Zombie System: Ruling The Apocalypse

Jonathan sat on the cold, unforgiving slab of his cot and checked the calendar. He shook his head and broke his pen. At just 21, he was already a convict.

  “Two months,” he said to himself. He had been marking out his calendar. 

  Suddenly, a piercing shriek ripped through the oppressive silence. The prison alarm, a banshee’s wail, blared and became a relentless assault on the eardrums.

  Gunshots cracked like thunder, followed by a cacophony of shouts, screams, and the frantic pounding of feet, in the rows above and below.

  The electronic doors, usually an impenetrable barrier, whined open, responding to the fire alarm that had somehow been tripped. Inmates surged out of their cells and Jonathan watched their shadows dancing wildly in the flickering emergency lights.

  "Jon! Let's go!" Ali, his cellmate, grabbed his arm. "We'll get caught if we stay! They'll round us up."

  Jonathan shook his head, a grim certainty settling over him. "No place to run, Ali. We'll be caught, one way or another. Being in here is better than being a fugitive." He felt a strange detachment, a weariness that transcended fear. What was the point of escaping one cage, only to be caught and thrown into another, perhaps even smaller, one?

  Ali stared at him, his face a mask of disbelief, then nodded curtly. "Suit yourself." He flung open the cell gate and stormed out, disappearing into the chaotic current of escaping bodies.

  Jonathan remained seated, a lone island in a sea of pandemonium. He closed his eyes. If he got out, he would go after one man, Orion Moxley, The Professor. 

  Then, a new sensation. A faint, acrid scent, growing stronger, thicker. Gas. It seeped into the room through the vents, a noxious fog that clawed at his throat. Green.

  He covered his nose and mouth with his hands, but the rotten, cloying smell, like decay and spoiled meat, permeated everything, clinging to his clothes, his skin, his very being. It was the scent of a thousand graves, unearthed and left to fester under a malignant sun.

  Fifteen minutes crawled by, each second an eternity. The gas continued its insidious invasion, its putrid breath filling every crevice. Then, as abruptly as it had begun, the chaos outside died down. The alarm choked into silence, the gunshots ceased, and the frantic shouts faded into an eerie stillness. The air in his cell, however, remained thick with the rotten stench, a phantom limb of the horror that had just unfolded.

  Curiosity pricked at him. He pushed himself up, his limbs stiff, and peered through the iron bars of his cell door. The corridor outside was bathed in a sickly, pulsating green light, casting long, distorted shadows. He strained his eyes, trying to make sense of the strange illumination.

  Suddenly, two figures emerged from the gloom, shuffling towards his cell. Ali. And another inmate, whose face was a blurry nightmare of fear and grime. Max.

  Jonathan jolted back from the bars. What had happened out there?

  "Jonathan! Open up!" Ali's voice was laced with an urgency that pierced through Jonathan’s apathy.

  Jonathan hesitated, his heart hammering against his ribs. The terror of the unknown was a cold hand gripping his throat. But the sheer desperation in Ali's voice forced his hand. He fumbled with the locking mechanism, his fingers numb, and the heavy door creaked open.

  Ali and the other inmate squeezed into the cell. Immediately, Ali slammed the door shut, the clang echoing ominously.

  Then, a figure materialized in the doorway, a living nightmare. It was transparently green, its flesh shimmering with an unholy luminescence. Its form was fluid, shifting as if its body was melting before his eyes. Its eyes, vacant and soulless, glowed with the same sickly green light.

  He gnawed his teeth at them as though they could bite through the bars.

  "What?" Jonathan screamed. “What the fuck!” His blood ran cold, his stomach churned, and a wave of nausea threatened to overwhelm him. Fear, raw and unadulterated, seized him, its icy talons digging deep. This wasn't just a breakout; this was something else, something monstrous.

  "These things are everywhere," Ali gasped, his breath ragged.

  "They bite people," Max added, "they eat people. The last time I saw this, was when I watched Cannibal Holocaust."

  "Zombies?" Jonathan choked out the word.

  "No," Ali countered, shaking his head frantically. "They have brains. They attack in formation. I think it's some scientific shit."

  As if on cue, more of the green entities shuffled past the cell, their translucent bodies casting an unsettling glow. Some paused, their vacant green eyes fixing on Ali, Jonathan, and Max. They were like predatory fish in a murky aquarium, their collective gaze a chilling observation. 

  The numbers began to increase, as though they were beckoning on each other. 

  "What are we going to do?" Ali's voice was barely a whisper now, laced with a desperate edge.

  "Wait till... Ahhh! Till help comes," Max groaned, his voice cracking. He raised his uniform, revealing a gaping, bleeding wound on his forearm. A bite. A gruesome, fresh bite, already oozing a dark, viscous fluid.

  "Oh my God, you've been bitten!" Jonathan exclaimed.

  Max's eyes, when Jonathan looked up, were no longer the terrified brown he’d seen moments before. They were starting to glow, a faint, unsettling green.

