Zachariah woke up laughing. He giggled and gasped and hooted in disbelief and horror. He couldn't believe that he had done it! He couldn't believe what he had figured out!
Last night, after 2 months of trying to fight back against the Zombies and dying pitifully every time, Zack finally killed a Red Zombie. Shocking, right? It took him so long to make one kill, and he died directly afterwards.
But what he found out is that killing Red Zombies can make him stronger. After struggling to survive so many times, Zack is extremely familiar with how weak he is. He can hardly off a normal Zombie - even a fresh Red is out of his league. Even now, he can feel the new power flowing through him.
It was intoxicating. The ultimate rush of instant gratification and lingering pleasure, and the only thing on Zack's mind is who he killed, and how to kill more.
The alarm clock starts sounding off, reminding him of the world he once knew, and responsibilities he no longer cared about. Casually he grabbed the cheap plastic thing in his hand and crushed it easily. It was about as hard as scrunching up paper.
In his mind, he saw the scene again - the rain had just started to fall, he was standing near a nightclub with his Baseball Bat. He was wearing a cheap plastic poncho, and a pair of rain boots, both in cheerful shades of yellow.
The rain slicked down the plastic, dyeing it red and soaked in to his clothes around the edges. For a moment, as people around him fell and were drowned in thick liquid the colour of blood, Zack felt like he must be the first Zombie.
He raised his Bat, took aim at one of the nearby corpses, and waited for the rain to stop. He felt anticipation and trepidation - what better way to start the night this time than by bashing in a Zombie brain. Even so, he wasn't confident of his strength, so the target he chose was a young girl of perhaps 15. Her dress must have been light pink or white, and it still had pretty printed flowers in bright colours that beaded and repelled the red rain.
Such a young girl, with all her life ahead of her, was being transformed into a monster before his eyes. Zack was glad she was lying face down - he didn't want to know who she had been. Even after all these deaths and horrors, compassion still kept a dying light in his heart. It was too late to save the girl - by killing her now, perhaps someone else could be saved.
As the last drops fell from the sky, the liquid puddles moved by their own means, thickening around the fallen sacrifices, changing them for it's own purpose. Zack watched curiously as the liquid wrapped about his rain boots, and climbed up the sides in thin streams. It really did seem to be alive, in some horrid and strange way. Apart from his feet feeling wet, Zack couldn't feel any issues with the liquid in his shoes, which was weird in its own right. Shouldn't this stuff soak into him, and cause a feeling of pain? It always has before.
But there is no time to ponder this now. He looked back at the girl and saw her body twitch, the first sign of becoming an active Red Zombie. With only a small hesitation Zack brought the bat down firmly on her skull.
She twitched, and tried to get up. Obviously one blow was not enough.
So Zack raised the bat again and hit her. And again. And again.
He kept going until the lump of flesh on her neck could not be identified. And that's when he felt it - the power rush. It made him gasp and staggered, falling back onto the road and into the liquid. As the foreign energy invaded him he started to fit and shake.
And then another Red Zombie tackled him and tore his throat out. It really was their method of choice.
Zack chuckled to himself again, even as tears began trailing down his cheeks. This power feels so amazing and reassuring - but it comes at the cost of a person's life. That girl's life.
He would never know her name. He would probably never see her again. The world has Reset, and she is alive and well right now, somewhere in this big city.
But that doesn't clean her blood from Zack's hands. It cannot take the guilt from his heart.
Slowly Zack got up, still laughing and crying, mourning this new loss of innocence on top of all the rest.
It doesn't matter that she was a zombie - Zachariah Kane is still a murderer.