51 The Girl Stained with Blood (1/2)

7:23 PM – City Mall Bacoor, Central Area, First Floor, Batsons Storage Area

Mark and Paula started checking the labels printed at the boxes inside the storage one by one. There were a lot of boxes stacked over one another with all sorts of products from skincare cosmetics, baby necessities and nutrient supplement drinks to different kinds of medicines.

”What kind of medicine are you looking for?”

Breandan asked Paula.

”Paracetamol for children, the syrup one. That's the priority. Also other medicine for common diseases just in case.”

”Let us help look for those.”

”Alright.”

The two students also started searching the storage for medicine Paula spoke about.

”Hey. Breandan right? Use this to store what you find.”

Mark threw his backpack to Breandan and the latter nodded.

Though it just seemed normal, Paula noticed that Mark had a different reason why he passed his backpack to Breandan. Mark was standing in place while looking towards the direction of the storefront.

”Is something wrong?”

Paula approached him and asked.

She could not see Mark's face because of his helmet but right now, his eyebrows were tightly knit.

Mark did not immediately notice it but when he moved closer to that area near the storefront, he felt it. As he could detect emotions of the people around him, there were times that he could detect unusual emotional fluctuations. It was when the person he detected was dangerous like killers and people high of drugs whose emotions were highly unstable. But right now, he could not fathom what kind of person he was detecting.

He was sure it was not a zombie as he never detected any emotional fluctuations from them. It was more like the zombies were moving by instinctual urges. The fluctuation he was detecting right now was faint. It made him sure that it was a child. But the strange thing was the emotion he detected from that child.

Calm.

The only emotion he could detect was calmness. There was no sadness, no happiness and no fear. It was really strange if it was just a child.

Mark looked at Paula and spoke.

”Continue searching for the medicine. I'm going to check something.”

He did not explain to Paula what he was going to check as he did not know how to explain it either. He walked away towards the door that led to the storefront.

Paula felt strange as he did not explain why. She just followed what he said and continued searching for the medicine.

Mark leaned his back towards the door and slightly opened it. Using the compact mirror, he looked at the situation outside. He was surprised.

The storage room had two doors that led to the storefront. The door he opened led towards the enclosed counter where the clerks receive the payments for the products sold. It was also where clerks attend customers who had prescriptions from their doctors and give the medicine they needed like how it was in pharmacies. The only difference from pharmacies was that the area was just enclosed by a long counter table.

What surprised him was the scene at the area behind the door. There were several mangled zombies of different sizes. He was sure that the bodies were from zombies as there were bites visible on some parts of the bodies along with the other changes of appearance that could only be seen on bodies of zombies.

He could see some zombies lurking quite a distance outside the counter but the area within the counter had none but the mangled bodies.

Seeing that the situation within the counter area was safe, Mark crouched down and slowly moved out.

He then froze.

Under one of the payment counters, he was a life size doll of a girl with black wavy below shoulder length hair wearing a red frilled dress. Her pale-light skinned face was stained with red paint and the dress had tears in various places. The doll sat on the floor with her legs stretched out and she was missing her right shoe.

Then, the doll looked at him. She was not a doll but a child about five to six years old.

Though he did not actually thought that she was a doll but her appearance would make anyone think so. If not for the emotional fluctuations he was feeling from her, he would think that he was looking at a ghost.

Her dress was not red colored and it was not paint that stained her face. The girl looked like she just took a literal bloodbath.

Mark slowly approached the girl and the girl just watched him calmly. There was no joy seeing a human or cautiousness seeing a stranger. She just calmly watcher him move closer.

”Who are you?”

The girl spoke. Her voice was calm and full of innocence.