You advance slowly through the corridors towards the food court. Without electricity, some areas are dark to walk through. It makes you nervous, but you press forward. Then, after a turn, you see it and can barely believe your eyes.
“The food court… What the fudge?!”
In the middle of the court, climbing all the way up to the glass ceiling there is a tree. The sorts of you never seen before. It’s trunk and branches are soft and green. The branches open up like vines and fill all the walls. The roots spread all over the floor, in a darker tone of green. Little red tulip-like flowers sprinkle the plant. The tree has barely no leaves. All in all, it’s beautiful.
If you… Go to…
Inspect the tree Section 257
Search for food Section 258
Section 242
Head for the fountain court
You follow the tracks on the floor to the fountain area. This place was once a relaxing place, with a nice coffee stand and a sun roof. All that is gone now. Broken cups and glasses, turned tables and chairs, stains of blood and struggle are all that is left.
You pick one chair and turn a table around. The light coming through the sun roof makes you feel warm. You close your eyes for a moment, hoping that nothing interrupts you to make you run again.
A cold breeze brings you back to the present. You heart almost stop when you open your eyes. In the opposite side of the plaza, a thin tall woman is standing in silence. Her dark straight hear covers her face, and contrasts heavily with the white of her robes. You can’t see her face. She’s staring at you.
If you… Go to…
Attempt friendly contact Section 259
Run away Section 260
Attack first. Ask questions later. Section 261
Section 243
Attempt to have a civilized talk
As you turn around, eight red eyes look down on you. A giant spider communicates with you. Telepathy? Maybe. You put aside your stick and raise your hands in a non-frightening manner.
“I mean you no harm”, you say, “I’m just trying to find a safe place to rest.”
“Good”, the spider replies, “I don’t like when my food fights back”
Before you know it, the foul over sized arachnid jumps on top of you, injecting you with poisonous tranquilizers in one painful sting. Even though you fight back, the increased activity only makes the poison run through your body faster. The world around you blurs as your internal organs melt away. The spider strikes again, injecting you with another dose.
“Finally, live meat”, the spider says, “I was growing tired of dead flesh to eat.”
The spider spins you mid air, covering you with silky web.
YOU DIED
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 244
Strike first
With a swift strike you smash the giant spider thing against the wall. Before it can stand up, you smash it with your heavy boots.
You take a moment to catch your breath. You can’t stop thinking that those cocoons may have been survivors just like you. The light of day grows dim again. This day has been quite full of surprises this far. Time to find a safe place to crash the night again.
A foul smell comes from below. Whispers climb up the stairs as well. It doesn’t sound like undead people. Something is down there.
You look down to the bottom of the staircase, then you look at the door back to the sports shop. Either path will lead you into the unknown.
If you… Go to…
Go back to the store Section 223
Descend through the stairs Section 262
Section 245
Find out what all this is about
Around you, faces full of hope wait for your answer.
“I want to know more, before I can make a decision.”
Steve takes a deep breath.
“Very well. I’ll show you.”
People resume their work, and you follow Steve into a huge elevator. It seems improvised, but sturdy. There are only two buttons in the control panel. Steve presses the lower one, and smiles.
After several minutes, the doors open. You are in a huge underground gallery. The brute rock walls open up to either side. You step out and walk into a platform that oversees what looks like a valley of man made machines. Row after row, you see well aligned pods. There must be thousands of them. Beyond the horizon, a large mountain shaped machine produces energy to power the whole system.
“This, my friend, is Phoenix. These pods will cleanse our DNA and keep us safe, suspended in time for as long as it takes for nature to reset itself in the surface. We are ready, and with the fall of this colony… we have no other option.”
Steve looks at you, this time his friendly face turns extremely serious.
“Will you join us?”
If you… Go to…
Accept the offer Section 263
Reject the offer Section 264
Section 246
Decline the offer and stay behind.
Steve looks disappointed, lowers his head and nods.
“I understand your choice. But we must proceed for our own sake, and humanity’s as well”.
He signals his people. In organized groups, they carry notebooks, papers and books into the elevator. Batch by batch, they descend below. Steve stays behind, making sure all of their group depart. You watch in silence.
The door behind you holds steady the zombie horde.
The elevator comes one more time. Steve walks in, turns around and throws you a pair of car keys.
“Look”, he says, “there is still food here to last a few months, and this floor is nothing but safe. You can stay here and survive for a long time if you’d like… but if you ever make it out, use my car. Head north. There may be another colony. With some luck, it’s still there.”
