We knew we had to leave our makeshift home. With the hole in the fence, the backyard became a draw for them. We've waited until this moment to climb carefully down the lowered rope ladder, hoping not to attract attention to ourselves. I was the last to descend, cautiously feeling for each woven rung as I watched the scarred and lonely landscape around me, hoping I wouldn't attract any attention.

Over my left shoulder I saw it. The solitary corpse had spotted me and was now limping in our general direction. It was slow but it moved with purpose. Our only hope was to confuse it by waiting until it was in the enclosed backyard before sneaking out behind it.

Fate wanted to play a different game with us today. Not only had it stacked the deck against us with Zombies, it had also given us Billy.

Stupid Billy.

As the broken leg of the Zombie came into view around the smashed edge of the planked span of fence, Billy screamed. High pitched and girly.

He froze, his mouth forming a perfect, round hole as the scream choked in his throat. A face appeared around the damaged edge, almost comical in its surprise and hunger. Its eye locked on Billy, the milky cornea searching for something; recognition perhaps.

With another scream, matched by a strident noise of victory from the Zombie, the dance of death resumed.

The rest of us took the moment of inattention to scale back up the rope ladder, knowing that at some point, we would need to escape. The time will come; we just need to be patient.

Julianne Snow's Bio: It was while watching Romero's Night of the Living Dead at the tender age of 6 which solidified Julianne's respect for the Undead. Since that day, she has been preparing herself for the (inevitable) Zombie Apocalypse. While classically trained in all of the ways to defend herself, she took up writing in order to process the desire she now covets; to bestow a second and final death upon the Undead. As the only girl growing up in a family with four children in the Canadian countryside, Julianne needed some form of escape. Her choice was the imaginations of others which only fostered the vibrancy of her own.

Days with the Undead: Book One is her first full-length book, the basis of which can be found in her popular web serial of the same name. Along with many zombie shorts published on her blog, she has a story in Women of the Living Dead as well as two zombie pieces; a standalone short and a collection releasing the summer of 2013. Julianne's second novel in her Days with the Undead series will also be released in 2013. Stay tuned!

Social Media Links: Twitter: @CdnZmbiRytr Facebook: Julianne Snow FB Fan Page: Days with the Undead Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/cdnzmbirytr/ Google+: https://plus.google.com/u/0/110149434437717424445/posts Goodreads: Julianne Snow Blogs: Days with the Undead & The FlipSide of Julianne & The Randomness of Julianne Days with the Undead: Book One Synopsis: It's a journal of survival.

Five people set out to escape the Undead who have risen too close to home. Join the emotional and physical struggle as they began on the third day after the awakening of Brooks VanReit, as they are recorded from the point of view of Julie, a former pathologist and part-time survivalist.

Each entry is geared toward helping those who want to help themselves and maybe give a few that don't a swift kick in the ass. Join our group of survivors on their journey through these Days with the Undead.

Rebecca Snow A Mile in His Shoes Del Weldon looked down into the hold and counted the bodies swaying in the flashlight beam. Twenty pairs of gray-green arms strained toward the light. Reaching to the floor, he grabbed the cold metal handle and pulled. A wheel shrieked as the steel trapdoor rolled on its runners. He shut the squad back into darkness. Removing a pen and a small black notebook from a breast pocket, he scribbled the tally and made a note to grease the caster. The smallest noise upset the squad sequestered beneath the uninsulated floor. They called for quiet as Del unhooked a leather harness from a storage locker and snapped it onto a loop dangling from the ceiling. Tomorrow, the count might be up to twenty-one. Or perhaps, it would still be twenty.

Stepping to the wall, he grabbed a crank and spun it clockwise. Empty straps lowered to the floor. Winding in the opposite direction, the loose yoke rose to its former position hovering in midair. The chain holding it swung without a jingle. Del made another notation in his book before taking a final glance around the room. Aside from his desk and the closed metal panel, the floor was clear. The monotony of the block wall was broken by a single sheet of safety rules and the locker. The few fixtures gleamed. Dust bunnies had been swept down onto the squad's cell. He would bring the oil for the squeaky wheel in the morning. Switching off the lights, he left the room and closed the door.

"Evening, Tony," Del said. He flashed an identification card at the guard behind the shatterproof glass. "Quiet night?"

"Usually is before we lose one," Tony said as he pressed a button.

