backyardbbq | [closed] zombiestuck

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[closed] zombiestuck

[April 13th, 2009. That was the day everything changed. Nobody expected the sudden invasion from the skies, and within a year the invading aliens had taken control of a good portion of the planet. These creatures with grey skin and orange horns were absolute terrors on the battlefield, and no human army could even compare to their destructive capability.

That was why the remains of the American government decided to make the virus. They knew no army on Earth stood a chance against such a fearsome army, so they decided to turn to chemical warfare instead. No matter how strong the alien army was, even they would fall to disease. By late 2011 they had designed a virus that only killed off trolls, while leaving humans unaffected. The world had its secret weapon.

November 11th, 2011. 11/11/11 day. It was meant to be the turning point in the war, where the American military would unleash their fearsome disease on trollkind, killing them all off within a matter of weeks. Indeed, it seemed to work at first, and trolls began dying off by the thousands. They were dying so quickly that the Condescension, the leader of all trolls, had to continuously send new waves of trolls to Earth to fill in the spots for the front line soldiers as they died. Still, the virus seemed to be working, and all of humanity bundled themselves in to try to wait for the trolls to give up and leave.

But then, as the bodies accumulated on the battlefield, something terrible happened. Nobody knew why it happened, but some of the dead trolls began to rise again. Their bodies were dead, their souls were gone, but somehow they were able to move and attack. And when they attacked, they didn't just kill humans. they devoured them. And they attacked and killed other trolls too, and those trolls who were killed by their own dead rose again as well. spreading this mutation of the sickness.

Zombie trolls proved to be much, much harder to fight than regular ones. While normal trolls stopped fighting if they were fatally wounded, zombie trolls would continue to fight until their bodies were either burned or blown to bits. At first the Condescension tried to fight the zombification, telling her best scientists to find a cure. But after years of trying, no cure could be found, so the Condescension pulled her forces out and left in 2014, a mere five years after her initial invasion.

She didn't take all of her trolls with her, though. Any troll who had ever been planet-side was left behind, and all of their space-traveling vehicles were destroyed. She would not risk any chance of the sickness going along with her when she left. As far as she was concerned, the displaced and zombified trolls were now the problems of Earth.

It is now 2019. Roughly thirty million humans and seventy million trolls remain alive on Earth. Those numbers continue to dwindle every day, as the hundred million survivors of Earth have to combat countless zombies, each more fearsome than the last. Some are fast. Some have telekinetic powers. Some can control the minds of animals, other trolls, and even humans. All of them want just one thing: the flesh of the living.

John Egbert had only been 13 when the invasion started. He had been far too young to play any kind of role in the war, and afterwards all he could do was survive. Most of his friends had fallen out of contact when the invasion had started. His one remaining relative, his loving father, had fallen to the zombies years ago. All alone in the world, John had continued to survive in what remained of Seattle, making a home in the small, walled-off area that held all of the survivors from the western coast of the United Stated. It used to be a suburb of Seattle, actually, and the mayor of the settlement had been the mayor of Seattle when civilization had fallen.

They couldn't hide behind the wall forever, though. They could grow food and sustain life inside the walls, but when anything special was needed someone had to go out into the remains of Seattle and hope to find what they were looking for.

That is why John Egbert is currently sneaking through the empty streets, his trusty hammer on his back and his two pistols in his belt. He is trying to recover a spare part for one of the generators, and he has to make it to one of the many hardware stores and back before the sun sets. Being midday, the zombies are all inside, hiding from the harsh rays of sunlight. One of the lucky breaks humanity had gotten was that trolls seemed to hate sunlight, so zombie trolls instinctively kept to the shadows. John is taking advantage of that, and he hopes to make it home before any zombies come out to bother him.

But is he truly alone?]

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[War is a two-way street. Each side does what they believe they are in the right to do. When met with resistance, they fight back. When their lives are endangered, they defend themselves. Regardless of who instigates the war, once it starts good and evil becomes a matter of opinion.

Many of the remaining victims of the chemical fallout, the remaining trolls, had arrived not long before 11/11/11 day. Though they had been raised for this exact purpose, they were still very green. Inexperienced. The invasion seemed as good as complete, as far as the youngsters were concerned. It was very unfortunate for those eager to make a mark in history. Those who had something to prove.

Then the virus struck. There was nothing to prove anymore.

There was only survival.

Abandoned by the very empire they were fighting for, they were left to deal with the aftermath. Their own forces -in some cases, their own friends- were turning against them. Many alien brethren who they had witnessed fall before them rose once more and attacked indiscriminately.

Their culture was not unfamiliar with the undead.

They were unfamiliar with it en mass. They were unfamiliar with the territory.

It became a quick and growing problem throughout the sweeps to come. The remaining few, the ones immune to the disease, were hunted down by human and undead alike. The former with a vendetta and pride in what was left of their miserable planet. The latter were eager to feed upon them, make their numbers grow. There was little rationality. No kinship. No remorse. There was only suffering.

