John Egbert (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
windyheir) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
backyardbbq2012-09-15 06:13 pm
windyheir) wrote in backyardbbq2012-09-15 06:13 pm
Entry tags:
[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?]
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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Karkat.
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[It rolls off his tongue funny, as he can't quite pronounce it right.]
That's a cool name, I like it.
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Well, there you go.
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You know, I don't think I ever rode the subway while it was still running. it's a shame, I always thought they were cool as a kid, but every time we came to Seattle Dad had his car, so we didn't need to use public transportation. I was gonna move here when I grew up, to go to college, but...yeah.
[A pause.]
Dave was going to come here too, we talked about it. But I haven't heard from him in ages.
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This John. He wasn't exactly the sharpest weapon in the armory was he?]
Sucks to be you, I guess.
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Wasn't it the same for you? Having plans for the future, I mean.
[If trolls can have names and parents and grow up like humans do, then maybe they have aspirations as well.]
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[To be honest, he was amazed he managed to make it this far. All logic dictated he would have been found out and culled long ago. He was cautious, but mostly he was just lucky.]
I wanted to be an elite soldier when I was younger. I don't know what made me think it was even possible, but it was really more of a wriggler's pipe dream.
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[All John had wanted was a nice life with a nice family and to die old and surrounded by his loved ones. So far none of that had happened, and it was very unlikely that it would ever happen. Dreams being crushed were a common thing nowadays.]
So...how long do you think we should hide here?
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I'm not going to sleep, so just do your human diurnal thing whenever.
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But he was pretty tired, too.]
...Okay. Wake me up if anything bad happens.
[And he tried to make himself comfortable to sleep. Luckily years of surviving by the skin of his teeth had taught him to sleep when he could get it and not be bothered by the lack of a bed or how creepy this tunnel was. He still slept lightly, though. It wouldn't do any good to sleep through zombies arriving.]
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Still, John was a very confusing human. He had actively sought Karkat out when hardly an exchange between them was made. He had never met a single human dumb enough to try making peace with the enemy force.
Of course, this blatant stupidity is probably why he was putting up with John now. The human seemed harmless enough. Definitely not worth the time and effort to kill.
He wasn't stupid though. He wasn't taking his eyes off the man for a minute.]
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He didn't exactly acknowledge John's awakening, but he was no doubt aware of it.]
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John was groggy, and it took him a moment to remember why he was in a dark tunnel instead of back in the makeshift village he called home. That was followed by a moment of panic when he didn't see Karkat anywhere.
Standing up, John looked around for the troll, until finally he wandered further down the tunnel to look there. He walked carefully as he went, keeping his eyes on the shadows, as if he expected a zombie to jump out at him suddenly.]
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Karkat reached a hand out towards John in an effort to tell him not to move any closer. He didn't know if John could see it, and he didn't really care either. That guy better stop moving.
Though the undead were not in sight, there were sounds coming from deep within the tunnel. He doubted anymore would come through the entrance, but it was best not to go any further for an hour more at least.]
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Then he immediately covered his mouth with his hands, because he was sure Karkat wouldn't have stopped him if it were safe out there. Whoops.]
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When they were back in the tunnel, he finally started to whisper again. To the extent that he could whisper.]
A couple more hours.
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But he still nodded, and he settled back down to wait out the couple hours. Sleeping was out of the question, though, especially with the undead so close.]
If you want to rest, I'll keep watch.
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I don't need to sleep.
[It was partly true. He did, in fact, need to sleep. He was just capable of going long periods of time without doing so.]
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Don't be dumb, everyone needs sleep. I'm not gonna do anything or leave you here, you'll be fine.
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[He was a little on edge, so he was being kinda short. He even managed to make it a good minute before he spoke again.]
...I won't tell anyone, when I go back. About this place, I mean.
[It was meant for Karkat more than anything else. He didn't want Karkat to think he would come back with a mob of angry humans. Karkat's hideout would remain a secret, though John would remember where it was, in case he got into trouble with zombies again.]
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[He actually did believe John was telling the truth. He couldn't explain why, but he didn't think he was lying. Still, he had to make sure John wouldn't endanger him. A warning would suffice.]
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[That was a nervous laugh there, since he's sure Karkat could carry out that threat if he really wanted to.]
And you won't tell the other trolls about all of this, right?
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[Of course he didn't HAVE to mention that part, but to be honest he would often avoid contact with the colony anyway, going very rarely to take some food and hide. He hardly spoke to anyone while he was there either. This secret was pretty much well-kept.]
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