Realistic or Modern Dying to Live, Living to Die REBOOT (Not cliche Zombie survival) *COMPLETED*

(Alright well, it appears another tie-breaker is needed, now Ik this is tried and true and cliched, but it seems really immoral to leave this young child behind, especially considering he is in the midst of all this chaos, it wouldn't be right to just ditch him. So Option 1 has been chosen by tie-breaker)

“Come on out kid,” you say to the boy, reaching in to help him out. Damn, you hope you’re making the right decision.

“What’s your name?” you ask him, as you look him over.

“Jacob Baldwin,” he answers timidly.

“My name is Greg Bradley,” you offer – “How did you end up under the sink here in the kitchen?”

“Daddy threw me in the water and told me to hide under the dock, when the army men came and started shooting everyone!” the kid manages, before breaking down into tears again.

“It’s going to be all right,” you say weakly, trying to console the boy. “Look, you can come with me and I’ll keep you safe till we can find your mommy and daddy.”

“My daddy died!” Jacob bawls, “the army men shot him and all the other men. They took mommy away with the kids and their mommies too!”

Wow. That must have been really hard for a six or seven year old to see, you think, shaking your head.

“I’ll help you find your mommy then,” you say patting Jacob on the shoulder.

Of course you don’t believe that for a moment, but you got to get the kid to calm down and trust you if he’s going to be traveling with you.

“You promise?” Jacob asks you, looking for encouragement.

Ugh. You don’t want to make promises you know are a lie. The best you can offer is – “we’ll just have to do our best and see.”

There is an awkward silence momentarily, but you break it by asking the kid to help you gather supplies.

The two of you then look through the mess for anything remotely edible or at least useful. You manage to find a large chef-knife, a lighter for the propane stove, a full roll of duck-tape, and a small individual-sized bag of salad croutons. You take these and add them to your supplies, sharing the salad croutons with Jacob as you check out the stove.

You’re in luck – the stove still works with the propane tanks outside. Thinking about your thirst as well as your hunger, you take a large deep pot and a measuring cup, and head to the restrooms upstairs. There, you scoop out all the water from the back of the toilet tanks and bring it back down to the kitchen in the large pot. You place the water on the stove and add the water that you collected in your Pepsi bottles. You then leave the Pepsi bottles in the pot as well – might as well sterilize them along with the water.

As the water boils, you sift through the trash but find no food – other than a small bit of lard left in the bottom of a discarded container. You force yourself to try choking some of it down and stop when it seems to make you more sick than anything else. You’re not really sure there’s any nutritional value in lard anyway, so you toss the container and fill up with the boy on some of your boiled water – refilling your bottles and stowing them up for later.

The two of you then make your way around the back of the boat club and onto the docks. There are seven separate docks, floating out on the river off a wide boardwalk behind the building. About thirty bodies lay scattered about the docks – mostly men, but also three or four women. They all appear to have died of various gunshot wounds and not all to the head. They are all well dressed and rich looking people, but missing any watches or other jewelry. Whoever killed them appears to have thoroughly looted them. You also notice a distinct lack of any baggage – which one would expect to see from a group about to flee the city on boats; but then the looters probably took the baggage along with any other valuables.

Jacob is troubled at the sight and begins to cry, but does so quietly. He grabs the hem of your jacket and won’t leave your side.

You feel sorry for the boy, but focus on the scene. One thing you see here and there along the docks are brass shell casings. Large caliber rifle and what looks like military grade. You note shotgun shell casings around the groups of the dead and can imagine them firing shotguns at their attackers – the military perhaps? You saw the military vehicles out in the parking lot, but there are no military bodies out here on the docks…

You don’t see any boats currently moored to the docks, except at the far end, where the boat club’s fueling station is located. A large trawler and three sailboats were tied off there, but something has blown up the fueling station and the resulting fire has burned the boats down to their hulls. Even the fueling dock itself is completely destroyed and half sunk.

Walking out onto the docks, you notice a line tied to a mooring point, but running taught down into the water. Grabbing the line, you give it a pull and can feel something big under the water slowly moving toward you. You continue to heave the line up, one foot after another, until the bow of a small wooden rowboat suddenly breaks the surface. You slowly lever it up and drag it onto the dock, then note a foot wide hole smashed through the bottom of the hull.

“It’s got a hole in it,” Jacob observes.

“Yeah, I see it,” you reply patiently.

If you can find something to patch it with, you might be able to use it to cross the river.

You then go back inside the boat club building with the kid and recall the wooden oars in the small equipment shop. Those will certainly be of use if you can get a patch going.

After giving it some thought, you go upstairs and grab a plastic shower curtain, and then head down into the kitchen. There you find a large pie tin.

