Dominic lay on the floor. His strength had left his body. Knowing that his girlfriend was gone, and more so by his own hands, was something he couldn't process so quickly.
Self-defense requires cold-bloodedness, but when Dominic killed Emma, he didn't think of anything because he couldn't imagine the pain he would feel doing it.
"What sense is there now in surviving?" Dominic asked with a hoarse voice as he looked at the gun in his hand. A single bullet would be enough to disappear; one shot, and it would all end.
That's the easiest part of this, so he aimed his gun at his head, and just as he was about to pull the trigger, he remembered Emma's words moments before dying.
Who will remember us when we die?
"Damn it." Dominic stopped aiming at himself; his trembling hand took some time to recover.
In his entire life, he had very few things he valued, including his little cat, which ended up being poisoned by one of his neighbors. When he was only eighteen, he was diagnosed with that strange virus. He agonized for months, and after recovering, he thought it was all over. He returned home, months passed, and as if it were impossible, he ended up infected again. He was tired of living; maybe that's why his body stopped functioning correctly. He didn't heal, and one night he ended up sleeping deeply; that dream might have been his death.
He woke up at the age of five in this world that seemed to be similar to his, but fourteen years earlier. Those wills to live grew strong in his body, but over time, he knew the dark life he had with his father, who treated him harshly.
As he remembered, he could only survive because he was a teenager in a child's body. He learned that his mother had died and that his father treated him harshly because, due to his work, he couldn't be with him all the time.
Dominic now knew that all that time, his father had been a mercenary; he could die at any moment. This world is cruel; that's why he had to be cruel.
In this world, the things Dominic could do were many more than he could have imagined. Passing through death, there are a there are a few things that usually matter. Maybe you think that if you die again, you'll wake up in another body as if this were a superpower.
"Waking up in another body..." Dominic didn't want that; the suffering would still be in his body, and he couldn't allow that.
Crack!
Boom! Boom! Boom!
"My memories won't go away." Dominic ignored the explosions heard in the city and looked at the collar Emma had given him.
Looking at the blood on his hands, Dominic didn't bother to clean it off; he would turn this pain and anger into fuel for his engine to make it all worth it. Selfishness, confusion, and everything else would be used by him to create a safe place where kind people wouldn't have to suffer like he had. "I don't wish this pain on my worst enemy; no one will suffer this."
Dominic tightened the collar Emma had given him, walked over to where she was, and began to clean her face of the blood that had stained it. He tried to leave her as best as possible and walked into the room where he estimated Emma's mother was, and when he opened the door, he saw her mother's body transforming into a walker.
Arghhh!
"Damn it!" Dominic clenched his teeth, lamenting in his silence the things that could have been different if he hadn't focused only on more flashy things for his interest.
Bang!
As he pulled the trigger, a not-so-silent bullet shot out at great speed, and with precision, it hit Emma's mother in the forehead, who fell to the ground a few seconds after receiving the shot.
"Now what?" Dominic wouldn't return to the shelter immediately; first, he would make sure that the things he had done were worthwhile. In the original story, many people were left abandoned in the shelter the military had made after Operation Cobalt was completed.
Those people were left to their own devices; they would most likely die if he didn't do something. He wasn't becoming a hero or anything like that, but at least he would make sure his power was the strongest on the board.
"If I ever want to die, I'll make sure no one forgets me for who I'll become. That's the only way no one will forget you, Emma; you'll live on in my story." Dominic took a lighter and began to burn the room.
This place would be hell. In a few months, the military would bomb a large part of the city in an attempt to eliminate huge numbers of walkers. At least now, he was giving those people a chance to survive.
Taking his cell phone, Dominic connected via message with Tobias and said, "[Send out the alerts by radio that we're broadcasting; at least we'll make ourselves known."
Tobias: [Are you sure?]
"Completely sure; at least they might survive longer." Dominic thought as he watched the fire spread throughout Emma's house, which was consumed by the flames.
After sending that message, he made it very clear that the last instructions were from Nelson, who knew perfectly well that Dominic was the owner of the shelter. He told him to start the sealing plan; no one entered or exited the shelter without authorization that wouldn't be given.
At this point, chaos would begin; the world would plunge into flames, and the undead would walk everywhere.
"Today, the apocalypse has begun."