The world had taken everything from them. And they are the only remaining of the humanity.
Elisa and Dr. Lena Castellanos stood at the edge of Site 09, staring into the heart of the nightmare. The facility loomed before them, its steel walls wrapped in razor wire, its gates long shut, and its courtyard crawling with the dead.
They had made it.
But it wasn't the victory. Not yet.
The weight of every sacrifice, every friend lost, pressed down on them. Evelyn, Marry, Marcus, Zoe—all gone. Each name carved into their minds like scars. They had to make it count.
Elisa tightened her grip on her rifle. Her hands were trembling. She wasn't sure if it was exhaustion, fear, or the sheer gravity of what lay ahead.
Beside her, Dr. Lena was silent. Her clothes were torn, her face streaked with dirt and dried blood, but her eyes—her eyes burned with the kind of desperation that only someone who had seen the world end could have.
They had no time to waste.
The main gate was out of the question.
Beyond the fence, the undead swarmed like an ocean, moving aimlessly between wrecked military jeeps and abandoned barricades. There were hundreds of them, their bodies pressed so tightly together that even stepping inside would mean death.
The walls were too high to climb, and the old automated security systems were still active, meaning an improper breach could trigger a lockdown—or worse, alert any remaining military defense system.
"We can't fight our way through that," Lena muttered.
"No." Elisa exhaled. "We need to be smarter."
She scanned the area. There—a checkpoint booth near the perimeter, leading to an underground maintenance tunnel.
A way in.
The problem? The checkpoint door was locked.
They needed a keycard.
Elisa turned toward the nearby wreckage. Among the rotting bodies pinned beneath fallen debris, some had to be security personnel.
Their stomach twisted as they moved toward a corpse in a torn uniform. She crouched, peeling back the blood-stained fabric. Nothing.
They moved to another—still nothing.
Then, Elisa saw it.
A fresh corpse, sitting inside a half-crushed car, its head twisted unnaturally, glass shards scattered across the dashboard. The glint of a keycard clipped to its belt caught her eye.
But the car was surrounded by lingering zombies.
No way to get the card without drawing their attention.
Elisa's jaw tightened. She needed a distraction.
Her gaze flickered to a shattered office window across the lot. She picked up a small rock and threw it, shattering the remaining glass. The noise echoed through the air.
The zombies at the car turned and followed the noise.
A slow, groaning wave of undead shuffled toward the sound, their footsteps like wet slaps against concrete.
Elisa didn't wait. She rushed to the car, yanked the door open, and reached in.
The corpse slumped forward, its weight pressing against her. The stench of rotting flesh filled her lungs.
She gagged, and her hands worked fast. She ripped the keycard off the belt and backed away.
A low snarl came from behind her.
A zombie, slower than the rest, had stayed behind. Its milky white eyes locked onto her.
"Elisa, move!" Lena hissed.
She didn't hesitate. One shot to the head, and the zombie dropped.
They sprinted toward the checkpoint.
The keycard slid through the scanner. A green light flickered, and the metal door clicked open.
Beyond it lay a narrow, rusted staircase leading down.
The moment they stepped inside, the smell hit them.
Damp. Mold. And something worse—something rotting.
They moved cautiously through the tunnel, flashlights slicing through the darkness. The air was thick, humid, the walls slick with moisture.
Then, they saw them.
Bodies.
Strung along the walls. Twisted. Fused into the metal.
A military team, or what was left of them. Some were partially consumed, others mutilated beyond recognition.
Elisa swallowed hard.
"This wasn't just the virus," Lena muttered.
The deeper they went, the worse it got.
Then, the sound.
A distant, low growl.
They weren't alone down here.
At the end of the tunnel, a second security door loomed. This one required a biometric scan.
A handprint.
"Shit," Elisa whispered.
"There's no way we're getting through without a body," Lena said, scanning the area.
Elisa's eyes landed on a scientist in a bloodied lab coat, pinned under debris. His ID tag read Dr. Howard Kim—Level 4 Clearance.
Perfect.
She crouched, grabbing his wrist. But his fingers were too stiff, curled into a death grip.
Lena knelt beside her. "We need to… loosen them."
He pressed a hand to the cold flesh, then wrenched the fingers straight.
The sound of cracking cartilage filled the silence.
Elisa fought the urge to vomit.
Lena forced the rigid hand against the scanner.
For a moment, nothing.
Then—beep.
The lock disengaged.
The door slid open with a mechanical groan, revealing the pristine white walls of the facility beyond.
Bright, sterile lights flickered overhead. Computers sat untouched. Lab stations remained intact.
Elisa exhaled.
They were inside.
Far above the ruined world, The Traveler watched.
The survivors had come far.
Through the horrors of the dead, through the losses that had shattered them, through the impossible odds stacked against them.
And yet, they stood.
He had seen this before.
People clinging to hope. Fighting until the very end.
But, would it matter?
Would this world survive?
He didn't know.
But for now, he watched.
And waited.