You think that you could duck-tape the pizza tin over the hole in the rowboat, and then cover that with a piece of shower curtain. You’ve heard that duck-tape can hold underwater if applied dry first, and the pizza tin would give it enough strength against the water pressure. As long as the tape seal along the edges of the shower curtain holds, the rowboat should be in good enough shape to cross the river.

You decide to wait until morning however, to give the boat a chance to dry overnight, and the two of you a chance to sleep. With no zombies in the immediate area, you go upstairs with Jacob to the sitting lounge and barricade the door. If zombies do come around during the night, they shouldn’t bother you – and since you’re only on the second floor, you should be able to escape out the windows if you have to.

You then point to one of the many large black leather couches in the sitting lounge – “you sleep there; I’ll take this one over here.”

Thinking about it a little more you decide to outline some more survival rules.

“If you hear anything besides the two of us, anywhere in or outside the building, I’m going to need you to tell me, but be very quiet about it. We will be safe up here, if they don’t know we’re in here. That and we got a pretty good barricade going. Even if they come up, we can escape out the window. Got it?”

“Yes Mister Greg.”

“Good, now let’s get some shuteye.”

You set your gear nearby and lay down to relax.

The next morning you and the boy awake – more thirsty and hungry than ever. You should probably do some more scavenging for food in your travels today – or you might not make it the rest of the way home. At least you have plenty of clean water though, and it has never tasted so good as you drink some of it down and share the rest with Jacob.

“We need to see about scrounging up some food today,” you say as you gather up your things.

“Yes, food!” Jacob says with a really hungry expression.

You can’t help but chuckle and pat the kid on the head.

“We’ll see what we can find,” you conclude.

You gather up your gear and are taking down your barricade to leave, when Jacob asks an astute question.

“It’s zombies in the city, aren’t they Mr. Greg?”

Since you’re likely to run into thousands more of them with the boy, you decide it best to just tell him the truth.

“I’m afraid so,” you answer.

“Will they get us?” he asks tearfully.

“Not if we use our heads,” you say; “If we both do that and you do what I say when I say it, then I’ll be able to keep you safe until we can get out of this mess.”

Jacob wipes his face, but says no more.

The two of you then carefully make your way back out onto the docks to look at the rowboat. Still no zombies around and all seems quiet in the early morning light.

The two of you:

1. Try to patch the rowboat and cross the river

2. Go back to the parking lot and try to revive the two and a half ton truck

3. Leave the boat club and make your way to the train bridge on the rocky embankment along the river

1

The Omen of Death

1. Hope the boy doesn't get seasick.
EDIT: Oh wait...

(Hey I am dealing with college finals and whatnot so I apologize again for the delay, I will make up for it by doing the plan I have done with the other times this has happened, anyway Option 1 has been chosen with 2 votes!)

You and the boy gather together your gear, the supplies needed to patch the boat, and the lifejacket and set of wooden oars from the small equipment shop. Luckily, there are no zombies down near the river yet, so the two of you head over to the rowboat and begin working on the patch.

You duck-tape the pizza tin over the hole and then use the chef-knife to cut a section out of the vinyl shower curtain. You then tape this in place over the pizza tin and seal all the edges with a generous amount of the duck-tape. You hope it holds, because you’ve got no more tape to work with.

As you slide the rowboat back into the water, you see that the patch is holding and no water appears to be leaking in. You have Jacob climb in, throw all your gear into the boat, jump in to set the oars, and begin rowing.

Once you are safely away from the docks you look over your shoulder to see where you are going you’re rowing with your back to the bow of the boat. You see that the current in the river is quite noticeable, but not so much that you can’t deal with it in the rowboat. You figure that you can row directly across the river to a point along the south side of the river with a very similar rocky embankment as on the north side.

Looking up river, you see the broken Veteran’s Bridge and the train bridge just beyond. You consider trying to row upriver to the train bridge. It might be harder and take a bit longer, but there may be a slight advantage in doing do.

As you recall, your home is about ten miles south of the Indian River, and a little more west upstream than your current position. Normally, that wouldn’t take very long to travel, but based on what you’ve seen, the zombies slow you down considerably – and you’re probably looking at double or even triple the normal time frame presuming the boy can keep up. Still, you have plenty of daylight to work with and should be able to get home well before nightfall.

The difference is that you may have to pass through more zombie infested streets and if you go directly across the river, you’ll have to travel southward past the railroad tracks anyway. Also, you remember that the tracks themselves seemed to be somewhat recessed back away from all the residential areas. It might mean that you and the boy can travel down the tracks without meeting quite as many zombies. That and your car is at a commuter parking lot only four miles down the tracks from the bridge. If the roads are clear enough, you might be able grab your car and drive home.

Of course you could also try to jack a car directly across the river from you and save yourself a tough bit of rowing. You check your patch and see that it seems to be holding fine.

