“The formula for raising your stats, is one hundred multiplied by the whole number of the stat. Each boost you purchase is for one hundredth of a point.”
“Will increasing it by that amount actually do anything for me?”
“No, but you might feel a difference at each tenth of a point. I can guarantee you will notice the difference on each whole point. Going from a three to four in Brawn for instance, is a significant difference.”
“Great,” Alvin sighed, as he couldn’t even bump his stats right now. “Is there any stuff for this room that I can buy?”
“Yes, just not with your current point total.”
Alvin fiddled with the store, setting it to a thousand-point maximum and checked it again. All of his stats were now listed. There were more melee weapons, like a metal bat, but still no ranged weapons. A ‘medkit’ was listed for a thousand, he tapped it to pull up the description.
“So, there’s a way to fix myself if I get fucked up,” Alvin mumbled. “A grand for a single use item that fully replenishes health to a single part of my body is a bit much. Oh, look, a pillow and a blanket are both on here, for five hundred each. What is this fanny pack?”
As Alvin went to tap it, Scott explained, “It gives you two slots for items to take with you and also to bring back. The bag system is one of the few ways to bring loot back with you.”
“Wow, you guys hate us, don’t you?”
“No, we just want it to be a challenge. Now, are you going back out?”
Alvin bought the bat he could afford, for 250 XP. “Let’s see what’s available,” he replied, pulling up the job list.
Chapter Three
As soon as he accepted the mission, Alvin was engulfed in bright white light. Blinking as the light faded, he found himself in a hotel suite that was trashed. He checked the suite carefully, but found nothing. Not a single item in the room was intact. He went to the door and listened at it for a moment. He could hear a shuffling sound in the hall that sounded like a lone zombie.
Taking a few deep breaths, Alvin gripped the bat tightly in his right hand as his left touched the knob. Turning it gently, the gentle click of the catch retracting sounded loud to Alvin as he slowly opened the door.
The hallway was lit by the window at the end of the hall, along with light spilling in from a few open doors along the hall. At the far end of the hall near the stairwell was a single zombie. It turned around as Alvin watched it.
Stepping into the hall, Alvin saw the room he exited from was next to the elevators. A second hall stretched out on the other side of the elevators. Luckily, no other zombies were in sight. His mission was to kill five zombies, he hoped to take them one at a time. His hand felt a little damp on the bat as the zombie started to shamble towards him.
“Batter up,” Alvin muttered as he turned to face the oncoming zombie, putting his other hand on the bat. He brought the bat up, planning on bringing it down right on top of the zombie’s head. “Head shot or go home.”
The zombie’s out stretched hands made small grasping gestures as it closed in. Alvin waited until it was in range, then brought his arms down hard with everything he had, knowing if he failed he would be zombie chow.
The sound of a wood bat breaking a skull is unpleasant to hear, at least the first time. The splatter of blood is even more unpleasant to see. An eye popping out of the zombie’s head was the final, grotesque touch. The zombie dropped like a marionette with its strings cut, just as the previous dead zombies had. He felt his bile rise, but this time didn’t puke.
“Glad I stopped doing that.” He frowned for a moment, “Four more. You can do this, Al,” he said, giving himself a pep talk, as he went to leave the suite.
A groan was all the warning he got from the zombie that lurched into the doorway just as he got close. Acting on reflex Alvin brought the bat around, solidly striking the chest of his attacker. Unfortunately, all it did was push the zombie back a few steps. Alvin backpedaled to get some room, which let him avoid being grabbed as the zombie lurched forward again.
A hard swing left to right crushed the skull of the zombie, sending blood and a small piece of skull flying across the wall. Panting, Alvin watched the body fall lifeless, as his heart jackhammered easily over a hundred beats a minute. Hands shaking on the bat, he stood there waiting for the next zombie but a few minutes went by without another incident.
His heart slowed and he felt drained from the close encounter. Slumping to his knees for a few minutes, Alvin looked at the bloody bat, then at the corpse a few feet from him. “Well, guess the cops might have been right about me. It seems I do kill people, or at least dead people.”
After a bit, Alvin pushed himself to his feet. He still needed to kill three more zombies to get the mission done and he wasn’t doing himself any favors by staying here. He checked the open doorways, but all the rooms were as trashed as his starting room had been. He went down both halls opening each door, but no more zombies appeared on this level.
The elevators didn’t have power so he went to the stairwell. He pushed the door open and listened as the sound echoed up and down the well. A single groan could be heard followed by the sound of feet coming down the stairs. Backing up, Alvin got ready to kill the zombie as it came through the door.
