1st Person POV
Andre?
I knew him, Andre Reza.
One of the four guards assigned to "protect" me—though everyone knew what their real duty was. They weren't bodyguards. They were handlers. Plainclothes officers sent by the central regional police to keep watch. To keep me from being a problem.
They were also part of the reason people started moving back into the area. Everyone assumed the house had changed hands—that someone new lived here now. That I was gone. It made them feel safe again.
Most of the guards didn't care much about me either. Just doing their job. Detached. Indifferent. Andre, though… he was different. Never cold. Never disrespectful. He played games on his phone more than he watched me. Said little. Smiled when he did. Not a bad man.
But something was wrong now. Deeply wrong.
His clothes were soaked in blood—dark patches smeared across his chest and sleeves, dripping down one arm. His left hand… chewed. Torn. Like something had gnawed through flesh and tendon. His fingers twitched unnaturally, like they didn't remember how to move. His head jerked faintly, side to side.
My gut twisted. Something dangerous was standing in that room. My instincts screamed it.
Rabies? vCJD? Something viral? No. Not quite.
There was a name. A word I didn't want to believe.
Zombie.
Ridiculous. Impossible. But I couldn't ignore what I saw.
I stopped thinking. Reached to the wall beside me and took an old, dusty jacket off its hook. Then, I hummed—low and soft, just loud enough to carry across the room.
3rd Person POV
Andre stirred. His movements were stiff, disjointed—as if his joints remembered how to function but had forgotten why. His body turned in jagged shifts, head tilting slightly toward the sound.
And then his face was visible.
Pale. Sickly gray. Smeared with dried blood. His eyes had sunk into shadowed sockets, glassy and dull, yet locked forward with an unnatural hunger. His lips were torn, exposing gum and chipped teeth, slick with dark red. His jaw twitched open, like a reflex. Like it couldn't stop itself.
He shuffled toward the noise, arms swaying slightly, each step a battle with gravity. As if pulled by instinct alone.
Andre entered the side room—where clothes hung from rods and dust-covered shoes sat stacked in old boxes. But the man was no longer there.
A pause. Andre tilted unnaturally to the left. Just slightly.
Then— A sudden strike.
From behind, the man appeared—swift and precise. His foot drove into the back of Andre's knee, collapsing the leg instantly. Andre's body lurched forward, losing all balance, falling face-first toward the floor.
But before he hit the ground, the man was already moving. In one fluid motion, he swung the jacket over Andre's head—wrapping it tightly around the pale face—and twisted both sleeves backward in a sharp loop. Andre's face met the cold floor with a dull smack, but his body jerked, trying to push itself upright in the next second. The man responded instantly, yanking the knot tight, cutting off the movement before it could gain momentum.
Andre thrashed.is limbs convulsed with erratic force. Growling, snarling through the thick fabric, the creature twisted, trying to turn its mouth toward him—snapping blindly in rage. Its limbs flail wildly, the stench of blood thick in the air.
But the man didn't flinch. His expression was calm. Focused.
He passed the jacket sleeve from his right hand into his left hand, locking the struggling body close. Then after that, he reached into his right pocket and drew the scissors he had tucked earlier. Reverse grip. Blade ready.
Andre—or what was left of him—kept resisting, clawing against the hold, teeth grinding against the fabric, every twitch more violent than the last.
The man exhaled. And then—he pulled the knot tighter, this time with a burst of strength. The sudden force yanked the creature's head back. Without hesitation, the man drove the blade into the motor cortex—deep, clean, precise.
A twitch, a final jerk. Then silence. Andre collapsed, lifeless. The fight gone.
The man remained there a moment longer, hands steady—still gripping the knot of fabric, the blade buried in the skull. Breathing slowly. Then, wordlessly, he let go. The body slumped to the floor.
He let out a long sigh, staring at the motionless figure at his feet—not with fear or guilt. Only the quiet weight of what he already knew:
This was just the beginning.