The doors close. After a while, when the elevator’s motors becomes silent. Small charges detonate sealing the shaft. A cloud of dust escapes through the small slits. You just stay there, alone, and thinking that somehow staying behind was not such a good idea. But there is no way back now.
In time, the horde noises end. Your food supply seems to go on forever. Even the plumbing works. You spend your days reading, and watching outside for any other survivor that may come. The colony below is all but gone and forgotten now. Months pass. Without sustenance, the zombie horde becomes week and decays. Eventually, you venture out. Steve’s car is right where he said it should. It takes months for the battery to charge using solar panels, so you wait.
One Sunday morning you leave the mall forever. You head north. Who knows, maybe the colony in the north still exists. But that would be another story.
YOU SURVIVED
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 247
Run towards a military truck
You descend through the fire stairs on the side of the building. A few zombies notice you and run in your direction. You run towards a truck, pushing distracted zombies along the way. The first truck you try is locked. You move to the next you. This time, the door opens and you climb into the cabin. You also find the keys on the ignition.
The truck’s engine starts, but the loud noise attracts a thousand zombies from inside the mall. They surround the truck and climb over it, like ants on a lollipop. The truck can only push so hard to drive through them. The pressure is so much that it comes to a stop.
They brake the windows and get inside.
YOU DIED
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 248
Run away from the mall
From the safety of the roof, you inspect every corner in every direction. There is a gap in the wandering zombies in the parking lot. If you can descend without drawing attention to you, and sneak carefully past them, maybe you can make it to a secondary road.
First you think of using the fire stairs,
but that would put you in the wrong side of the building. So, you decide the best option will be to climb by the closest side, jumping over to the nearby tree. If you fall, the shrubbery below may soften your fall. More or less, it works. You make your way to the fence, and run away.
A zombie catch your scent, but you are already on the other side of the fence.
YOU SURVIVED
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 249
Play the file
You sit on the chair and open the file. After a loading spinning wheel, a person appears on the screen. To your surprise, the person is you!
“Yes, I’m you and you’re me. You made it. This place, all the things you lived for the past year in this zombie uprising, is nothing more than a simulation.”
You feel like you’re in the matrix.
“But the simulation is not as you think. The zombie end of the world did happen, many years ago. You are living the experiences of one of your ancestors. Now, look at this screen and wake up.”
A logo appears on the screen, and you open your eyes. You’re sitting on a chair, surrounded by people clapping and cheering at you. It takes a few moments, but your memory slowly comes back and now you know who you really are. It is the celebration party for the “Ancestor’s day”. The months you lived in the simulation were only a few hours in your real time. Your experiences projected for your family and friends to see.
Grabbing a drink, you set yourself apart from the crowd. You look through the window, far beyond the dome of protection that surrounds the city. There, in the distant wastelands, you think about your ancestor and how they survived the unthinkable. Having felt what they felt, the joy, the fear, the cold and the hunger. What a remarkable experience.
“This has been a great Ancestors’ day“, you tell yourself, and you drink from your cup.
YOU SURVIVED
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 250
Open the glass chamber
You approach the chamber and take the note off.
“Nothing for Christmas can’t be bad”, you tell yourself. Then, you open the door and walk inside the room. The door closes behind you and locks you in. Panicking, you hit the glass and try to break the window, but it doesn’t even make a dent.
“It’s not going to work”, a voice behind you announces. “The glass is bullet proof. But come, have a sit and chat with me.”
Walking around to the center of the room, you see on an examination table. On it, there is a highly decomposed zombie, too far gone to even move. He can’t get up, but turn it’s head and talks to you in a most cordial way.
“Where are my manners. I’m doctor Kim”, he says, pauses and then continues. “You see, it was supposed to work, but it didn’t. The air in this chamber is filled with a vaccination that will make you immortal…”
Doctor Kim tells you the story of his life, and with time you both talk about many things. You loose track of time, and maybe a few years pass before Kim decomposes so much that he can’t speak anymore. Your body can’t move either now, but its okay. You are immortal, just like him. The most terrible thing, is to pass time when you are alone. You miss talking with somebody else.
YOU SURVIVED..?
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 251
Don’t trust the doctor
The doctor waits for your reply. Something seems out of place. Making small talk, you ask the doctor about her plans. She tries her best to show herself composed. You listen while inspecting the location. There is a garage door, and a huge habitat truck, similar to the mobile lab you saw in the deposit. She continues talking, and now you direct your attention towards her. She’s talking about fixing the truck and travelling to a new location. You nod often, weighting the situation.
