The Weekly Challenge

I'm gonna go ahead and say it.

I'm proud of myself.

That's right, three weeks in a row of writing short stories.  Thank you Chuck Wendig for the regular challenges, because otherwise I'd probably flail around an fail to come up with an idea.

Speaking of, this week the challenge was to take a list of pop culture items and combine two of them into one story.  I went with Star Wars and the Walking Dead.  Once again I had fun just thinking about it, I brainstormed all the things I thought were themes of the pop culture items I knew and those two jumped out at me.  Almost went with Batman but the vigilantism angle just wasn't working this time.

So yeah, we're back on zombies.  That didn't take long now did it?

The main thing I wanted to avoid here was having just a crossover fanfiction.  I didn't want to have the Walking Dead survivors find lightsabers and use the Force, or put zombies in space (they've done that, it's called Death Troopers...good book actually.)  Instead I tried to combine what I felt some of the themes were, and ended up with a zombie apocalypse ruled by a totalitarian government.  Enjoy.

P.S. My word count is rising, I broke 900 this time.  XD

Wasteland

“Hey boss, I think he’s coming to.”

            You open your eyes to a small concrete room with weak lighting coming from an old camping lamp off to one side.  Two people, a man and a woman, are leaning over you as you try to sit up.  Ragged clothing and matted hair are the uniform traits.  Behind them are shelves with an assortment of what looks like emergency survival gear.

            “Where-“ your voice cracks, they hand you a canteen and a flask.

You drink from both.

            “Where am I?” you ask.

            One of them, the guy, grins, “You’re alive.”  He laughs at his own joke.

            “Ignore Marcus,” the woman says with a shrug.

            “Hey, Mara, come on!”

            “Where am I?  And who are you people?” you ask.

“We’re with the Underground,” Mara says.  “We’re smugglers.”

“And right now we’re smuggling you,” says Marcus.  “Congratulations buddy, you just got recruited.”

Turning back to you Mara says, “We pulled you from the wastes.  What do you remember?”

            At the question, it comes back to you.  The walking and the fear.  The hunger and the thirst…especially the thirst.

            You take another swig from the flask, you’re not nearly drunk enough for this.

            “Hey, hey, hey!  Easy on that, that’s mine!”  Marcus shouts.

            “What he means,” Mara interrupts, “is that you’re dehydrated.  Stick to the water for now.”

            She reaches for the flask and you take one last drink before handing it back.

            “Shouldn’t have let me have it in the first place then,” you grumble.

            “It was to make my job easier,” she looks down sympathetically.

            You follow her gaze and see your leg.  You remember twisting it as you fell from the Republic’s Criminal Execution chute, falling outside the city wall and into the wasteland.  The splint you made has been removed, it makes a pile of old debris and the remains of your coat in the corner.

            “I was waiting for you to wake up before we set it,” she says.  “This is going to hurt.”

            “Geez Mara, can you work on your bedside manner?”  Marcus says.

            Mara ignores him.  “Here.”  She hands you a thick piece of wood.  “Bite down on this.  Marcus, hold his shoulders down and keep him still.”

            You lie back and try to relax, putting the block in your mouth.

            Mara counts down, “Three…Two…”

You take a deep breath.

“One!”

            With a wet crunch the twist in your leg is reset and you dig your teeth into the wood as you cry out, the pain making you sweat.

            “Crap, give him my flask before he passes out again.”  Marcus hands you the flask and you take another drink before giving it back and drinking some water to wash out the foul taste that suddenly fills your mouth.

            The pain clears your head, and something nags at the back of your mind but you can’t remember what it is.

            “Easy there, man.”  Marcus helps you sit up.  “We’ve got you.”

            Mara is replacing the splint around your leg.  She looks up.  “How long were you in the wastes?”

            “More importantly,” Marcus cuts in.  “What did you do to piss off the Republic?”

            Your head still hurts, the room is too warm.  Taking another drink, you say, “I think I got drunk…tore down some propaganda.  Maybe beat up some Enforcers?”

            “Yep, that’ll do it!”  Marcus laughs.

            Mara takes another look at you, waiting for an answer to her question.

            You wipe the sweat off your face.  You’re still thirsty and you take another drink.

