Note: These first three "Encounters" were purely to set the scene at the beginning of the outbreak for the fiction section when it started back in 1997...

Encouter 1 - One Becomes Two

Mr Edgecombe, a mortician, working in his office one evening, hears a bang from the direction of the funeral parlour. Rubbing his tired eyes he rises from the desk and walks across the room and into the corridor towards the parlour.

In his mind he pictures the lid of the coffin, which he had earlier carefully rested against the table, falling over and making a bang as it hits the floor. Cursing under his breath he hopes no damage has been done to it. "Oak is so damn expensive", he thinks.

He remembers a can he had seen some days earlier in the workshop. "Never mind, that wood stain will quickly fix any scratches, and besides Mr Harford is being cremated, his relatives won't even be getting close to that coffin."

Turning his key in the lock he misses the muffled scuffling sounds from somewhere behind the parlour door. Inside, a coffin lid still rests neatly against a table...

Encouter 2 - Pain Killer

Mrs Yearling, a frail, grey skinned patient in a geriatric ward, puts down her glass of water and looks over her bed side cabinet to see Mrs Bates sleeping soundly. "Soon the pain killers will take effect and I'll be sleeping too", she thinks to herself.

Closing her eyes she squints at the pain of the arthritis riddling her legs. The tablets help, but she can still feel the numb ache of her swollen joints.

Looking down in the dark she sees her uncovered leg. "Damn hospital beds", she mutters, thinking of her large comfortable bed back at home. Slowly sliding her leg back under the sheet she makes a mental note to ask the nurse to tuck the sheets in tighter tomorrow.

"At least that fat Mrs Bates isn't snoring as usual", she grins to herself. She looks over expecting a large snort to burst from her lips any second, but there is a peaceful quiet. Infact for once Mrs Bates had been surprisingly quiet all night.

Mrs Yearling's head sinks into the uncomfortable hospital pillow and lets her mind wander...

Coming to she grimaces at the pain in her leg. Cursing the arthritis, she thinks to herself how much worse this attack is.

Thinking her leg is uncovered again she looks down but a large figure bending over the bottom of the bed obscures her view...

Encouter 3 - Two Becomes Four

On a street corner the sound of breaking glass goes unnoticed. A pair of shambling figures emerge into a side-street from the rear entrance of the Funeral Directors. In a strange irony, one was a customer and one was the owner.

Mr Egdecombe's neck had been mauled and his right arm taken down to the bone in a number of places. His blood soaked clothes were nearly dry now, his blood had long since stopped flowing.

Apart from Egdecombe's tattered arm and the strange angle at which his head lolls, he and Mr Harford almost look like a pair of comical drunks as they stagger out towards the early morning bustle of the town.

A young boy standing outside a paper shop looks through the window waiting for his mother to finish buying a magazine inside. "How can it take so long to buy one magazine", Robert mumbles to himself.

As the two figures come closer to the street the first few pedestrians almost pass by without reaction, giving only a strange half glance. The kind of embarrassed look given when passing someone with a serious malformation. That quick sideways look when you shouldn't really look at all, but you just can't help it.

Harford excited by the people now less than 20 feet away groans louder, followed as if in some nightmarish duet by Edgecombe.

A smartly dressed women seeing the pair lumbering towards her tries to come to terms with the situation. Mouth open wide, she silently stumbles backwards away from the pair. On her third step she trips as her foot misses the curb. Arms flailing she collapses into the road.

Bill Wright seeing the figure falling out of the corner of his eye instinctively slams on his breaks. A loud pair of bangs follow as two cars consatena into the back of his car.

Robert hearing the smash excitedly turns to see the accident. A figure stands in the way. With a loud groan Edgecombe leans over and grabs Robert in a wild bear hug.

Wright sits dazed while coming to terms with the accident unaware of the commotion happening outside his car. A few seconds pass and horns blast from vehicles somewhere behind him. "Shit, the woman", he says to himself. Bursting from the car he runs to the front of his vehicle. With relief he sees the womans body laying a few safe feet infront of his car. He then looks quizzically at the figure hunched over her unconscious body. "Must be worse than I thought if she needs mouth to mouth", he thinks to himself.

Wright turns at the sound of Robert's scream. The far stronger corpse takes a bite from the young boys shoulder. Infront of him Mr Harford rises from his crouched position eagerly chewing…