Land of the Undying

by Dave Willmarth

  His belly full and his soul content, he quickly washed the dishes and put everything away. In a world where even the cockroaches might be contaminated, it would be careless to leave food out to attract them.

  Mace spent some time in the lab. The same lab where he would’ve worked if the zombiepocalypse hadn’t happened. Only now he was working on a project of his own. This really was a top-notch research and development lab. He had access to all the tools he needed to build a pod from scratch if he so desired. As it was, he was modifying one that had been in one of the testing labs. This was another way for him to occupy his mind. Fill his days without dwelling too much on the possibility that he was the last living human in the area. Maybe on the planet. He really didn’t have a good way to know.

  The security office had a radio in it that could monitor police frequencies. Mace had tried broadcasting and listening on all the channels for hours each day. But after a week of no one answering, he’d given up.

  The cafeteria had several TV’s with a satellite dish feed. But none of the networks were transmitting. He’d found an older TV/VCR combo in a pawn shop that could still pick up antenna signals. But every channel was either static or a test pattern. Mace had even spent an entire day calling phone numbers for police, national guard, and fire stations in nearby cities. Then another day calling the same numbers in other states. Then just random phone numbers.

  The internet was still operational, though many websites and servers had gone down. He’d tried all kinds of keyword searches like “survivors” and “living” and “not dead” but found no chat rooms or boards with recent posts. He even quickly created a website called “stillalive.com” with a message for anyone who saw it to email him, or leave a comment right there on the main page. He checked it twice a day, but so far there had been nothing.

  A couple of shopping trips ago, he’d taken some poster board and paint and made a few signs that said in large print “Still Alive?” then “Leave a note here” in smaller letters. He used duct tape to put them on a few random storefront windows. So far, nobody had responded.

  Mace was getting lonely. He was considering leaving this facility and moving cross-country to see if he could locate any survivors. He’d come up with all sorts of schemes to accomplish this. Most were sure-fire ways to get himself killed. But a couple had possibilities. Like he could pick a rural area and start a fire. Throw some tires on it for a thick, black column of smoke. Then sit back on a rooftop somewhere and watch to see if anyone showed up to investigate.

  But the problem with most of Mace’s ideas was that they involved being exposed for long periods of time. Exposed to birds, or bugs, or larger dangers. He wasn’t quite lonely enough to risk that yet.

  Mace had tried hacking a satellite system that could provide him real time aerial coverage so that he could look for signs of life. So far, his coding skills hadn’t been up to the task. Still, he would sit down every few days and give it another shot. He had plenty of time to kill. Just the other day, partially to prove to himself he could do it, and partially just for fun, he chose a bank and hacked it. Then he proceeded to open himself an account and transfer millions of dollars from big corporations’ accounts. Mostly insurance companies. Mace hated insurance companies. And it wasn’t like the FBI was going to come after him.

  He also downloaded tons of his favorite music before iTunes went down. He used the security office computer to play random songs on the intercom while he worked or just puttered around the complex.

  Which was why he almost didn’t hear the voice on the radio.

  Mace was dancing his way down the corridor toward his quarters to “Shake Your Groove Thing” when the faint sound of a voice caught his ear. He froze mid-step, listening. The voice came again, and he bolted for the security office. Stopping the music, he spun to stare at the police radio.

  “Is anybody out there?” came the voice.

  Grabbing the microphone, he pressed the talk button frantically. “Yes! Yes! I’m here! Can you hear me?”

  There was silence for about half a minute. Then “Are… are you really alive?”

  Mace was stunned. He understood the question perfectly. Hearing another human voice was almost too much to believe. “I’m here. And alive, yes. Where are you?”

  “I’m at a fire station. Been hiding here a couple days. We found this radio in a closet.”

  “We? There’s more than one of you?” Mace had to keep a tight rein on himself in order not to shout into the microphone.

  “My sister and I. We’re hungry. Figured this place might have some food. Now we’re trapped here.” The voice sounded like a teenager. A very scared teenage boy.