            “I don’t think it was that long, it’s a little hazy.”  The memory of your exile is still a blur.

            “Do you have any other injuries you need me to look at?” she asks.

            “No,” you cough.  “I’m fine.”

            You take another drink while scratching at an itch on your chest.

            “Your splint was pretty well put together.  This was your coat right?”

            “Right.”  The room is getting warmer.

            Mara holds up the shirt.

“Any idea how it got so bloody?” she asks, with a concerned look.

            The silence in the room is stifling.  You wrack your brain but you can’t remember anything, the heat is making it hard to think.  You swallow water but the taste turns your stomach and you spit it back out.

            The water hits the floor flecked with bile and red with blood.

            “Oh shit,” Marcus whispers.

            The sight of the blood brings your memory back.  Limping away from the city wall, trying to move as quickly as you could, knowing you had to find shelter before it got dark.

            Before the Corpses came looking.

            “I was bitten.”  You say, your hand going to your chest.  The memory of the bite comes back as you feel the tear in your skin through the fabric.

            “Oh shit, shitshitshit!”  Marcus is backing away from you, crawling towards the wall.  “Mara, Mara we have to dump him.”

            “Shut up Marcus, we should have enough meds to help him,” she says.

            “He’s already coughing up blood,” Marcus is reaching behind him.

            “Marcus, sit down and shut up!” Mara yells at him.

            Marcus ignores her and pulls out a pistol, aiming it at you.  Before he can fire Mara grabs his arm, wrenching the pistol out of his grip.  The two fall back and slam into the far wall and the pistol clatters to the floor.

            Your chest itches like it’s on fire.  You’re sweating bullets and the room is oppressively hot.  You’re thirsty but can’t stand the thought of water.

            Your two rescuers keep fighting.  The room begins to spin.

            You reach for the gun.  You know what you have to do.

Five Reasons I Didn't Keep Dead Island

It's been too long since I've done a Friday Five, and since zombies tend to be the best topic to make a list about, I thought I'd ease back in with talking about the Dead Island video game.  Maybe use this to transition from lists about zombies to lists about other topics.

Anyways, the game is...Well, not terrible, but I actually did something I never do with games.  I traded it in.  Again, I never do this...ever.  Even if the game is just horrid I'll typically shelve it and just not play it for awhile.  And maybe I'll pick up Dead Island again in the future (once the price has dropped dramatically) and I can find some people to play with.

Because that's the thing about this game, you cannot go it alone.  Which I suppose makes sense in a zombie survival game.  But with all the good ideas the game has, for me at least, it fails in the execution...of the ideas.  The player dies constantly.  Ideas like;

(Note:  I'm doing this list in reverse order with the least annoying/aggravating aspect first and building up to the deal breakers that ruined the game for me.)


#5:  Poor Menu Interface and Inventory Management.

Let me ask you, if an item like medikits are an auto-equip that take up no inventory space, why am I not allowed to buy them from vendors if my inventory is full?  It means I have to drop an item, buy the medikits, pick up my item, and confirm my inventory is all correct and that I didn't miss anything.  That's three steps too many, it should just be 'buy medikits and leave store.

Also, why does my quest log hate me?  I have to tab to the quest log, select the quest, check the map, tab back over, check the next quest, repeat.  I'm not saying I want all quests active at once, that would just clutter the map.  The problem here is that there seems to be lag not only with opening the menu and changing tabs, but also before the controller will respond to allow me to select the next quest.

Again, none of these are deal-breakers.  I've dealt with awful menus in games before and it's completely manageable.  It's just a minor annoyance.

Sadly minor annoyances can begin to stack up, like crappy writing.


#4:  The Characters Want Nothing to do with the Player

When you start a new game in Dead Island you get to pick one of four playable characters, each with their own special attack and (supposedly) different stats.  I chose one of them and was playing through just fine until suddenly I found myself in a cut scene with all four characters present!

Who gave them all permission to be here?!  Because I certainly didn't, I chose one character to play as.  One!  If all four are here, then why can't I have the computer control them?  I would have killed to have that extra inventory space, never mind having some fucking help with the zombie hordes!

