User:Jac Z/Autobiography of Jacus Z

This story is part of the Malton Chronicles. This story is fan-made, and is not officially part of any background history for Urban Dead.

Put into writing during a brief foray into the land of the living, this first-person story relates how a drunkard layabout harman became a top-level zombie warrior.

Life

Chapter 1

That night I was at Club Webbe in Rolt Heights. I’d had quite a few glasses of port, but wasn’t completely drunk. I can remember what happened well enough. The big group mamba had almost finished when he came in.

To everyone’s confoundment, a maniac with a rifle stood at the main entrance and fired his weapon into the floor three times. He was in army uniform, his rank being Private. Once the entire club was silent and attentive, he shouted “All right everyone, listen up! Malton is officially in a local state of emergency! I’m supposed to guard this building until we can evacuate you lot in the morning.” He then bossed the staff around, making them barricade the doors and putting the TVs onto a 24-hour news channel.

I just sat at the bar and continued like nothing was out of the ordinary. We all watched the news, but there wasn’t much of it. The government had declared the state of emergency because the local homicide rate was still spiralling upwards uncontrollably despite the MPD’s best efforts at public order. Recently several suburbs had fallen to the hands of extremely violent mobs, which were roaming the city and committing mass murder. The army was rapidly descending on the city, and it was hoped that they’d have a full evacuation and quarantine in place by the end of the following day.

I contemplated being forced out of Malton. In the end I decided that depending on government shelter and handouts would probably make me better off than depending on myself. We all lay down for sleep in the bar area after midnight.

Before I fell asleep, I witnessed a police officer arrive via the roof – he’d free-ran from Tompson next door. He stayed only to hand our Private a portable radio and whisper conspiratorially. I suppose that’s all one should expect from Pigs in a martial law situation. I overheard that he was on his way to Schreiber Drive next, and then he made his way over the barricades and outside.

What promised to be a good night’s sleep was interrupted at around 3am by the sound of a strong person smashing all their weight at the front doors. They put their all into it, and screamed inarticulately - a blood-curdling groan! A few items fell off the barricade, but the private put them back in place. After only a minute they stopped, and seemingly moved elsewhere. Our man said “it’s one of those psychopaths responsible for the state of Malton.” My lazy apathy and unthinking confidence in the ability of the authorities to protect us was broken there and then, with the realisation that we were up against a definite group of fighters intent on our murder.

At dawn we were awoken as our supervisor received orders from his radio. The barricades were deconstructed, and we all walked to Land Park, where the other evacuees from that part of the suburb were gathered. The park perimeter was guarded by an army patrol armed to the teeth, and there was a helicopter parked in the centre of the lawn with the commanding officer there. After a while, when everyone had arrived, the commander produced a megaphone and addressed the crowd: “I need everyone’s attention right now! General Aaron has given us until nightfall to get the entire city empty of people who aren’t nuts or dead. Right now everyone here who can walk is going to go over to Youl Avenue Railway Station over in Pescodside, where a load of trains are waiting to take you north. Everyone who can’t walk can come with me in the chopper straight away. I’ll have no time-wasting, and absolutely no disobedience! I don’t give a shit if your dog or your wife is still in Malton, we’re all leaving! NOW!”

The men began to enact his orders immediately, and the 500–strong crowd started a slow march east, escorted by the soldiers. We passed by St. Herman’s Hospital, and saw clearly that the building had been totally ransacked – even worse, I’m sure I spotted one, maybe more, mutilated corpses in the foyer.

We got as far as Kempshaw street without any difficulty, but from the Clewett Building the unmistakeable sounds of a heavy battle were clearly heard. The soldiers of our escort hesitated at this, and the group leader hailed his commander via radio. The order he received was unambiguous: any threatened Necrotech buildings are to be defended at all costs. Before going to assault the building, he gave a hasty apology to us abandoned and vulnerable civilians, telling us to make our own way along the edge of Gilles park.

Group Dynamics is a bitch. A couple of tough guys volunteered to take the lead, and the rest of us just tried to stay as close to the centre of the throng as possible. We skirted along the edge of the park lawn, protected on one side by a high wall. Progress was much faster than before, as the limiting factor of our speed was the rushed pace of the leaders, not the caution of the soldiers. Being fairly close to the centre, I didn’t see at first what it was that induced the group to panic.

