Turn 8
Survivors: 3 Opposition: 5
Michael and Kaylee enter the Master bedroom to see a man standing in the doorway to the bathroom He is ashen colored and making snarling noises. Further, he is trying to get to a woman within the bathroom, who is crying and screaming for him to stop.
* * *
Michael saw the back of a man, staggering toward a bathroom. He seemed to have forced the door open and a woman was inside begging him to stop it. “Hey!” Michael shouted, bringing his weapon up to his shoulder.
The figure turned around, and stared at Michael with milky eyes. His grayish face was expressionless for a moment, then with a snarl he staggered toward the two in the doorway; unconcerned with the carbine pointed at his head.
“That’s all I needed to see.” With that, Michael fired at the creature at point blank range. The bullet went into the zombie’s right eye, but at an angle and exited out the right temple. Dark red blood spurted from the wound and knocked the thing over to the ground. Michael realized with one look that the creature was still active, and so walked toward the former person and raised the weapon to his shoulder, aiming it at the man’s forehead.
* * *
Michael made his “Zed or no Zed” test back in Day 1. Kaylee however makes her roll and fails so she is uncertain and doesn’t act this turn. Michael shoots at the zombie and gets a Knocked Down result, knocking the zombie to the floor but not killing it.
The zombie takes his activation to return to a standing position while the woman inside the bathroom screams at Michael to leave her husband alone. She charges him and hits him with her bat. She gets an Obviously Dead result, but since she is a lower Reputation (Rep 3) than Michael (Rep 4) this is dropped to an “Out of the Fight” result. Michael goes down for the count!
The above gunshot generates no zombies, which is a good thing as the only team member with a firearm is now KO-ed.
* * *
“Leave him alone!” came a scream from the doorway. Michael glanced up just in time to take a baseball bat to the side of his head. The carbine’s stock and his right forearm took some of the blow, but it was still enough to stagger him. With a grunt, he dropped the carbine and fell near the creature. He moaned and held the side of his head in obvious pain.
“You leave my husband alone! He’s sick!” the unhinged woman screamed at her husband’s shooter and raised the bat for another strike.
“Stop it!” Kaylee exploded into action, shouting and using her own baseball bat to knock the woman’s aside. “Your husband’s not just sick, he’s trying to kill you!”
“No! He understands me!” The wife of the undead monster staggered back but retained hold on her own bat. “You want to hurt him too! I won’t let you!” She charged the younger woman with a screech and the melee was joined.
Meanwhile, Lisa was grinding her teeth in frustration. Despite circling the block she returned to the house only to find that the infected had turned around and were walking back toward her first location in front of the little girls’ house. As she pondered what to do, Maggie looked up from her pop tart wrapper and said “Hey, those freaky people are coming back.”
“Yes…” Lisa replied in a forced calm voice. “They are…so, we’re going to go back the other way and try to lead them down the street.”
‘What about mommy and daddy?” Jilly squealed from the back. “They might come out and we’ll be gone!”
Lisa performed a highly illegal U-turn in the street and then glanced in the rear view mirror again to make sure the zombies were moving toward the van. ‘Great.’ She thought to her ‘Now Michael has me doing it.’
The return of the van did seem to catch their attention again, so Lisa moved slowly back down the road. Unlike last time, she kept the van moving at a crawl to keep their attention. This time she would wait until well down the connecting street before speeding up.
* * *
Turn 9
Survivors: 2 Zombies: 5 NPCS: 1
Lisa continues the drive around the block.
Kaylee and the wife go into baseball-bat melee, only on Pay-Per-View! After several tense moments as the dice pools become smaller and smaller, the wife goes Out of the Fight. Kaylee wins!
* * *
“Stop it! Ducking behind a TV stand, Kaylee’s shouted attempts at reason were getting nowhere. The lady was obviously nuts! So, with some reluctance she waited for the guy’s wife to overswing again and then lunged in with a solid smack to her head. She’d been aiming for the back of her head but instead she took it full on the side. With a coughing moan she staggered and fell between Michael and what was once her husband.
