The images projected through his eyes like a macabre dream. Painful memories he had fought hard to erase and leave in a tiny remote corner of his mind.

But there they were again. He could hear the screams clearly like they were bullets fired in the air, his skin tingling nervously at the sound of the chaos unfolding around him. Soldiers were standing everywhere, holding heavy weapons and shouting orders over the noise of the nervous crowd, but none seemed to listen. The mass hysteria caught everyone. People who once had a normal life, were now running like lost ghosts with the horror reflected in their eyes.

He had landed in the city two hours ago. Theirs was one the latest flights lucky enough to land. He had heard some rumors, coming from the people he had crossed, that some flights were not able to leave the airports. Others, he had been told, didn't even reach their destination.

He tried to grab a cab, but the few he found told him they were out of service while they drove away, leaving him there. He finally was able to convince a middle-aged couple to take him in their car. He offered them some money, but they refused to accept it.

"I'll leave you a couple of blocks away from were you live. We have to pick up our grandson and we don't have much time," the gray-haired man told him.

Of course he had accepted the deal; after all, he had no other choice. But the trip was a stressful nightmare. There were traffic jams everywhere. It took them almost two hours to escape one of the most congested routes, and just a few minutes later, they were blocked again by vehicles moving in every direction.

They were about fifteen minutes away from where they were headed and he was growing impatient, so he thanked the couple and told them he would walk the rest of the way.

"Good luck," he said, before leaving the car.

His heart was pounding in his chest with the fury of a beast, and the sound of helicopters overhead was not helping him to calm his nerves.

He had tried to call Benjamin repeatedly during the past few hours but the lines had been saturated, and at that moment were already dead.

After nearly thirty minutes fighting the masses, he finally arrived to the residential area where he lived. For some stupid reason he had hoped things were better there, so he couldn't help but feel the disappointment when he found out his neighborhood had succumbed to the same bewilderment as every other place.

He was just a couple of houses away from his own, when he stopped in front of the Anderson's. The front door was open and he thought he heard a scream coming from inside. He didn't think twice before entering the house.

He could hear a desperate cry drowned by some strange wrenching moans. There was blood, he saw it as soon as he walked through the door, but he forced himself to ignore it and focus his attention on the cries that seemed to come from the backyard.

He crossed the hallway and the living room up to the garden. Then he stopped. Right there was Leonard Anderson kneeling, in front of Abie's playhouse, like a hungry animal. His body arched unnaturally as he desperately tried to catch whoever was inside. He could barely see anything, but he knew the little girl was there, he could hear her terrified sobbing while she was trying to hide from that man. Her father.

"Leonard, stop!" He shouted.

The man turned around immediately. His eyes, covered by a white gelatinous membrane, looked at him blankly. A deep guttural moan escaped his throat. His skin wrinkled loosely to his features like a piece of cloth. If there was something left from Leonard in that man, he could not recognize it.

He watched the man get up and walk towards him awkwardly, and he stepped back instinctively. They didn't have much information about the virus; all they knew was that once you were affected by it, there was nothing you could do. That was it.

The man who was trying to approach him was only a vague reflection of what he once was. No memories were left in his now dead brain. Leonard didn't remember him, his neighbor, the same way he wasn't able to recognize his own daughter. The man was now a predator moved by a primary instinct, and he had become his prey.

He looked around for anything he could use to defend himself. Then he saw the metal bar from an umbrella stand in a corner. Leonard was getting close, and had spread his arms desperately trying to catch him. It may have been the adrenaline running through his veins, he wasn't sure, but he didn't hesitate sinking the metal bar deep into Leonard's chest. The man groaned heavily, however the action was not enough to end his suffering.

He kicked him in the stomach and Leonard slid over the stick until he fell to the ground. There wasn't much time to think; he was writhing on the floor trying to get up again, so he placed a knee on his injured chest to stop him moving and stuck the bar into Leonard's head.

The sound of broken bones rang in his ears for a few minutes while he watched the lifeless body under him.

He had killed him. He had killed Leonard.

The whisking noise of a helicopter woke him from his trance. He realized that Abie was still inside her playhouse. He rushed over and found the little girl huddled in the farthest corner.