Several people screamed, and everyone else just started running in every direction. The group dissipated as people tried to get away from... the psychopaths. I saw about 10 or 20 of them in the park – most seemed to just be loitering with a vacant expression, but 5 of them were actively assaulting the evacuees. Their identity as genocidal maniacs was confirmed immediately by their appearance. Their bodies were, to greater or lesser degrees, all covered in dried blood and they all bore horrifying wounds that didn’t seem to cause them any distress.

I tried to scream, but that’s what everyone else was doing. I froze against the wall – there was nowhere to run. It was every man for himself as the enemy closed in and killed everyone they reached without any hesitation – they literally tore their victims apart using their bare hands... and teeth! Fight or Flight kicked in, and I rushed at the nearest psycho, a woman – I hit her with both fists in the face and give her a kick in the shin. She fell over with a groan.

My confidence somewhat raised, I tried to run between two of the idle psychos – they just stood still, swaying slightly. But then my face hit the grass! One of those two had stuck his leg out and tripped me, and before I knew it he was on top of me! He stank – an odour worse than sewage, and wholely unfamiliar to me. At last I screamed as he grabbed my hands, pinning me down. I struggled with all my might and made as much noise as I was able, but that just attracted two more of them. The one on top of me bit my neck, and I felt incomparable pain as each fibre and vital tube was severed by those sharp, cold teeth.

I passed out, my last living thought being: “why do they feel cold?”

Death

Chapter 2

I think, therefore I am... A rotten corpse on the park lawn began to think, and thus I was born.

My first thought, and for some time my only thought, was a feeling of overwhelming hunger. For the sake of being able to eat, I arose from my dead rest and began to walk, looking about for possible food. During that first rise I was confused and thinking little – I’d forgotten how to walk properly and took an hour just to traverse the length of the park.

Lost in the strange empty city of death, I wandered for the whole of the day, before at last finding direction: a bestial groan from not too far away convinced me that satiation was at hand. I thus set course for the invisible source of the call, and employed 100% of my energy to the task of moving myself there as quickly and directly as possible.

Club Popham, I know it well. Five odd-looking folk were milling about the entrance, but my appetite still held a monopoly on my brain cells, so without being distracted I shambled in through the open doors. At last I found what I’d been looking for in my confused desperation: a live hunt! A feast of living prey was ongoing when I arrived, with downed specimens on the floor being devoured by their slayers.

A weak-looking specimen was cowering against a wall - I closed in and tried to attack it with my bare hands, but my negligible coordination was a great impairment. I did manage to damage it however, and its wounds made it a soft target for a stronger hunter. Someone faster and more powerful than myself jumped on my victim and with ease rendered it immobile – at that my stomach readied itself for the long-awaited first meal.

Falling down onto my victim, I proceeded to rend the abdomen with my claws and bury my face into the warm, sweet smorgasbord. It was exactly what I had lusted after, and I saw why at once. The effect of the living tissue on my system was overpowering, and extremely positive. Every single one of my faculties was enhanced: my senses became more acute; the strength in my back and arms increased; my balance improved; my thinking became clearer and deeper.

What had been blind drive before became, from that point on, conscious policy: I must kill and eat all that I can - for not only is it immensely pleasurable, it is the path to health and self-improvement.

I found that for some time I’d been standing where I was, lost in my incoherent thoughts. Looking around, the dead bodies had mostly gone away, only two of my partners were still present, and they were standing unconscious just like I had. The prey were still there, though. I made an advance on the nearest, but it backed away with great agility and whipped out a strange object in its hand.

It pointed the alien thing in my face, and then everything just stopped.

Chapter 3

A corpse lying in the street, I slowly became conscious once again. With effort I stood up.

Unlike the time before, I was well-fed already, and was able to lucidly think over my predicament: the “food” had produced an alien artefact and attacked me – in fact, it seems I was killed instantaneously. How could that be, that I died yet still exist? What is death, anyway? Clearly not total and final destruction - merely the killing of the body, which obviously regenerates.

...But if I had died a temporary death, in what state was my health now? I looked upon myself more closely: As I had stood up just then my motion had been stiff and slow; the senses in my eyes, ears and nose were dulled; my skin was of an unnatural pigment; but of most concern were my wounds. Large sections of my torso and legs were missing, with the wounds being open and the blood coagulated - no scar tissue. I felt no pain. At all.

