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This is the story of Esteban. |
| [Introduction]
CRASHBOOM!!! There it was again. That terrible sound was getting closer. Esteban had been walking for hours, but he didn't know where he was or how he had gotten there. In his pocket he had a map with strange, undecipherable writing on it and an old cell phone.It had a fully charged battery, but no stored contacts and no service. He paused cautiously before stepping onto the small wooden bridge that spanned the stream several feet below. |
| The crashing sound drew nearer, sending seismic tremors through the forest underbrush. Esteban had no time to admire the view from the bridge. He had to keep moving. Taking his steps as gently as possible, he maneuvered himself along the ancient planks of the rope bridge. He was nearly across when he heard a voice calling from behind. A girl stood on the ravine ledge wearing camouflage, her face caked in mud. She had a rifle raised. “You said you would never abandon us, Esteban.” |
| Esteban didn't recognize the young girl. Her eyes were red as if she had been sobbing for years. Esteban stared at her, a blank expression on his face. She turned away as if ashamed of his actions. She finally turned back to him tears running down her face. "How could you forget me!" she exclaimed. Esteban shook his head not knowing what to do. "Who are you?" Esteban asked quietly. "Your daughter!" She yelled in a very harsh tone. |
| Esteban stared at his daughter for a few minutes. She looked to be about 19 or 20."Listen I don't know who you are or where we are but we need to get out of here before that thing catches up with us." "What do you mean you don't know where you are Esteban?" "Do you really need me to remind you of how you abandoned us and how all of humanity will be lost to The Zombie Apocalypse because a weak old man left us behind just to save him self?" |
| Esteban was overwhelmed. Could this girl be his daughter? His mind reeled. Could she be telling the truth? His chest tightened. He stopped, calmed himself and studied her face for a clue, looking past the anguish and pain. An image flashed in his mind, an image of a younger happier version of this girl. He felt a smile involuntarily creep across his face and desperately tried to hold the image in his mind even as it was slipping away. A name started to form on his tongue, but before he could get it out, he saw her pull the trigger. A blinding flash and then his world was darkness and silence. |
| “Emilia.” The name slipped from his mouth as Esteban opened his eyes. He was half-submerged in a tub of warm water, alone in a moss-colored room. Piano music was coming from somewhere. There were strange, faded portraits on the walls. His head was bandaged. He felt the gauze and saw blood on his fingers. He tried to lift himself from the tub, but his legs were limp and he slumped into the water again. Esteban tried to think. There was the crash, and the girl... The door across the room swung open. |
| Esteban noticed the phone he found in his pocket sitting on a small stool next to him. He reached out for it. He picked it up and immediately began tweeting. |
| However as soon as he picked up the phone he felt a hand grab his wrist and he felt the phone get torn out of his grasp. Esteban glared at the stranger who had just opened the door. He was tall and had ashy blonde hair and blue gray eyes like the sky after a thunder storm. Just as Esteban was opening his mouth to ask the man where he was the man turned around and ran out of the room shutting and locking the door behind him. Esteban realized that he was imprisoned and an instinct in him told him that he would have to escape. Already his brain was formulating an escape plan. |
| Luis slammed the cell phone down on the table. "The old fool was trying to send a message to them! I just barely stopped him in time." Emilia had been poring over the map that was on Esteban when he was brought in. She looked up at Luis. "He's our only hope." "Then we have no hope," muttered a confused Luis. "He didn't abandon us. He risked his life to save us. I don't know how he got his hands on it, but with this map we might just have a chance against whoever's manipulating the zombies." "You're as crazy as Esteban. That map's full of nonsense and gibberish." "No, it's encrypted. We just need to decode it." "Esteban's the only person capable of that and he thinks you just tried to kill him. He'll never help us." Emilia opened her mouth to speak just as the siren started blaring BWAHBWAHBWAH... |
