The Omen of Death
My presence has marked your eventual demise.
(Alright well, it appears another tie-breaker is needed, now Ik this is tried and true and cliched, but it seems really immoral to leave this young child behind, especially considering he is in the midst of all this chaos, it wouldn't be right to just ditch him. So Option 1 has been chosen by tie-breaker)
“Come on out kid,” you say to the boy, reaching in to help him out. Damn, you hope you’re making the right decision.
“What’s your name?” you ask him, as you look him over.
“Jacob Baldwin,” he answers timidly.
“My name is Greg Bradley,” you offer – “How did you end up under the sink here in the kitchen?”
“Daddy threw me in the water and told me to hide under the dock, when the army men came and started shooting everyone!” the kid manages, before breaking down into tears again.
“It’s going to be all right,” you say weakly, trying to console the boy. “Look, you can come with me and I’ll keep you safe till we can find your mommy and daddy.”
“My daddy died!” Jacob bawls, “the army men shot him and all the other men. They took mommy away with the kids and their mommies too!”
Wow. That must have been really hard for a six or seven year old to see, you think, shaking your head.
“I’ll help you find your mommy then,” you say patting Jacob on the shoulder.
Of course you don’t believe that for a moment, but you got to get the kid to calm down and trust you if he’s going to be traveling with you.
“You promise?” Jacob asks you, looking for encouragement.
Ugh. You don’t want to make promises you know are a lie. The best you can offer is – “we’ll just have to do our best and see.”
There is an awkward silence momentarily, but you break it by asking the kid to help you gather supplies.
The two of you then look through the mess for anything remotely edible or at least useful. You manage to find a large chef-knife, a lighter for the propane stove, a full roll of duck-tape, and a small individual-sized bag of salad croutons. You take these and add them to your supplies, sharing the salad croutons with Jacob as you check out the stove.
You’re in luck – the stove still works with the propane tanks outside. Thinking about your thirst as well as your hunger, you take a large deep pot and a measuring cup, and head to the restrooms upstairs. There, you scoop out all the water from the back of the toilet tanks and bring it back down to the kitchen in the large pot. You place the water on the stove and add the water that you collected in your Pepsi bottles. You then leave the Pepsi bottles in the pot as well – might as well sterilize them along with the water.
As the water boils, you sift through the trash but find no food – other than a small bit of lard left in the bottom of a discarded container. You force yourself to try choking some of it down and stop when it seems to make you more sick than anything else. You’re not really sure there’s any nutritional value in lard anyway, so you toss the container and fill up with the boy on some of your boiled water – refilling your bottles and stowing them up for later.
The two of you then make your way around the back of the boat club and onto the docks. There are seven separate docks, floating out on the river off a wide boardwalk behind the building. About thirty bodies lay scattered about the docks – mostly men, but also three or four women. They all appear to have died of various gunshot wounds and not all to the head. They are all well dressed and rich looking people, but missing any watches or other jewelry. Whoever killed them appears to have thoroughly looted them. You also notice a distinct lack of any baggage – which one would expect to see from a group about to flee the city on boats; but then the looters probably took the baggage along with any other valuables.
Jacob is troubled at the sight and begins to cry, but does so quietly. He grabs the hem of your jacket and won’t leave your side.
You feel sorry for the boy, but focus on the scene. One thing you see here and there along the docks are brass shell casings. Large caliber rifle and what looks like military grade. You note shotgun shell casings around the groups of the dead and can imagine them firing shotguns at their attackers – the military perhaps? You saw the military vehicles out in the parking lot, but there are no military bodies out here on the docks…
You don’t see any boats currently moored to the docks, except at the far end, where the boat club’s fueling station is located. A large trawler and three sailboats were tied off there, but something has blown up the fueling station and the resulting fire has burned the boats down to their hulls. Even the fueling dock itself is completely destroyed and half sunk.
Walking out onto the docks, you notice a line tied to a mooring point, but running taught down into the water. Grabbing the line, you give it a pull and can feel something big under the water slowly moving toward you. You continue to heave the line up, one foot after another, until the bow of a small wooden rowboat suddenly breaks the surface. You slowly lever it up and drag it onto the dock, then note a foot wide hole smashed through the bottom of the hull.
“It’s got a hole in it,” Jacob observes.
“Yeah, I see it,” you reply patiently.
If you can find something to patch it with, you might be able to use it to cross the river.
You then go back inside the boat club building with the kid and recall the wooden oars in the small equipment shop. Those will certainly be of use if you can get a patch going.
After giving it some thought, you go upstairs and grab a plastic shower curtain, and then head down into the kitchen. There you find a large pie tin.
