Jyera World Apocalypse-Chapter 55: Strange Survivor

It had been several hours since his last contact with Anna, and Marco was growing impatient... Entry into Jyor’s atmosphere followed by the landing of such a ship shouldn’t have taken so long...

He was about to use his communicator to contact her, even though he knew the risks... But he decided to wait and check Anna’s room to see if he could find anything that could help him in this situation.

Entering Anna’s room, Marco swallowed hard as he caught the lingering scent of her, looking around carefully. He had helped her build this place, and she had been quite strict about many things that seemed simple...

There was a painting of a simple landscape; Anna had been quite strict about the position of the painting with her bed and the window. At the time, he thought the painting was something important someone had given her, but when he asked, she said she didn’t know who had painted it.

Marco soon reached a desktop computer near her bed, but when he turned it on, he couldn’t figure out the password. Frustrated, he finally gave up and walked down the building’s floors, deciding to check if the survivors at his base needed anything.

"I think I’ll be leaving soon. Does anyone need anything?"

"We have almost three hundred survivors; our only need right now is the limited space in the building," replied an old man named Ronald.

"With so many survivors, we need more food, right?"

"No, we’re fine too. We looted everything nearby and still have a large stockpile from the food drive that took place here. If the worst happens, we can consume the contaminated monsters, since they won’t affect us after the alteration Madame Anna made."

"But the taste and texture are still very bad. We should try to find more meat."

"There’s no need, sir. After the trauma they experienced at the start of the apocalypse, many people have avoided eating meat..."

"That’s it..."

Marco was speechless. He had forgotten that he had also experienced this trauma during the first apocalypse... But he was still frustrated at not finding anything to do at the shelter to occupy his mind. Mr. Ronald, sensing his anxiety, said to him:

"Sir, I don’t know why you hide your face from most people, but you’re still young... On Tuesdays and Saturdays at SS3, some young adults get together to play live music and have a few drinks... You should join in when you can; it will help you relax..."

He thanked Ronald for his concern and returned to his room...

Still pacing, Marco remembered something and grabbed his mask and went out to check on something he had been putting off for days and had forgotten. Maybe this would occupy his mind for a while, and he’d stop worrying about Anna... Before leaving, he left Ronald in charge of the office building’s affairs...

When he stepped outside, he saw the office building from the outside, and it looked completely different. All the windows had been reinforced with wood and welded metal, and the building looked like a veritable fortress in the apocalypse...

As he walked, Marco quickly crossed several streets, ignored by most of the zombies and animals that were all over Kaelor.

He never engaged in combat with the zombies and monsters, to avoid being recognized as human by Level 3 zombies who were more intelligent than normal... Marco soon arrived in an upper-middle-class area of the city, where there were several luxury buildings...

"It was in that building that I saw the light... But what floor was it?" Marco muttered and continued, using the stairs, deciding to check all the floors as a precaution...

But as soon as he reached the second-to-last floor of the building, he found a message written in blood near the stairs...

"Do not enter! Too many dead pets!"

Marco frowned for a moment, but undaunted by the message, he continued, opening the door to the top floor of the building. As soon as he entered the top-floor hallway, a strong smell of decaying corpses assaulted his heightened senses, making him reach for his mask in an attempt to muffle the smell...

The place was very dark, but Marco, being a Level 2 Enhanced Zombie, could still see why this hallway smelled so bad. There were many viscera, feathers, and animal bones scattered across the floor. Someone had fought here, and the announcement hadn’t been made just to scare anyone...

Marco soon spotted a door. It was numbered 1501, a reference to the floor they were on and the fact that this entire top floor had only one apartment... His steps continued through the darkness, and before Marco knew it, he tripped over some kind of line.

"Click"

"BOOM"

Marco was thrown by a massive explosion and injured in several places, but the most insane thing of all was that the explosion didn’t smell like gunpowder, but rather a mist of blood...

Marco was frightened, his body preventing him from feeling pain, so he returned to the stairs, leaving the dark hallway behind. He took out one of the flashlights Anna had given him and began to more carefully examine the severity of his injuries.