| “Let's take a look. It could be nothing,” Luis drew the Colt Remington from the holster on his belt. Emilia swung her rifle from around her shoulder, “It's never nothing.” The pair ran down the hallway of the bunker. Luis stopped at room 66, peering through the pothole window of the door: “Esteban's still knocked out.” At the end of the hallway was a reinforced, steel door. Emilia pulled it open and the hallway flooded with golden light and nightmarish caterwauling. Emilia and Luis ran onto the second-story balcony of the garrison with their guns drawn. The fortress was built in a forest clearing, surrounded by a ring of tall trees. The sirens continued to wail as the horrible screams rose from the treeline. From the shadows of the forest came the first revivified cadaver. Emilia centered its corroded skull in her sights and fired. The zombie's head jerked backwards in a half-circle, spraying rotten brain through the foliage. |
| Esteban had come up with a plan. All he needed was a lot of luck. And he got just that. As Esteban finished his plan he Heard an alarm he new that they would come to see if he was still knocked out so Esteban did what he had to and faked it. No one came in but he knew they were watching him. Esteban also knew that the alarm sounding would draw there attention off of him, it was the perfect time. |
| So Esteban climbed out of the tub, gathered his clothes and moved the stool under the lightbulb hanging in the front of the room. As he climbed up to the lightbulb he took off is soiled,torn mud covered shirt and wrapped it around both of his hands and smashed the light bulb between them. Esteban swore as the shards of glass poked through his thin shirt and into the hard calloused skin of his hands. Esteban then unwrapped the shirt from his hands and began digging through the pile of glass to find the filament so he could pick the lock. |
| Picking the lock was surprisingly easy. Esteban calmly opened the door and walked into the hall. The steel door at the end of the hall stood ajar. Grunts, screams and the sound of gunfire streamed in. Some forgotten memory guided Esteban to the storeroom. The door was open. He hesitated before reaching inside for the light switch on the wall. As the yellow light of the incandescent bulb fiiled the room, a snarling zombie hurled himself at Esteban. Esteban sidestepped and grabbed a steel pole in time to strike the zombie across the back. The zombie, back broken, nearly in half, twisted around grabbing for Esteban's ankles. As Esteban's weapon came down on the zombie's skull , Esteban saw him, not as he was now, but as he was before. As they both crumpled, Esteban whispered his name, Ricardo. |
| The zombie let out an incoherent gurgle, then fell silent. Esteban held his head between his hands. An image was forming and he did not want to lose it. “Ricardo.” Esteban closed his eyes tight. Ricardo stood in a well-furnished room, healthy and young. He slapped Esteban on the shoulder. “She's beautiful.” The room was bright white. Ricardo was looking into a bassinet. “We named her Emilia, after her mother.” The brightness of the room was overbearing. “She's beautiful, Esteban.” A gunshot brought Esteban back from his reverie. He stood up, took a shotgun from a shelf, and pressed himself into a shadowy corner of the storeroom. The shots continued, coming closer along with heavy footsteps. They reached the doorway. Esteban saw the girl who had knocked him out on the bridge. She was with an older man. Both were unloading their weapons down the hallway. “I've never seen this many!” “Emilia, get to the safe-tower. I'll hold them off!” |
| Esteban didn't know what to do next. The sound of running foot steps were getting louder. Esteban did the only thing he could think to do and.... |
| Esteban whirled around the corner and out into the hallway mowing down the zombies in the front lines the fair haired man turned around and yelled, "how did you escape?" Esteban yelled, "there is no time for that now!" Together Esteban, The fair haired man and the girl blasted through dozens of zombies in the hallway but they just kept coming. After more than 15 minutes Esteban took a looked around and saw that the man and girl next to him were still standing."I think that was the last of them puffed Esteban wiping the perspiration from his blood soaked brow. |
