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

Jakelad said:

I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning, Heisenberg, and as such will proceed to investigate the basement.

I require no reason other than overwhelming curiosity.

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Heisenberg said:

*Heisenberg buries his face with his hands.*

You have doomed us all! All of us! We going to die, man. We gonna die. Oh, but it's just a damn basement, Heisy. I was just curious, just wanna see what was under this house. Then suddenly we bump into a horde of cannibals and get feasted on by the multitude of these sick bastards.

*Heisenberg continues to sputter more words under his breath.*

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ViciousVip3R said:

I'm curious to see why you think the basement is overrun when the entire house has thus far been devoid of any creatures other than the racoon. If anything, you would think that the upper floors would be the most infested as our neighbor retreated in that direction. It's not like gravity would pull the zombies towards the basement, or anything. Although I'm sure the author could make a way to make the basement completely infested by suggesting that the neighbor lured and trapped them there or something, if we were to look at this objectively, the basement should be relatively safe. Of course, in addition to the need to satify our curiosity, there is also the added concern that there is some monstrosity there that we will be completely unaware, something that is completely unacceptable if we plan to stay in the house for a while.

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Heisenberg said:

Oh, damn, didn't think of that. So I was just being unnecessarily paranoid this entire time?

*Dramatic pause.*

. . . But. . . what if there are actually super zombies out there that are attracted to staying inside the basement?

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ViciousVip3R said:

There is no rule that we have to stay and engage them. We just book it like hell....(and if we die we respawn). And at least we know there is something there. "Of course, in addition to the need to satify our curiosity, there is also the added concern that there is some monstrosity there that we will be completely unaware of, which is completely unacceptable if we plan to stay in the house for a while."

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The Omen of Death said:

(Well sorry for not posting this yesterday like I said I would... Guess we will just move as usual, to make up for it you got an even longer post. Also possible trigger warning, of implied rape so just bringing that up before hand. So Option 1 has been chosen with 3 votes!)

Going upstairs, you are surprised and at the same time encouraged to find an intact barricade at the top. Someone – hopefully your wife – has stacked a few bedroom doors across the opening and backed them with a large mattress and some heavy dressers. The barricade shows signs of zombie attack, being scraped up and bloodied, but it looks like it held the duration.

Arriving at the top of the stairs, you listen carefully, but don’t hear anything on the other side.

Again, you want to call out for your wife Laura, but if there’s someone else up here with her, you don’t want them to know exactly where you are.

Giving the barricade a careful looking over – something a zombie wouldn’t do – you see that you can climb up and squeeze through at the very top. Getting up there and using your fire ax to help pry it open enough to fit through, you slither in and back down the other side.

With your fire ax and an empty pistol in hand for show, you look around and see that the doors to the bathroom and both kids’ rooms have been taken off to use in the barricade, while the master bedroom door is still on and shut.

Moving cautiously toward the door, you suddenly hear something from the other side. A very weak moan and then your wife’s voice calling feebly “Greg?”

She’s alive! Your heart leaps and you hurry to the door. Stopping, you check and see that the door is locked. In spite of knowing there might be someone else in there ready to ambush you, you can’t just leave your wife unanswered. “Laura? It’s me Greg. Are you all right? Are you alone?” Again through the door you hear your wife’s failing voice calls out, “Greg, help me Greg…”

That’s all you can take and you jam the hook of the fire ax into the seam of the door and pop it open with a loud crack. Inside, you see your wife lying on the bed, almost unconscious. She looks like she’s been beaten badly and is terribly dehydrated and you know that she needs help immediately.

On the floor by the door to the master bathroom, you see the body of a rough looking man, covered in tattoos. He’s wearing some of your clothes, but you notice an orange prison jumpsuit on the floor in the corner of your bedroom that has to belong to him. The back of his head is caved-in and a bloody iron lies on the floor next to him. Your brave wife has managed to take care of the intruder all by herself!

Still, looking at the bruising on your wife, you shudder to think what she must have gone through while the rotten bastard was alive. Your heart breaks, knowing this was going on and you weren’t able to be here to protect her.

Going to your wife, you cradle her head in your arms and try to give her some water, but she’s immediately begins to choke on it. You wait until she recovers some and then try hydrating her with one small capful at a time. She reaches to your hand and squeezes it gently, and then loses consciousness.

You take out some saline IV bags from your medical supplies and set them up to begin re-hydrating your wife. Then remembering that you have Jacob waiting downstairs in the garage, you throw a sheet over the dead man and go to fetch the kid, bringing him up to the bedroom. He sleeps in a corner of the room, while you stay with your wife through the night, watching the color slowly come back into her cheeks.

By morning, she wakes again up and gives you a weak smile. “Oh Greg, you saved me! I knew you’d come for me!” she says in a raspy voice.

You gently put your finger on her lips to hush her, and tell her that she needs to rest and get her strength back. She brushes your hand aside and speaks anyway and you can hear the strength coming back into her voice with every word.