  Jonathan and Ali recoiled, stumbling backward, their backs hitting the cold concrete wall. They were trapped. Between Max, who was now groaning, a guttural sound of agony and transformation, and the unblinking, green-tinged horrors outside their cell. Now more than ten.

  "You should go," Max choked out, his voice already losing its human timbre. "I feel my heart dying. Something is telling me to bite you." 

  Suddenly, the green entities outside the cell, as if acting on an invisible command, gripped the iron bars of the door. One bar each. Their translucent fingers, impossibly strong, began to pull. The metal shrieked, slowly bending inwards.

  "See, they have brains!" Ali shouted. "They're trying to break in."

  Jonathan and Ali stood frozen, caught between the encroaching horrors and the rapidly transforming Max. Panic, cold and unyielding, began to claw at Jonathan’s throat.

  "I think we'll die here," Jonathan muttered, a bitter acceptance settling over him. 

  "No!" Max roared, a primal sound that was more beast than man. He stumbled into the middle of the cell, his eyes now fully green, a monstrous luminescence. "Use the ceiling! The pipes. Step on me!"

  Jonathan and Ali hesitated, their eyes wide with disbelief and a morbid fascination. The ceiling was a good ten feet up, and their escape through the ventilation system had never been a viable option. It was a desperate, suicidal gamble. But that was when the guards were watching. 

  "I still have my brains!" Max screamed, “now!”

  The bending of the bars intensified, and one bar pulled out. That was Alpha, the strongest inmate, the bully.

  Ali, with a desperate surge of adrenaline, launched himself forward, stepping on Max's shoulders. Max, despite his pain and the terrifying transformation, held steady, providing a surprisingly solid base. Ali scrabbled at the ceiling, his fingers finding purchase on a loose pipe. He hauled himself up, disappearing into the dark maw of the ventilation shaft.

  “Jon, it's now or never,” Ali said, looking down at the ceiling before he disappeared. 

  Now it was Jonathan’s turn. The iron bars were almost fully bent, another broke out. He leaped, propelled by a surge of pure terror, his foot landing on Max's outstretched hand. The touch was horrifying, his skin felt clammy and already cold and slippery, decayed.

  Max screamed, a sound that quickly devolved into a gurgling roar. Jonathan scrambled, his hands finding the same pipe Ali had used, his muscles screaming in protest. Just as he pulled himself up, the door gave way.

  The green entities outside surged in, a torrent of translucent horror. They swarmed Max, their forms coalescing into a nightmarish feast. Max didn't scream, not truly. He kept looking at Jonathan, his green eyes burning with a fading flicker of recognition, a silent, unknowingness. 

  Jonathan saw it all: the feasting, the tearing of flesh, the splatter of green blood, the grotesque display of green entrails. The stench of decay, now mixed with a sickeningly sweet odor, filled the cell. He got the idea. The murky gas that stepped in… “I inhaled the fucking gas too,” he said and shook his head. 

  He scrambled faster, his mind blank with horror, following Ali into the dark, narrow confines of the pipe.

  They crawled for what felt like an eternity, the putrid smell of the gas still clinging to them, the sounds of the feasting fading into a distance, and when they crawled over some cell, they heard the growls of the beasts. 

  They didn't talk to each other. Ali crawled faster, not caring if he was behind. Jonathan kept his eyes on him; he understood the concept, ‘in an apocalypse, it's a game of survival, on your own.’

  After an hour of agonizing, claustrophobic movement, they emerged into a world unrecognizable, opening the lid that cut into the middle of the road, right before the prison gate.

  The prison, a symbol of confinement, was now a fractured ruin. Choppers lay on their sides, their blades twisted like macabre sculptures.

  Cars, once vibrant vessels of human movement, were mangled wrecks, piled up in chaotic heaps, their metal bodies grotesquely contorted. 

  Buildings, once proud sentinels of the urban landscape, were reduced to rubble, their concrete skeletons exposed to the unforgiving sky. 

  Skyscrapers, once piercing the clouds, burned with an infernal glow, their fires licking at the bruised horizon, monuments to a fallen civilization. The air was thick with the scent of smoke, ash, and the lingering, rotten sweetness of the green gas.

  Jonathan and Ali stood in stunned silence, their eyes wide with disbelief, absorbing the horrifying panorama. The world had ended, not with a bang, but with a silent, green consumption.

  “Jon? Say something,” Ali said.

  “The world is coming to an end,” Jon replied.

  “But… could it be… that we're the only one alive?” Ali asked. 

  We turned and the GoWorth Correctional Centre’s gate fell. The Greens rushed out. The outside world was infested already, now they're going into it. 

  Jonathan tripped. Ali stood in his way. He fell. When he rose, he felt a pain. He looked. It was a Green bite on his arm. 

  He got to his feet. He ran as fast as his legs could carry him. Betrayal? He was used to it. But the bite? Something else. 

  He closed his eyes. He felt his heart beating fast. Something was going on within him. Something was trying to eat its way out from within. 

  “I can't be one of these things,” he said. But that wasn't enough. He wriggled. He screamed. His body contorted as his bones broke. Then, silence. Then, hunger! He wants to eat flesh.