| Luis still looked suspiciously at Esteban, but Emilia embraced him, tears welling up in her eyes. Esteban hugged her back. “I remember,” he said. Emilia pulled away slightly to look in Esteban’s face. “Everything?” she asked, wiping the tears away. Now Esteban was glassy-eyed. “No, not everything, but I remember you and …” he paused. He looked over at Luis, who averted his gaze. ”I remember where I was. There’s so much I have to tell you, but right now we must get out of here.”“ They,” he said, gesturing towards the remnants of the zombies, “ were just a distraction. When that thing gets here, no one will be safe. Our rifles won’t save us.” And then, as if on cue, CRASHBOOM!! |
| “It's here, Mortem Monstrum.” Emilia looked dumbfounded. Luis spoke, “What do you mean rifles can't stop it? What it is?” Esteban held his head, with each crash his mind was filling with forgotten memories. “We need to get out of here right now.” “We can go to the safe-tower. The zombies can't reach it.” “Yes, but this can.” The sound of a titanic collision came rumbling and ringing through the barracks. Esteban turned to run, but was pulled back. Luis had grabbed him by the collar. “Listen, maybe you've won over Emilia, but I'm not ready to follow you again. Before we go anywhere you're going to tell me what that thing is!” Esteban was terrified, but he had no choice. He had to explain as best he could, “T-the Mortem Monstrum. It's bigger than all the others. They combine. T-the zombie combine. Their flesh bonds together. One beast- hundreds of arms, eyes and teeth. A colossus. It...It means the Death Monster.” |
| "Esteban if what you say is true then I don't think our safe tower will be enough to protect us." "Luis do we still have that old van?""Yes, Esteban we do but it hasn't run in years." "Oh I think I could get it running again." The trio continued on into the basement of the building coming into an open garage with tools lying around on work-benches, engines suspended from thick greasy chains and in the middle of it all was an old white Jeep. Esteban quickly got to work under the hood pulling plugs and grabing tools off of near by tables." Emilia try to start the engine."Emilia climbed into the drivers seat and tried to start the car and to her amazement it started up as she tuned the key. "Luis get in the car"called Esteban as he himself threw open the passenger side door.With all of them in the car Emilia revved the engine and flew out of the garage door. |
| "Do you have the map and the cell phone?" shouted Esteban as the Jeep's rear wheels spit gravel and dust at the shrinking compound behind them. "I have the map. The phone was no good," answered Emilia. "Turn back! screamed a frantic Esteban. Emilia looked confused, but made no effort to stop or turn. "No! keep going Emilia! We can't go back and besides I have your precious phone Esteban."said Luis. Esteban sank down in his seat. He calmed himself and then explained to Emilia and Luis that the map was indeed encrypted and that the phone was a decryption device. " I modified the Twitter app to decrypt the code, but I never gat a chance to use it with the map." |
| Esteban took the map from Emilia and Luis passed the phone to the front seat. "So, how does this work Esteban?" Esteban turned on the phone and held it over the encrypted map, "As you scan the map the corrected image should come up on the display." Esteban scrolled over the map and, sure enough, an image came up. "It worked!" Luis leaned in from the backseat, "That's a fine trick, but what's this a map of?" "This is a map to Yggdrasil." "Oh, everything's perfectly clear now," said Luis sarcastically. "It's true, or at least I believe it is. It's still fuzzy, but I'm remembering now and this may be our only chance of stopping those zombies. We're not the only group left. There are others, up in the mountains. We were attacked before we could make an expedition to Yggdrasil." "And what exactly is...however you say it?" "Yggdrasil is the World Tree." |
| AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!! And like that Esteban vanished. Emilia and Luis couldn't see anyone or anything, it was as if he had vanished in thin air. |