The lock clanked as it released. Del nodded then entered the corridor beyond. Behind him, the gate swished closed. Before him lay a hallway filled with doors leading to eight-foot by eight-foot rooms. A fluorescent light flickered at the end. Del made another notation in his book and walked halfway down the passage. Rubber soled shoes squished on the waxed floor tiles. He turned left to face a door marked with the number 313 in a thick layer of shiny black paint. Striding toward the small, eye level window, Del stared into the chamber. All the rooms were almost identical, the occupant being the sole difference. A lumpy cot stood on the left, a small receptacle for human waste on the right. In this particular compartment, a man in an orange jumpsuit reclined with an arm over his face. Lights out wasn't for another four hours, so darkness had to be manufactured. Del rapped a knuckle on the tiny glass pane. The man craned his neck without dropping his arm.

"What now?" the man asked and lowered his head back to the mattress.

"Mister James, I need your meal request," Del said, reaching for his small notebook.

"I'm not hungry," the man said. "And what does it matter? I'll be dead before it digests."

"It's protocol." Del waited, pen poised above the unspoiled sheet of paper.

"Screw protocol. I'm not hungry."

A large, silver-toned clock ticked on the wall as the second hand measured lost moments. Del shifted his weight to his left foot. The light at the end of the hall brightened before flickering again.

"If you don't tell me what you want, I'll be forced to guess." Del tapped the glass again. "I don't think you want the last food you see to be my wife's faux meatloaf."

The man groaned and rolled toward the wall.

"Might I suggest a breakfast food?" Del asked.

The man sat up.

"Don't bring me anything. I don't want a last cigarette, I don't want last rights, and I don't want a last meal. I don't want anything but to be let of this cage. But no, that's out of the question because I was the only one they could blame."

"Excuse me, sir," Del said in a voice he used to calm his wife's nightmares. "You had your day in court, and you were sentenced. There's nothing I can do for you other than bring you your last meal."

"Day in court, my ass." The man stepped to the little window and slammed his fists on either side of it. "It was a bunch of clowns at a circus." Spittle flew from his mouth and dotted the glass.

"Would you like me to summon your lawyer?" Del asked, retreating from the man's rage.

Mr. James spun on his heel and threw his arms in the air before dropping onto the cot.

"No, she was useless." He let out a sigh. "And can you at least call me Patrick? Not even a day left, and I'd like to remember I had a name."

Del glanced toward the guard station before looking back into the tiny cell.

"Certainly, Patrick. Now, will you please tell me what you want for breakfast?"

Del planned to leave as soon as he'd left the meal request with the facility chef, but found himself walking back to the office instead. Patrick's words tugged at his mind. The key turned the tumblers. He let himself into the extermination room and cushioned the door against his hand to shut it. Tiptoeing across the floor to keep the squad undisturbed, he flipped through a stack of files resting in a wire basket on the desk. Del dragged the one marked "Patrick James" open on top of the blotter. The pock-marked, wooden chair wobbled as he lowered himself into it.

The procured pages described Patrick James as having been a decorated soldier during the original outbreak. His bravery and quick thinking had saved scores of men and women from becoming shamblers themselves. What was left of Kingston had been renamed the Jamestown Sector in his honor. But as with some valorous heroes, the information portrayed his family life as having been anything but glorious. According to his file, he had killed his wife and three daughters after taking them prisoner and barricading himself inside their home. Del was surprised that the media hadn't swarmed the scene. Reading the file was the first he had heard of the story.

Closing the folder, Del pushed himself back from his desk. Chair legs scraped across the flecked industrial tiles. He could hear the moans through the trapdoor. He sighed knowing the squad wouldn't relax for hours, but he had to get home. Locking the door, he set off toward the transit station.

"Don't they always say they're innocent?" Del's wife asked. She lifted a wooden spoon to her lips and blew on the end to cool its contents before sipping the sauce. "Perfect. Dinner will be ready in about five minutes."

She turned off the stove and removed the pan from the element.

"Yeah, they all say they didn't do anything wrong." Del smiled. "It's always not what it seemed, or they were framed. The best one I've heard was some guy said his dog made him kill his neighbors. That guy would have been committed before the outbreak. Now, he's making himself useful."

Del laughed as he set the chipped plates in the hand-me-down table he and Jenny had received as a wedding gift. Mismatched flatware rested on stained napkins. Two plastic cups finished off their place settings.

"But he seemed different. I can't put my finger on why, but I don't think this James guy should be in there."

"Can you do anything for the man?" Jenny asked. She pulled another pan from the heat and brought it to the table.

"Not really. At least nothing that I can think of that's legal." Del held his plate out, and his wife spooned on dripping strands of pasta. "Anyway, his file said he killed his wife and kids."

Jenny lowered the pan midway to the table and threw an incredulous stare at her husband.

"Then why do you want to help him?"

Del shook his head and smoothed a napkin onto his lap.

"I don't know. Maybe it's because he saved more people than he was supposed to have killed."