* * *
Turn 10
Survivors: 3 Zombies: 3
Random Event; 8 again! But the only figure with a firearm is OOF so I’m going to ignore this result.
Lisa returns to the front of the house. Will those zombies walk off the board?
A zombie generation is called for by the van’s engine, which generates 1 zombie outside. It appears in the path of the 3 walking toward the board edge….with it join them?
As two people are down, I give a Challenge roll to see whom the zombie in the bedroom goes after first; Michael or his wife. Michael rolls 4 successes and wife rolls 3; he goes after wife…so much for matrimonial affection! Feast lasts 4 turns.
Kaylee takes a “See the Feast” test, with only 1d6 pass she has to do it again next turn.
* * *
That unfortunate was staggering to his feet. When it saw his wife fall down, he fell upon her and started tearing at her flesh.
Kaylee stood horrified as the man started chewing chunks of meat from his gurgling wife. Michael was still disoriented, but had enough presence of mind to skitter back and fumble with his carbine. Though he did get ahold of it, he couldn’t bring it up to aim at anyone or anything.
* * *
Turn 11
Survivors:5 Zombies:1
Zombie inside the house keeps on munching, while the Zombie Soul Train moves closer to the van…12 inches. Lisa must be furiously trying to think of another plan.
Another engine noise roll for zombies, which generates no new zombies; which is nice that this is suburb and early days otherwise 4 would have been generated!
Turn 12
Survivors:4 Zombies:2
Lisa backs van up in an attempt to get them to follow her again but only one zombie does, the other 3 start moving to the house.
Kaylee makes another See the Feast” roll again and this time makes it with +2 successes.
She attacks the zombie and gets a Knocked Down result, putting the creature back on the ground.
* * *
So, the blonde shook herself out of her stunned horror and swung the bat as hard as she could down on the zombie’s head. There was a sickening crunch of bone and he fell over the body of his wife. Though one of his legs continued to twitch, he seemed to be out of the fight. Still, Kaylee smashed his head again to be sure, then drug him off the wounded woman beneath him.
She was coughing up blood and bleeding profusely. Jesis!’ Kaylee thought frantically. ‘What do I do?’ As she glanced around for something to staunch the blood flow, the torn woman gave a final cough and collapsed on the floor. She didn’t move, and her eyes stared unblinking, fixed on the ceiling.
“Ohgod” Kaylee said, and tried desperately not to be sick. She looked away, and saw her companion pushing himself to his feet, by leaning on the doorjamb with his shoulder and using the carbine as a cane. His eyes looked dilated and he didn’t seem to be able to concentrate on anything in his vision.
“G.g..gotta check on her.” He mumbled, gesturing weakly at the woman on the floor.
“No way guy” Kaylee said, glad of something to do other than look at the corpses on the floor. “What we’ve got to do is get you out of here!”
“No…gotta make sure..” Michael swayed and Kaylee caught him under the arm and turned toward the door. “C’mon let’s get going. Nothing left for us around here Mike.”
“But, but….” The man on her shoulder kept trying to speak but seemed to lose track of a thought again. Only when they were in the Den he said. “S-she was bit, she might become…”
A cold fear gripped Kaylee’s chest. That’s right! Anyone bitten by those things just might… She suddenly turned toward the door and Michael nearly fell over with the movement. Absently she put him against the wall and stuck her head back into the bedroom.
Dead eyes met hers from the floor. The woman was starting to sit up, and as her filmed over eyes met Kaylee’s she tried to moan. Instead, only a wet gurgling sound came from her ruin of a throat. This didn’t seem to bother the walking corpse, as the once-protective wife shoved the body of her husband off her legs and started to try to get to her feet.
Kaylee couldn’t deal with another one. Not this soon, and not someone she saw alive not five minutes ago. Nearly leaping out of the doorway, she grabbed the semi-coherent Michael and dashed to a back door.