You decide to:

1. Row one mile directly across the river

2. Row three miles upstream to the train bridge and travel from there

2. The current will help.

(Yeah, no problem. Life comes first. The make up posts work just as well for me.)

2. Okie dokie.

(Option 2 has been chosen with 2 votes!)

You take the time to make the long row upriver toward the train bridge. It takes almost two hours, but you and the boy finally make it – both amazed that your ducktape patch has held this whole time. You note that just like the river’s north shore, a road follows along the southern shore, above a steep rocky embankment. Residential areas overlook the river about eighty to a hundred feet up steep grassy hillsides rising beyond the road.

You land the boat on the steep rocky embankment, help Jacob out, gather up all your gear, and then begin climbing up to the road. Fortunately, you don’t see any zombies on the road anywhere near the train bridge.

Arriving under the bridge, you look around, but don’t see any nearby road access from the river road up to the train bridge itself. A sheer concrete abutment, about sixty feet high, runs along the road (opposite the river side) for at least two to three hundred yards in both directions – and the nearest roadway is at least another mile further upriver to the west.

You do note however, that the ends of the concrete abutment gradually slope downward as they go along, and appear to be only ten or so feet high at the far ends. You should be able to get up onto the abutment there, and then walk up its length all the way to the top.

Heading to the far end, you see that a narrow footpath has been worn into the hillside at the foot of the abutment and that you and Jacob are easily able to scramble up and onto it without any problem. It’s also about three feet wide, so you’re not too concerned about falling off – as long as you don’t suddenly find yourself fleeing down its length from a ravening horde of zombies or something…

“I’m scared!” Jacob says, hesitant to walk up the top of the abutment.

“Here,” You say, getting out your rope and cinching an end of it around the boy’s waist.

“You can follow me up with the rope tied between us, or you can walk below on the road and then I’ll pull you up when I get to the top.”

“I… I’ll follow you with the rope,” Jacob responds nervously. Apparently that’s not as scary to him as being pulled up a sixty foot high wall.

“Ok,” you say, tying the rope around your own waist, and then gathering up all the gear – “watch your step and don’t look down over the side.”

You refrain from telling him that if he slips, you’re both likely to fall over the side to your deaths.

You and the boy walk up the concrete abutment to the train bridge and climb through the steel truss-beams and out onto the tracks. Looking south, you see that the tracks are clear of zombies and fenced-off from the residential areas on either side.

The two of you begin walking south down the tracks, knowing that you’re only four miles to your car. As you go, you notice a painful puffiness around all of your wounds and stop a moment to get a better look at them. Sure enough, they are swollen and surrounded in angry-red lines traveling out from them. You note that you also feel a little feverish and realize that you’ve got a serious infection going here.

Damn! It must have been the nasty shit you inadvertently exposed yourself to. If the world hadn’t all suddenly gone to hell, you wouldn’t even be worried. You’d just go get an antibiotic and be done with it. But without modern meds, this stuff can kill…

You are abruptly snapped out of your thoughts however, when you hear a large pack of dogs barking and snarling nearby. Looking, you see about two dozen dogs attacking a group of zombies in a parking lot, out in front of coincidentally a large Veterinary Clinic not too far from the railroad tracks.

Amazingly, the zombies don’t seem to respond to the dogs – other than being drawn toward the commotion – while the dogs ‘pack-tackle’ and pull down individual zombies to devour them ravenously. There is something primeval about the dog pack; and you know that they’re no longer your friendly neighborhood house pets. The threat of starvation has driven them back to the pack and now they easily hunt their slow-moving dull-witted zombie prey.

Thinking about the Veterinary Clinic, you wonder if anyone has thought to loot it yet. As an animal hospital, they would stock all sorts of drugs and medical supplies for the various animal surgeries. If you can figure out a way around both the zombies and ‘man-eating’ dog pack, you might be able to recover some truly valuable supplies – maybe even the antibiotics you need to beat this infection.

“Don’t go over there,” Jacob says nervously, “you might get bit by a dog”…

You decide to:

1. Leave Jacob here; go under the chain-link fence and circle wide around the parking lot to get into the front of veterinary clinic, while the dogs distract the zombies

2. Take the kid with you around the front parking lot

3. Leave Jacob here; go back up toward the train bridge, and then jump the fence and circle wide around the entire block, to get into the veterinary clinic through a back alley

4. Take the kid with you around to the back of the veterinary clinic

5. Don’t risk it and keep going down the tracks

3. I think i'll need those antibiotics; if they still have any. Don't want to screw up while driving.

4. We need meds pretty badly, we have to take a chance. Don't feel safe leaving Jacob here though, best to bring him along.