The game has online multi-player to progress through the story, but I shouldn't be forced to use that.  If I'm playing alone, I should be allowed to play alone.  And with that in mind, I shouldn't see the other characters who I chose not to use.  Basically, it means that I, as a player, have no influence or control over the story.  Which completely removes any investment I have in it.

#3:  Challenging Enemies are Good...Too a Point.

As you level up in Dead Island the various flavors of Infected and undead also level up with you.  This is a fine idea on paper.  The problem with how it plays out here is that the enemies get more health, take more of an impact from your weapons (oh by the way, your weapons degrade as you use them, fun right?)  So your strongest weapons quickly become your worst.  But I never found enough replacements that were more effective.  So I stayed with my great, then mediocre, then crappy weapons.

The bigger problem is that the higher level you get the more damage the undead do.  Sure you get more health, but the ratio to health vs damage is not balanced.  So while in the beginning it's possible to take on a small crowd of zombies, pretty soon you can barely handle one.  Especially with the way they like to blind-side you.


#2:  Please Let Me Know When I Can Use My Special Attack.

This was a pretty big issue for me as I was playing.  The special attack each character has can only be used sparingly, you have to kill zombies and take damage to recharge it.  But the issue is that the charge gauge was very unclear.  I would never know when it was ready so I almost never used it.  I also used it rarely because of the time limit on it so it wasn't usually worth using unless I had enough of a crowd.  And even then it wasn't the guaranteed kill it was supposed to be.  Using it on a crowd of zombies sometimes worked, but sometimes I'd be no better off than before I activated it.c

And the regular attacks aren't much better.  The collision detection for the melee attacks is spotty at best, and for some drunken reason the gun mechanics seem to use the same detection as the melee.  So even when I'm auto targeting a zombie's head I still miss and hit the arm or even leg?!  Forget this noise.

That's really all I have to say on that except that it does lead directly into the biggest aggravation I have with the game.

#1:  Why the FUCK are Medikits and Special Attacks Linked to the Same FUCKING Button!?!

Seriously!  Who thought this was a good idea?!  To quick-use a medikit, nay, the only way to use them, is to press a button on your controller.  Ok.  I have no problem with that.  In the middle of combat you want to be able to access them quickly.  But if you hold that button down instead of a quick press, that's how you activate the character's special attack.  Oh, and for extra fun, even if your attack is charged, it's not clear how long you have to hold it.  So if your attack isn't charged you can hold the button, realize you won't be clearing the room with your special, then let go AND WASTE A MEDIKIT!

Do you realize how many medikits I wasted doing that?  This was, in all honestly, what broke the game for me.  Well, this and point #2.  I can handle lousy menus, no problem.  I can handle poor story telling, annoying but I've seen worse.  I can handle unfair enemies, sometimes I like a challenge.  But all together, the poor controls, the bad story and the implied insistence on multiplayer...Done.  I'll handle the zombies myself when the world ends thank you very much.

Goodbye Dale

So if it wasn't obvious from my Friday Five posts (that reminds me, I need to do more of those) about the undead, I'm a fan of zombies.  As such, I'm a fan of The Walking Dead.  Both the comic and the AMC series.


From this point on there will be spoilers, you have been warned.

In yesterday's episode the group was discussing what to do with someone they had captured a few episodes ago.  They had saved him from zombies, fixed up his injuries, and then decided to kill him because of the potential threat he might at some point represent.

I was not happy with seeing characters I liked choosing to kill someone who was otherwise harmless, I'd like to think people are better than that.  But what I do like about the show is how the characters are being portrayed in their decisions.  I don't like the decision, but it's clear that the characters aren't happy about it either.

Most vocal about this was Dale.  Rick was upset about it but willing to kill a living, human, captive.  Rick was unhappy, but Dale was outspoken.  I've always liked Dale.  From the first episode he appeared in I liked how he was not just the moral center of the group but also a connection to the world they had lost.

A large part of this was his age.  Dale was, aside from Hershel, the oldest character on the cast.  So it was understandable that he would cling the strongest to the 'civilized way' of doing things.  Again, I think this helped him also be the moral compass.  One of my favorites moments of his was in the first season when he argued to allow a dying man the choice of how to die.  Not to kill him, but to give him the choice.

Even when the show first began airing, AMC put up a character test on their website.  And lo and behold, turns out the character I'm most like is Dale.  Like I said, I always liked Dale.

