chance of them leaving, with the side effect of undrinkable water or no water at all.

She gripped the handle and closed her eyes.

As she turned she heard the pipes rattle and water rushing.

Water began to fall onto the metal bowl.

Sienna opened her eyes and saw that not only was there actually water flowing into the sink, but it was actually clear.

Of course, she wasn't an idiot, she wanted to actually drink the water until after she tested it with a water purity strip from a box she had gotten a few months ago.

But it was good enough for her to use it as a way to wash herself off a little.

She cupped her hands and gathered some water, it was cool and wet like she remembered it being.

She let the water fill up to her thumbs and watched as it poured out, its texture somehow smooth and hard at the same time.

It was hard to describe the water in Sienna's mind, but it was how she remembered it from when she filled up a cup of water in her kitchen.

Finally, after basking in the religious presence of the bringer of life, she leaned down and splashed the water on her face.

She could feel the dirt and grime melt off, collecting at her nose, chin, and lips before falling back into the sink and counter.

She splashed some more and scrubbed with her hands.

As she washed her face, she remembered the last time that she had seen clear water, roughly a month after the military shelter she was staying at had fallen apart.

It was learned shortly before its collapse that several different camps were training their residents to fend for themselves, especially the children.

While this wasn't inherently bad, the real kicker was that they were going to use this to grow their own military strength.

They were going to use their residents as troops to fight other nearby camps for their resources.

The paranoia and fear had struck everyone when the zombies rose, and it turns out the military was no exception.

Thankfully, she had already grown up with a retired military dad and a mom who loved hunting, so she picked up on their lessons quickly.

When she felt her face was clean enough, she re-positioned and began to run the water to her hair.

It was uncomfortable, but she could feel the water cleaning her hair, running through it like the wind runs through a forest.

Finally, she turned the water back off, shaking her hands into the sink that was now draining brown water.

As the sound of the water ceased, she noticed the sounds outside the doors also stopped.

She found that her muscles had finally relaxed, and the edge she had been carrying dropped.

She looked in the mirror and saw a beautiful young woman with soft brown hair.

Her face was obviously full of red marks and old scars, but compared to where she was before it was a complete makeover.

Her hair had grown so long over the past couple of years, there was never a good way or reason to cut it.

If she found a pair of scissors somehow, she would have to change that.

After admiring her real face for another minute or so, she pulled away from the mirror and took a couple steps back.

She was wearing a pink T-shirt that was once nearly spotless in a thrift store before she had grabbed it and ran through a zombie-infested hospital with a bloody arm.

It didn't have any holes, but there was blood down one sleeve and dirty spots everywhere else.

She was wearing some skinny jeans that, contrary to her shirt, had several rips and tears in it.

She should've gotten another pair of pants while at the thrift store, but she couldn't seem to part with the pants.

It was a pair her mom had given her, and as long as it was still attached enough to be considered "pants", she wouldn't get rid of it.

That being said, there were still several bloody marks over it, and from about halfway up the calf down it went from faded blue to dark brown.

She had taken off her shoes and socks, entirely coated with mud that she didn't even recognize as such when she looked at them now.

Sienna opened some cabinets and searched for stitching supplies.

Eventually, she found some stitching wire and even a needle to use.

Sienna grabbed one of the many rolls of bandages and threw all of her new friends on the shelf.

Sienna took off her shirt and tossed it on the bed, she didn't want it to get in the way.

She never considered herself fat, even before the zombies began to appear.

When she used to look in the mirror without her shirt she would strike some poses like the models online would do.

She would show off her back, lift her arms up like she was in a loud party, and do other trendy things.

Her stomach wasn't as flat as the people online, it protruded more than she would have liked to but otherwise, she was happy with it.

She always thought that her chest was a little flat though compared to her friends, silently wishing it was bigger.

But looking at herself now, the lack of food in her recent days made her stomach sink in more, showing a little bit of her ribs.

Sienna missed how she had looked before food became scarce, it was a sign of malnourishment now.

She pushed the thoughts of her body out of her mind and focused on the cut on her arm.

She had restitched it multiple times, so the pain wasn't as much of a surprise as it once was.

She also got better each time, hopefully now with the new wire and bandages her wound would finally heal up.

She went to her bag, grabbed a water purity strip, and dropped it in one of the medicine cups she had found.

She let it sit for a few minutes, watching the color of the strip change slowly.

After what she approximated as 5 minutes passed she took it out and examined the color.

It was light blue, which meant that it was clean.

Sienna smiled to herself, before rushing to the sink and turning the handle so hard it could have broken.

Water rushed down her face and neck as she swallowed the water in large gulps.

She could feel the water going down her chest and stomach, probably wetting her pants in the process but she didn't care.

Eventually, she turned it off and fell onto the floor, back to the cabinets.

Something about her laying half naked covered in water caused a rush of emotions to overwhelm Sienna.

She felt the water slide down her face and body, and soon tears joined them.

She cried into her hands and arms, all of her emotions that she had kept away since she was left alone were being let out by screams of pain and despair.

Sienna's bare back pressed against the glass of the cabinets, the cold giving her goosebumps.

Soon her screams fell into sobs, and then into whimpers.

Sienna soon fell silent, sliding down until she lay fully flat on the floor.

She stared at the ceiling that had grown darker as the sun started to set outside.

Sienna raised her hand and looked at it.

She remembered her hand being soft.

The skin was perfectly fitted around her bones and veins.

She remembered her nails being perfectly cut, rounded, and short, and how she liked it.