The day time was hardly a safe time for a still stable-minded troll to be out and about. No time was, really. The undead we less of a threat during the day, but there were still the humans to worry about. Though fewer in numbers they were still dangerous.

Especially to a troll with no powers. Nothing to give him an edge over his predators.

But the day time was the only time he could avoid the undead, who were an even greater threat in his mind. Humans can't manipulate trolls. They have no psychic powers to use against them. It took greater strength for humans to take them down than a fellow troll. Or former fellow troll, he guessed.

Still, while the sun was nowhere near as painful as the Alternian one, it was still a pain to have to endure. Begrudgingly it was a pain he needed to trudge through to get to safety. He had survived this long. Dying now would be fucking stupid.

With sickle in hand he carefully traversed the dystopia that was once a human community. As soon as he heard a sound in the distance he made sure to take cover behind what he could only assume was the wall of a former hive. He looked up to spot a figure in the distance.

Human. Shit.

Avoiding confrontation would be best, but it was only one human. Maybe he could take him out before he even noticed he was there?

He decided to watch for a few minutes more, trying to find an ideal opening to strike.]

[John was a very observant person. He hadn't been, when he was younger, but growing up in a zombie apocalypse tends to make observational skills a priority. Because of that, John eventually caught a glimpse of Karkat.

The thing was, John didn't know Karkat was a troll. Not at first, at least. He had seen Karkat from a distance, and with his shoddy glasses (picked up from an abandoned store about two years ago, and definitely not precisely right for his eyes) his vision was clear enough to make out Karkat's figure in the distance, yet blurry enough to miss the tell-tale signs of a troll. Karkat's grey skin blended in with his clothes, and Karkat's horns were short enough to get lost in the mess of hair. Had Karkat been a larger troll, or had his horns been more like a normal troll's horns, John would have seen him for what he was immediately. But since it had just bee a quick glance, and John's vision was just blurry enough to cast doubt, he thought he had found another human.

John wasn't stupid enough to call out to Karkat. Years of scouting and resource-hunting in the ruins had taught him that a loud scout was a dead scout. But he did adjust his path, heading towards where he thought he had seen the other person. He kept darting his eyes around to the surrounding buildings as he went, though, keeping his guard up in case some rogue zombies showed up.

There was the worry of trolls too, since there was a troll settlement on the other side of Seattle, and John was sure the trolls used the city to scavenge from as well. But honestly, he wasn't as scared of trolls as he was of zombies. There was some deep-seated hatred between the two races, but anything alive could be reasoned with, even if it took wild gestures and badly drawn stick figures. The dead, on the other hand, could not be negotiated with.]

[Oh great, he was heading this way. This made Karkat flinch a little bit, trying to keep himself out of sight. He couldn't tell if the human had actually spotted him or not; it was best to keep still he was sure he was unaware.

It wasn't that he didn't think he could take the human out. His kind outnumbered them dramatically. It was just better to avoid confrontation unless necessary. After all he was just heading back to his own little base. It wasn't like he was out to pick a fight.

Still, he made sure to keep what was left of his former sickle at the ready. If the human noticed him he would not hesitate to strike. If not...well, he wasn't above killing him either.]

[Not knowing of the danger waiting for him, John pressed forward, still searching for the person he had caught sight of. It had only been a glimpse, and Karkat was pretty good at staying hidden, so when John got to the spot he thought Karkat was at and found nothing he began to doubt what he had seen.]

Huh. Was I just seeing things?

[Genuinely confused, John looks all around him, trying to search for Karkat. He was sure he would be the only person in the ruins of the city today, his usual exploring partner had chickened out on him. If someone else was here, he wanted to find out why. Maybe they were a survivor who had been holding out?

John really wanted to call out to whoever was out there, but he was too afraid of the zombies that could have been lurking in the dark buildings. So he did try to call out, but in one of those fakey, whisper-calling-out voices.]

Hello? Is anyone there?

[Shit. So he had been spotted after all. Great job genius. Way to make this more of a pain in the ass then it had to be.

He felt his heart beating a little faster, and was suddenly annoyed with himself. Why was he nervous when the human was the one in the hunted position? If Karkat waited long enough he could just kill this guy from behind.

In fact, maybe if he moved slowly enough...

He started to slowly sidestep, making sure to stay perfectly still if he felt he had made too much noise. He wasn't going to get caught, and this dumbass wasn't going to rat him out to anyone else.

More importantly, he wanted to do this without attracting any undead.]

[Karkat was successful at sneaking, as John didn't notice him at all. But John only lingered in his spot for a short while, since he knew staying in one place was a bad idea. So, before Karkat got close enough to attack, John started moving again, still searching for the person he thought he had seen.

He was going in the wrong direction, though. He actually started heading away from where Karkat was, and he was watching the buildings to the left and right of him as he walked, looking for any signs of life. He wasn't too nervous, not any more nervous than he usually was when traversing Seattle. And with no sign of any undead, that made John even less nervous than he should have been.