| "Emilia and Luis stop screaming" chuckled Esteban.Emilia stared at the space were Esteban's head had been just moments before."Esteban where are you? Stop playing around you old man!" Luis said in a tone full of annoyance and anger. A moment later Esteban reappeared. Esteban then pulled something out from inside his jacket. It was no larger than a regular lighter and was white in color with two blue buttons on the top of it. " I am sorry for startling you two but I just remembered I had this old thing." " Esteban what is that thing?" asked Luis. "This is a Full Body Invisibility Cloaking Device.It allows someone to become completely invisible." "And you're just remembering this now" asked Luis. "Well I'm just recovering from amnesia." " But more importantly we need to get back to our conversation about Yggdrasil. |
| Esteban directed Emila to pull off onto a nearly invisible trail. Esteban began, "As I was saying, Yggdrasil is the world tree of ancient mythology, but it was also the code name for a top secret divisionof the Monsanto Pharmaceutical and Chemical Conglomerate. You may remember that in 2020, after years of aquiring many other companies, Monsanto bought Apple, gaining global control of every aspect of daily living; from the food we ate to the tecnologgy we used. In fact, it was a bad batch of Monsanto's vaccine against the Greenwhich virus that started turning people to Zombies. Yggdrasil had been working on many projects, like the cloaking device, but when the apocalypse began, they shifted all their efforts to creating an antidote. They never produced a cure, but the Department of Defense was very interested in Yggdrasil technology that allowed zombies to be controlled and directed. This map will help us find the secret location of Yggdrasil. We must go there." |
| The trio consulted a map. After some figuring, they discerned their position: a mere 131 miles from Yggdrasil headquarters. "Looks like we have lucked out once again," said Esteban. Everyone high-fived. "They won't know what hit them," said Luis. "We'll show..wait," Emilia paused. "We don't have any weapons. How can we take down an entire divisional of Monstanto? Undoubtedly they are armed and well guarded. We might not be able to get through the front gate! We'll be captured or worst! Not to mention that this 131m trail through the woods will be riddled with zombies, possibly booby-traps, and is certainly not entirely drive-able! And we're almost out of gasoline!" "I could also use a restroom," Luis chimed in. "How can we accomplish this seemingly impossible task?" "Because," said Esteban. "We have something they don't have..." Emilia and Luis leaned in. |
| "We have brains.Zombies don't have much in terms of intelligence but we have resourcefulness and cunning on our side.""That still doesn't help us get to the HQ Esteban."" Or get to the bathroom"Well I just remembered something.Before the Apocalypse there were caches hidden throughout the world.They had been part of some kind of treasure hunting game called geocaching but during the Apocalypse their contents had been replaced with weapons,fuel,food and any other necessities needed for survival." |
| "Esteban, do you know where these gee-oh-catches are located?" asked Luis. "When Emilia was a child we found over 5000 geocaches along with her mother. I remember some of them, but when they were being converted, I also put them in my phone. In fact, there's one not more than 800 feet from here. Oh and there's a spot near the cache that you can use as a bathroom," answered Esteban "But we don't have much time. We have to move quickly, the zombies will be..." The sound of Emilia sobbing stopped Esteban in mid sentence and both he and Luis turned toward her. "Emilia, what's wrong?" asked Luis. "5000 geocaches! I thought I was done. I swore I'd never geocache again. Sure it was fun in the beginning, but by the end I hated it; the ticks, the mosquitoes, the brambles, the bushwhacking, the missing caches, the broken containers and wet contents!... I'd rather be eaten by zombies! |
| Esteban and Luis convinced Emilia to find just a few more geocaches with them. They all made their way to Yggdrasil using Esteban's map and the supplies and weapons from the caches. When they arrived, they found Yggdrasil in disarray. The zombies had taken over, but without anyone controlling them the were easily subdued by the trio's weapons. They set up a new base at Yggdrasil and used the extensive global communications network there to locate small pockets of survivors around the world. Without healthy humans to feed on, the zombies eventually became extinct. Other survivors came to Yggdrasil and joined Esteban, Emilia and Luis. A post-apocalyptic world was beginning to take shape... THE END Thanks for taking part in this campfire. I hope you had as much fun as I did! The End! |
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