And now he's dead.

Rewinding my rambling a moment, in this past episode Dale spent the entire time arguing for the life of their prisoner.  First individually with other members of the group, even moving forward Shane's character development away from a complete psychopath.  Then later with every member of the cast.

What really caught my attention was that during the group conversation Dale was the only one standing in the light.  Rick was caught between the light and the shadows and everyone else was standing in shadows.  At first I thought it was a bit of a blatant use of lighting and staging to show Dale's standpoint compared to everyone else, but it worked for the scene and kept the attention where it needed to be.

Then Dale died and I started thinking.  Earlier in the episode there was also a brief conversation regarding Heaven and belief.  I'd like to think that Dale's death could actually be interpreted not only as a moment of redemption for the group (as the next episode promo seems to imply) but also as a way for him to get to where he deserves to be.

I'm not saying I personally believe in Heaven.  But I feel that Dale stepped into the light.

Top Five Ways for the World to End

Five Ways I’d Like to See the World End (and the Zombies that would hopefully come with it)

Apparently, from what I’ve been told, this is the year the world is going to come to an end.  Ignoring for a moment that the Mayan calendar most likely ended because they weren’t around to continue it, let’s take a look at some possible ways the world as we know it will n longer exist.

1:  Natural Disaster

This one is kind of broad, as it could be anything from forest fires to floods to asteroid impacts.  Anything that does not occur as a result of humans screwing with the natural order of things (something we’re a little too good at.)  But on the scale large enough to wipe out the majority of life on earth, I’d say at least earthquakes and tsunamis would be needed.

Call this a test run...What, too soon?

Sadly this wouldn’t really result in zombies so much as a crapton of bodies, but a man can dream can’t he?  Yes, a man can certainly dream.

2:  War

This is a pretty basic one, but mankind is very good at killing things, especially each other.  And over the years we’ve only gotten better at it.  War used to be a tiresome effort involving men stabbing, and later shooting each other one at a time.  Not so anymore.

Now we have smart bombs, dumb bombs, and satellite lasers that can decimate entire populations at a time with no fallout.

Well, maybe a little fallout.

Obviously the radiation would infuse the dead, those not flash-fried in the initial explosion that is, with a twisted unlife.  This would result in shambling hordes wandering the wastelands.  Provided you survive both the explosions and the radiation, the good news is that the undead will be easy to spot, and you won’t even need a nightlight.

3:  Socio-Economic Collapse

Yet another thing people are good at is screwing each other over, are we seeing a trend yet?  As we’re aware of, unless you live under a rock, from movements like Occupy Wall Street people in America are more than a little upset over the current spread of income and the lack of jobs.  And what happens when people are upset?  Well if it’s handled poorly it can lead down a very bad road.

Although it's considered polite to let them riot first.

For this to really end the world it would have to impact multiple countries at once, something that is unlikely even in the worst case scenario.  And again this one wouldn’t really result in zombies.  More like waves of angry, angry people only out for themselves.  Think “28 Days Later” but with less biting

4:  Supernatural

This is the one that most everyone is banking on.  The Apocolypse, The End of Days, The Second Coming…Other Religious Events I’m Not Aware Of!

Every culture has its own version of the end times but the formula is mostly the same.  World ends, the good are rewarded and the wicked punished.  Personally I just want to see the looks on the faces of people who don’t get the good ending they’re expecting.

As with others on this list we won’t be seeing any zombies.  Just gaping pits leading to the abyss and pillars of light reaching upwards, and if you don’t qualify for either of those then you’re dead anyways and/or in some version of Purgatory.

Not bad, not great but not bad.

5:  Plague

Something of a combination between War and Natural Disaster as, in all likelihood, the plague that wipes out the majority of humanity will be grown in a weapons lab.  This is the scenario I’m most hoping for.

For starters it allows for a small percentage to be immune or resistant enough to avoid the first waves of death.  After that either the dead or people who die later will be revived as zombies for the rest of the survivors to deal with.  This is the set-up that best leads into a zombie apocalypse (As seen in pretty much any zombie movie ever.)

No fallout, no explosions, no disasters.  Just you, a gun and the undead hordes looking to eat your face.

I just really like this picture.