* * *
Turn 13
Survivors:3 Zombies:6
Lisa keeps on trying to goad the zombies after her, and Kaylee attacks the downed zombie again. Zombies don’t activate this turn so Lisa just bides her time. Kaylee gets an “Obviously Dead” result on t
* * *
“This is ridiculous!” the van’s driver shouted in exasperation. Lisa had driven the van very slowly around the turn. So slowly that a couple of times the creatures nearly caught the van in their grip. But she managed to draw them around and once on the side street parallel to the house she hit the gas and speeded back around. So fast, she nearly hydroplaned on the parallel intersection and had to slow a bit to return to the house her boyfriend was somewhere within.
What awaited her was that same group of zombies once again coming around the corner, backpedaling once again toward the house. In fact, they’d apparently even gained a convert as the small group was now four in number.
“What is this? Zombie MENSA?” Remembering her passengers, Lisa kept her language from becoming more colorful and instead decided on a change of plan. This time, they’d drive right past them while the were still at the corner and make the trip a complete circle. Or square. Or whatever. Then repeat the block but this time leading them further down the side street.
Fortunately, the two children seemed to enjoy the speeding up and slowing down of the van. They even squealed with delight at the hydroplaning, blissfully unaware of the danger they had been in. ‘Once more unto the breach, dear friends…’ Lisa thought sardonically as she gripped the steering wheel and aimed the van for the group.
* * *
Turn 14
Survivors:3 Zombies:4
Lisa is busy leading the Zombie soul Train to the side street.
Kaylee killed the zombie inside last turn. However, I roll a d6 to see how long it will take for the dead wife to reanimate as a zombie. Ack! I get a 1 so she starts moving! She will stand up her next activation.
What will Kaylee do? Will she attack the rising zombie wife or grab Michael and get out of Dodge? A die roll results in her grabbing Michael and his rifle and bugs out. She drags Michael to the den (movement is halved due to carrying Michael) and starts moving to an exterior door.
A die roll will determine which door she takes; 1-3 front door and 4-6 back; I roll a 5 so I’m saying Kaylee remembers the zombies gathering outside in the front yard and so decides the back might be safer since she’s having to carry Michael’s semi-conscious self.
This time zombies outside again result in 1 fooled but 3 again turning back to house.
The car engine generates no zombies. Maybe they don’t like the rain?
* * *
Using her shoulder to open the back door Kaylee dragged the semi-conscious Michael out the door and into the garage. Kaylee had hoped that the door led to the back yard, but no such luck. She did see another door at the far side of the garage, maybe that led outside? Would Lisa notice them in the backyard? ‘Probably not, and if I left her man while I ran to the front to flag down Lisa she’d probably run me over.’ Kaylee thought sourly.
* * *
Turn 15
Survivors:6 Zombies:5
Nobody does anything. Kaylee must be resting from dragging Mr. Only-One-With-A-Firearm around.
Turn 16
Survivors:3 Zombies:3
Doubles means a random Event again, and I get a car alarm going off. Since the only vehicles on table other than the van are the SUV and Sedan in the garage, I roll for one of them. It’s the SUV, perhaps the key chain found in the bathroom had auto activation on it or something. It inspires Kaylee to head for it.
She uses the keys to open the SUV and turn off the alarm.
The zombie wife finishes standing up in the Master Bedroom and starts to follow Kaylee.
Lisa again honks the horn of the van in front of the house to again get the attention of the 3 zombies slogging through the front yard.
* * *
Suddenly the garage was filled with the sound of car honking and alarms going off! Blinking, Kaylee was momentarily surprised. What happened? What would set off the car alarm? Then she remembered, the keys in her pocket. She must’ve hit some button or something while pushing through the backdoor. She dug the keys out of her jeans and quickly deactivated the alarm. “Waitaminute…” She said to herself. “This just might do the trick!”
Gathering up Michael she unlocked the SUV with the remote and pushed him into the passenger door. He stumbled in, unable (or unwilling) to put his gun down so she just locked him into the seatbelt around the thing. She slammed the door and moved around the back of the vehicle to hear a crash against the backdoor. It had swung shut, but now was vibrating in its frame as something hammered at the door. It wasn’t locked, so it would only be a few minutes before that cadaver figured out the doorknob!