  “Trapped?” Mace didn’t like where this was heading.

  “One of those things. I think it heard us. It’s sniffing around downstairs. We blocked the door, but…”

  “Stop talking, you idiot!” Mace shout-whispered into the radio. “Be silent!”

  The voice cracked with panic. “I- —I think it already knows we’re here! You gotta help us! We need help!”

  “Shut up! Just be silent. If it can’t hear you, it might move on.” Mace’s gut clenched.

  The radio went silent. Mace prayed the kid, whoever he was, was smart enough to stay quiet. The zombies were stronger, and faster, than they’d been when they were still human. Especially those that had fed well. But they were stupid. And their sense of smell, while better than human, wasn’t like a dog’s or anything. Unless they were within a few feet of you, if they didn’t see or hear you, they might pass on by without catching your scent.

  Mace waited. He paced back and forth in the room. He tried pulling up a map of the city to see where there might be fire stations close by. He knew of one just a few blocks west of the Safeway. But there had to be dozens of others within radio range. He began to think about how he might locate this kid and his sister, bring them back to the facility where it was safe.

  Minutes seem to drag on like hours. Twice he reached for the microphone, only to set it back down again. If the kid was being silent, there was a reason. Either the creature was nearby, or they were dead.

  The silence was shattered as sound burst from the radio. “It’s here! It’s at the door! Oh god, help us!” the kid was shouting into the radio as his sister screamed in the background. “Katie get back! Get behind me! When it gets in, you RUN!”

  Mace heard a splintering sound followed by another scream from Katie that was quickly cut off. The kid shouted “Katie nooo!” and the radio went dead.

  Mace sat in stunned silence. Gone. The first live humans he’d heard from in weeks. Just… gone. What had that stupid kid been thinking? Katie’s brother. He hadn’t even gotten the kid’s name. Mace’s head fell into his hands. Tears of frustration and anger welled up in his eyes. “WHY!?” he shouted at the radio.

  It was a question he’d asked himself a lot in recent months. “Why couldn’t we have just left well enough alone? We did this to ourselves. We made the machines that made the particles that killed us all.”

  He sat there listening to the silence, half hoping the kid would somehow call back. He knew they were dead. Gone. Or maybe contaminated, turned into one of them. The weight of the outside world bearing down on his soul, Mace needed to escape. He needed a distraction. He rose from the chair in front of the radio, and shuffled to his quarters. Stripping down, he crawled into his pod and activated it.

  *****

  Mace the drow sorcerer rose from his bed at the inn. He picked up his staff on the way out the door, moving quickly down the stairs and out of the inn. It was time. Time to kill something. Time for his ritual.

  When he first claimed his quarters and set up his own pod, Mace wasn’t alone. There were still six survivors living in the facility with him. They were all in shock, to some degree. The end of the world, followed closely by the deaths of fellow survivors time and again. The endless fear. Nightmares. Nobody spoke much, afraid to get close to anyone who might be dead that next day.
Nobody slept much, either.

  Which was why, the next day when they lost some who stupidly brushed up against a tree simply because they were too tired to think clearly, Mace nearly lost it. They’d all agreed that anyone who became contaminated had to be put down. The girl, Lucy, was a cute twenty-something year old who’d actually flirted with him a few times. But the stress had gotten to her, and she got careless. Or maybe she’d just given up.

  Mace was the one who’d had to put her down. They were outside, and his sword was the only weapon that was silent, and could give her a quick death. He’d pleaded with the others to just let her go. But nobody was willing to allow another of those creatures to run loose. And Lucy begged him to do it.

  “Don’t let me turn into one of those things” she said thru gritted teeth. Tears ran down her cheeks as she knelt in front of him. She made to grab at his belt, then held back. “Just make it fast.”

