revivalproject | Zombies from all parts of the city

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Zombies from all parts of the city

WHO: Sephiroth and everyone
WHERE: Temba
WHAT: Zombie fights
WHEN: October
WARNINGS: Zombies, emotional distress at having to kill zombies that look like loved ones

I Don’t Give a Damn Because I’m Stone Cold Already

Sephiroth is less than thrilled when the storms increase. His powers are going haywire, just as he was warned, and so are the weapons. Bad enough he doesn’t have the Masamune. Now he doesn’t have reliable guns, either. He’s had to go searching for any non-electric weapon he can find and has probably ended up with what to him is a very short sword.

He finds one just in time to confront the first batch of zombies. These happen to be zombie Agrii. As soon as he gets over his initial shock, he makes short work of them. That . . . was not good. He’s sure there’s more where those came from. He’ll have to make sure everyone else is okay. . . .

Another zombie comes out of the mist. Sephiroth stares, falling back in horror. It’s rare to ever catch him like this, visibly shaken, but the sight of this zombie, when he’s already afraid the real person is dead back home and that it’s Sephiroth’s fault, is just too much.

Oh my God ...

“Zack ...”

The zombie comes closer. Sephiroth grips the sword tighter. He knows what he’s been told about the storms and seeing people you love in them. Is that what that is? He doesn’t have much choice but to hope and believe that’s what this is. He steels himself and strikes.

He falls to one knee, stabbing the sword into the ground as he trembles. These sadistic aliens.... Whoever it is doing this.... How can they know to make perfect images of people from back home? They’ve never seen Zack.

He pushes himself up and starts through the fog. No doubt others are going to be in trouble from this. He’ll have to find them.

One female zombie, she won’t behave

Sephiroth soon finds other residents in need of help. The hotel, the diner, the hospital ... zombies are everywhere! Who is it he’s trying to rescue? You? He lunges from behind, attacking the zombies as they reach for the unfortunate person. One tries to bite his wing, but he makes short work of it before it can do anything. He is a master swordsman and he shows it when several come at him at once. It’s a good thing he’s on your side.

“Are you alright?” he asks when they fall.

I’m headed for a breakdown

After days, weeks of this, he’s growing weary beyond belief. He can’t count the number of times he’s killed Zack. Even Cloud sometimes. It’s not really them, but ... when it looks like them, there’s only so many times he can do it before it really takes a toll on him.

Outwardly he is always the same—nerves of steel, determined, the hero of old. He kills zombies, he protects the living, and when he can, he tries to help search for a cure for those who have been bitten. He rarely sleeps.

Killing one more Zack zombie is the last straw. He finally just sinks down on a box, wherever he is, and covers his face with a hand. All his wings are drooping to the floor. There are no zombies here, so he’s safe, but perhaps you find him?

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Keith nodded in agreement.

"Yeah... I'm not sure which way you were headed or already looked over, but I came from that way." He gestured. "So, I'm gonna go over that way next." And he pointed in the other direction where he'd been planning on heading. "Mainly, just looking to find people and get them to safety." He frowned slightly. "There's no point in trying to kill all these things. The storm'll just make more."

He was determined to keep going, and he would... but his recovery times were taking longer from the storm, just like his endurance was lower. It wasn't going to be easy.

Sephiroth nodded as well. “I’ve mainly been killing the ones getting too close to me or others. I was heading in the direction you’re planning to go.”

So perhaps they might as well look together.

"Okay." Keith supposed there was some safety in numbers... they could watch each other's backs or whatever. Or, if one of them got hurt, they could help each other get to safety.

He gave a nod for them to start moving. If they were careful and didn't go crazy, he could recover more energy on the move.

Sephiroth nodded too and started out, staying alert. So far everything seemed peaceful, but he didn’t want to get too comfortable. He would try to move slowly enough that it wouldn’t further wear Keith out, but he was concerned to go quickly.

Keith managed to keep a decent pace. He was used to pushing his limits. He just wasn't used to those limits being so restrictive. Keith was okay keeping pace with Sephiroth for now, and, as long as they didn't have to fight again, he seemed to also be regaining some of that energy as they moved, his own pace picking up a bit more as they moved along.

Sephiroth was glad to see him regaining some energy, as well as pleased that they hadn’t been attacked again yet. But that situation could always change and he remained alert for any possible trouble.

“… Things have been disastrous ever since I arrived,” he remarked. “First the serial killer problem and now this. Is it usually like this?”

"Well-..." Keith stopped himself. Was it? He knew things could get crazy, but... He sighed. "No, but... also... yes." He knew that didn't help. "We don't usually have serial killers... or serial... attackers... whatever's going on," Keith said. "But, the storms and crazy power stuff happens kind of regularly. But, the zombies are new."

So... no... but also... yes.