Jenny returned the pan to the stove and reached for the sauce. Pouring it onto Del's pasta, she slid her gaze sideways and looked at him.

"But he killed his own children," she said. "That can't be forgiven."

Easing herself into her chair, she shook open a napkin and placed it over her swollen stomach. She was due to give birth to their first child in a month. Del hoped it was a girl.

Feeling the vibration in the button under his finger, Del heard a buzzer sound behind the wall. A seamed partition slid aside, and a tray appeared in front of him.

"All set, Mr. Weldon?" a woman wearing a white hair net and latex gloves asked. Wisps of gray curls peeked around her face.

"Yes, Lucy. Ready as always." Del took the tray and stepped back into the hallway.

"You go get those bad guys." Lucy smiled, shaking a fist in the air before disappearing behind the panel.

"Yeah, I guess," Del mumbled.

He took a deep breath and sighed. Even though he'd taken the prisoner's breakfast order, Del hadn't been prepared for the scent of bacon. He wasn't sure when he'd last had a meal that tempted him like this one. His wife cooked like a skilled chef, but there was only so much she could do with canned beets and endless boxes of pasta.

Del tapped the door to 313 with the edge of the tray. Tinny clangs echoed in the hall. Patrick James stood up, stretched, and took two steps toward the door. Holding the tray with his left arm, Del unlocked a small door the size of a large mail slot and opened it. He removed the metal lid covering the meal and slid the tray through the hole into the prisoner's waiting hands.

"Would you like anything else?" Del asked. "Is there anyone you'd like to talk to, any last requests?"

Patrick drew his eyebrows together and stared at Del through the small window.

"I missed the sunrise, didn't I?"

Del nodded.

"Well, is there any chance I can see the sky one last time?" Patrick asked, tilting his head.

"You didn't let your wife and kids see the sky," Del said.

Patrick slammed the tray onto the cot. Del saw the bacon bounce into the air. The prisoner turned and stalked back to the small window.

"Is that what the records say?" Patrick's blue eyes glared through the glass. "They say I killed my family?"

Del nodded. Patrick threw back his head and grunted before turning his back to the door. Del stared through the window and waited. He thought Patrick looked like a caged lion at the zoo. No one was certain what happened to the animals, but the zoos had been empty ever since. Patrick leaned his head against the cinder block wall at the back of his cell. Del thought he heard the man talking.

"Excuse me?" Del asked.

Patrick spoke again.

"I'm sorry, I didn't hear you."

Patrick turned.

"I said," Patrick shouted. "Then, I might as well be dead."

Del tilted his arm and glanced at his watch. The hands pointed to 8:30AM. Patrick's extermination was scheduled for 11AM.

"It won't be long now," Del said under his breath.

Patrick shuffled back to the cot and flopped down next to his breakfast.

"Any chance I can see the sky?"

The law said prisoners sentenced to extermination were allowed a last meal, last rights, and a last request. Patrick had refused his last rights, almost refused his last meal, and his last request wasn't against any law as far as Del knew.

"Let me see what I can do," Del said before relocking the slot. He smacked a palm against the door and trotted back to the guard station.

"I need roof access," Del said to the uniformed man behind the window. He didn't recognize the guard but noticed his name badge said "Thompson."

The man pressed some buttons on a keypad. A metal panel folded out from below the window revealing a set of keys. Del pocketed them.

"I'll also need a set of restraints."

The guard raised his eyebrows and peered at Del.

"I hope those items aren't going to be used together," the guard said.

"Officer Thompson, I am required to grant the last wishes of our detainees. The man in three-thirteen is scheduled for extermination in two and a half hours. He has requested to see the sky."

The guard lowered his eyebrows and nodded before leaning back in his chair and reaching into a cabinet. Turning back to the window, he smiled.

"Here you go." The man put restraints into a container and slid them through the opening. "I thought you were going to throw somebody off the roof. You'll need to sign for those."

Del scribbled his signature on the next empty line of the sign out sheet and returned to cell 313. Patrick sat on his cot leaning his head back on the wall. His arms rested on his knees. Half of the bacon remained on the plate. Del unlocked the slot.

"Hands through," he said.

Patrick stood and moved toward the door. His hands slid into view. Del placed the restraints around Patrick's wrists and pulled the buckles.

"Please return to your cot," Del said. He unlocked the deadbolt and removed the padlock from the door.

Stepping inside the cell, Del secured Patrick's ankles with the second set of restraints and pulled him to his feet.

"Can you walk?" Del asked.

Patrick shuffled forward a few steps.

"Good enough," Patrick said. Using his bound hands, he motioned to his breakfast plate. "Want some bacon for the road?"