Chapter 2

It was the day my girlfriend exploded.

Max huddled in the back of the news van, shivering, curled into a ball against the back wall of the vehicle with the spools of cables and batteries. The outside metal of the van was warm from the day but the air had become cool with the night. She protectively held a towel over the jagged wound in her arm.

The attack came on so fast, so damn fast.

Max didn’t hear what Jake was trying to tell her during the broadcast; the camera man isn’t supposed to talk. Then they were on top of them, ripping and pawing at her.

“Those goddamn Cosplay freaks!” Maxine shouted out.

“I think that’s Japanese,” Jake tried to say before getting cut off.

“Like I give a flying shit! Every year, these fuckers converge on our city and then think they can do whatever the hell they want! Well, this is too much, now it’s gone too far! They can just take their people-chewing asses home!” Max said and tried to keep her full body shiver from creeping into her voice.

Jake watched on, sitting in the driver’s seat, as the flood of people came out of the convention center. Some of them were screaming as others pulled them to the ground, biting at them. No…eating them.

Lifting the towel Maxine could see just how much blood she was spilling. It wasn’t good. She had to have stitches before and this was a lot worse.

“My god, Jake, that bastard ate part of my arm! Years of journalism and communications and now I’m going to have to wear goddamned long sleeves every time I’m on camera!” She squeezed the towel down over the wound again and laid her head back against the wall of the van just as it rumbled to life.

“Don’t worry, we’ll get you to the hospital,” Jake said putting the van into gear and rolling slowly forward, the noise starting to attract more of the freaks. Maxine pulled herself forward as the van crawled forwarded to watch over Jake’s shoulder.
“What the hell are they doing Jake?” she asked softly, the anger giving way to wonder. The scene beyond them was only getting worse by the second, more cop cars pouring in from every district.

Caring less about hurting the shambling crowd, Jake started to roll forward, making his way through the mess. The van was rocking, telling him that he was indeed running over feet, but not a single one of the them shouted in protest or tried to struggle.

“I don’t know,” Jake said, “but we are getting out of here now.” He tried to glance back in the side mirror to find the camera he left behind, the one he dropped while saving Maxine. It was nowhere to be seen. Wondering how he was going to explain the loss of the very expensive camera to his boss, he slowly ground his way through growing crowd with the van. Slowly, excruciatingly, they made it to the street where he was able to pick up speed, pull away from the crowd, and head for the hospital.

Just as Jake started to breathe a sigh of relief, there in his lights was something that white with black spots.
“Fuck!”

Whipping the van right then left, causing Maxine to stumble and fall back into the hold of the van, tumbling over the editing equipment. Just out of the corner of his eye Jake was able to see what he barely avoided: a dog, an Australian Shepherd. “That has to be the dumbest mutt I’ve ever seen,” he muttered.