ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE SYSTEM

chapter two

WEEK THREE

I woke up to find the ward door barred shut. A flash of memory hit me — reaching for a letter — and I sat up fast. The machine beside me had stopped working; I unplugged it and looked around. The room was a mess. "What happened here?" I muttered, pushing myself toward the window, which was shut tight. Outside, I could see people wandering in slow circles across the hospital grounds. I stood there, confused. "Why are there so many people out there? Is there some kind of emergency?" I asked myself, backing toward the bed.

I looked for the letter from Martha — I was sure I'd left it right there — but it was gone. The flowers on the nightstand had wilted, gone brittle and gray. "How long have I been asleep?" I turned to the calendar hanging on the wall. "Three years? Three weeks?" I checked the date again, trying to make the numbers make sense.

The television crackled to life with static, and I crossed the room to turn the volume down. A loud bang hit the door. I froze, wondering why my own ward had been locked from the outside.

"Who's there?" I moved toward the door carefully.

I opened it slowly and recognized the nurse who'd been running my tests. But something about her was wrong. Her clothes were soaked in blood, her face slack and hollow in a way that didn't look human anymore. It looked like the face of something dead.

"What— am I dreaming? Is this even real?" I slammed the door shut and locked it, my hands shaking as the snarling on the other side grew louder. My mind flashed back to the crowd I'd seen outside the window. "What the hell is happening to me?" I hit my palm against my forehead, staring at my own reflection in the mirror across the room. None of it felt real. I remembered being loaded into an ambulance — and now this.

I backed away from the door, heart slamming against my ribs, a cold sweat breaking across my forehead. "This has to be a dream," I muttered, trying to talk myself down from the panic building in my chest. But the pounding and snarling on the other side of that door were real. Too real.

I scanned the room for anything I could use to defend myself. It was sparse — standard hospital furniture, the now-quiet television, nothing built for a fight. I grabbed the IV stand and gripped it like a spear.

The snarling grew louder, and the door started to shudder under the weight of whatever was on the other side. I couldn't stay in that room. I needed a way out, and I needed to think fast.

"The window." I crossed to it and tried to force it open — locked tight. I swung the IV stand at the glass, and it took several hits before it finally shattered. The noise was deafening. I knew it would draw more attention, but I didn't have another option. I needed out of that building.

I cleared the remaining glass from the frame and climbed through, dropping to the ground below. I landed wrong and felt a sharp jolt of pain shoot up my ankle. I winced, forced myself upright, and started hobbling away from the hospital as fast as I could manage.

Outside was worse than I'd expected from the window. People really were walking in circles, their movements jerky, unnatural — eyes empty, clothes torn to shreds. It looked lifted straight out of a horror film. The city itself looked abandoned — cars left parked and untouched everywhere, the streets littered with burned bodies.

My mind kept circling back to Martha's letter. Where had it gone? I had a feeling that finding it again might help me understand what I'd woken up into. I took a breath, steadied myself, and started making my way through the crowd of shambling, empty-eyed people.

I moved carefully, trying not to draw attention. My eyes swept the area for any sign of life, anyone else who still looked sane. Near the edge of the hospital grounds, I spotted a small group huddled by a burned-out car. Unlike the others, they moved with purpose — alert, scared, aware.

I approached slowly, hands raised to show I wasn't a threat. "Hey," I called out, keeping my voice low. "I'm not one of them. Can someone tell me what's going on?"

A woman stepped forward, her eyes wary but hopeful. "You don't know?" she asked, voice trembling. "It's been years since the outbreak. The infection spreads fast. We thought you were one of them when we saw you in that hospital."

My mind was racing. "Outbreak? Infection?" I struggled to make sense of it. "I was in a coma. I just woke up. Can you tell me exactly what's happening?"

"No one really knows how it started," one of the women said. "People just started behaving abnormally — tearing into flesh, eating other people. Like cannibals."

"Cannibalism." I felt the blood drain out of my face and moved closer, one hand pressed against my stomach where the pain from the jump still throbbed. "I think I've missed a lot. Can you fill me in?"

The first woman nodded, something like understanding settling over her face. "That explains it. You've missed a lot. Come with us — we'll explain everything, but we need to move before more of them show up."

We were about to leave when a sharp pain hit my chest again. I remembered something — a prompt I'd clicked yes on without really thinking. The encrypted message returned.

"Can you see that?" I asked the woman beside me.

"See what?" She looked at me like I'd lost it.

"I'm not losing my mind. I'm not turning into one of them."

[ZOMBIE SYSTEM ACTIVATED]

[SYSTEM BOOTING IN 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1...]

[SYSTEM TYPE: ZOMBIE SYSTEM]

[NAME: RICK STILES]

[AGE: 30]

[SKILLS: NONE]

[WEAPON: SILVER BULLET]

[OCCUPATION: COP]

[MISSION: KILL FIVE ZOMBIES TO ACTIVATE THE SYSTEM]

[REWARD: WEAPONS GRANTED TO AID YOUR FIGHT AGAINST THE INFECTED]

I stared at the message, then back at the woman, who clearly had no idea what I was looking at. That's when I heard the snarl beside us. I turned to find her — the woman I'd just been talking to — no longer human. Something else entirely. She lunged, and I went down hard, fear locking up every muscle in my body.

I remembered the gun the system had given me. I shoved at whatever was on top of me, calling out for help from the woman I'd been speaking with, only to realize she'd already fled. I got a hand free, drew the silver gun, and fired straight for the heart. The gunshot cracked through the air and the thing collapsed off of me.

I scrambled up — and watched it get back to its feet. "What? I hit it in the heart. Isn't this the part where it's supposed to die?" I said to no one, backing away as I spotted a whole horde closing in behind it.

I ran, searching for anywhere to take cover, but every path I turned down was already blocked, every exit cut off. My back hit a wall. I raised the gun and checked the cylinder — five rounds left. "Make it count," I told myself, and put the first one straight through a zombie's skull. It dropped with a heavy thud. A message flickered in front of me.

[SYSTEM: FIRST KILL CONFIRMED. FOUR MORE TO UNLOCK A NEW WEAPON.]

I kept firing until I had one bullet left, and no clear shot left to take. The horde kept closing. I didn't know what else to do. I closed my eyes and let go, some part of me almost wanting proof this was really happening, that it wasn't some cruel joke playing out in my head.

Then a hand grabbed me, and a fist connected with my face.

Everything went black.