It was almost morning.
Not that it looked like it.
The sky beyond the dormitory window was a sickly gray, thick with cloud and mist, as if the world itself had stopped breathing. No birds. No wind. No signs of sunrise. Just that haunting, unnatural stillness.
Katharina had barely slept—none of them had, really. Their eyes were red-rimmed and hollow, the kind of tired that had nothing to do with rest. She sat at the desk again, pencil in hand, sketching something useless on a napkin: the academy gates, their school crest, the tall iron fence. Her fingers moved without purpose.
"Do you think… they're okay?" Monika's voice broke the silence.
She was sitting cross-legged on the floor, wrapped in one of the velvet blankets from the bed. Her eyes were fixed on the door, but her mind was miles away. "Mama. Papa. We haven't heard anything. No calls. No messages."
"There's no internet," Henriette said, rubbing her face. "No signal. No radio. We're cut off."
"That doesn't mean they're not okay," Seraphina added gently, though her voice was raw. "Maybe the network collapsed. Maybe they're in hiding, like us."
"Or maybe they were in the city," Monika whispered.
No one responded.
It had been two days since the first news reports—the ones with polite headlines like "Sudden Illness Sweeps Through Select Regions" and "Men Affected by Rapid-Onset Syndrome". Then came the lockdowns. Then the silence. And now… this.
Katharina looked out the window again. Nothing but trees and the edge of the forest. Their school—St. Viktoria Akademie für Mädchen, founded in 1893—was beautiful but remote. Surrounded by vast grounds and old woodlands. A prestigious sanctuary far from the noise of cities, isolated by design.
Now that isolation felt like a tomb.
"It's hopeless, isn't it?" Monika said. Her voice cracked. "They're gone. All of them."
"We don't know that," Katharina replied, but the words felt thin in her mouth.
Henriette stood up suddenly, hands clenched. "If we stay here and do nothing, we'll die anyway. We can't just sit and cry."
"We aren't," Katharina said sharply. "We're waiting. We're planning."
"For what?" Seraphina asked. "Even if we could escape, the nearest town is forty kilometers away. Through forest. With no vehicle. No food. And we don't know how many of those… things are out there."
Henriette looked toward the door. "Then we fight. We find weapons. A way out."
"With what?" Katharina asked, her voice rising. "Chair legs? Flashlights? The damn ruler you're all clutching like a sword? We're four schoolgirls against a plague."
There was silence again.
Monika began to cry softly, covering her face. Katharina looked at her and felt the guilt twist deep in her stomach. She crossed the room and knelt beside her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm just scared too."
"I want to see Mama again," Monika said, muffled into her sweater. "Even if it's just once."
"I know."
They sat like that for a while, the four of them huddled in their dorm room. The walls—once painted in warm ivory and adorned with award plaques and family crests—felt cold now. Like they were closing in.
And then Seraphina said it, quiet but clear:
"They're zombies."
The others looked up.
"That's what they are. The faculty. The girls outside. It's not a sickness. It's something else. Something we only used to see in films. But they're dead. And they keep moving."
Nobody argued.
"We all thought it," Katharina admitted. "But none of us wanted to say it."
Henriette snorted. "What else do you call your Latin teacher foaming at the mouth and ripping someone's throat out with her teeth?"
Seraphina nodded slowly. "It's a virus. Or something that acts like one. It kills them. Then it reanimates them. Brings back whatever reflexes are left. Hunger, maybe."
"We don't know if they're really dead," Monika said shakily.
"They're not alive," Henriette replied.
Another silence.
They weren't just hiding from sick people anymore.
They were hiding from the dead.
The conversation died out. The tension didn't.
They sat quietly, listening. Hoping for the sound of helicopters. Trucks. Anything that sounded like rescue.
Instead, they heard footsteps.
Not heavy. Not rushed.
Just soft.
Dragging.
Shuffle. Drag. Shuffle.
Katharina froze.
"Do you hear that?" she whispered.
Henriette had already picked up her makeshift iron baton. She crept toward the door and put her ear to the wood.
More footsteps. Just outside.
Someone—or something—was walking down the hallway. Slow. Aimless.
The sound of nails dragging along the wall.
Then… another footstep. Closer.
They all held their breath.
And then—thud.
Something hit the door.
The girls jumped.
Seraphina covered her mouth.
Another thud. A palm. Or maybe a head. Pressed against the wood.
Katharina signaled for silence. They didn't move. Didn't breathe.
And then—
Scratch.
Fingernails across the surface.
Henriette gripped her weapon tighter.
Katharina backed toward her sister, shielding her instinctively.
They waited.
Another thud.
And then… nothing.
Just silence.
They didn't sleep the rest of that morning.
Only when the pale light of dawn finally began to seep in—soft and weak through the gray clouds—did they allow themselves to breathe again.
Katharina stood, eyes locked on the door.
They were surrounded by monsters now.
And the world outside?
Dead.