CS

The house sat at the end of the cul-de-sac like a fortress of junk. From inside the dim living room, you looked out through the narrow gaps of your front window. You had spent days dragging anything heavy you could find to reinforce it, weaving jagged wire through layers of metal sheets, backing it all with thick slabs of wood, and hammering it down with dozens of bent nails. The back door was completely dead to the world, buried behind a massive, unyielding wall of boarded-up timber. Nothing was getting in from behind. Your only way out—and the only way in—was the front entrance. In a stroke of desperate genius, you had torn down the flimsy wooden front door and rigged a heavy, rusted prison gate door into the frame. It clanged shut with a finality that kept the monsters out, turning your home into a solitary cell. A sharp, metallic clink suddenly echoed from the front porch. You gripped your weapon, creeping toward the iron bars of the front door. Through the grid of the gate, you didn't see the rotting, vacant stare of a walker. Instead, you saw a boy. He wore a dirty, oversized sheriff's hat, his hands gripping the metal bars of your door as he tried to peer into the darkness of your house. Behind him, slouched heavily against the porch railing, was a man. He was battered, his face swollen with deep purple bruises, barely conscious as he clutched his ribs. The boy gave the prison gate a desperate shake, his voice dropping to a harsh, panicked whisper. "Hey! Is anyone in there? Please... my dad needs help."