Outbreak Chapter One

Brendon's Apartment
Saturday March 12 7:05 A.M.
Day 1


Brendon woke up to the sound of the apartment's front door slamming. He rolled over and looked at his alarm clock that read five after seven in the morning in glowing read numbers. His roommate Aidan must have been running even later than usual. He was usually courteous when getting ready for work in the mornings so long as he wasn't cutting it too close. His job allowed him to be up to fifteen minutes late before being penalized and it took about ten minutes to get there with decent traffic. Brendon chuckled a little bit knowing that Aidan would soon be sprinting through his work's parking lot to make sure he got clocked in on time.
Brendon rolled over onto his stomach and tried to shade his eyes from the light coming in the window so he could get back to sleep. After a few moments he realized that it was a losing battle and he had woken up too much to get back to sleep. He looked next to him and saw that Rebecca was still out cold. It wasn't surprising to him that she'd still be in a deep sleep. They had gone out to a nearby bar the night before to see off a friend of theirs that had been back in the state for a short visit. Brendon had offered to drive as usual and while Rebecca wasn't a very big drinker she had still had a few drinks while they were with their friends. He felt a little guilty for having his parents watch his daughter Joanna on one of his nights with her but he figured her mother Leslie wouldn't be too upset since she understood that he had their daughter half of the nights and it had been months since he had last used a babysitter overnight. He and Leslie had experienced their differences in the past but for the most part they managed to avoid having much in the way of disagreements these days.
He rolled out of bed and pulled on a pair of gym shorts and a t-shirt before sneaking out into the living room, being careful not to wake Rebecca up. When he stepped into the living room he saw that the light on his saltwater aquarium had kicked on already just like it did every other morning around sunrise. He walked into his kitchen and began to reach for a box of cereal before he stopped himself. He was pretty simple in the mornings and generally just ate a bowl of cereal to tame his stomach. Rebecca wasn't too big into eating cereal since she hated milk and would generally just skip breakfast but he wanted to try making something she would like. He figured he might as well give pancakes a shot.
While he was starting to retrieve everything that he would need from the cupboards he heard what sounded like weapons fire coming from outside. If they were indeed gunshots they weren't coming from the immediate area, between his time in the Army and the fact that shooting was one of his main hobbies he had become fairly adept at gauging how far away gunshots were coming from and these were at least a quarter mile away. He lived in a reasonably safe city and the Midwest was a peaceful place to live so he figured there was no immediate danger. He decided he would just flip on the news as soon as he got breakfast started to see what was going on so he started sifting through his cupboards and pulling out everything he would need.
He was just pulling a mixing bowl out of a cupboard when he heard a blood curdling scream come from outside. He rushed over to the balcony window of his second story apartment and looked outside to see a bloodied woman limping through the lot in front of the apartment building. He couldn't tell exactly how bad her injuries were but there was a lot of blood running down her left leg and she was limping badly enough that she wasn't moving very quickly. She kept looking over her shoulders with a terrified look on her face at a man who was covered in blood himself and lumbering after her.
Brendon had no idea what was going on between the two outside but the lady looked like she needed help. He ran into his room and eyed his pistol lockbox on his end table for a second. He knew he could use the digital keypad to open the box in a flash but he still didn't really know what was going on outside but the man was unarmed so he likely wouldn't be able to shoot the man without getting into serious trouble for excessive force and he didn't need some maniac trying to take his gun from him. He pulled open his closet and grabbed his black KaBar combat knife from it's sheath on his shooting vest. He figured that if the guy didn't stand down he'd be able to handle one injured man just fine with just a knife.
He hurried out of his apartment cut through the hallway to the nearest stairway that lead to that side of the building. He was down the stairs and out the front door before he realized that he hadn't even bothered to throw on a pair of shoes. As soon as he made it into the parking lot he saw that the man had caught up to the injured woman and had tackled her. She was on her back kicking and screaming while the man attacked her.
"Hey! Get the hell off of her!" he yelled in as deep and commanding of a voice as he could muster. As he yelled out the command he realized he hadn't used that voice since he had served in Iraq with the army conducting combat patrols. The man seemed completely oblivious to Brendon and as he advanced closer he noticed the man was sinking his teeth into the woman's neck and Brendon almost recoiled in horror as he saw the man tear a chunk of flesh out with his teeth as the woman screamed.
"I said get off of her!" he shouted an instant before he planted his heal in the man's side. His kick landed with enough force that the man was knocked onto the ground next to the woman. Brendon didn't have time to check and see if the woman was ok before the man snarled at him and pulled himself back onto his feet.
Brendon took a few steps back and brandished his knife in front of him making sure the man could see it. "Don't make me use this," he threatened, "I have no qualms with sliding this between your ribs" The man didn't so much as blink at the threats and Brendon couldn't help but think that something was terribly wrong here. The man completely ignored the woman as he stepped over her and came towards Brendon letting out a horrible moan. Brendon decided to stand his ground wanting to get medical attention for the woman as soon as possible.
Once the man was a handful of steps away he raised his arms to grab Brendon. He didn't want this maniac getting a hold of him but he wasn't quite yet ready to take this to the next level. Instead he slashed out at the man's right arm leaving a deep bloody gash then quickly stepped out of his reach.
To his surprise the man didn't so much as flinch, it was like he could feel no pain at all. Great I've got a druggie on my hands Brendon thought to himself. The guy wasn't going to listen to reason and threats would be useless. The man made a quick lunge at him and the image of the man tearing a chunk out of the woman's neck flashed through Brendon's head. He felt the man's hands grip his shoulders firmly and Brendon shot his left hand out in front of him and grasped the man's throat and pushed with all of his might as the man tried to pull his mouth towards Brendon's throat.