Not stopping to investigate if there was any kind of door key on the ring, she fumbled at the car door to get in the driver’s side of the vehicle. Having seem way too many horror movies, she checked the back seat before getting in. Nothing!
* * *
Turn 16
Survivors:5 Zombies:2
Zombies outside follow van yet again, and zombie in house moves to the back door into the garage. Kaylee must be having trouble putting the seat belt on Michael. Lisa could be explaining to the girls in the van why she’s actually TRYING to get the zombies to follow her.
The car alarm in the garage generated 1 zombie. It is generated to the west so is right outside the garage. I figure he’ll try next turn to attack the garage door as he heard the noise of tasty meat snacks in the garage.
Van engine still doesn’t generate any zombies? This luck is too good to last…
* * *
As she sat in the seat she heard the deep hammering noise of something at the garage door. It was one of the thin aluminum types and she could see dents forming where fists were banging on the surface. “Great!” she shouted in fury. “What now?” her luck held out though as when she started the SUV the vehicle purred to life immediately. A quick glance at the fuel gauge showed three-quarters of a tank! Now grinning, she put the car into drive and slammed on the accelerator.
* * *
Turn 17
Survivors:2 Zombies:5
Lisa moves around the block; again trying to keep her tail of zombies moving. Its like herding cats!
Kaylee packs Michael and the rifle in and starts the SUV. She makes the “Start the Car” roll.
* * *
The zombie outside the garage had been a utilities employee in life. He’d been killed while checking meter readings in the yard of a delinquent customer. When he rose, he staggered out into the world and did his unthinking best to spread his disease of undeath. One of his victims was Mr. Al Bailey, the former owner of this house. However, he was unaware of this and wouldn’t have cared if he had known. All he knew was there was noise behind this metal wall. Noise meant food, so he hammered his decaying fists against the surface of the barrier. If he could have thought, he might’ve been concerned by the sound of a car engine starting within, and the screech of tires on concrete. But he couldn’t so he didn’t.
* * *
Turn 18
Survivors:3 Zombies:6
Again the zombies fail to activate! Lisa comes back around to the front of the house to find that not one of the zombies followed this time and are instead beating on the front door of the house.
Kaylee throws caution to the winds and just blasts out the garage door, pinning the zombie outside under the doors. Squish!
* * *
It was in this state of blissful ignorance that his unlife was put to an end by a 1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee Rolling over the garage door, which was rolling over him in turn. Kaylee couldn’t hear the noise of the utility worker’s unlike coming to a crunching end, but if she had it would have only added to her whoop of glee as the SUV peeled out of the driveway and into the street.
The rain had almost stopped now, so Lisa could see the SUV barrel out of the garage of the house and speed up towards the van. Only when it was within 20 feet did the driver of the Jeep remember to turn their lights on.
* * *
Turn 19
Survivors:1 Zombies:5
Kaylee runs the SUV around to the front of the house and matches windshields with the van. After verifying everyone’s (mostly) ok they haul ass out of there.
Encounter ends
* * *
The Jeep moved to level the driver’s window with Lisa’s and with some relief she saw a grinning Kaylee at the wheel. Michael was next to her, apparently sliding his arms out of the seatbelt and putting them gingerly to his head.
“Oh my, are you two all right?” Lisa’s statement was to both of them, but Kaylee could see her eyes locked on Michael’s hunched form. “Its ok, Mikey took a hit to the head but its not serious. Let’s go back to your house…I’ll follow.”
“But what about…” Lisa cut off her sentence as she saw Kaylee glance nervously at the back of the van where the two girls continued to chatter away at each other. The blonde looked back at Lisa and mutely shook her head no. Nodding, Lisa rolled up the window and led the way down the street. Back home? Where it was safe? Lisa found herself beginning to wonder if anyplace was safe anymore.
- The End –
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