You think that you could duck-tape the pizza tin over the hole in the rowboat, and then cover that with a piece of shower curtain. You’ve heard that duck-tape can hold underwater if applied dry first, and the pizza tin would give it enough strength against the water pressure. As long as the tape seal along the edges of the shower curtain holds, the rowboat should be in good enough shape to cross the river.
You decide to wait until morning however, to give the boat a chance to dry overnight, and the two of you a chance to sleep. With no zombies in the immediate area, you go upstairs with Jacob to the sitting lounge and barricade the door. If zombies do come around during the night, they shouldn’t bother you – and since you’re only on the second floor, you should be able to escape out the windows if you have to.
You then point to one of the many large black leather couches in the sitting lounge – “you sleep there; I’ll take this one over here.”
Thinking about it a little more you decide to outline some more survival rules.
“If you hear anything besides the two of us, anywhere in or outside the building, I’m going to need you to tell me, but be very quiet about it. We will be safe up here, if they don’t know we’re in here. That and we got a pretty good barricade going. Even if they come up, we can escape out the window. Got it?”
“Yes Mister Greg.”
“Good, now let’s get some shuteye.”
You set your gear nearby and lay down to relax.
The next morning you and the boy awake – more thirsty and hungry than ever. You should probably do some more scavenging for food in your travels today – or you might not make it the rest of the way home. At least you have plenty of clean water though, and it has never tasted so good as you drink some of it down and share the rest with Jacob.
“We need to see about scrounging up some food today,” you say as you gather up your things.
“Yes, food!” Jacob says with a really hungry expression.
You can’t help but chuckle and pat the kid on the head.
“We’ll see what we can find,” you conclude.
You gather up your gear and are taking down your barricade to leave, when Jacob asks an astute question.
“It’s zombies in the city, aren’t they Mr. Greg?”
Since you’re likely to run into thousands more of them with the boy, you decide it best to just tell him the truth.
“I’m afraid so,” you answer.
“Will they get us?” he asks tearfully.
“Not if we use our heads,” you say; “If we both do that and you do what I say when I say it, then I’ll be able to keep you safe until we can get out of this mess.”
Jacob wipes his face, but says no more.
The two of you then carefully make your way back out onto the docks to look at the rowboat. Still no zombies around and all seems quiet in the early morning light.
The two of you:
1. Try to patch the rowboat and cross the river
2. Go back to the parking lot and try to revive the two and a half ton truck
3. Leave the boat club and make your way to the train bridge on the rocky embankment along the river
“Come on out kid,” you say to the boy, reaching in to help him out. Damn, you hope you’re making the right decision.
“What’s your name?” you ask him, as you look him over.
“Jacob Baldwin,” he answers timidly.
“My name is Greg Bradley,” you offer – “How did you end up under the sink here in the kitchen?”
“Daddy threw me in the water and told me to hide under the dock, when the army men came and started shooting everyone!” the kid manages, before breaking down into tears again.
“It’s going to be all right,” you say weakly, trying to console the boy. “Look, you can come with me and I’ll keep you safe till we can find your mommy and daddy.”
“My daddy died!” Jacob bawls, “the army men shot him and all the other men. They took mommy away with the kids and their mommies too!”
Wow. That must have been really hard for a six or seven year old to see, you think, shaking your head.
“I’ll help you find your mommy then,” you say patting Jacob on the shoulder.
Of course you don’t believe that for a moment, but you got to get the kid to calm down and trust you if he’s going to be traveling with you.
“You promise?” Jacob asks you, looking for encouragement.
Ugh. You don’t want to make promises you know are a lie. The best you can offer is – “we’ll just have to do our best and see.”
There is an awkward silence momentarily, but you break it by asking the kid to help you gather supplies.
The two of you then look through the mess for anything remotely edible or at least useful. You manage to find a large chef-knife, a lighter for the propane stove, a full roll of duck-tape, and a small individual-sized bag of salad croutons. You take these and add them to your supplies, sharing the salad croutons with Jacob as you check out the stove.
You’re in luck – the stove still works with the propane tanks outside. Thinking about your thirst as well as your hunger, you take a large deep pot and a measuring cup, and head to the restrooms upstairs. There, you scoop out all the water from the back of the toilet tanks and bring it back down to the kitchen in the large pot. You place the water on the stove and add the water that you collected in your Pepsi bottles. You then leave the Pepsi bottles in the pot as well – might as well sterilize them along with the water.
As the water boils, you sift through the trash but find no food – other than a small bit of lard left in the bottom of a discarded container. You force yourself to try choking some of it down and stop when it seems to make you more sick than anything else. You’re not really sure there’s any nutritional value in lard anyway, so you toss the container and fill up with the boy on some of your boiled water – refilling your bottles and stowing them up for later.