Maybe that was why he started to grow braver. He started to speak louder, to the point where he really was calling out. He was hoping whoever he had seen would come out and speak to him before anything bad happened.]

Hello! Hey, I know you're around here, I saw you just a moment ago!

[It was at that point he turned around fully for the first time, and he was looking back in the direction Karkat was.]

[Yes. Yes he did turn around. Unfortunately for Karkat it's impossible to be stealthy when you're hunched over behind someone in broad daylight, ready to strike.

John had gotten too far away. The jig was totally up.

>FIGHT
RUN

Well, he may as well take the shot. As soon as he came to his senses he came charging at the hammer-clad lad.]

[Oh.

Well that hadn't been a human after all.

Weirdly enough, that was the first thought that ran through John's mind. The second one was holy shit he's going to cut me to pieces!

Luckily, he had his hammer. It was a sledgehammer, to be exact. Not the best for killing zombies, unfortunately, but it proved to be very helpful at fending off deadly things when he was out of ammo. And while he wasn't out of ammo this time, Karkat was too close for shooting, so the hammer would have to do.

Well, it would have to do as soon as John could get it off of his back. At that moment he had to duck down and out of the way to avoid getting decapitated.]

Woah!

[John tried to pull away far enough to give him a couple seconds to unstrap his hammer. He really hadn't been expecting to come across a lone troll, and definitely not one who wasn't a zombie. There was a distinctive lack of rotting here, so Karkat couldn't have been a part of the undead hoard.

Then he remembered that living things could be reasoned with, so instead of whipping out his hammer to smash Karkat, he stood up and held his hands out in front of him.]

WoahwoahwoahwoahWOAH! Calm down now, there's no need for fighting!

[As much as he hated trolls for all the trouble they had caused humans, he really didn't want to fight, especially not in the middle of a city of undead. The smell of fresh blood would draw zombis there like flies to rotten fruit.]

[Karkat didn't respond, but he did hesitate for a moment. Was this guy really going to try to rationalize the situation? What sort of creature doesn't fend for its life?! No wonder humans were a dying species.

Still, the fact remained that fighting the human was more trouble than it was worth, so he lowered his weapon, implying he'd at least listen to what he had to say.

He swore to god it better have been good. He hated having his time wasted.]

[Okay, so the troll was at least stopping long enough for John to talk more. John wasn't sure if this troll would listen to him, or even if he could understand, but he had to try. So he spoke quickly, trying to get as much out before Karkat decided to attack him again.]

Okay, look. We're in the middle of zombie deadland here, and the last thing either of us need is a hoard of superpowered dead guys after us. You know they'd all flock here the moment they smell fresh blood, so let's just keep all sharp and pointy things to ourselves, mmkay? I'm not even looking for a fight, I just thought I saw another human and I wanted to make sure they were safe. But I guess that was you, huh? It was kinda hard to see, your horns are all nubby 'n stuff, so I didn't even notice them. But hey, we all make mistakes, right?

[John really did ramble on when he was feeling jumpy.]

AT LEAST I HAVE HORNS Y--

[Okay that was loud. He wasn't a very quiet guy to begin with, but when he was pissed off he was even worse. He clammed up and glared at the guy. He could have culled him right then and there, but...

Well, he had a point.

With a little cringe he decided to just run off. The human wasn't even worth wasting his time on anyway, and he needed to find shelter; the sun was starting to irritate his eyes.]

Wait-

[But Karkat was running off already, and John really didn't want to press his luck and chase him down. Honestly, it was better that way. They could go their separate ways and not have to cause a big scene. Nobody got eaten by zombies, nobody got stabbed in the face, and everything was good.

But as Karkat escaped, John noticed how unusually skinny he was. Everyone was eating light, John knew that. Even back at the makeshift town he lived in everyone had to carefully ration their food. But Karkat looked like he was beyond rations and extending into 'constantly hungry' territory. Maybe he had been following John because he was hungry?

Whatever it could have been, something compelled John to find out more about this lone troll. he had never even heard of a troll being by themselves, they always moved in groups, or so he thought. Why was Karkat different?

Those thoughts led John to come back to that same area the next day, this time with extra rations of food on him. Maybe a little peace offering of a lunch would butter Karkat up enough to get him talking. John was distrustful of trolls, but he was also curious about them too.]

[Of course he would have been back in the area. He was a troll that didn't get much sleep. It had always been the way he lived, and being the creature of habit that he was he continued this trend on Earth, sleeping only when he felt it was safe to. Or when he couldn't stay awake any longer. Whichever came first.

At any rate he had returned to the area to scrounge around for food himself. The little base of operations had nothing he could readily take, so it was another night of winging it. Winging it and hiding from the undead. Wow was this place shitty!

It didn't take long for the nubby-horned troll to realize the human had brought food. When you're hungry food smells even better than usual. It still confused him though. Why was he back? Did he forget something?

Was he just stupid? That was probably the answer.

He didn't approach John directly, again choosing to keep an eye on him from a distance. In hiding. Brilliant.]

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