Infection Kills 2: Reaper
Chapter 1 - Feral
"Humans are pathetic, cowardly creatures. If I ever encounter one, they will meet their end at my hands."
-Reaper, formerly known as Hunter
How long has it been? About two years? That sounds about right.
Two years of torturous treatment and agony incomprehensible by anything not infected.
I survived... but at what cost? Nothing could make me forget the pain, and nothing could remove my immense hatred towards mankind.
So, as I am dragged down corridor after corridor, awake but paralyzed. My hatred and disgust only grew stronger with each painful collision against the rough concrete ground. If I could move the guards cries would be heard throughout the entire building, and their blood and innards would decorate the walls and their flesh would fill my malnourished stomach. But as it stands, I can't move. So they were spared, at least for now.
They stop dragging me for a moment as one of the guards taps on a panel to open the motorized door. Inside awaited the same scientist as had been there since day one. I hated him the most. So confident, happy... it made me sick.
The feeling of the syringe entering my spinal cord by force was like taking a wooden plank full of pointed nails and forcefully pushing it against your back up and down, and then it spreading to the rest of your body.
'STOP PAIN STOP PAIN!' Was all that rung inside my head as my thoughts rested solely on trying to stop something they had no control over. Once my spinal fluid was extracted, I am sent back to my despised prison.
The only company I had was another Hunter I began calling "Claw" in our infected language. He called me "Reaper". Every day we would talk about nothing but how to escape. And to keep ourselves strong we sparred every day. And while it left us with even more cuts and bruises for the day, we would be ready to defend ourselves once the time came.
We ate together, slept together for warmth, and mostly stayed together a majority of the time. Quite an improvement from when he was first let in here. I almost killed him, poor guy. Claw was a top-notch Hunter though, true to the ways a Hunter should be. And he wasn't afraid to kill something in his way. In fact, he wanted there to be something in his way at all times.
I, on the other hand, had yet to really kill anything on my stay here unless if you count how much life of my life I've 'killed' being stuck in this crappy excuse for a government facility. Something needed to happen, and it was about to.
"Claw." I say in our language, "When are the guards coming to take us?"
He sighs and says, "In an hou- wait, do you hear that?"
We both stay deathly quiet as we hear the sound of breaking concrete, followed by the sound of a Tank.
"Actually, I don't think the guards are coming." He says.
The scientists watching us from the observation room run out to find some cover from the attack. Alarms in the room activate, bathing us in a crimson glow. The steady drone of a siren quickly becomes annoying.
"They are just leaving us! You cowards!" I yell as I run up and kick the glass with all my might. The glass bends to what seemed to be it's breaking point, but then it bounces back and throws me clear across the room.
"Reaper, it's no use. We have both tried, and neither of us could break the glass."
I huff and growl as I claw at the air in frustration. I needed out! Claw sees my distress and puts his hand on my shoulder to comfort me, I shrug it off. How could we escape? We've come up with theory after theory of potential escapes, but none of them worked. And neither of us were strong enough to break that glass!
But suddenly, I realize something. That glass almost breaks when one of us kicks it, but we haven't ever tried having both of us kick it before!
"Claw, come over here." I tell him as I walk to the glass.
"What now?" He says impatiently.
"... Kick the glass." I say.
"It's not going to-"
"Kick the glass!" I yell at him and he kicks it with all of his might.
I kick with him, but it's not breaking.
"Push harder!" I say as I put more force into my push, as does he. Cracks begin to appear where are feet are planted in the glass.
"Now run back, and let's leap into it!" I say as I run back to the other end of the cell and wait for him. He complies. We both jump upwards and push off the adjoining wall and straight into the cracked glass wall. Upon impact the glass tries to support the force pushing into it, but it's too much and the glass shatters. An alarm goes off in the observation room, but it is easily drowned out by the much louder alarm already going on.
I cough and pull a glass shard out of my arm. Claw was unscathed, but a little shaken.
I get up slowly, my arms shaking. Same as Claws. We were finally free!
"We did it!" We both say as we hug each other in victory. We briefly look at all the papers strewn about the floor from the desk we broke upon impact. A good majority we couldn't read, but there were a lot of graphs talking about the efficiency of a cure.
I signal to Claw that we are leaving, and he crouches down and follows me to he door. I take a deep breath before slowly opening the door. As soon as the door was opened just an inch, our ears were assaulted by the sounds of gunfire. We both count down to three and run out the door and down the hall. We passed by hundreds of specials still in their closet sized cages. As we pass by them all we unlock the cells by pressing a button on the panel besides them, and we watch as they all make a run for it. We follow them as well. As we run we see countless specials in front of us gunned down, but we quickly mutilate any humans we come across.
Several hunters leap from wall to wall high above us and pounce straight onto the unsuspecting humans coming to contain us. A charger rushes down the hall and mows down a blockade the humans set up, and then smokers dragged them to us and we finished them off.