(Sorry once again for the long delay, you get the drill of what's going on with me, but I need to stop this tie, I'd probably agree that leaving him alone is not the best idea. So Option 4 has been chosen by tie-breaker!)

“Come one,” you say to Jacob, heading back toward the train bridge.

“Where are we going?” Jacob asks nervously.

“We’re going to go search the veterinary clinic for medical supplies,” you reply.

“Oh, I don’t want to go in there!” Jacob says, near panic.

You sigh, trying not to be too domineering.

“Look,” you say, “we need everything we can get our hands on, if we are going to survive this thing. Right now, I need you to stick by me, and do what I say without questions, so I can keep you safe. Understand?”

Jacob tears up, but nods. He obviously doesn’t like the plan, but complies.

The two of you head up the tracks until you are out of sight of the parking lot and then climb up and over the fence. Carefully making your way around the main block with the boy, you find a narrow alleyway that heads back to the rear of the veterinary clinic.

Fortunately, there are no zombies in the back alley, but even back here you can still hear the ruckus of the dog pack out front. You hope that all the wandering dead within earshot have already been drawn to the sound, so as not to have any stumble into the alleyway with you inadvertently.

Reaching the rear of the clinic, you see several outside dog-runs, affixed to the back of the building. Each has or at least had a large doggy-door between the building and the run itself, to allow animals to go in and out at will. You note that all the doggy-doors, except for the one in the very last run, have been ripped apart; and that even the cinder-blocks surrounding the door-frames have been smashed and displaced – almost like something too big to fit through had forced itself in anyway. The splatter of blood and fur in each of the now empty dog-runs seems to suggest something truly awful happened to whatever animals where once in there.

You also note that the back fencing of the second dog-run has been torn completely open. You wonder if that means whatever did all this has escaped into the city – or if that was how it got inside the building in the first place. The last dog-run along the row is actually smaller than the others – made for a smaller breed of dog you guess. The doggy-door between that run and the building is only a foot high by a few inches wide, and is still intact. When you get closer, you see a ratty-looking Pomeranian dog curled up in the farthest reaches of the run. It looks half dead from dehydration and trembles something terrible.

“Oh, a doggy!” Jacob exclaims, but you quickly cover his mouth with your hand; and then motion him to be quiet with a finger to your lips.

On the left side of this last dog-run, you see a short set of concrete steps that go up to the rear door of the veterinary clinic itself…

1. Take the kid and enter the veterinary clinic through the rear door

2. Carefully climb through the hole and into the second dog-run, so that you can take a stealth-look into the clinic through the busted out doggy-door

3. Try to give the small Pomeranian some water through the fencing first

4. Come to the conclusion there’s something in there that you don’t want to tangle with and head back to the tracks with the boy

2. I don't like Pomeranians... If it was a Shiba Inu, I'd take it along

2. Movie spoiler the dog dies.

(Option 2 has been chosen with 2 votes!)

You have Jacob hide against the building, down between the concrete steps and the Pomeranian’s cage.

“Wait here,” you whisper, “I’m going to make sure it’s safe inside; then I’ll come open this back door for you.”

Jacob sinks down in his nook as far as he can.

“Hurry,” he pleads nervously.

You then go over and cautiously climb up into the second dog-run through the hole in the fencing and creep toward the busted out doggy-door. Amid the usual smells of caged animals that you would expect to have inside the clinic, you also smell the salty stink of slaughter and the sickening stench of decomposition.

Listening, you can hear something breathing heavily just inside the building and to your right. Whatever it is, it doesn’t sound like a zombie – they don’t breath right? – Nor does it sound like a dog or other animal you’d expect in a clinic. The breathing is larger and deeper – like a bear or mountain lion…

Very quietly, you take a peek into the building and see a number of smashed and ripped-open pens and cages scattered all over the place. Bones and tufts of fur are all that remain of whatever animals were once in them. You are currently looking in from the long row of dog kennels that lead out to the runs along the outer wall of the building. All of the bars to the kennels are bent or completely broken open; and bloody splashes on the walls and floor within, indicate the fate of the once occupants. The Pomeranian’s kennel at the far end however, while ripped open, shows no signs of blood. It must be that the door flap leading out is too small for whatever did this to get through.

Directly across from you is a pet washing station and a hallway leading through a storage area, past two surgical suites, and to a closed door at the far end. You note two large locked drug cabinets in the storage area; one of which is also some sort of refrigeration unit – though it has been without power for some time now.

You then look toward the sound of heavy breathing and wait for your eyes to adjust to the shadows. Lying in a corner just to your right, amid almost a nest-like pile of twisted cage fragments is a huge crimson abomination of some sort. It looks like a giant-sized canine – only now completely warped and hairless, with thick red skin, banded over rippling and wholly unnatural musculature. Huge bone spikes protrude from the thing’s neck and shoulders, while long black talons sprout from its over-sized paws – each as wide as a human head. The beast really is as large as a bear and is currently sleeping. Even sleeping, it looks incredibly dangerous.