“But Greg, what about the girls?”

You frown, having to tell her you haven’t got that far yet – “I just made it this far. Once I get you stabilized, I’m going to go to the school and see if they are still there.”

“Nonsense!” Your wife scolds, sitting up. “We’re not wasting time waiting on me! They need help now and we need to go get them!”

“We?” you ask in dismay – “Honey, you can’t be serious, last night you were literally on your death bed!”

“I will be fine!” she declares firmly, “I survived that asshole who broke in, held me captive, stole our supplies, beat me, and…” she abruptly begins to cry…

You hold your wife close to your chest to comfort her, knowing what it is she can’t bring herself to say. The man must have had his way with her while she was his captive. You suppress a rage welling up in you at the thought and try to be supportive instead.

“You sure took care of the bastard though honey,” you say. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here to protect you.”

Your wife recomposes herself and hugs you. “I’m just glad you made it home dear.”

She then brings you into her lips and kisses you deeply.

You sit there together in silence for a moment, and then you get up and bring some food and water from your supplies to share with her. Jacob meanwhile, finally wakes up and looks around.

“Hello?” Your wife says, looking first at the boy and then at you.

“Hi, I’m Jacob,” the boy says to her, “are you Miss's Greg?”

“Why I guess I am,” your wife smiles.

“Laura, this is Jacob,” you introduce the two of them, “Jacob, my wife Laura.”

“Mr. Greg is helping me find my mommy,” Jacob explains.

“Oh, I see,” your wife nods knowingly.

You then hand Jacob some food and water too. As the three of you eat, you think about trying to save your girls. They would still be at their school in lockdown assuming their bus made it that far before the outbreak. If your wife managed to stay barricaded in this long, then hopefully the school would too. And unlike your wife, who only had seventy-two hours of food and water to sustain her and the intruder – the school would have a larger supply base to work with.

As you consider how to go about getting to the school to save your two daughters, you open a bedroom window on the far side of the house, opposite the garage and shove the intruder’s body out through it. It lands with a nasty crunch. You close the window and curtain – not even a little concerned whether zombies in the street come over to investigate.

“Thank you dear,” your wife remarks. “You always were good for taking the trash out.”

“Yeah, right,” you smile.

“You know I’m coming with you,” your wife reminds you again; and you know that there’s no changing her mind about it now.

“Ok,” you relent, “Just try to get as much strength back as you can before we go. It is really dangerous out there and you’ll need every ounce.”

“I’m ready now,” she replies, moving to get off the bed.

“Not so fast dear,” you say, motioning for her to stay right there – “I need to clean up first and gather a few supplies. We’re not going to come back here to the house once we leave. We’re going to go out to our old camping spot and wait this zombie apocalypse out in the woods where it’s safe.”

“Hey? What about my mommy?” Jacob interrupts, hearing that you are going to be waiting things out. You’re almost at the point where it’s time to tell him the truth – but that can wait until you’re in a safer environment at least.

“Don’t worry Jacob,” you reassure, “it will be like a base-camp, where we can set up operations and go out on rescue missions. Your mommy and everyone else is going to need a safe place, far away from the zombies, to come and live at once they are saved.”

The boy looks at you with worry in his eyes, but then agrees that having a base-camp is a good idea. You then turn to your wife.

“Fair enough?” you ask.

“Fair enough,” she replies and lies back down.

You then spend the next hour or so just cleaning yourself up with a damp washrag and changing into some real clothes – black jeans and long-sleeve t-shirt, dark leather jacket, steel-toed boots, mountain biking gloves, and a dew rag pulled tight to keep the dirt out of your head wound. You also pop some more antibiotics and note that your blood infection does seem to be getting better.

You then collect some supplies for yourself, your wife and the girls, and stuff it in a large duffel bag. After convincing Laura to stay up here behind the barricade with Jacob, while you gather the rest of the supplies that you’ll need from the basement, you head back downstairs. You are relieved to find that the rest of the house is still empty of the walking dead and that their numbers have thinned-out somewhat during the night. There are still about two or three dozen zombies wandering in the neighborhood outside – but they are no longer concentrated in the cul-de-sac itself. That will give you and your wife enough time to open your garage door and get the car out before they can crowd in and block you.

Going into your basement, you see someone crumpled at the bottom of the steps. It’s a dead zombie and looks like it fell down the stairs and smashed it’s head on the foundation at the bottom. You note the guy’s jacket and realize that it was once your local pizza delivery guy. What a shame. Ignoring it further, you go and collect some camping gear.

Coming back upstairs and into the garage, you set your things down and consider some other important options…

You could transport all your gear over to your neighbor’s house and take his SUV. It will hold all the food and water stores you found in his kitchen and you won’t have to risk getting it all back from his house to your car. You are also aware of a gun shop on the way to the school, and while it is likely overrun and looted by now, it might also be worth a look – especially if you can dig up some ammo for the scoped hunting rifle. A dead zombie at a thousand yards is much better than a dead zombie close enough to bite you.

