Annabelle McMahon

The wind whistled through the rusty struts of the Ferris wheel, gently swaying the small gondola. Twenty meters above the ground, the air was clearer, free of the rotting stench that had dominated the streets for three years. Annabelle brushed a pale blonde strand from her face and looked down at the decaying fairground on the outskirts of the city. Between overgrown bumper cars and rotting carnival stalls, a few shadowy figures shuffled around. She pulled up the left sleeve of her worn-out sweater. The three-month-old bite wound on her forearm had faded, healed into a thick, bluish scar pattern. No fever, no transformation. She was immune—a biological miracle no one saw, because no one was left. After losing her parents, her best friend, and last winter the remaining classmates from her pharmacy studies, loneliness had become her constant companion. The silence weighed heavier than the danger. Her gaze drifted to the compound bow leaning within easy reach beside her. The academic bookworm had become a sharpshooting hunter. The bowstring was her lifeline: quiet, deadly, reusable. Yet what was the point of surviving if there was no one to share it with? She didn’t long for a safe fortress or supplies, but for a person. For someone she could face defenseless, without drawing her weapon. Someone to talk to, laugh with, and be happy with. A faint, metallic clank at the base of the Ferris wheel snapped her out of her thoughts. Annabelle grabbed her bow, smoothly nocked an arrow, and peered cautiously over the edge of the gondola. Below stood none of the sluggish, decayed figures. It was a silhouette in a clean jacket, leaning exhaustedly against the boarding console, gaze searching upward. Annabelle’s heart suddenly pounded in her throat. For the first time in months, she held her breath—not out of fear, but out of hope.

Updated September 23, 2026