"Atlas was permitted the opinion that he was at liberty, if he wished, to drop the Earth and creep away; but this opinion was all that he was permitted."
— Franz Kafka


Chapter 1: Awake

I'm floating...drifting as if I didn't have a care in the world.

And I didn't. I shouldn't anymore. The activation of the RFI should have solved everyone's problems. The plague, the beast, and conduits. Conduits won't be bothering anyone ever again.

For a while things felt okay. There was a deep sadness in the air, mourning; appreciation for my sacrifice. But above all, things felt peaceful. The world was returning to some much needed normalcy. I could rest easy now, wherever I'm destined to go.

I've been told that when you die, you get a sense of rising or falling all depending on your behavior beforehand. It's choice not chance. I never read to deep into that kind of stuff but I had the basics down. I still entertained their ideas. Because no one else would, right?

Activating the RFI, I will admit, it did feel like I was elevating. I felt myself getting higher and higher. Then when that final explosion went off and I let go, I fell. I slammed into the ground with a force, enough to shatter the normal human body to pieces.

I guess the Big Guy upstairs changed his mind. I didn't take any offense. I wasn't exactly a golden boy in my years. Years of crime does outweigh a couple of months of heroics.

It didn't feel hot, it actually felt cold, freezing almost.

I guess the saying cold as hell made more sense that we thought.

Then something went wrong, hellaciously wrong. The peace was disturbed by noise. A loud noise. Chaos ensued, the country once again divided.

There was devastation. Thousands, no…millions of lives being ended. One after another at an alarming rate.

Why? I thought everything would be fine now?

The air around me shifted. Wait the air? I can't be feeling the air if I'm dead. I'm dead.

Right?

Fear, panic, pain, suffering. People running for their lives.

Chaos. Sweet utter chaos.

Afterwards…silence.

Complete and utter silence.

I guess I'm not done here yet.


The peaceful sound of water can be enough to lull anyone to a peaceful slumber but it rocked Cole out of his. His eyes fluttered opened and found himself next to the seemingly never ending body of water. He sat up and rubbed his eyes before looking around him.

"How did I wind up in the swamps?" He asked himself. The first question of many.

Did Zeke really just unceremoniously dump his body in the swamps? No…he wouldn't. Zeke had too much respect for his brother. Next question.

Cole stood up to further assess his surroundings. When he was in the swamps before, there was usually a tense silence, but this type of silence was an ominous one, something he's never experienced before. He felt like something was waiting, watching and waiting.

Cole shook it off and decided to walk around; staying in one place surely wasn't going to help him get a better understand what was going on nor would it help his stiff body. After some time, he finally made it out of the swamps. And the sight before him made his stomach drop straight to the ground.

New Marais was in shambles.

The buildings were in poor condition; poorer than that of Empire City in its hay day and cars were scattered everywhere. New Marais had obviously been abandoned. And without the human race, nature took its rightful place. There was overgrown grass, weeds, and moss everywhere it could grow.

Cole didn't want to believe it but there wasn't a shred of life anywhere. The hustle and bustle of New Marais seemed to have ended. Not even the militia lurked about.

"What the hell happened?" Cole asked. He was certain that the RFI would solve the problems present in New Marais, mainly the Beast, the monsters, the swamp freaks, and the plague, but not drive everyone else away.

He continued walking and soon recognized that he was in Ascension Parish. A place where you always had to watch your back or it meant a bullet in your head or a knife in your back. As he walked, he felt that wasn't exactly needed, despite the ominous silence. Eventually he reached the St. Ignatius cemetery. Cole found it slightly more difficult to breathe. There were all these white particles floating in the air. Pollen?

The sound of a growl instantly quickened Cole's heart beat.

Cole turned to his left and found the source of the menacing and deep growl, much to his horror. A vile, fungal creature was staggering blindly about. He immediately crouched down, hoping the creature hadn't spotted him. It didn't appear to have eyes, but Cole wasn't about to take his chances. He began moving back to find a different route around the creature. When Cole mistakenly stepped on a branch, his already fast beating heart had beat faster.

The creature had spotted him and immediately went on the attack. It reached behind and a bomb full of spores was thrown directly at Cole. He barely managed to move out of the way but upon impact the bomb released a cloud of spores that clouded Cole's vision and filled his throat. When the dust cleared the creature was hobbling towards him.