A low growl echoed from above—followed by a loud thump and the sound of something heavy rolling down the stairs. The man turned instantly, eyes locking onto the staircase.
Yep. Just as he expected.
Another one.
This time, it was—Danny. Another one of the guards.
As the body finished its awkward descent, a violent bang erupted at the front door, followed by a chorus of snarling and pounding against wood.
More of them.
Danny, now fully upright, let out a deep, guttural snarl before charging. His limbs moved erratically, but his speed was unsettling—faster than before. Without flinching, the man reached down, grabbed a dusty shoe off the floor, and hurled it with force.
Thud.
It struck Danny square in the face, staggering him just long enough. The man didn't waste any more seconds. He snatched another jacket off a nearby hook, gripping each end of the sleeves like a makeshift restraint. His breath steady, body loose. He waited.
The infected guard was now just a step away.
In a blink, the man shifted left—swift, controlled. As Danny lunged, teeth bared, the man moved behind him; at the same time, he swung the sleeves around his arms, trying to bind them. But the creature twisted its head fast—unnaturally fast—and snapped at him.
He didn't hesitate. With a sharp pivot, the man sidestepped again, this time to the right, yanking the sleeves tighter and planting a solid kick into Danny's side.
The zombie stumbled, lost balance, and collapsed beside Andre's corpse. But it didn't stay down. Danny twisted mid-fall, landing face-up, eyes wild and mouth gaping, desperate to sink into flesh.
The man moved in—his grip tightening on the makeshift binding as he forced Danny's wrapped arms across his own face, pinning them down with one hand. His knee pressed hard on the zombie's thigh, keeping it grounded.
Still thrashing. Still snarling.
With a sharp grunt, he reached across and yanked the scissors still embedded in Andre's skull.
It resisted. Danny writhed harder, starting to break free.
Finally, the blade tore loose—but so did the infected's arms. Its jaw snapped open, ready to bite.
The man shoved its bound arms back over its face just in time. Another second and it would've torn through his hand. No more hesitation—he drove the blade straight into the creature's brain.
Thunk.
Not deep enough.
The zombie screamed—if such a thing could scream—body convulsing violently. The dull blade barely pierced the surface. With gritted teeth, the man pulled it back, and drove it in again. This time deeper. Right through the base of the skull.
Danny went still. Chest heaving, the man kept his grip firm for another moment. Just to be sure. Then he let go of the scissor, still lodged in the creature's skull, and stood. His eyes flicked to the front door, where the pounding continued—louder now. More of them.
And now it wasn't just from the front door. There were hits echoing from the gate too. Metal rattling. Rhythmic. Desperate.
He turned his head slightly, listening.
'Two separate points of impact, he noted. Front door and gate.
So the ones outside the door…'
"Billy and Aril," he muttered under his breath. "Well… at least they had the sense to close the gate before turning."
He exhaled through his nose. Calm. Calculating.
'I need a better weapon,' he thought. His eyes flicked to the dull scissors still lodged in the infected guard's skull—bent, bloodied, useless now. The box cutter in his pocket wasn't going to cut it—not anymore. It was never meant for this.
He'd only grabbed it because he thought all of this—the corpse smell, the blood, the silence—was some elaborate setup. A trap. A grudge from the past comes home to roost. A human problem.
But now?
This was no grudge. This was a mess.
Something else entirely.
While he hid from Andre earlier, he'd quietly slipped the cutter into his other pocket. Useless against bone. Just enough to injure. Not enough to survive.
Now he needed something that could kill.
He turned toward the middle room, eyes on the wooden cupboard. He remembered the old hammer inside—forgotten, rusting—but solid. Reliable.
He took a step—
Then stopped.
A sudden sound—mechanical, unnatural—cut through the tension like a blade.
[SYSTEM BOOTING...]
[A.R.K Protocol System Active.
Host Detected.
Initializing Interface…]
He froze, eyes narrowing. The voice wasn't human. It wasn't coming from outside.
It was inside his head.
Or worse—
It was real.