  Mace could barely see through the tears in his own eyes. Just a day ago she’d been smiling at him, twisting her hair around a finger as she asked about his new quarters. He’d hesitated, unable to bring himself to cut off the head of another person. Until one of the others, a yuppie asshole named Matt, had pointed his shotgun at her and said “If you can’t do it, I will” in a quiet, determined voice.

  Mace knew what that meant. The blast would bring the creatures. At best, they’d have to run back to safety without the supplies they had come out to get. At worst, all of them would die.

  Before he could think about it any more, Mace drew back the sword and swung hard, slicing through her in a downward angle that ended with the blade embedded in her shoulder. It wasn’t a clean cut, her head rolled forward, hanging by the uncut skin under her chin. Matt and a couple of the others emptied their stomachs onto the sidewalk. “Shit, man. That was…” Matt didn’t finish the thought.

  Mace was numb.

  They finished their supply run in silence. Upon returning to their safe haven, Mace retreated straight to his room and locked the door. He’d showered, and climbed into his pod. For a full twelve hours he roamed the tunnels around the city of Immernacht, killing every living monster he’d found.

  From then on, it became his ritual. When they lost someone, he would retreat into the game. To a world where he was not a victim. Where he was the monster.

  He found himself in those same tunnels now, more than an hour later, moving swiftly. His racial darkvision allowing him to see as clearly in the tunnels as if he were walking down a street in the city. His eyes were able to detect heat, as well as light and motion. His elven hearing alerting him to any movement where he couldn’t see – around corners, down passageways, behind a stalagmite. Drow were the ultimate hunters in the underground realms. Bred over eons to be superior killing machines. Trained from birth to kill or be killed. To trust nothing and no one. To strike first without hesitation.

  But even a drow could be caught unawares, if they were distracted. Mace didn’t even see the sleeping rock spider until he’d stepped onto its web. Rock spiders weren’t like surface spiders that spun ornate webs vertically across a space in hopes of catching a flying insect. Rock spiders simply laid a sort of rough grid of webbing across the floor of a tunnel somewhere, and waited for something to step on it. They slept with one foot on the nexus of the strings, monitoring for movement. The web wasn’t sticky, and not meant to trap prey. It was simply an alarm. Unsuspecting creatures would awaken the spider as they passed by unaware, and be ambushed from behind shortly after stepping on the web.

  Mace, lost in thoughts of the kid and his sister Katie, felt the web shift underfoot as he put weight on it. He immediately spun around, raising his staff and whispering a spell. One never shouted outside the city, unless one wanted to be lunch to any number of beasties.

  “Infier”. The whispered command sent a stream of fire from his staff downward into the webbing as he took a step back. The light revealed the rock spider already unfolding itself from a hole in the side of the tunnel. Its bulbous body maybe six feet long from the mandibles to the spiked spinner at its tail. Eight legs extending out, easily six feet in length, each one ending in a sharp, barbed claw.

  Rock Spider Hunter

  Level 28

  Health:1400/1400

  Temporarily blinded by the light of the fire, the monster tried to withdraw back into its hole. Deadly ambush killers, rock spiders were not so tough face to face.

  “Ventus!” Mace whispered again, waving his hand from the burning web toward the hole. A blast of wind formed and fanned the flames up onto the rock spider’s body. Though its skin looked to be made of rock, the large arachnid was actually covered in millions of tiny hairs. The flame caught hold and spread across its entire body. The spider screamed as it convulsed with pain, spinning in a circle and bouncing off the walls in blind panic. After a moment, a smell of roasted meat filled the tunnel as the thing flopped onto its back, it’s legs crisping as they curled inward toward its body.

  Mace quickly looted the body. Rock spider meat was a sought-after delicacy in the city. It would bring him several gold at the market. He also received four claws, the stinger, mandibles, and a sac of poison for his troubles. He stowed it all in his inventory and departed as fast as he could. The sound of the battle and the smell of roasted meat would soon bring more dangerous predators.

