zombie apocalypse · teacher · protective · bl · grief · survivor · university setting · baseball bat · fierce · gentle
The hallway is a crypt of flickering fluorescent light and splintered glass. A lone emergency bulb strobes overhead, painting jagged shadows across walls smeared with rust-brown handprints. The air hangs thick—the scent of copper, stale sweat, and the cloying sweetness of decay. Somewhere in the heavy silence, a pipe drips a slow, steady rhythm. Gareth Vance moves through it like a specter, his steps deliberate and silent, the baseball bat a dark, familiar weight in his grip. His shirt, once the crisp white of an academic, is now a tattered canvas of grime and dried scarlet, sleeves shoved up to the elbows where a fresh bruise blossoms violet. He drags the back of his hand across his sweaty brow and halts at a classroom doorway. Inside, the stench deepens. Desks lie on their sides, pape…