You freeze where you are a moment, waiting for your heartbeat to come back down to a reasonable rate. The fact that the monster is sleeping, leads you to believe that it is a living creature, rather than undead. That probably means that it can be killed. Still, what the hell caused it mutate into what slumbers before you? It makes you wonder what other monsters besides zombies have been released upon the world in this damn apocalypse.

You test the grip on your weapon and wonder if a well-placed blow to the base of its skull would finish it off. Given that it is sleeping might mean you could actually creep up to it for a try. But damn if you want that thing awake and on you – it would rip you limb from limb.

With it in here however, there’s no way you can get into the clinic to look for supplies – and who’s to say the thing won’t try to track you and the kid’s scent or something when it wakes up.

Given this, you:

1. Try to sneak up and do it in while it sleeps

2. Forget the clinic and back the hell out of there now!

1. Fight me, coward. I'll die to a mutant dog before I die from germs and bacteria.

2. That skull is too thick to crush, and it wont kill him before he takes us with him.

(Grr, it happened again. It didn't post but saved as a draft instead. Sorry for holding things up.)

The Omen of Death

(Hey guys once again I must apologize for the delay, Christmas time occupied me away from being able to post anything new, so anyway let's get back on track, and with a tiebreaker I'd say it's better we try taking it out, as I'd say we need those meds now, and this would be a waste of an opportunity no matter how dangerous it would seem. So Option 1 has been selected through tie-breaker!)

You take a deep breath, hold it, and very carefully creep in and tiptoe over to where the giant monster is sleeping. You half expect it to snap awake at any moment, thinking it has to hear your heart beating as loudly in your chest as you do. But you manage to get up alongside it without it stirring. It just lays there breathing heavily.

You note a placard on a section of broken cage that it currently rests on. The placard reads: ‘Rabies Quarantine’. You wonder if this creature was a rabid dog and the rabies virus somehow mutated with the zombie virus to create this abomination.

Raising your fire ax high over your head, you hesitate a moment – not wanting to get this wrong. You have to kill it in one blow, while you have the chance. You note that the huge bone spines protruding from the thing’s neck actually come right out of the vertebrae and through its thick leathery skin. You can see right where you need to strike, in order to chop down on its spinal column to remove its head, or at least paralyze it – but it’s going to be a tricky shot to get the blow down between the protective spines.

Looking at the thing’s head, you see that it’s not protected by any spines, but is incredibly thick and bony-looking. You doubt that hitting it in the head would kill it in one blow, so you’re going to have to make the strike down between the bone spines.

Having decided; you line it up and slam the blade of the fire ax down on the sleeping beast’s neck at the base of its skull with all your weight and might! There is a loud chunking sound and immediately, the monster’s blood-red eyes snap open and it jolts back with a yelping roar.

With it startled by the sudden attack, you rip the blade free and hit it again. The force of the second blow sends a shockwave through the monster’s massive body and it abruptly slumps forward, twitching and wheezing loudly. A few more blows and you’re completely removed the head from the beast’s massive spike-plated shoulders. You then take a moment to catch your breath and watch as the monster stops moving altogether and huffs out its final dying breath through the bloody hole in the stump of its neck.

Backing away, you shudder. Damn, you’re sure glad it was sleeping. Had you tried to come in the rear door first, you might have woken it up…

Listening, you don’t hear anything coming to investigate the noise. Obviously, the monster canine would have eaten anything else in the building with it. Still, you don’t want to take any chances and move cautiously, as you check out each of the areas off the hallway leading to the closed door at the far end.

The pet washing station is open and empty with nothing in it to warrant any sort of in-depth search. Moving to the supply area, you find all sorts of stuff, mostly unopened packs of medical supplies that you’d expect to find stocked in the surgical suites; but there is also some animal feed, administrative items, and the two large locked drug cabinets.

You easily pry open the drug cabinets and find the cabinets stocked with a variety of antibiotics, germicides, and pain killers like Novocain syringes and morphine in little needle-free syringes, meant to be administered orally. You know they’re made for animals, but they got to be better than nothing or so you hope. Finding an antibiotic with a familiar sounding name, you see a dose-by-weight chart and quickly determine how much you’ll need to fight your infection. Hoping for the best, you take the first dose; and then fill your supplies with the rest, before heading over to the surgical suites.

Inside are a variety of useful medical supplies, including bandages, gauze, wraps and tape, medical tools, suture kits, scissors, scalpels, syringes, antiseptic, saline IV bags, and sterile water. You grab a bottle of sterile water and drink it down. It certainly tastes ‘sterile’ all right, but at least it’s refreshing. You find a large medical bag as well and fill it with as much as you can manage.