Then you got your mountain bike that you keep in the garage. You could take it as well for backup transportation or if you need to move by stealth at any point.

1. Get your wife and the kid and take your stuff over to your neighbor’s SUV (including the mountain bike) and load it up over there

2. Take your stuff over to your neighbor’s SUV (but leave the mountain bike)

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ViciousVip3R said:

This choice is a no brainer for me(pun intended): the bike has served us well thus far, so there is no reason for us to leave such an useful tool behind.

(I'm glad we found the wife alive, no matter what condition she is in, now we just need to find the girls. Based on our luck so far, I am hesitant to take a detour to the gun shop, and we shouldn't need firearms at the school anyways. It might actually spook the people there so I think our handy fire axe will do to take care of any threats we do encounter.)

Edit: Wait, is the difference between the choices that you take your wife and Jacob along or not? Or solely the choice between taking and leaving the bike? The Omen of Death

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The Omen of Death said:

(Option 1 has been chosen with 3 votes!)

You fetch Laura and Jacob, gather together the mountain bike and all the supplies you can carry, and head out the back of your house and into the trees that surround the edge of the cul-de-sac. Cautiously moving through the woods, the three of you head over to your neighbor’s house and in through the back.

"Oh my god, it's horrible!" your wife exclaims, seeing all the dead.

"Try not to think about it," you say, pulling her along quickly.

You then go into the garage with her and the boy and begin loading the SUV. Checking the fuel gauge, you see that it not only has a full tank, but also an extra fifteen gallons of gasoline in three five-gallon metal containers in the back.

“Thank you paranoid survivalist neighbor!” you whisper to yourself and head back into the kitchen for the food and water stores. There, you also find the keys to the SUV on peg near the door leading into the garage.

Once you have everything loaded, you take another peek into the street and see that the zombies are far enough from the garage that you should be able to get the SUV out before they can swarm you.

Then getting in with Laura and Jacob and locking all the doors, you hit the button for the garage door and wait for it to go up. As it does, you see some zombies in the street lurch toward the garage to investigate, but you pull the SUV out well before they can arrive on the scene and point it down the street.

You then drive the out of your neighborhood, ignoring the gathering zombies drawn out by the sound of the vehicle and swerving around those already on the road at just the right speed – slow enough not to lose control and fast enough not to allow them to latch on.

Your wife Laura meanwhile, holds on for dear life and looks pale as you maneuver around the walking dead. Jacob holds on as well, but doesn’t seem overly concerned

“You get numb to it after a while,” is all you can think to say – but Laura hardly seems comforted by your words.

Thankfully, the zombies seem to be concentrated in the housing developments and thin out dramatically once you get onto more rural roads. You know that your daughter’s school is about four miles from your home, on the other side of the rural area you are currently in. It sits on the edge of a large country club and golf course at the edge of town. You should be able to avoid large concentrations of the undead on the way – though you’re dreading what you might find once you actually get there.

The gun store that you are aware of along the way is actually a sportsman’s club of some kind with its own shop. You’re dubious about whether there will be anything left of it when you get there, but since it is on the way to the school, you definitely want to check it out.

Driving along, you near the sportsman’s club and can see a dozen or so vehicles crowding the parking lot out in front. Slowing down to look closer, you can see a number of dead bodies littering the area and some even hanging out of the stopped vehicles – shot up! There are bullet holes in quite a few of the vehicles and even more in the building itself.

You also see a ring of dead zombies surrounding the area, but not very close, as if someone had been sniping them from a secure position. They lie around anywhere from just across the road to a couple of hundred yards away. As of right now, you don’t see any living beings – man, zombie, or otherwise.

Looking at the building itself, you see a two-story red brick gun shop off to one side of the sportsman’s club. Aside from a few bullet holes in the brickwork and shot-out windows, it still looks secure with heavy iron bars across the storefront itself and obvious signs of unbreached barricading at the door and other openings. A white banner with red lettering – spray paint on a sheet – hangs over the front of the building and declares: “ALIVE INSIDE. Will barter for trade. Looters and zombies will be shot dead.”

“You’re not actually going to stop here?” Your wife asks; obviously shaken up at the sight of all the shot-up bodies lying around.

Part of you wants to somehow ease your wife into all of this slowly, but necessity demands a more direct approach.

“Honey, it’s much worse in the city,” you begin, “millions of people are dead and we will join them, if we don’t do what it takes to survive. I’m going to do everything I can to save you and the girls – even if it means killing others to do so.”

Your wife gives you a look like she’s having a hard time comprehending what you just said.

“I’m not going to go out of my way to murder anyone,” you say, “but I will kill to survive as needed. It’s the only reason I was able to get out of the city alive and it’s the only reason you and I and the girls will have any chance to survive this whole horrible thing.”

“I… I understand,” your wife assures, coming to terms with the realities you both face and giving your hand a comforting squeeze.

1. Pull in and try to get the attention of anyone inside

2. Forget stopping and drive on

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