"How the hell can you see me?" Cole whispered.

Cole climbed on top of a tomb to create some distance. But the creature still continued to attack and threw another spore bomb at him. Luckily Cole had room to dodge and all he had to do was move back.

"Wait, what am I doing?"

Cole raised his arm and took aim. But nothing came out. Not even a spark.

"Ah crap." One of two scenarios was possible; he didn't have any more energy to spare or he didn't have his powers at all.

Suddenly switching over to the dire situation at hand, Cole looked up and realized the creature had joined him on top of the tomb. Cole jumped to another nearby tomb just as the creature threw another spore bomb at him. He ran and jumped across the tombs. Cole's heart threatened to beat right out of his chest. One became two, then two became four, then four become ten. They were everywhere.

The first one he had encountered luckily wasn't persistent and gave up in its pursuit and had not alerted the rest. Cole took a few seconds to breathe and gather his bearings.

"Well I guess y'all's hearings is shot but your hearing is just fine." Cole said to himself. "Better keep to myself then."

Whatever these things were, this was obviously a mating ground of sorts for them, or however the hell they reproduced.

As silently as possible, Cole jumped on top of the outer walls of cemetery. The creatures were none the wiser and continued to roam about, occasionally letting out menacing low and deep growls.

"Jesus that's terrifying." Cole said as he jumped off the wall to the ground.

The day had soon become night and Cole found himself in Smut Triangle. Or what was left of it. What was once bright and lively, was now grey and dead. There was debris everywhere and the ground was cracked. It was dark, the only source of light coming from the full moon in the sky.

Cole continued to walk around but his senses were on high alert. What if there were more of those creatures walking about? In his powerless and defenseless state he could not chance another encounter with one of those things. He ultimately decided that it would be best to find a place to settle down for the night. But the question was, where?

He eventually found an old building, one he recognized to be the Bloody Mary. The door had been broken down and tossed to the side long ago. He made his way inside, watching his footing the best that he could in case one of those creatures was in here. A foul smell had also hit him with a force. In the dimness of the moonlight, he managed find a flashlight.

"Please work." He flipped the switch and to his surprise, the flashlight shined brightly.

Revealing a disheartening sight.

Cole finally realized what was making the horrible smell. There were dozens of decaying bodies and what threw Cole fully over the edge was that some of them were fresh.

"Well staying in here is obviously out."

Click-click-click-click

Cole immediately froze. "What. Was that." Cole turned around and found two creatures hobbling inside. They were similar to the ones he encountered earlier, but the fungus had only surrounded their heads; their bodies appeared to be human.

Sort of.

Cole immediately crouched down and shut off his flashlight. The creatures hobbled in his direction and Cole pressed himself as close to the wall as possible to stay out of their way. Taking a chance, he turned his flashlight back on, kept a close eye on anything that could make a sharp noise, and slowly made his way out.

The creatures did not acknowledge his presence and continued hobbling towards the decaying bodies. The creatures crouched down and began feasting on the decaying bodies.

"Oh man." Cole whispered. Once he was out, he ran. He really needed to find a place to settle down for the night. Staying on the streets was definitely not an option.

Soon enough, Cole encountered another building that was familiar to him, but mainly for what was on top of the building. He turned his flashlight off, tucked it into his front pocket and began to climb. He finally made it to the top and found barbed wire lacing the edge of the building. In the dimness of the moonlight, he spotted an area where the barbed wire was parted, leaving a wide enough gap for someone to enter through.

Once Cole was safely on the rooftop, he turned on his flashlight to look around. Everything was about the same; save for numerous cans of food, multiple rounds of ammunition, and various melee weapons.

"Hands where I can see them." Cole heard behind him. The demand was followed by the cock of a gun. "And no funny shit either."

Cole raised his hands, complying with the demands. "I don't want any trouble, I'm just passing through."

"On your knees." The voice demanded once. Cole complied and swiftly dropped to his knees.

The man walked towards Cole and began searching him. "You infected?"

"What do you mean infected?"

"Don't play dumb with me." The man pointed his gun at Cole's head once more, letting the cool barrel make contact with the back of his head.

"Alright, alright. Um no, I guess not."

"You ain't got shit on you either. Who are yo-" The man's question was cut off when he faced Cole.