Scientists barricaded themselves in a room, but the room was quickly filled with spitter acid and they all die a painful death. The death of a nearby Boomer also meant that commons would soon be swarming the place through the hole the Tank left we were trying to get to. Claw stays right by my side throughout the whole ordeal.
We come to a closed off stronghold door. Someone had to go into the room above and open it, and no doubt there would be quite a few guards waiting for us in there. I let out a shriek calling all Hunters nearby to me, and I tell them we are going to rush in there for the best of the pack. And they agree. I send them all in, I go first. I kick the door open and jump up and attach myself to the wall and watch as a flood of Hunters leap into the room. I fall down and jump in with them. I leap and find my target, I dig my claws into his chest and rip it open. I then proceed to tear apart his internal organs and outright mutilate him. His cries of terror and pain were soon silenced by my jaws on his throat. I rip out a piece of him and devour it. As my first taste of fresh meat, it invigorated me. I wanted more, but I had to stop myself for until we got out of here.
I look up from my kill and see that the entire room was bathed in blood. I see Claw in a corner finishing up his own kill, blood dripping from his lips. I let out a shriek of victory, as do all the other Hunters with me. I quickly get up and pull the lever to release the stronghold door, allowing our escape. I rejoin Claw and we both head towards the exit together.
As the doors slowly open, and the infected try squeezing through, we see the Tank pick up a human and slam it into the wall and then throw the lifeless body towards us. It lands right in front if us.
"For a secure base of operations, I would expect better defenses." I hear Claw say as we watch the body twitch.
And, almost as if on cue, holes all along the walls open up and reveal automated turrets, and they all open fire on the infected within.
"Thanks for opening your mouth!" I say as I grab Claw and drag him against one of the walls. We try to creep along the walls and hope that the turrets don't aim for us, but rather the infected running past us.
The Tank gets angry and throws a huge chunk of concrete at one of the turrets. The wall collapses and it rains metal in every direction. A large thick steel plate lands in front if us, and I have a brainstorm.
I grab the plate in my hand and create a dent in it with my fist. I then rip two holes on each side of the dent with my teeth. My jaw now sore, I grip the two holes I created with my hand and hold it like a shield.
"Get behind my shield! We are getting out of here!" I yell to Claw over the gunfire and sirens. I quickly run towards the exit in front of us, Claw staying behind the shield as best as possible. Bullets begin hitting us as the turrets target the giant hunk of moving steel. I am able to deflect them, but the dents being made in the metal made me think it wouldn't hold for much longer.
We finally make it to the exit of the compound, guards were waiting for us, but the Tank comes barreling past us looking for an escape from the barrage of turret fire and plows straight through the guards about to open fire on us.
We follow the Tank and eventually branch off and run down into a small ravine. Overhead was a bridge, where even more guards were waiting for the approaching infected, but we would be bypassing them. The sounds of the Tank finally going down filled the air, but not before he punches a survivor down into the ravine in front of us a few feet. We run over to him and we see that he was still breathing.
"Look Reaper! A gift!" Claw says devilishly.
I smile and say, "Help yourself, I'll have some after you." I then proceed to walk past the human, but first taking a big step on its chest, and hearing the satisfying sound of ribs crunching under my weight. As I look under the bridge for potential refuge, I hear the tortured screams of the poor human currently being eaten alive by Claw, and I smile at the sound. Once the screaming stops, all the can be heard was the sounds of bones breaking and the ravenous eating sounds being made by the starving Hunter. I was starving too, so I was looking forward to eating soon.
I sigh. We had finally made it. After two years, we were free. This was a turning point. I would be able to live out my life doing exactly what I was built to do.
Kill.
I was looking forward to it. I needed to feel the thrill of the hunt, just like I had with that poor guard in the control room. I needed to kill. I lived for it. And now that I was free it was all I would strive to do. You could call it payback, but all I called it was good, messy fun. I hear Claw get up, and he crawls over to me and taps on my shoulder. I turn to look at him.
"I saved half for you, go ahead. I'll keep watch." He says happily. His two glowing eyes rivaling my one.
"Thanks." I say as I walk past him and go slowly into a crawl as I approach the body.
I sniff in the scent of blood, it was delicious. I craved for some more food. And me being half starved only enhanced the already succulent smell of flesh. I dig in, tearing away at the corpses arm, tearing the flesh clean off the bone in nice big chunks. I tear away bit after bit of the body, even ripping the chest open wider to get at the liver and heart. It was all delicious and each body part was an equally wonderful-yet-different flavor. The blood kept my thirst quenched. And soon my chin dripped heavily with blood and gore. I was finally full. And the body was practically bone.
I breath in as I wipe the blood off my chin and I let out a breath of relief. I close my eyes as the food settles in my stomach.
"Even better than I imagined." I say out loud so Claw could hear. He laughs in a very deep voice that sounded more like growling, due to his vocal cords.