A minute later a zombie came through the door only to have its head cracked open as the bat came down. Alvin swallowed the bile in his mouth as a small fragment of skull hit him in the cheek. He looked down at the zombie, feeling a little less sick about this one. Around one arm was a band just above the elbow with a needle that looked to be broken at the joint. “Guess the cops were right again, drugs do kill.” He scrubbed the splatter of blood from the skull fragment away.
He stepped over the body into the stairwell. This time no sounds came to him. He dithered for a minute, on whether to go up or down before he decided on down. He was sure that if he felt suicidal he could go out into the city. He’d seen it through the suite’s window, and he was sure he would find plenty of zombies there.
He wound up finding the last two zombies before he got to the ground floor. Neither surprised him, so he was easily able to kill them. As soon as the fifth zombie died the light washed over him and he found himself back in his room. No blood could be seen on either him or the bat. “Huh, easy cleaning service at least.”
“Yes, but it doesn’t repair damaged items,” Scott chimed in. “I see you survived, which is helping make your case that you might not be a complete waste of time.”
“Glad you agree,” Alvin muttered as he pulled up the summary for completing the easy mission.
Kill Mission Completed
Total Experience Earned: 150 XP
Breakdown: Mission completion 50 XP, Take no damage 50 XP, Killing five Shamblers 50 XP.
Sighing Alvin looked at his now total experience of 220. “Well, this is going to take for fucking ever.”
“This is to help weed out the chaff from the wheat as an old saying goes. We want only those who are worth a damn doing World Mode.”
“Yeah, this kind of feels like being threshed,” Alvin replied. “Okay. Once more into the breach.” He pulled up the job board again to look over his two choices of Basic Missions; survive or kill.
He completed another kill mission without incident and netted another 150 XP. His stomach rumbled as he was about to take another mission. He paused and considered his options.
“Hey Scott, do the survive missions always have food in them?”
“No, but it is much more likely than a kill mission having food.”
Opening up the store he noted his meager 370 XP, which could net him a sub sandwich and a bottle of water for close to two hundred points. Shaking his head, he purchased a ‘Serving of Sustenance’. A bowl with a spoon appeared in the middle of his floor. He picked it up and looked dubiously at the greyish sludge in the bowl.
“What the fuck is this?”
“Sustenance,” Scott replied with a snicker, “eat up.”
Alvin picked up some on the spoon, sniffing at it. It had no scent that he could discern. Tentatively he stuck the spoon in his mouth, letting the sludge like stuff hit his tongue. Lukewarm wet cardboard is what it tasted like. He swallowed quickly to get it off his tongue. It slid down his throat like watery glue, not fast, but not sticking as he swallowed.
“Blargh, this is horrible,” Alvin spat.
“Yes, that is the intent,” Scott replied with a smug voice. “It is designed to keep you going but also to be repulsive. After all, wouldn’t a sandwich and water be so much better?”
“You guys are assholes. Major assholes,” Alvin grunted before he took another bite.
“Your complaint has been passed along,” Scott snickered. “Yum, yum. Eat up.”
Alvin felt his jaw twitch as he took bite after bite. He hoped Story Missions wouldn’t be too far away, as he really needed to get XP faster.
“Are you recording all my adventures?” Alvin asked between bites. “Do they get replayed later when I’m asleep?”
“Video on demand. We also do a highlights reel, which for you right now is drumming and throwing up. Good job with getting over that, by the way.”
“Ass,” Alvin muttered as he took the last bite. As he swallowed the last of the sludge the bowl and spoon vanished. He also felt sated, like he’d eaten a substantial meal. “That is so wrong.”
He used the john before he got ready and took his next two kill missions back to back. His two missions put him in a casino for one and an empty supermarket for the other. He had been able to kite the zombies during both missions to get the kills.
Alvin looked at his slab to sleep on, then checked his XP total, finding it at 610. He wanted a pillow but wasn’t going to waste 500 XP on one right now. He was close to getting the fanny pack, which he felt would be really handy come Story Missions. He would need to get another bowl of sludge tomorrow, as well. He looked at his bat. It was showing signs of wear from repeatedly cracking skulls.
“Fuck,” he sighed. “Scott, you guys suck. My bat might last another mission or two but that will be it. So, I can either get another worn bat or the metal one for 600 XP.”
“Choices, choices,” Scott half taunted him. “Isn’t choice one of those big things that you humans harp on about?”
“Asshole,” Alvin sighed before he stripped off his shirt and pants. He stuck the jeans into the shirt then lay down on the bunk using his clothes as a pillow, an old jail trick. “See you when I wake up, prick.”
The light in the room dimmed as he lay down. “Night, princess,” Scott replied with a snicker.
Chapter Four
Alvin woke slowly, his body aching from a night of restless sleep. Sitting up with a groan, he blinked at the grey room, as the memory of his last day washed over him. He twisted his head side to side, his vertebra popping lightly. Shaking his head at the insanity of his situation, he reached back and pulled his clothes over to him.