There were times when she wanted to feel even more beautiful and she would throw some glitter onto the back of her hands to make them sparkle in the light.

Now when she looked at it, it was like she was in a different body.

The skin had been torn so much that there wasn't a solid color left to focus on.

Her nails hadn't been cut in so many months that they had broken and bled into jagged, sharp edges.

One of her fingers was shorter than it was by an inch because it had been caught in a nasty hook and was beyond natural healing.

Sienna wanted to cry again but found that she couldn't.

She was tired from this hell she had found herself in as well as the rest of the world.

There had been days when she figured she should just kill herself because what was the point of surviving.

She knew that even if you didn't get bitten or scratched by the zombies, once you died you would still come back.

She saw it happen.

The lady that she had met not too long ago returned to her mind.

Before she came to this hospital, there was someone else she traveled with for a while.

Sienna had been traveling with another woman for a few days.

They didn't share a lot bout each other, but they were very open about their wounds.

There was a previous misconception that you would become a zombie if you got bitten or scratched or something similar.

Like a virus or bacterial infection.

So it had become proper etiquette to explain every single scratch, bloody mark, or bandage that was on your body.

One day they were hunting for some food in the woods when they found a bear.

The bear wasn't looking at them and seemed like it was getting ready to sleep anyway.

They moved along quietly when the lady had fallen over.

Sienna looked over to see she had tripped on a bear cub and it had started calling for its mom.

Sienna was able to duck into a bush and remain unseen, but the other lady wasn't so lucky.

She saw the mama bear trampled over her, biting her neck and pulling.

It didn't eat her, they just killed her viciously so her skin hung off like a wet piece of paper.

Sienna was horrified, and couldn't move.

When the bear decided it had thoroughly protected its children, it gave the lady one final pound of her feet, huffed, and walked away.

Sienna did her best to quietly sob in the bushes.

She did her best not to scream at the horrible bloody mass that was previously alive.

Her eyes stung with tears and blood that had splayed onto her face, and every time they opened she saw it again.

Unfortunately, only a few minutes passed when she saw the lady start to move.

At first, Sienna thought that she had miraculously survived and tried to coax her into staying down so the bear could get further away.

Instead, when the lady stood up, her head hung unnaturally low below her shoulders.

Her head swung like a sack of apples, and a horrible creaking of her spine echoed between her and Sienna.

Sienna was horrified, as the lady that had died in front of her started to walk toward her, skin falling off in strips and blood still pouring out like a leaky water bucket.

Sienna ran away, as fast as she could.

She kept running until she found a road, and she followed the road.

Roads were typically seen as the modern-day game trail for zombies, as many people had died and come back while on the road.

However, Sienna wasn't thinking straight.

She ran around cars and squeezed passed two semis that had collided with each other.

She tripped and fell onto a wrecked car, gashing her upper arm on a jagged piece of metal that stuck out from the door.

She brought herself up, not feeling the pain through her adrenaline, and kept going.

The lady was miles away by the time Sienna had reached the bridge.

She stood dropped to her knees and heaved, throwing up the food they had eaten together before the bear.

Sienna hobbled over to the bridge and watched as the vomit from her dry lips fell into the river.

She heaved some more but did not vomit.

She climbed up onto the railing and looked down.

She saw the water, the ledge of the bridge, and her dirty shoes.

She missed her old shoes.

Sienna closed her eyes and faced upwards.

She began to lean forward, towards the edge of the bridge, towards the 10-foot drop into the water only inches deep.

Before she fully stepped off she opened her eyes, wanting to see the sky before she ceased to breathe.

But instead Sienna saw a water tower.

She blinked, thinking she read the words on its metal side wrong.

This was the water tower near where she lived.

Sienna stared for a moment before stepping down and walking towards the tower.

She walked in from someone's backyard into a small suburb.

It wasn't one she recognized, but she was still drawn to it.

She walked around, looking into houses and cars, trying to find out why she had come here.

There was a blockade of cars down the street that Sienna was approaching.

Before she could reach it, she heard something crack beneath her feet.

She looked down and saw that she had stepped on a picture frame.

Next to her was a house with its door wide open and various items strewn about, clearly telling the short and sad story of a family leaving their home to find somewhere safe.

She bent down and picked up the picture frame, turning it around in her hands.

There was a picture of a daughter with her parents, a dad and a mom.

The little girl looked a lot like Sienna when she was younger.

The joy on her face glowed like a star.

Sienna bent down and placed the picture back onto the ground, propping it upright.

Sienna then walked away, away from the suburb, away from the bridge, away from the bear.

Until she ended up where she was now.

Staring at her hand, her hand that seemed no longer hers.

Except it was hers.

Sienna stood up and looked in the mirror.

She clearly looked like she had been sobbing, her body was malnourished and her clothes were old and dirty.

But she also saw that she was alone.

Sienna stripped off the rest of her clothes and did her best to wash what she could under the water in the sink.

She then laid her clothes on the counter, so that they could dry overnight.

She knew she was safe in this room, so she felt comfortable even though she was in the most vulnerable state.

Before all of the light outside of the shades dimmed to darkness, Sienna pulled off the sheets of the bed and placed herself inside.

Tomorrow she would have to grab whatever she could carry into her bag.

She would have to put back on her clothes which were sure to still be wet.

This room where she cried will need to be left behind.

She lay in bed, curled up like an animal trying to stay warm.

She should think about where to go next, and how to escape this hospital.

But for tonight, she could let herself fall into a deep sleep that she hadn't had since the zombies came.

Tonight she can truly let herself go.

End.