Going to the door at the end of the hallway, you once again listen, but don’t hear anything. Cautiously opening the door, you see a large waiting room with a counter to one side, a wall of various animal feed and toys on the other side, and a row of waiting chairs in between. A single glass door exits the waiting area, to a small foyer with a coat-rack and large glass doors leading out of the building itself. Through the large windows in the outside wall of the waiting room, you can see the zombies milling around the parking lot. Apparently, the dog pack has moved on and the zombie horde has begun to wander about again.

Driven by hunger and a little curiosity, you crouch low and go over to the feed section to look at some of the items on display. There are sacks and cans of food for various kinds of animals. You note some tins of 100% natural dog foods. Hmm, beef and chicken with vegetable, precooked and ready to serve…the dogs aren’t going to need it. You load up on as many tins as you can comfortably carry with the rest of your gear.

You head out of the clinic and back into the alleyway behind it. Retreating Jacob from his hiding spot and making your way around the block, you see that the zombies now wander the parking lot and surrounding streets, like nothing ever happened. You grimace at the huge swath of greasy ichor and chewed up bones, left in the wake of the dog pack’s hunt. Damn. Too much death.

Crouching low, the two of you make your way back to the fence demarking the railroad tracks. As you and the boy climb up over, a number of zombies, no longer distracted by the dogs, see you and lurch into motion. The rest see this new activity and soon the entire horde is heading your way.

“They’re coming!” Jacob moans in fear.

You don’t wait for the zombies to get to the fence however; grab Jacob by the arm, and hurry away down the tracks. The zombies continue to follow on the other side of the fence, but the two of you quickly outpace them and eventually they are long out of sight.

You and the kid continue traveling down the tracks, grateful that for most of the way, a tall chain-link fence stands between you and roving hordes of undead on both sides.

After a while, you head through a short tunnel running under a small ridge in the landscape. Coming out the other side, you see a large fenced-in propane processing plant of some kind on the right side of the tracks no too far off. Getting closer, Jacob abruptly holds his nose in disgust and you suddenly note the ‘rotten-egg’ smell of gas in the air. Looking, you see a huge hundred foot long propane tank just inside the fence hissing away with a small bullet hole in it. A large mob of zombies are also on the other side of the chain-link fence ravenously crowding around something in their midst’s near a collection of corrugated steel buildings and sheds.

You also can’t help but notice a large hole in the fence along the tracks a little ways down that could prove to be a major problem, should any of the zombies see you trying to pass by and decide to come pouring out after you.

As you pull Jacob down to observe unseen, you suddenly see two men fighting their way out from among the zombies. One guy, armed with a massive sledge hammer, is of Middle Eastern descent and is quite hairy with a long beard. The other guy has no weapons, but is a flurry of sweeps, kicks, knees, and elbows. He looks like he could be Spanish and is exceptionally lanky with a goatee and mustache that make him look something like a modern day conquistador.

You see some bloody bites on the Middle Eastern guy’s arms, but he continues to slam away at zombie heads with the sledge – pulping them left and right with great strength, even as they reach in clawing at him and taking hold of his long beard. The Spaniard meanwhile, doesn’t look touched yet; and is actually doing an impressive job keeping the zombies at bay with lightning-fast kicks that continually knock them back or topple them over. You wonder how long he can keep up such a blistering pace though.

If it weren’t for the fact that the zombie mob is actually between you and the two men, you’d think about trying to get their attention somehow. Maybe they could escape with you and the boy down the tracks – or at least the Spaniard as long as he can somehow keep from getting bit as well.

A moment later and the sledge-man is pulled down by the zombies, in spite of his best efforts to resist. Seeing his companion swarmed over, the Spaniard grabs the sledge hammer and flees away from the mob – running further away from you and into a large corrugated steel building. The undead mob pursue, crowding at the doorway to file in after the man.

“Is he going to get away?” Jacob asks with unfeigned concern for the stranger.

You quietly shush the boy and consider using this distraction to sneak past the hole in the fence and continue down the tracks as all the zombies are currently facing the opposite direction. That’s when the two of you hear a loud clank and a clattering sound from inside the corrugated steel building – followed by a loud whoosh – and then see a four foot long propane cylinder come flying out of the building to blast its way through the pressing zombies. As the cylinder quickly flies through the air toward your position, you see it trailing a jet of fire and suddenly realize that it’s headed straight for the hundred foot long tank right next to you!