Several bone fragments appeared to be of human origin, embedded in the leg he had stepped on in the trap. His mask had been melted by some kind of acidic liquid, and other bone fragments of varying sizes had pierced his abdomen.

Marco removed the remaining pieces of the melted mask and acid-burned clothing and began removing the smaller fragments from his abdomen, leaving the ones from his leg for now. Suddenly, a distorted voice rang out from above, as if coming from some system hidden in the walls:

"Who are you? Why are you breaking into my house?"

Despite the voice trying to sound deeper and more intimidating, Marco still recognized it as a child... And not only that, but the voice belonged to a child Marco knew from the previous apocalypse...

"Lucien, is that you?"

"Oh, you know me?" the voice said, this time in a normal childish tone...

"My name is Marco, I know your father... Are you guys okay?"

"Um... My father isn’t doing so well, but I’m taking care of him..."

"Maybe I can help you? Do you need anything?"

"I DON’T NEED ANYTHING, GO AWAY!"

"That’s... I’m serious, Lucien, if you need medicine, I can bring it to you..."

"Rum, do you think I’m going to believe you? You’re probably just another bad guy after my stuff... If you don’t leave soon, I’m going to detonate the bombs in the stairwell!"

"Hey, Lucien, calm down, I’m hurt, but I’m leaving now, okay?"

"What could this kid have been through? Is he bluffing about having more bombs?" Marco thought...

But when he thought of more bombs, he suddenly focused his flashlight on the ceiling of the stairwell, and what he saw gave him chills... Several basketball-sized tumors made of flesh and bone were stuck to the ceiling of the place, pulsing as if they were alive. Marco counted at least 10 more of these things scattered across the ceiling of the place, and soon he got up, hobbling down the stairs and leaving... But not before leaving one last message.

"Lucien, do you see the office building with the blocked windows? It’s in the direction where the sun rises, five blocks away from here... That’s where my group and I live. If you or your father needs help, you can come find me there, just tell me you want to speak to the leader there..."

The child fell silent, saying nothing more, and Marco returned to the streets. This time, he was without his mask and with an injured leg, limping heavily. He would only remove the bones when he returned to his base, because he needed to stop the bleeding before letting his body heal on its own...

But as soon as Marco walked away from Lucien’s building, a shadow appeared in the sky, and Marco felt a familiar silver power envelop his body before reappearing in the sky, being grabbed by the neck by a powerful hand that left him completely breathless.

"Gak!"

Marco grunted, trying to breathe and free himself from the grip on his neck, as he stared at a man with golden skin, eyes, and long hair.

But for the man, all he saw was a red-eyed zombie, spitting black saliva as it struggled to breathe...

"I almost gave up, but I finally found Marco..." the golden man said sarcastically.

"Oh... So, is he alive?" replied a low voice in his ear, but Marco could still hear it thanks to his enhanced senses.

"No, he turned into a zombie... That’s why I wasn’t sensing any traces of his Universal Force even after wiping out the entire city of Kaelor..."

"With that, we’ve taken care of all the targets in Kaelor; there are only three left in Jyera now."

"I’m moving on to the next one. His name is Rick, right? I’ll save the two from the capital for last..." As soon as he finished that sentence, the man disappeared in a flash of silver, leaving Marco to fall from the sky.

"THUD"

"Cough"

"Cough"

"Cough"

Marco coughed several times after falling from the sky back to the ground... Due to his injured leg, he was further injured by not being able to put both feet on the ground at the same time...

"Shit, did he think I was a zombie? That was my luck..."

"Oh no... He seems to be after Rick and the others. I need to run and warn Rick quickly. This abomination took my breath away just by his presence. I don’t think Rick and the others will survive if they try to fight it..." Marco thought.

Limping, he tried to get back as fast as he could to his Base where he could use the quantum antenna to send a warning to Rick and maybe the others... He just hoped the warning would arrive in time...