Viral

Carina had never been on a boat, much less a yacht before. She preferred her waters to be very shallow and not brimming with sea creatures. Yet there she was, boarding a damn yacht of all things.

Zoe, her best friend, insisted it would be a good time. A phenomenal time. She even swore on her own life that things would be next level fun of Coachella-at-Sea proportions. Carina was trying to build her social media following anyway and caved in to Zoe’s demands as she felt the new environment, all 75 feet, could provide some fresh, new content. So she gave in and that’s what led to her shakily boarding the boat.

“Girl, will you chill out,” Zoe sighed. “People have been in boats on the ocean since the dawn of time.”

“And things still happen!” Carina snapped back, “Just look at the Titanic or, gee, any of the other thousands of shipwrecks.”

“Hey, you wanted entertaining footage, didn’t you?” Zoe joked and Carina spun, nearly losing her footing, to give her a cold stare.

Zoe chuckled and managed to guide Carina towards the back lounge area where everyone was gathering. Zoe introduced her to a few of her work colleagues and friends before finding a spot for the two to relax and have a drink. Carina didn’t want to admit it this soon, but it wasn’t actually too bad on the yacht so far. Then again, they hadn’t even started moving yet. She sipped her margarita and did a little people watching as she conversed with Zoe and participated in small talk with random people who worked their way over.

As the yacht left its berth, Carina recorded the launch, eventually turning the camera on herself and Zoe for some cute bestie shots. They settled back and enjoyed another drink. After a few sips Carina was letting herself relax and she had to admit she was actually starting to enjoy the ride itself. The movement wasn’t even that noticeable, or so she thought. Her stomach flopped and she made a face, pausing when the very loud sound of retching crescendoed close to them. It was unfortunately followed by the wave of stench—alcohol-laden vomit. Someone at the back of the yacht near the railings was not having a good time, and seemed to be wracked by motion sickness (or too much Bacardi already).

“Oh yay, another thing to worry about,” Carina sighed.

Zoe rolled her eyes, “Well, at least it’s them and not you! Don’t wish that on yourself. Let’s keep this positive, girl!”

There was a sudden, sickening thud as the man’s head hit the floor of the yacht’s deck and both girls jumped. Other passengers gathered around them, trying to figure out what happened. Finally one of the yacht’s crew worked his way through and pushed the small group back, getting two people to help him move the unconscious man to the couches in the shade and off of the deck.

Zoe and Carina couldn’t help but stare as they brought the man closer to them, laying him down and fanning him in a nearby couch.

“He was vomiting pretty hard back there, maybe he couldn’t catch his breath,” someone suggested.

“We’ve barely moved, it couldn’t be motion sickness already could it?” Another asked.

No one seemed to have any answers but soon the man made a bizarre noise, half growl, half groan.

A blonde woman, face twisted with concern, patted his cheek repeatedly and he groaned again.

“Matt??? Baby??? Can you hear me?” She questioned before Matt shot up to sit, staring at the woman with a furrowed brow and glassy, dark eyes.

“Oh honey, why don’t you lay back down, your color isn’t quite right I think you need to re-“ but before she could finish the sentence, Matt lurched forward and bit her square on the nose, tearing flesh away from cartilage. Zoe and Carina both jumped back in shock as others shrieked in horror. Matt leaned back, contentedly munching on the woman’s nose as she fell to the floor in shock and trauma, blood running over her lips and down her chin. Matt sniffed the tang of blood on the air and lunged forward again, pupils dilated, diving onto her back and biting at her neck.

“You.. should definitely record this…” Zoe whispered and Carina whacked her on the arm.

“Are you that twisted?” She gasped. “This is serious!”

“Seriously good content,” Zoe quipped nervously as the two of them slowly backed away from the chaos.

People attempted to pull Matt off of the woman, but he would just try to snap at them and get a chunk out of them as well. The woman’s name was Megan, which the duo deduced from the cries of her name as the madness erupted. Megan twitched under Matt’s weight before suddenly shoving him off of her with an animalistic shriek, lunging at another man near her.

“What in the Walking Dead…” Carina muttered and the two took off as fast as they could for the upper sun deck.

“This is not happening, this is not happening…” Zoe kept repeating under her breath.

Carina grabbed her shoulders and looked her in the eye, “Hey we gotta hold it together okay? For each other.”

Zoe slowly nodded and Carina sat her down, rushing off to alert anyone she could find on the crew about the madness further spreading on the lower decks.

The crew were scrambling themselves, now aware of the situation from the crew member who intervened on the lower deck. They shoved past Carina, panicking more than doing anything that seemed like a decent plan.

Carina made her way back to Zoe, throwing her hands up in frustration. “No help from the rest of the crew.”

The screaming below them only grew louder.

“I think we’re going to need life jackets,” Carina sighed. Her worst nightmare was coming true. Then again, zombies being real could easily beat being out exposed on the ocean any day. It wasn’t something she ever thought she was going to experience and yet there she was, with her best friend in some sort of zombie apocalypse boat horror film turned real.

“I think there’s a lifeboat on the other side!” Zoe mentioned, “I saw it when we were boarding… but we need to go… back near them.”

Carina bit her lip and nodded, “we can grab lifejackets on the way.” She noticed a red emergency axe clipped to the wall and grabbed it without hesitation. If people were lunging at each other, trying to have a cannibal buffet, they needed to NOT be running around empty handed.

The monstrous din was beginning to spread to other parts of the yacht as those who had been bitten began to turn into shuffling, lurching zombies themselves. Zoe couldn’t help but apologize as she shoved one of the snarling former people down the stairs before it could grab either of them. He hit the floor with a sickening thud, his head bouncing off the floor. The girls rushed past before they could even question if he would get back up.

Carina didn’t want to take the axe to a former crew members face but there she was, with an axe in the face of the first mate. Whatever sickness was causing the changes was spreading through them like wildfire. The girls had to get on the lifeboat and get out of there if they had a flying chance of not becoming a pair of the undead too.

Zoe and Carina made it to the main deck but the chaos had turned into a full blown war. Blood and flesh slicked the floors, making it difficult to walk on, chunks of flesh and entrails in grisly lumps in the carnage. The girls nearly fell a few times just trying to get to the back of the boat to try and see how they could get to the lifeboat. They managed to find the jumbled half-empty rack of life vests and get themselves into some before two bloody bodies shuffled towards them.

“I don’t think we’re gonna get to the lifeboat,” Carina sighed. She had noticed a few other people had escaped over board in panic and that the former humans were not following after.

“Well, I think we’re gonna have to dive in,” Zoe nodded towards the water, noticing the other people bobbing in the waves as well.

The duo inched themselves back astern, taking one look back at the carnage on the yacht before jumping into the churning water themselves.

That was the very day that Carina overcame her fears of the ocean, because given the choice? She’d choose the ocean over zombies again any day.