“Heh,” said Sephiroth. “In other words, things are always insane, but this particular brand of insanity is new. During regular times, are the storms the only odd thing that happens?”

"Mostly," Keith said. "You've missed calibrations." That was a whole other story. "But that also comes from Drift Fleet."

Which... yeah. That was also a whole other story.

"I have heard about calibrations. It sounded very uncomfortable, to say the least. What is Drift Fleet?"

"Yeah," Keith nodded. "That's a nice way of putting it... having people roaming around in your dreams and memories every night for like a week." He sounded slightly bitter as he said it, but also kind of resigned that it was just A Thing that they had to deal with sometimes. "It doesn't happen a lot, thankfully.

"Drift Fleet was how the people that brought us here found us," he then explained. "They were fans of the show... which is honestly kind of a weird thing to begin with. There aren't many of us left, but some of us were part of it. We were kidnapped across realities and then forced to be contestants on some interstellar reality show. The Agrii were fans and considered us to be the heroes of the show, so they figured out a way to get us here from there." Which kind of answered another question.

"So, no... I haven't been home, yet," Keith said quietly. "It's been a long time. Around seven years, I think, between the two places."

"I suppose that's something," Sephiroth grunts, although he's thinking once would be too much.

He raises an eyebrow at the description. "Drift Fleet sounds completely bizarre and twisted, even for a reality series." It's clear from his tone what he thinks of reality TV. "At least on every other reality show I know, the contestants agree to be there.

"Seven years is a long time to be away from home," he says sympathetically. "I too was forcefully removed from my home for years after the Heartless destroyed it."

Once definitely was too much...

Keith took a deep breath, giving a small sigh and then a nod. "Yeah, same for where I'm from originally. Turned out, though, that the whole thing was being run by some corrupted AI that was being influenced by a giant blob of a creature, and, when it couldn't get voluntary contestants, it started kidnapping people."

But he nodded at the other statement, too. Seven years was definitely a long time. For a moment, he almost asked Sephiroth how long he'd been away from home and if they'd ever been able to rebuild, but something else caught his attention first.

"The Heartless?"

A dark smirk at this. "Corrupted computer programs and blobs usually do end up causing a great deal of trouble for people," he says with dripping sarcasm.

And a nod. "The Heartless are beings of darkness that seek the corruption of everyone they come in contact with. They're an infestation that's very difficult to control. They destroyed countless worlds, including my own. We were finally able to take it back, however. It only took ten years."

More sarcasm.

Keith couldn't argue with that. He remembered the corrupted crystal that Sendak had plugged into the Castle of Lions and how it had damaged King Alfor's AI, making the Castle attempt to kill all of them.

Corrupted computer program indeed.

"That is a long time," Keith said quietly, Sephiroth unknowingly answering the other half of that question. "So... kind of like the zombies, where they infect others?"

One of the dangers of having a heavily automated home, unfortunately. Sephiroth would be very leery of it for exactly that reason.

He looks thoughtful at this question and then nods. "Yes ... yes, that's a good way to put it. They are the physical manifestations of the darkness in people's hearts and seek out the darkness in other hearts to feast upon."

"They sound delightful," Keith muttered, clearly as sarcastic as Sephiroth had been earlier.

They were back near town again now.

"Anywhere in particular you want to check while we're together?" At this point, even if they had kept moving, the lack of fighting had helped to get Keith back into something more like himself energy-wise. And there were definitely still people around who needed escorting back to those mines.

Kosmo was along with him, too. So, that helped.

"Oh yes," Sephiroth says, still sarcastic too.

He looks around at the town. "The places where people are the most likely to be found is a good place to start: the diner, the hotel, the hospital...."

"Well, Tommy and I cleared the diner earlier, and we left a note stating that people could take food, but that it's not the most secure place to hunker down. All those windows make it hard to defend." The hospital had a similar situation on the main floor, but...

"There might be people holed up on like second floors and above in some of the taller buildings, though... defending staircases."

"That's good to know," Sephiroth said. "Alright, we'll check buildings with multiple levels."

He headed for the nearest one.

"We could split up..." Keith offered. "If you want to head to one, I can cover the other." They were both fighters. They could escort more people separately.

Sephiroth paused. He was confident in his abilities, but the zombies kept multiplying and always seemed to attack in droves. And with the network down, they couldn't call for help via the most efficient way. Still, he recognized that they might be able to do more to help separately.

"Very well," he said at last. "I will go in here."

"Good luck," Keith said with a nod. The blue wolf looked between the two of them, seeming to understand what was happening, and moved to stand at Keith's side. "I'll see you in the mines."

Which meant he'd better make it there because Keith certainly was planning to make it himself.

He headed off towards the other building, Kosmo moving alongside him.

Sephiroth nodded. "You will."

He headed inside.

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Zombies from all parts of the city

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good spot to end it?

Sure.