  Mace turned back toward the city and made his way down tunnel after tunnel, turning here and there to throw off any pursuit that might pick up on his scent. He paused in a small chamber with an underground stream flowing down one wall and across the floor before it disappeared under another wall. Taking a moment to fill his canteen and take a drink, he listened carefully for any sound of movement other than his own.

  A slight splash was his only warning as a tentacle emerged from the stream and wrapped itself around his leg. Before he could react, it squeezed tightly and pulled him off balance, tipping him into the stream.

  Immediately, several more tentacles wrapped themselves around him, dragging him under the surface.

  Squod Ambusher

  Level: 30

  Health: 1900/1900

  A squod! A big one, too. Damn, I should have known better.

  Though the stream was shallow, it had a strong current. It pushed him and the squod downstream, across the room toward the far wall. The squod was a cephalopod that was a cross between an octopus with its eight arms, and a squid with its elongated body and two longer tentacles with hooked paddles on the end. Another ambush predator, the squod can unfurl its longer tentacles like a whip, setting the hook into its prey and pulling them back where it can enfold them and consume them live.

  Holding his breath, Mace struggled futilely to free himself. He stowed his staff in his inventory, so as not to lose it, then put his hand on the nearest tentacle and thought “Frigus!”

  The tentacle instantly began to freeze. Stiffening as the ice spell moved toward the squod’s body, the limb relaxed its hold on Mace. He began to struggle harder, his oxygen quickly being depleted by the effort. The frozen tentacle cracked, then shattered. Mace could see the spell effect moving into the squod’s torso. The monster squeezed harder in panic, the hooks on its tentacles ripping chunks out of Mace’s arms and legs. He clenched his jaw shut as the pain made him want to scream away what little air he had left. Mace began to feel lightheaded from both lack of oxygen and loss of blood. He had the satisfaction of seeing the squod die by being notified of the experience gain from the kill. He managed to lay a hand on it and loot the body. But the weight of the corpse dragged him down, and held him as they bumped along the stream bed. Mace’s vision went black, and two notifications popped up.

  Level Up! You have reached level 29!

  You have earned 1 free attribute point.

  You have died.

  You may choose to respawn at your most recent bind point, or remain with your corpse, and resurrect it after a ten-minute wait period. Your resurrected avatar will have 50% health, and a two-hour death debuff.
/>   Respawn at your bind point? Yes/No

  Knowing that he’d never untangle himself from the frozen squod before drowning a second time, Mace chose to respawn back in his room at the inn. The death debuff reduced strength, stamina, and health regen by 30% for two hours from resurrection. Even if he could free himself and escape drowning, it would be unwise to be in the tunnels with such a handicap.

  Checking his notifications, he saw that he’d avoided the loss of any items upon his death. He had also collected some decent loot from the squod. The thing’s beak could be sold to an alchemist for as much as five gold. He had also picked up two of its claws, and a stack of squod meat. While not as valuable as rock spider meat, it was tasty enough. And he had a cooking recipe for squod that would give a buff of +2 to strength for an hour. The last item looted was a spell scroll.

  Mace examined the scroll using his Identify ability.

  Scroll of Levitate: Level 1

  “Yessss!” Mace pumped a fist in the air and did a little happy-dance in the meager open space of the tiny room. “This was totally worth getting killed for!”

  Spell scrolls were a shortcut for learning spells. One simply opened the scroll and read it, and the knowledge of how to cast the spell was implanted into one’s mind. Simple scrolls, like a basic fire spell that would allow you to light a campfire or a torch, could be purchased at most shops for a gold or two. More complex or rare spells could cost hundreds, or even a few thousand gold.

  A levitation spell was not classified as ‘rare’, but it was definitely valuable. Worth maybe 300 gold if sold at the auction house. On the other hand, levitation magic was incredibly useful. Mace could lift himself up to high windows to sneak into for assassinations or thefts. He could stand aside and lift an idol off a pedestal remotely, watching with a smile as the inevitable giant boulder rolled past harmlessly.