Day Two
Dawn came again, washing out the glow from my still-burning house, the dark column of smoke the only flaw in the cloudless sky. From my hiding place beneath the porch of an abandoned house, I can see in all directions. From here, I can flee from any who might approach. But I see only isolated figures on the street, shambling with slow determination through the darkness toward the towering pyre of my wife's final resting place. I wonder what impulse drives them, and what the dead will do when they reach their destination.
The growing light allows me to examine my position, and I feel a shock of fear as I recognize a single shoe on the ground next to me, parallel lines dragged through the dirt nearby, raked by fingernails as some unfortunate was located here, hours before. I was not safe here, no matter what I might have believed. Thus far, I’d been lucky, but luck doesn’t last. Scrambling forward on hands an knees, I feel a ring of keys bite into my palm. My eyes fall on the family car parked nearby, and the keys jingle softly as I lift them from the dust. I open the car door and lean in, fumbling, trying to fit the car’s key into the ignition without getting into the driver’s seat.
The cocking of the gun is loud in the morning silence, and I freeze, turning just enough to see the blue metal barrel inches from my face. Beyond it, a girl grips the weapon with both hands, fear making her shake.
“Are you one of them?” she asks, her voice unsteady, trembling. I shake my head, unable to take my eyes from the barrel.
“No”, I whisper. “No, I’m not.”
“Go away,” she says, and I turn to face her for the first time. Sandy hair is knotted and dirty, her face tear-streaked, eyes raw.
“We’ll be safer together,” I say, and she hesitates. Beyond her, through the back window of the car, I see a knot of shambling figures has gathered in the street, all of them watching us. One of them takes a step forward. After a moment, the others follow, advancing up the driveway.
“We need to get out of here,” I say, and back from the car, heart pounding. The keys slip from my grasp, and I scrabble on the pavement, looking for them, unable to focus, aware of the growing miasma of death, the softly shuffling figures growing closer with every moment.
The back door of the car opens, and the girl climbs out, her gun pointed at the advancing forms. But she cannot force herself to fire, and backs away, one step, two, until she nearly trips over me. I steady her, and her arms grip me, the gun hard through the thin shirt I’d thrown on.
“Stop them,” she says, and in her voice, I hear the same fears I’d once calmed in my own daughter. The fear of the unknown, and the sudden realization that she would not live forever. My daughter had not known to tragically true that was, and how close the end was drawing. I take the gun from the girl's trembling hands, and face the slow march of the poor souls before us. Was my daughter wandering somewhere nearby, lost and alone, her brightly-colored funerary dress stained with the dirt of her grave?
I grip gun and girl tighter. I had not been able to save my family, but I’d given my wife her final rest. Could I redeem myself, and save this girl where I had not been able to save my own?
Megiddo continues. The combat system is done, and I extended the action system to general cases, covering such things as moving, reloading, and searching, as well as keeping an eye out for zombies.
Yesterday I said a little about the psychology system, but today, with the general action system, things have changed again, and, I realize are much closer to my original advice to Ska_Baron. I suppose it shouldn't surprise me that my thinking about the mindset of zombie survival should keep coming back to the same themes. So I've revived some of those ideas, albeit with different names.
I've also started on a character generation system to go with the campaign system. The campaign system itself has a skeleton, of sorts, with ideas of how to get it running smoothly. the idea is that the player will perform missions based on their needs in a developing situation, sometimes forced to play certain scenarios, but often choosing their path. They will collect survivors, supplies, and, eventually, information about the zombie menace. Each mission can account for a day or more, but some can keep the characters safe for days at a time, allowing them to rest and recover, while others cover mere hours of a very bad day, wherein multiple scenarios are played out in a single day.
Still going strong, considering I'm going full-steam with Vast as well!