Miraculously, the cylinder hits a light post on its way over and veers off ninety degrees to land with a thump in the grass about two hundred feet to the left, not too far from the hole in the fence. Unfortunately, it’s still jetting flame and the tank right next to you is still hissing gas. You figure you got mere seconds before the inevitable happens and just know it isn’t going to end well…

1. You see a stack of heavy wooden railroad ties nearby piled six feet high – grab Jacob and dive behind them

2. Sprint back to the railroad tunnel with the kid and throw yourselves to the ground inside

3. Try to sprint with the boy down the tracks, past the hole in the fence, and away from the area before anything explodes

1 seems like a lot of flying shrapnel, but I'm split between 2 and 3. I'll settle for 2 as it seems to be the safer option, but I'll listen to Agent if he has good reasoning to pick 3.

2. I'm not open to unreasonable ideas at the moment.

Also 2. The kid is not strong enough to succeed the 3.

Edit: Thank you!

Pryno said:

Also 2. The kid is not strong enough to suceed the 3.

Click to expand...

Wow, new blood! Welcome Pryno

(Option 2 has been chosen with 3 votes! Welcome Pryno )

You sprint back up the tracks with the boy and dive into the railroad tunnel just moments before a tremendous thudding boom nearly bursts out your eardrums. The ground shakes and small chips of stone fall from the ceiling, as a wash of intense heat blows in through the end of the tunnel – then abates quickly. You cover Jacob with your body and bury your face in the dirt with your arms over your head, waiting for the uncomfortable heat to pull away. Then you slowly get up to look yourself over when it does. Your hair and clothing are actually scorched a bit, but you are otherwise intact and Jacob is fine, except for complaining of his ears ringing.

Carefully walking back out of the tunnel, you see a massive fireball rising high into the air on a column of black smoke. You also see a burning crater where the giant propane tank used to be, and a field of flattened buildings, and burning zombie bodies scattered all around. There’s no sign of the Spaniard, but if he was in one of the flattened buildings when the tank exploded, it probably didn’t work out to well for him.

You call Jacob over to you and consider trying to go see if you can actually find the Spaniard among the wreckage, but then the twitching of a few smoldering zombies make you think better of it. The sound of the explosion and the huge fireball going up into the sky has probably attracted every zombie in a ten mile radius. You’d better just get going now, while the two of you still can.

The farther south you and Jacob go the more the city seems to thin out and after a couple of miles, there’s no longer a fence along the tracks. Fortunately, the tracks are set well back from the population center itself, passing behind housing communities, industrial complexes, and even passing through some remote wooded areas. If you weren’t trying to get home, you’d actually consider trying to set up a camp in one of these more rural areas.

After going four miles, you’ve come back out of the more remote areas and into the suburbs again. You can actually see the train station a few hundred yards up the tracks ahead on the right, and note a commuter train stopped on the southbound tracks. As you and Jacob cautiously approach, you can see that the last four cars of the train are leaning over at a peculiar angle. Getting closer, you note that the cars of the train are actually being held up by some large vehicles trapped up alongside them where the train crosses a main road. Looking down the tracks beyond, you see that the rest of the cars in that direction have completely derailed and lie flopped over on their sides off the low embankment following the track.

You also observe a number of completely mangled cars and some dismembered body parts strewn amid the gridlock and zombies out on the street near the tracks and surmise that the train must have been trying to flee the city, when it ran through vehicles stopped on the tracks and derailed. Incidentally, you don’t see any zombies wandering around in any of the train cars themselves, so you carefully make your way between the train and loading platform along the west side to get past the wreck without being seen by any of the zombies out in the streets.

Arriving on the west side of the main road, you are surprised to see the gridlock on this side of the tracks is drastically reduced compared to the endless stretch of it on the east side of the tracks. Beyond a few more wrecked vehicles along the tracks themselves, you see that the streets are backed up only a few more blocks to the west, before thinning out again. You should be able to get your car and maneuver through the occasional obstacle, until you’re far enough from the city that gridlock and massive zombie hordes will no longer be a factor.

You take Jacob around the train station itself to the large commuter parking lot on the other side and stop behind some thick hedges against the red brick building to catch your breath. Looking out into the parking lot, you see that most of the vehicles that were there, when you left that morning to go to work, are still there. It makes you wonder what became of them all. Has anyone else managed to escape the city of the dead? Or are you the only one.

A number of zombies wander aimlessly around the parking lot, apparently deterred from leaving somehow, by the simple orange and white banded toll-arms dropped down across the exits. Even down, you should be able to drive right through those without any problem. You make a quick headcount and tally seventeen zombies in the lot; including a police officer zombie right next to your car. Even so, there are enough cars in the lot that you should be able to stealth your way with the boy to the car unseen. Even if the police officer or another zombie ends up blocking the car, you should be able to take it out quick enough to get the two of you in and started before the rest can swarm you.

Regardless, you look over the exit points in the lot a moment before heading out, to plan ahead a bit. You can see that once you are in your car, you’ll need to take the north exit, where you can see a vehicle-free backstreet not too far away that you can take to bypass the two or three blocks of gridlock on the main road.

