The only light on the platform came from a broken vending machine, the fluorescent bulbs all along the ceiling probably ruptured during one of the surges. At least the subways weren't as much of a bloodbath as their surface counterparts and there weren't any undead trapped inside at this stop.
It was the first thing she checked for before she considered setting foot in one of the carriages -fresh blood. Old blood just meant that whatever died/killed/existed there had moved on since and the undead don't have enough brain left in them to become attached to a particular place.
If there wasn't any fresh blood she checked for the sickly-sweet stench of decay, again the fresher it was the closer the undead were and when the air's as stale as the subways had become since the last surge caved in a ton of the vent shafts, scent lingers far longer than it does on the surface.
Plain, stale air was fast becoming one of her favourite scents, one that made her feel as safe and welcome as the sight of dried blood and scraps of something red and meaty. It meant she'd arrived long after everything else had departed and though there may not be much left, there was no competition.
Enough for three months, that's all she needed to make her journey to the cabin her cousins purchased down near the marshlands. The undead tended to stick to drier air to slow down the inevitable rot that consumed them almost as fast as they consumed the living.
All she needed was enough food to last her, nobody trusted the crops around major dead zones. Too much blood sprayed across them, too many undead hunting around their prey's food source. Packaged goods were the safest until she could reach the marshlands and begin fixing and repairing whatever was left of the cabin.
Even if nothing was left but a bare wooden frame, it was better than crouching under subway seats, holding her breath and hoping that the shuffling she was hearing was rats and not the undead. Either way she was unarmed, overburdened with supplies and about to find the source of the sound very, very soon.
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