The headset goes dark before the world appears.
For three seconds there is nothing.
Then the floor vibrates beneath my boots.
Rain.
Cold, silver, artificial rain falling through a city that doesn’t exist.
I can smell wet concrete.
Nice touch.
The abandoned street stretches ahead beneath broken neon signs. Cars sit crooked across intersections. A bus has crashed through the front of a pharmacy. Somewhere above me, a window breaks.
I check the magazine.
Full.
The screen flashes.
SURVIVE UNTIL MORNING.
Easy.
The first zombie comes through the pharmacy window.
I shoot.
ONE.
The second crawls from beneath the bus.
TWO.
By ten, I’ve stopped counting.
They aren’t particularly clever.
They hear you.
They follow you.
They remember where they last saw you.
So I learn to move differently.
I stop taking the obvious streets.
Stop running when they chase me.
Stop turning around when I hear them behind me.
Sometimes I hide.
Sometimes I wait.
Sometimes I let them walk right past.
The game adjusts.
The zombies get faster.
So do I.
One follows me into an apartment building.
I climb three flights, cross a hallway, jump through a broken window onto the fire escape and drop into the alley.
It follows the route I took.
Up the stairs.
Through the hallway.
Toward the window.
I am already gone.
Interesting.
They don’t hunt where you are.
They hunt where they expect you to be.
I start using that.
Leave doors open.
Break windows I never climb through.
Fire shots from rooftops and disappear through basements.
Let them hear footsteps going east while I move west.
Soon the streets are full of dead things chasing ghosts.
Then the game changes.
FINAL WAVE.
Hundreds appear.
Too many to shoot.
The city shakes beneath them.
I run.
Not away.
Through.
Past abandoned cars.
Under collapsed scaffolding.
Through a hotel lobby filled with broken chandeliers and dead flowers.
They follow.
Of course they do.
I lead them underground.
The subway tunnel is almost completely black.
My weapon clicks.
Empty.
Perfect.
I drop it.
Keep walking.
Behind me, hundreds of footsteps enter the tunnel.
I reach the platform.
Across the tracks stands one last zombie.
It isn’t moving.
Neither am I.
For a second we simply stare at each other.
Then it turns its head slightly.
Almost curious.
Like it recognizes something.
Maybe it does.
The tunnel lights flicker.
Once.
Twice.
Darkness.
When they come back, I am somewhere else.
The horde rushes past the platform.
Past the zombie.
Past the place I had been standing.
Still hunting.
Still following.
Still absolutely certain they know where I went.
I watch them disappear into the tunnel.
The sky above the city begins turning gray.
GAME COMPLETE.
The headset releases.
The ruined city vanishes.
Someone beside me laughs.
The song is still playing in the room.
Badlands.
I put the headset down.
And he said I couldn’t kill zombies.
(“Badlands” — Mumford & Sons & Grace Adams)
Leave a comment