In the opposite side of the room there is a cooking pot with something boiling. You approach it and casually take a pick. The floating fingers in a green sauce tells you all you need to know. Adrenaline rushes through your veins. A loud noise behind you makes you turn. The doctor jumps at you waving an ax.
“Crap”
In a split second, you duck just in time. The fatal blow misses you but hits the pot right on, spilling human parts all over the floor. Out of balance, the doctor falls to the ground. She’s howling at you when she comes back up. You think of running out, but the moaning zombies outside keep you inside. You run behind a stretcher and push it against the doctor, clamping her against the wall.
For a moment, you both lock eyes. She smiles and throws her ax at you. Again, she misses. The ax gets stuck on the wall behind you. You keep pushing the stretcher trying to keep her at bay.
“Oh, crap. Oh, crap”
The doctor pulls herself into the stretcher, severing her bottom half. She’s now coming at you.
If you… Go to…
Fight the doctor Section 265
Get on the truck and run Section 266
Section 252
Trust the doctor
The doctor points out at a bag resting on a litter nearby. Inside, over a dozen vials hold a blue liquid.
“That”, she says, “it is the vaccine. It works. It prevents you from turning into a zombie. We need to take it to Eden, the safe zone to the north…”
You look at the truck, everything ready to depart. Then look back at the doctor. Something doesn’t add up.
“Why have you not taken them yourself?”
The doctor looks down in shame, almost about to break into tears.
“I can’t drive”, she says, “I never learned. Plus, the truck uses a stick gear. I tried, but I was afraid to break it.”
Flashes of your teenager years cross your mind. That summer your father insisted in you learning how to drive with a stick worked. With most of the cars with automatic gear, you questioned a thousand times the futility of learning this old technology. Now you whisper under your breath a thank you note to your dad.
“Good thing that I do know”, you reply with a smile.
Together, you both claim on the cabin of the truck. The doctor buzzes a remote control and opens the gate. Zombies outside watch the curtain raise, and like a bad opera, they walk into stage. Soon the room is filled with zombies. The armored roars and runs through them. It is a bumpy ride over bones and skulls until you reach the open road. You pick up speed, and watch the zombies grow small in your rear mirror. You are heading north, hoping to find the last human population.
YOU SURVIVED
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 253
Go with the soldiers
The whole operation looks as professional as it could be in the middle of the apocalypse. A female soldier leads you to the back of a tall truck. You climb in with some difficulty. The drowsiness is gone, but your muscles still feel like rubber. Inside, you find other civilians of all ages, even a few children. The lack of luster in their eyes tells you a hundred stories of how they survived.
The truck shakes and vibrates when the engine starts. A soldier closes the door and locks it up. As you start to move, you take a pick through the slits outside. Light comes in as the garage doors open. The smell of zombie rotten flesh mix in the air with the smoke from the trucks.
The heavy trucks move mercilessly through the undead horde. Passing by, you hear how the undead howl and scratch the sides of the truck. The convoy advances at a steady pace through the parking lot. You hear as soldiers yell commands and voices of battle. Machine guns, explosions. It is a war zone out there, as the army opens up a breach enough to pass. Through he slits of the truck, every now and then blood splatter jumps in. Have the soldiers stay to fight, they would be overrun. But the plan is to move out, and so they do.
The slow convoy moves for hours on end until it reaches the open road. The heavy armored vehicle at the front cleans up
the way by pushing abandoned vehicles aside. It works like the train on wheels. Relief to be out of danger for the time being, you ask where you are going.
“Eden”, is the only reply.
YOU SURVIVED
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 254
Refuse the offer, and take your chances alone
You have been alive and well this far. Plus, you’ve never been a big fan of the military. As far as you know, all of them could just be some wild militia. They dress in uniform, but don’t act like trained soldiers.
“Thanks, but not thanks”, you tell them. To your surprise, there is no argument and no intent of change your mind. They just turn around and leave you alone. You watch them climb in gigantic armored vehicles. A rush of adrenaline is the sign from your body that you’ve made a hug mistake.
As soon as the hangar doors open, the convoy moves slowly into the parking lot. It is the place where you came into the shopping mall. Your reminiscence doesn’t lasts. A horde of zombies floods in. Trapped and unprotected, there is no way to run. You try to climb to the back of the last truck, but mid way they get you. The zombies drag you down and tear you to pieces. Your involuntary sacrifice distracts the zombies from the main convoy. That’s why, maybe, they didn’t care to convince you. They knew, and didn’t care.
YOU DIED
If you… Go to…
Start from the beginning Section 1
Section 255
Open the tank that reads “test”
Zombie Mall Page 17