“Maybe a pillow is worth the investment. A mattress would be nice too, maybe a sheet.” Alvin muttered as he got his clothes on.
“You sure are perky in the morning, ain’t cha?” Scott snickered. “You going to do a survival mission today?”
“No, today I’m going to grind the kill missions. They aren’t hard and it’s pretty much a guaranteed value. If I go through a half-dozen of them, I’ll be ahead enough to pick up some of the stuff I want without risking myself too much.”
“Coward,” Scott scoffed.
“I’d rather be a live coward than a dead fool,” Alvin replied as he checked the bat by the bed. It was missing small pieces and didn’t look like it was going to last much longer. He hoped it would hold out for at least one more mission.
“Let’s go to work,” Alvin said with no cheer as he pulled up the job board.
For the next five hours he did kill missions, one after the other. On the fifth mission, his bat snapped on the last zombie. The handle vanished from his hand as he appeared back in his home. “Well, at least I got all I could out of it.”
“Are you tired of this tedium yet?” Scott asked with a sigh.
“Pretty much. I now know the wood bat can go through about fifty skulls before it fails. Let me see what the job board has to offer, then I’ll grab another bat and head out again.” Alvin replied as he pulled up the job board. His eyes widened slightly and his mouth stretched into a smile. “Oh yes, we are finally done with that.”
He pulled up the store, purchasing the fanny pack, a worn wooden bat and lastly a serving of sustenance. He sat down as he suffered through the sludge, he wanted to make sure he was good to go just in case the mission took longer to complete.
“That is a lot of expenditure,” Scott opined as Alvin stuffed his face.
“Leaves me with seventy XP,” Alvin replied as he finished off the last of the bowl. “It should be worth it though. Story Missions just opened up.”
“Already?” Scott asked, a little puzzled.
Alvin snickered. “This will be way more entertaining now.”
“Yeah,” Scott replied his voice a touch subdued. “Nice knowing you.”
“I ain’t going to die yet,” Alvin rebuffed Scott. “Going to test the waters with a Story Mission.”
“My namesake died on his first Story Mission,” Scott’s voice held a tinge of regret.
“Ah. I take it that you kind of liked Scott, before he up and died?”
“He was the one who went the furthest with me as his case worker,” Scott replied. “The best so far is the guy being overseen by Felicia, he has…” Scott’s voice went mechanical for a moment, “That information is restricted at this time.”
“You tripped yourself,” Alvin told Scott.
“Yeah. Go on and try not to die like the noob you are.”
“Heh, noob? I think not. I did the right thing, you just wait and see. Be back soonish, I hope,” Alvin said as he tapped the Story Mission icon on the job board.
The light flared around him, when it faded he was in a lightly wooded area with the full moon shining down on him. In the distance, he could make out a bonfire with some people around it. Gripping his new bat firmly, he headed that way as a pop-up appeared before him.
Story Mission: Undead Party Crashers.
You must keep Penny safe while you kill all the zombies in the campground.
(Try not to party until you drop.)
As he read the pop-up, a commotion broke out from around the fire. Three voices were raised as they argued over something. He took off running for them, hoping that one of them was the woman he needed to save.
He had just gotten into view of the three by the fire. Two women and one guy were having an argument about what the news program on the radio had been talking about, some kind of broadcast by the Pope.
One of the women screamed as she spotted a number of zombies shuffling at them from the far side of the fire. Obviously very old corpses, they were mostly bones with jerky-like skin and dried muscle visible in places, not the embalmed bodies one would expect from recently buried corpses.
The sole guy of the trio grabbed a branch from the woodpile they had for the bonfire. “Run for the cabin, I’ll hold them off.”
Alvin shook his head and followed after the women as they ran. As the two women neared the cabins, a single scream could be heard from them. A guy with deep wounds on his face came stumbling out of one of them, the door slamming shut behind him.
The women stopped dead, allowing Alvin to catch up to them. “There is no safe place,” Alvin panted as he stopped a few feet behind them. The women screamed and spun on him, prompting Alvin to hold up his free hand. “I’m not a zombie, I just want to survive.”
“Who are you?” one of the women asked with wide, wild eyes as she looked back at the guy who had fallen to the ground.
“Call me Al. Which one of you is Penny?”
“Why?” asked the other, as she glanced from his bat to the cabins. Her British accent was clipped and precise.
“You… can kill them?” the first woman asked, before she fainted at the sight and smell of the zombie being killed.
The second one puked as Alvin looked back at them, “Bad time for this.” Sighing, he went to check on the fainter. He slapped her face gently, “Hey, wake up.”
Rapture (Apocalypse Gates Author's Cut Book 1) Page 3