"Abie, honey, are you okay?"

The girl made no gesture, her face hidden under her beautiful long brown hair. It took him a good few minutes to convince her she would be fine, but eventually the girl ended up clinging to his neck.

"It's ok, Abie, it's ok, don't worry." He whispered while carrying her out of the house.

Once outside he put Abie down but she clutched his hand tightly, and both walked briskly to his house, ignoring the convulsed tumult around them.

The first thing he saw when they entered the house was the bloodstain that ran throughout the hardwood floor towards the living room. The horrible yelps were audible from where they were standing. His heart sank and he felt an intense knot strangling his stomach. Abie cowered by his side and squeezed his hand with recognition. He bent down to look into the girl's eyes.

"Hey, hey… don't worry. Everything will be fine. I'm with you." He said, trying to sound calm. Then he opened a small built-in wardrobe beside the entrance and pushed some boxes aside "Wait here. Don't leave until I come back, okay?"

He didn't move until the girl accepted with an almost imperceptible nod. Then he closed the door and walked, slowly following the crimson trail. He carefully dodged a dresser that was in the hallway, leaving behind the memories, pictures where he and Benjamin smiled, looking happy and mostly ignorant of what the future had prepared for them.

The moans turned clearer and more disturbing the closer he got. His body tingled all over, in dreaded anticipation of what awaited him on the other side of that wall, in a place that just a few weeks ago had been a safe haven for them.

Not even the worst of thoughts could have prepared him for what he saw. Next to the glass garden door was the corpse of an unknown man, who had obviously met death for the second time. He imagined Benjamin fighting against him, defending himself, until he had finally managed to kill him, but something went wrong during the struggle. The stranger had hurt him, he could tell from there. On the other side, between the couch and the TV cabinet, Benjamin knelt with his neck completely torn apart. He was on the floor, wearing one of the shirts he had given him, devouring Emmes, the Beagle they had rescued from a kennel together, a couple of years back.

He put a hand over his mouth, trying to silence the pained whimper that slipped from his lips. Benjamin turned around at the sound, face covered in blood. He rose up and started to walk in his direction.

"Ben…" He said, raising his hands in a futile gesture; he knew that was not enough to stop the creature that had replaced one of the most important people in his life.

He stepped back and stumbled against a piece of furniture. Benjamin's shrieks were strumming the air like knives.

"Ben... Ben…" He repeated with a broken voice. "Please stop, it's me… Paul…" He was wasting his time. That was not Ben and he was more that aware of it.

Only a table separated them now, such a simple object was all that prevented that man, who he had loved more than anything for years, from jumping on him like a hungry wolf the same way he had Emmes.

He looked around quickly and grasped the fireplace poker, and with a strong movement, so fast he could barely register himself, he sank the object into Ben's head.

What happened next was an amalgam of vague and blurry images. He remembered open the wardrobe where Abie was waiting as he had asked. She was holding in her hands the book of fables he used to read her during the nights she spent with them. He had asked Abie about her mother but she did not answer and he didn't talk about it ever again.

The next thing he remembered was walking aimlessly with the girl in his arms. Tears blurred his view, but he was very aware that the hysteria around them was even more fervent. However, they moved through the crowd as if no one else existed, as if they were alone. And they were definitely alone.

"Jesus?... Jesus"

"Hey... Paul!"

The sound of Andy's voice brought him abruptly to reality. He looked up and saw his partner approaching him with a frown.

"Something wrong? I've been calling you."

"Really? I didn't hear you, sorry."

Andy tilted his head, not convinced with the answer, but he didn't press.

"I've found nothing upstairs," he said wearily.

"I haven't seen anything interesting here, either."

"I knew this trip would be a waste of time."

"Nothing is a waste of time until we make it a waste of time, Andy. We haven't been lucky, that's all." Paul let out a little sigh. "But, yeah... we should get back home."

Andy nodded and walked away immediately. Paul followed his gaze for a few seconds and then he laid his blue eyes back on the book of fables in his hands. It was the same issue Abie had loved so much, with the colored animals on the cover.

"Damn luck," he murmured.

He put the book back where he had found it, and left the building.