Thinking about the police officer zombie again, you wonder if it still has its sidearm. Damn, you sure could use a working firearm. It might actually be worth trying to take him out anyway, just to get his sidearm…

You decide to:

1. Take the time to stalk down the police officer zombie first, and then get to your car

2. Forget that, just get to your car and get out of here!

1. A sidearm would be immensely useful, for the reasons stated before, not to mention in dealing with the intruder we heard in our house.

1. Never let loot behind. Also, the car should allow a stealth attack.

(Sorry again guys for the long delay, Happy New Years! Just had to finish up all the celebrations and being with family, anywho HOPEFULLY things should return to a normalish rate again. Anyway Option 1 has been chosen with 2 votes!)

You sneak into the parking lot with the boy. Arriving at your car, you set Jacob in the back seat and tell him to stay low. He begs you not to leave him here alone, but you put a finger to your lips and quietly shut the door.

Then looking around, you see the police officer zombie not too far off and slowly stalk toward it between the cars – simultaneously keeping an eye on the positions of the other zombies in the lot. The last thing you want is to be surprised by one inadvertently. Luckily, they just wander around in a predictable fashion and you can look under the cars to see their feet and legs when they are close.

Coming up behind the police zombie, you ready your weapon, and see that his holster is empty. Damn, it figures – he probably had it out defending himself when he got bit. He does have something black in his hand though, but as he turns enough for you to see what that is, you realize that he’s holding a broken police radio rather than the gun.

You are about to head back the other way before he sees you, when he inexplicably starts to sniff the air loudly and then abruptly spins around to face you! Crap! When did the zombies start to have a sense of smell?!? The zombie lunges at you hungrily – attracting the attention of the others – but being ready, you slam it double-overhand in the face with your fire ax, and watch it slowly sink to the ground with a huge blood-squirting gash where its forehead used to be. As it goes down, you can’t help but notice the officer’s name on his uniform. “Officer Sol” – How ironic.

Turning, you begin to hurry back to your car with the rest of the zombies honing in on you, wailing and moaning loudly. You stop yourself though, reining in your natural instinct to panic, and force yourself to apply a bit of strategy to the situation. Making sure the zombies can see you, you run away from your car to the far side of the lot – drawing them all after you. When they’ve sufficiently mobbed together, you run wide around them and back to your car.

Hopping in and locking the doors, you start the vehicle and pull out of your spot. With the zombies closing back in, you zoom through the lot, clipping a few and knocking them over, but not hitting hard enough to damage your car or kill them outright. Jacob looks up from the back seat – happy to see you – and puts his seat belt on as you swerve and maneuver. Speeding to the north exit, you smash through the orange and white banded toll-arm and out into the vehicle-free backstreet you spotted earlier.

You drive your car down the backstreet for a few blocks and then turn back onto the main road.

While there are a few abandoned cars here and there, it’s nothing like the gridlock you’ve seen on the other side of the railroad tracks, and you are easily able to maneuver your car around them to keep going. In fact, the farther south and west that you go, the more clear the roads become – as you leave the city behind and get into the suburbs proper.

You continue along, passing condos and housing developments, driving past a scattering of wandering zombies. The undead are attracted to the sound of the car and follow after, but you leave them well in your dust and continue on unscathed. With your own home only six miles from the train station, you should make it there in no time. You are eager to get back and see what has become of your wife and family; and worry greatly for their well-being.

You are snapped out of your thoughts abruptly however, when a young woman stumbles out on the road ahead of you and begins trying to wave you down. She’s alone and you don’t see any zombies chasing her at the moment – and zombies aren’t known to wave down traffic – so at least you know she’s a survivor. What you don’t know however, is if this is some kind of ambush or other dangerous ploy…

Looking at her closer, you see that she’s a somewhat short twenty-something, with really long curly brown hair and dressed like a tomboy in work boots, jeans and a flannel shirt. She carries a bloodied hockey stick and has an injury on her right shoulder – as her shirt is torn there and stained red.

She’s enough in the road that you’ll have to stop, slow down to pass, or simply run her down.

“Hey look at that girl!” Jacob says on seeing her; “Are you going to stop and save her?”

1. You can’t just leave a helpless survivor. Stop the car and see if she needs help

2. Slow down, but don’t stop. You can’t risk getting involved

3. It’s some kind of a trap! Floor it and run her down!

As much as I want to help her, we have already delayed far too much on getting to our family. Our wife and child should be our number one priority so we can't take the precious time to help her. It is also very likely that this is an ambush, or that she will turn soon, seeing the gash on her shoulder, so let's just put her out of her misery. Tell Jacob to close his eyes first though.

3.