The Corporate Apocalypse: Jakarta's Survival Guide to Cosmic

The smell of death in Jakarta wasn't anything like what Hollywood movies portrayed. There was no dramatic scent of iron or the poetic aroma of damp earth. Instead, it was just the stench of a wholesale market rotting under the 95-degree sun, mixed with the rank smell of raw meat that had been left out in the open for three days.Rendy wiped the sweat dripping from his temple, which was smudging his cracked prescription glasses. In his hand, he gripped a thin book with a slightly crumpled, photocopied cover. The title was a total eyesore, written in bright Comic Sans: "ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR BEGINNERS: THE BUDGET EDITION & GUARANTEED SURVIVAL" by a mysterious author named 'Coach Udin.'Rendy flipped to page 14. It read: "Tip #4: Zombies have ears that are extremely sensitive to the frequency of fear. If you encounter a horde, do not stay silent or hide. That only makes them feel dominant. Instead, sing in a high-pitched, cheerful tone. Children's songs are highly recommen

The bass thump of "Uptown Funk" finally faded as the speaker’s battery gave a weak beep and died. The silence that followed felt heavier than the music ever did. In the middle of the wrecked electronics store, Rendy stayed in his freeze—one hand on the floor, legs crossed in the air—while in front of him, the Alpha Zombie stood frozen, one hand still on his crotch, mimicking a Michael Jackson pose that was physically impossible for his bloated, undead anatomy.Alana held her breath. Her hand, still gripping the bow, felt stiff from clapping for the last three minutes. She glanced at the exit, gauging the distance. If that monster realizes he just got played, we’re toast, she thought.But the Alpha didn’t attack. The giant let out a heavy sigh, sounding like a diesel engine about to stall. He looked at Rendy with watery red eyes. Slowly, the Alpha reached behind his shredded cargo belt, pulled out a slightly dented plastic container, and tossed it toward Rendy.Thud.The box landed rig

The dawn light crept shyly through the gaps in the dented rolling door, casting a cold, bluish-gray hue inside the "CLEARANCE SALE" shop. Jakarta in the morning was usually a symphony of honking horns and the roar of bus engines, but now, the only thing audible was a faint, raspy sound from a distance—the sound of a few zombies who seemed to still have the hiccups after "laughing" all night.Rendy woke up with a stiff neck. He had been sleeping on a pile of five-dollar "I Love Jakarta" t-shirts that were now worth absolutely nothing. He blinked, adjusting his vision behind glasses that were getting blurrier from grease and dust.The first thing he saw was the glint of an arrowhead, exactly three centimeters from his nose."Explain it again," Alana’s voice sounded raspy, cold, and dead serious. She had been awake since who-knows-when, sitting cross-legged with her bow still drawn.Her eyes, puffy from a lack of sleep, stared daggers at the book Rendy was still clutching like a security

South Jakarta was usually a gridlocked mess of hipsters sipping lattes, but this afternoon, it felt like an office waiting room where the AC had been cranked down to ten below. The air had turned frigid since that jet-black geometric tower appeared in Kuningan. The sky was no longer orange; it had shifted to a strange, silvery purple, as if the entire city’s atmosphere was being viewed through a failed PowerPoint filter.Rendy, Alana, Bang Gondrong, and Si Juling took cover in a bus station where every window was shattered. They were panting for breath. On Bang Gondrong's forehead, the "APPROVED" stamp still left a dark red mark, adding a touch of irony to his scarred face."I can't stand this smell," Alana muttered, sniffing the air. The usual stench of rotting corpses was now masked by something sharper: the smell of ozone, hot printer toner, and industrial-strength floor cleaner. "This isn't a zombie apocalypse anymore. What kind of end-times is this, Ren?"Rendy didn't answer. He

The sound of the massive typewriter stopped with a sharp ding, like a bell signaling the end of the workday. The blinding white light faded slowly, leaving black spots in Rendy’s vision. The first thing he felt was the cold asphalt. The second was the pungent smell of old paper—the kind of stench you only find in a national library that hasn't been cleaned in fifty years."Are we... are we still alive?" Alana’s voice was raspy, coughing from the dust that suddenly filled the air.Rendy opened his eyes. They weren't on the streets of Pasar Minggu anymore. They were in a vast room where the ceiling was lost in thick darkness. Around them, massive wooden shelves reaching dozens of feet high were lined up neatly, packed with brown folders and rolls of paper tied with twine.Right in front of them, the CFO was still standing. But something was wrong. The vault-headed monster seemed frozen. A neon yellow energy line circled Rendy and his friends, forming a sort of protective dome. Above th