"Cole?"

Cole looked at the man's face, and despite a few noticeable changes, he realized immediately who it was.

"Depends who's asking." Cole responded with a smile.

"Mr. Dunbar's asking."

Zeke grabbed Cole's hands and pulled him to his feet, then into a hug.

"What the hell are you doing here? Where've you been?" Zeke asked.

"Beats me. I'm activating the RFI then all of a sudden I'm waking up in the swamps."

"Oh jeez, that's where you wound up? I knew I should have looked there again."

"Come again?"

"I was taking your body out to sea during a storm when a strong lightning bolt struck the boat and caused it to capsize. I barely managed to return to shore. Your coffin washed ashore but your body wasn't in there. Your phone wound up washing ashore too but still no sign of you. I looked everywhere but I couldn't find you. It really tore me up when I couldn't find you." Zeke said somberly. "You must have washed ashore after I gave up."

"Well that answers one of my questions."

"I suspect that you would have more. But first how about we get you settled down and get some food in you. I've got a lot to tell you brother and I'm assuming you the same."


Zeke led Cole into his hideout. It was a one bedroom apartment. Zeke instructed that he make himself at home so Cole took a seat on the couch. Zeke had also placed a blanket on his shoulders and handed him a bowl of reheated soup. It was an abnormally cold October night in New Marais.

"So you don't have your powers?"

"I don't know." Cole responded while taking a spoon full of soup. "Is there anywhere I can possibly charge up or something?"

"We haven't had electricity in long time brother. Electricity is the least of our worries these days."

"Zeke, man. What in the hell happened here?"

"Brother…man it all went to shit about two years after your death. There was a huge outbreak and it spread fast. In just a day, thousands were either dead or infected."

"What was this thing? Does it somehow connect to those monstrosities I saw earlier?"

"Depends, what did you see?" Zeke asked.

"At the St. Ignatius cemetery I saw this beast, completely surrounded in fungus. As I tried to escape, I found at least a dozen more."

"Bloaters." Zeke whispered.

"What now?" Cole asked.

"I'll explain once you're done. Continue on."

"Alright. So the one I encountered initially, I thought it didn't see me but then I must have set it off somehow and started throwing these bombs at me. I got caught in the blast, smelled like something fierce, made it hard to breathe." Cole rubbed his still burning throat. "It's still a little hard to breathe."

Zeke's eyes widened. "Hang tight man." Zeke got up and walked into the kitchen of his hideout. He brought back a scanner and stood behind Cole. He placed the scanner at Cole's head. The light on the scanner remained green.

"Well this doesn't say you've been infected. How long has it been since you encountered the bloater?"

"Couple of hours at most."

"Hmm, I'll check again tomorrow. Anyway, got any more to tell?"

"Yeah, when I was at the Bloody Mary, I encountered to more of those fungus creatures, but the fungus was mainly on their heads. They made this weird clicking sound."

"Clickers," Zeke said.

"Clickers?" Cole asked again.

"If you ain't got more to tell, then I suppose it's my turn." Zeke said. "Like I said, a little while after your passing there was this outbreak; an infection if you will. It's been said that it came from some sort of tainted crops but I didn't get the full gist of it. It's called the Cordyceps Brain Infection or CBI."

Zeke stood up and walked around. "It's a parasitic fungus, which explains all the fungus that you saw on their heads and bodies. It attacks the brain and makes you go insane. And with that, you lose your humanity. The infection consists of four stages; first you're a runner, then a stalker, a clicker, then finally a bloater. Well five, if you include death."

Cole's eyes widened. "So what I saw. The bloaters? The clickers?"

"All used to be people."

"Shit." Cole whispered.

"The infection is either spread by being bitten or breathing in the spores. In time, 60% of the population was either infected or dead. The rest of us do what we can do survive. By any means necessary."

Cole looked intently at Zeke and noticed faint presence of scars on his face and arms. Zeke has been through hell and back and it looked to be a daily trip. But along with that he noticed that Zeke had aged. A lot.

"Zeke how long has it been?" Cole asked.

"Counting from when you died? It's nothing short of 23 years."


This story takes place just after the ending of The Last of Us in 2034. It will crossover elements from inFAMOUS 2, Second Son and The Last of Us.

Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think =D