"That's right..." He begins. "You've never eaten normal human flesh before." He sniffs. "For being one of the first Hunters, you never truly lived!" He laughs some more.
"Well, I'm looking forward to it now, where do you think more humans are?" I ask hungrily.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa." He coughs and then tests his voice before continuing. "Don't be reckless Reaper, humans are much harder to kill than you may think." He says.
"Enlighten me." I say as we begin walking.
"Well, humans travel in packs, and they react quick. If you just jump in for the kill you are gonna get shot down before you can even get a taste of anything, except lead." He says.
I growl. "Then how do we Hunt?"
He smiles. "We wait for them to give us a chance." He walks in front of me and walks backwards to face me. "Take this for example. Once I was trailing a group of survivors through a sewage plant right? Well, soon they had to head into the sewer so I waited in the dark until only one had yet to jump down, and then I pounce. I drag him away from the hole and they have no way to get back up because there is no ladder!" He crosses his arms in triumph of his tactic.
"Impressive." I say. "But what if you just killed them all? That would be even more food."
He shakes his finger at me. "It's not about just getting as much food as possible. It's about killing what's required. You kill until you are full, and you keep following them until you get hungry again. Since you've already killed one of their ranks it's easier next time. You got that?" He says questioningly.
"Y-yeah. I get it now." I say.
"Good!" He says happily. We will Hunt more in the morning!
"When's morning?" I ask.
"About an hour or so." He says back.
I laugh. Freedom never tasted this good. This was going to be fun.
I stop walking as I smell a survivor nearby. We begin moving in for the kill. We approach a small campsite of about 4 people. Two females and two males. They were surrounding a campfire eating. We watch them from the top of a building. One of the survivors sees us, so we back off to see if he lowers his guard.
"I just saw a pair of Hunters!" I hear the man say. I also hear the sound of a gun being grabbed and loaded.
"Calm down dude! You must be seeing things. I don't see anything." I hear a girl say. The other two beside her agree.
"You three are fools! We are being watched, and they will kill us when they get a chance. From now on, until we get to safety, nobody go anywhere alone." He gets up and walks around the campfire, looking towards the roofs of the buildings around him.
"When did you become the Hunter expert dude?" I hear one of the girls say.
"I used to be friends with one." Says Dario, slinging his sniper rifle over his back. "Before I went separate ways with my old group. His name was Hunter."
"You're shittin' me, there's no way you're tellin' the truth!" The other male says. "Where is he now?"
"He went feral. But there were others with us like him. His mate Rose, and his friend Alexander with his mate Elizabeth."
"Mates? Like, lovers? Oh man, this guy has a vivid imagination!" One of the girls says.
"It's not made up!" Dario yells, frustrated. But he knows it's better to be quiet so he settles down.
Done with hearing his life story, I continue watching for any weaknesses. This idea of friendly Hunters intrigued me. It would be interesting to meet this Hunter, wherever he may be. Maybe I would kill him first to make him tell me? It was tempting.
Once the survivors of the camp head to sleep, me and Claw head to sleep too. We embrace ourselves for warmth and fall fast asleep. Tomorrow we will someone in this little group we have found.
But first, I think we need some clothes.
(A/N): Do you like Hunters new name? I do! It's better than just Hunter, and since he doesn't remember anything this is not only a good plot device but also can be used for cool things later on! And just to make things clear, all the OC's from the original, plus new ones, will appear. But let me makes some things clear on who exactly will appear.
Game Characters
Zoey: Common appearance. But in danger of Reaper.
Francis: Common appearance. But in danger of Reaper.
Louis: Common appearance. But in danger of Reaper.
Coach: Cameo, but not really a part of the story.
Ellis: Cameo, but not really a part of the story.
Nick: Cameo, but not really a part of the story.
Rochelle: Not in story (Because she's a bad character in general.)
OC's
Ezekiel: Common appearance. But in danger of Reaper.
Dario: Appears often, is being hunted by Reaper
Beth: Common appearance. But in danger of Reaper.
Rose: ?
Elizabeth: in the story.
Alexander: in the story.
Please note: If you submit an OC (which is highly recommended you do) and you don't make them an infected of some sort but a survivor. There is a very high chance he/she will die in the story. Other than that, just keep the character realistic and believable. I don't want a teleporting Spitter, Smoker, Hunter or anything like that that's unrealistic. (Unless you really sell it to me that it could work ;-) )
Also, Freddy do not go ahead and post the most unbelievable character in the world and then contact me over Skype about why it didn't make it in. Also, if your name is Freddy and I am NOT talking about you in the sentence, if you post the most unbelievable character ever. ITS IN.
Just kidding, of course.
And, as always, I'll see you all in the next chapter!
Music Listened to while typing this:
Going Down by Three Days Grace
Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen
How To Train Your Dragon Complete Soundtrack (Shuddup, it's inspiring!) by John Powell
Enter Sandman by Metallica
See you later!