The two of you then make your way around the back of the boat club and onto the docks. There are seven separate docks, floating out on the river off a wide boardwalk behind the building. About thirty bodies lay scattered about the docks – mostly men, but also three or four women. They all appear to have died of various gunshot wounds and not all to the head. They are all well dressed and rich looking people, but missing any watches or other jewelry. Whoever killed them appears to have thoroughly looted them. You also notice a distinct lack of any baggage – which one would expect to see from a group about to flee the city on boats; but then the looters probably took the baggage along with any other valuables.
Jacob is troubled at the sight and begins to cry, but does so quietly. He grabs the hem of your jacket and won’t leave your side.
You feel sorry for the boy, but focus on the scene. One thing you see here and there along the docks are brass shell casings. Large caliber rifle and what looks like military grade. You note shotgun shell casings around the groups of the dead and can imagine them firing shotguns at their attackers – the military perhaps? You saw the military vehicles out in the parking lot, but there are no military bodies out here on the docks…
You don’t see any boats currently moored to the docks, except at the far end, where the boat club’s fueling station is located. A large trawler and three sailboats were tied off there, but something has blown up the fueling station and the resulting fire has burned the boats down to their hulls. Even the fueling dock itself is completely destroyed and half sunk.
Walking out onto the docks, you notice a line tied to a mooring point, but running taught down into the water. Grabbing the line, you give it a pull and can feel something big under the water slowly moving toward you. You continue to heave the line up, one foot after another, until the bow of a small wooden rowboat suddenly breaks the surface. You slowly lever it up and drag it onto the dock, then note a foot wide hole smashed through the bottom of the hull.
“It’s got a hole in it,” Jacob observes.
“Yeah, I see it,” you reply patiently.
If you can find something to patch it with, you might be able to use it to cross the river.
You then go back inside the boat club building with the kid and recall the wooden oars in the small equipment shop. Those will certainly be of use if you can get a patch going.
After giving it some thought, you go upstairs and grab a plastic shower curtain, and then head down into the kitchen. There you find a large pie tin.
You think that you could duck-tape the pizza tin over the hole in the rowboat, and then cover that with a piece of shower curtain. You’ve heard that duck-tape can hold underwater if applied dry first, and the pizza tin would give it enough strength against the water pressure. As long as the tape seal along the edges of the shower curtain holds, the rowboat should be in good enough shape to cross the river.
You decide to wait until morning however, to give the boat a chance to dry overnight, and the two of you a chance to sleep. With no zombies in the immediate area, you go upstairs with Jacob to the sitting lounge and barricade the door. If zombies do come around during the night, they shouldn’t bother you – and since you’re only on the second floor, you should be able to escape out the windows if you have to.
You then point to one of the many large black leather couches in the sitting lounge – “you sleep there; I’ll take this one over here.”
Thinking about it a little more you decide to outline some more survival rules.
“If you hear anything besides the two of us, anywhere in or outside the building, I’m going to need you to tell me, but be very quiet about it. We will be safe up here, if they don’t know we’re in here. That and we got a pretty good barricade going. Even if they come up, we can escape out the window. Got it?”
“Yes Mister Greg.”
“Good, now let’s get some shuteye.”
You set your gear nearby and lay down to relax.
The next morning you and the boy awake – more thirsty and hungry than ever. You should probably do some more scavenging for food in your travels today – or you might not make it the rest of the way home. At least you have plenty of clean water though, and it has never tasted so good as you drink some of it down and share the rest with Jacob.
“We need to see about scrounging up some food today,” you say as you gather up your things.
“Yes, food!” Jacob says with a really hungry expression.
You can’t help but chuckle and pat the kid on the head.
“We’ll see what we can find,” you conclude.
You gather up your gear and are taking down your barricade to leave, when Jacob asks an astute question.
“It’s zombies in the city, aren’t they Mr. Greg?”
Since you’re likely to run into thousands more of them with the boy, you decide it best to just tell him the truth.
“I’m afraid so,” you answer.
“Will they get us?” he asks tearfully.
“Not if we use our heads,” you say; “If we both do that and you do what I say when I say it, then I’ll be able to keep you safe until we can get out of this mess.”
Jacob wipes his face, but says no more.
The two of you then carefully make your way back out onto the docks to look at the rowboat. Still no zombies around and all seems quiet in the early morning light.
The two of you:
1. Try to patch the rowboat and cross the river
2. Go back to the parking lot and try to revive the two and a half ton truck
3. Leave the boat club and make your way to the train bridge on the rocky embankment along the river