Indeed, I was dead. But I was no inanimate vessel: I was vigorous and aware... and hungry for fresh blood. Thinking makes hungry, especially such deep philosophy - so off I went on another prowl for the food that gives me both energy and sapience.

I shambled along the deserted residential streets, meeting only inanimate dead bodies. At Barker Avenue, I made a discovery: another person like me, her face pale and her (expensive purple) clothes stained with blood. She was investigating St. Arnold’s Hospital, but apparently had been disappointed. She saw me, and gave greeting with a quick “Grh.” I responded in kind, and we began to walk silently as a pair.

She was sniffing violently, apparently being in possession of a superior sense of smell to my own. With her nose the leader, we came to join a large crowd encircling the tall Patterson Building. One of the men there was smashing all his weight against the front door with passion, but most of the people just stood where they were, swaying slightly.

At first I did not know why we were all there, but I was not going to wander off on my own when there was such a big, strong group to be a part of. Working together has got to be a good thing, no matter what the goal. We kept up the vigil until dawn, and nothing really happened in that time. At sunrise, the main doors opened from within and two meaty creatures ran out to meet us.

A small minority of the crowd were lucid, and we all advanced. The prey responded by revealing themselves to be equipped with *those things* - both of them took the weapons in their hands and emitted the fatal blasts. The first three valiant hunters fell.

Raw emotion boiled up inside me: righteous fury! The hot creatures of fat and flesh have no right to dispense destruction upon us übermenschen, their rightful owners and... consumers! Besides, those were my comrades, for I was a part of this mob. An attack on one of us is an offense to all: I myself was greatly offended. The demon in my heart awoke, and drove me forward to the imminent destruction of the evil murderers.

I went berserk and lunged at the nearer of the two. One of my friends reacted in the same way at almost the same time: automatically we employed couple tactics to surround it and attack simultaneously. It was agile though. It easily killed my partner with its weapon and the two of them retreated to the building interior. ...Not before I’d torn a piece of meat off its shoulder with my left hand.

Massively pleased with my small victory and fitting reward, I ate it at once, enjoying the benefits.

Chapter 4

It became obvious that the building housed many animals waiting to be slaughtered. Happy and proud to serve the common interest and my own at once, I joined the effort to break open the door. Each smash upon the glass made the barricades behind give a little way, and with prolonged attack whole sections were heard to fall apart.

The siege went on for 2 days, with me (just like my confederates) lapsing in and out of consciousness according to an irregular cycle. The monotony was only broken by the occasional murderous assaults from within, and the sound of barricades collapsing after especially heavy blows by us.

In the middle of the third night, the last few sections of the barricades fell away. The man responsible for the feat wasted no time in manipulating the doors so they were open and then entering. Immediately, reports from the weapons were heard as well as the unmistakeable groan of hunger’s banishment, prompting three more people to follow him inside.

The noises escalated, waking me from my detached observational stupor. Somebody kindly dragged an only-just-living specimen outside by the arm. I helped myself, and the re-energising effect was of course instant. At my peak once more, I speedily went in to join the party.

Happy pandemonium! Hunters and hunted ran in all directions around the large hall, and entered and left doors randomly. Plenty of kills were made, but many of us were getting slain too. This was not just a hunt – it was a battle, and more warriors were needed! Half-automatically I yelled with the full force of my lungs, a threatening “graaaaah!” that I made sure was heard from the street.

Just as desired, a mob of about 5 comrades followed me to join the fray. Thus given the confidence to fight, I did my duty by setting upon and mauling the first prey I found, giving it life-threatening injuries. More and more combatants arrived, and the Battle of Patterson was won within the hour – all of the enemy were dead and partially eaten.

Someone shouted “Gang! Harm zah bag manz zahn ranzag!” ...which made no sense whatsoever to me at the time, but a few of the others responded directly by proceeding to smash the resident contraptions and stalking off into as-of-yet-unexplored back rooms. A single prey came out from hiding therein, and its appearance marked it out: wearing a white coat and carrying a bag! The gang naturally set upon him.

The bag man’s exit to the street was blocked by myself and another person, so he began to panic – he hurriedly opened his bag and produced his weapons. Demonstrating the super-agility of his race, he stabbed my friend in the back of the neck, which seemingly yielded an instantaneous kill.

The rest of the gang closed in, and I sneaked up behind him and lunged to bite his neck. I missed, and felt my spine get impaled.