One day… every changed…
Our world became hell...
And we were left without help… because... our Heros vanished from the surface of the earth…
But we... the ones, who are still alive, weren't left alone for long...
Different times... just need different Heroes...

A young panda was trying his best to keep silence while passing the dark streets of the abandoned city, known in its past glory as Station Square. The city was in ruins, no wonder; there wasn't anybody who could take care of it. The cars and other belongings were left alone on the street, in a way that you could tell that their owners were in hurry whatever their reason was. But if you want to know, you could see a similar sign like this in other cities as well.

So what made the city look like this? What was the reason?

The boy was making his way by using the cars and other debris as his cover. This place was new for him. He knew that he shouldn't have entered it, but the need to get some supplies before the upcoming winter was bigger. His mother and the only other person that he have ever seen, told him before she died, that he has to stay away from places like this. He didn't understand why she had forbidden him to go to a city and as far he didn't notice anything dangerous. Was she laying to him all this time?

Then he made a mistake...
While wandering in his thoughts he stood on pieces of glass, making a quite loud noise. The young one has frozen in his tracks. Nothing happened... He didn't hear anything... He decided to go farther, till he heard a howl... Or rather howls that didn't belong to animals... He turned around and there were those hideous creatures...
There were humans and as well Mobians between them. Parts of their limbs were missing or hanging loosely on the remaining gray ill skin. Their guts were also on sight, reaped apart or being consumed by worms and other disgusting small creatures. Some of them had still their eyes... dead dulled eyes, but mostly there were two bloody dried holes...
They were zombies, ghouls and so on... And those are only few of the names how you could name them and while having different abilities, they shared one common thing, they were all DEAD.

This world was cursed with the disease that made people turn into undead. Nobody discovered where and how it started, nobody could find the cure. Only one bite of an undead and you become one of them. That's how the cities have fallen... How we have fallen...

The young panda has never seen the living dead with his eyes, but from his mother's stories he knew that he was in deep troubles. They were getting closer... He was actually surrounded by them, with no way out, but it didn't matter... If he tries to move, they will notice him immediately, attack and probably eat him alive... He will be dead sooner or later... and also one of them...

When he was preparing for the worst, somebody yelled the words such as 'chaos spear' and then a light had passed by him. Before he could do a thing he was forced to the ground, and the person told him to be silent. He could hear gunshots and other explosions. He noticed that the one above him also had a gun, but wasn't using it at the moment. So, that meant that someone else was actually fighting with the undead.
His protector was a rabbit girl, about twenty years old. She was wearing an uniform that covered all her body parts, except her head. She smiled at him when she saw the frightened stare and whispered that everything will be okay.

After a while everything went silent. You wouldn't notice that there was a battle if not the lying, burning bodies of the undead and the lonely black figure with gun weapons standing in the middle of them. The person turned and walked in their direction and in the dark you could see only his red piercing eyes. When he approached them it became clear that the shadowy figure was a black and red striped hedgehog with a contrasting white chest fur on his ebony furry body.

- Clear? – the girl asked him. And she received a nod from the hedgehog.
She stood up and helped the little one under her protection, to his leg.
- Cream, we have to change our plans...
- Shadow! If you mean that getting back to the headquarters and abandoning our mission only because we found a survivor, you're wrong! – she interrupted him.
- So what's your idea, kid? – he smirked. – We can't go there with him and we can't leave him alone.

The girl went silent and lost in her thoughts. The hedgehog knew that she would find out a good solution to their little problem. If not, he had a ready plan. But after all if she's going to be his field partner, he has to give her tasks that would help her prove in his eyes. Otherwise it would mean that she's not ready for it, for the war.
He trusted Cream; if somebody was going to be his partner it was her.

As Shadow was waiting, he looked at the girl; he noticed how much she changed... Cream became a beautiful woman, with the appearance that made most of the males in the base drooling or even having nose bleeds and she only needed to pass by them. The rabbit matured also mentally. She was no longer the same girl that needed protection, now she was the one who was fighting, keeping other people's safety. The sad thing was only that she had to grow up very fast, leaving her childhood behind. And to do that she had to face the death of her best friend Amy, who died in a mysterious way... Cream was the one who found her body...
After that the girl locked herself from everyone, blaming Amy's death as her fault, that she didn't stop the pink stubborn hedgehog from leaving their hideout. It was like that for a month, but then one day something crucial happened that changed Cream. Nobody was expecting that...

She left her self declared prison and went straight to Shadow. The next thing that the ebony hedgehog knew was that he was forced into training Cream, in fighting skills and wielding weapons, and surprisingly the girl was very good in it.
He liked those memories, but in them there was the thing that was making Shadow returning back to the event with Amy. The pink hedgehog was probably the only person that wasn't killed by zombies, more even, she had a single bite mark on her neck and her body was fully dried from blood...

- Shadow... Hey Shadow! Mr Shadow!
Suddenly he saw a hand waging in front of his face.
- Yes, Cream? – he said calmly, hiding his embarrassment. Cream nearly ever used her polite calls nowadays; and if she used that meant that she was really mad.
- Finally! I was trying to get your attention for five minutes!
- Humph. – his face took his usual neutral mask – Go on.
- So... I think that we should split up. I'll take the boy to our base and you go meet with him as planned.
- You remember how to get there back?
- Of course! I'm not five years old, you know...
- Good.

With that said they went in their designated directions. Cream took the boy with her and went back from where she and the hedgehog came from. She didn't have any problems with undead on her way, which was very helpful. The boy was too tired to walk there by himself, so she had to take him on a piggyback ride. Not the best position for aiming a gun on enemies. Won't you agree?

Meanwhile the panda boy was confused. And had many questions like 'What did actually happened here?' and 'Who are those people?!' But before he could ask or do anything more his eyes felt heavy and for the first time in his young life he felt safe and fell into a dreamless sleep.