INFECTED (Click Your Poison) (66 page)

MAKE YOUR CHOICE

Y
ou blast the first intruder in the head—instant kill. The others don’t even look as he falls, and you’re soon surrounded by wage-slaves and convicts. They bring you down and devour your flesh in greedy droves. There won’t be enough left of you to rise again.

THE END

G
eez, you must really want that food. You charge the bear, bring the axe down with fierce momentum. You’re like a Spartan warrior with that thing; lunging and jumping forward and using your full body weight to bring the bladed wedge into the animal.

Bears don’t need a headshot to go down. In fact, because of the extreme thickness of their skulls, hitting a bear in the head almost never causes mortal damage; even a .45 will ricochet right off. So instead, you plunge the axe into his chest—right into his heart.

Nonetheless, your attack only angers him. With bulky fur, thick skin, dense fat, hard-packed muscle tissue, and bone like concrete, your attack proves nothing more than a flesh wound. Some bears are timid in the wilderness and will avoid a confrontation if threatened, but a bear trapped at a food site? This will be a fight to the death—your death.

The bear swats at you, breaking your arm and severing whatever flesh it touches with its mighty claws. Once you drop your axe, the fight is truly finished. The bear gnarls on your skull, stripping it of skin with his jagged teeth.

Adrenaline blocks out some of the pain and the bear is gracious enough to kill you before it eats you. Who did you think you were, Davy Crockett?

THE END

S
he nods, allowing you to simmer in your own thoughts, and checks her gear. “Oscar Mike—let’s move out,” she says. You stay quiet, still feeling a little embarrassed from the scolding you just received, and walk through the woods. Her pace is brisk; it takes a concerted effort to keep up.

“Let’s try and keep fifteen-minute miles,” she says, looking at her watch. “A curious Zulu will go as fast as twenty when investigating, and I don’t want anybody trailing us.”

*     *     *

You hike the day away, walking about two-thirds up the hill, allowing you to see greater distances yet not create a silhouette like you would at the top. Rosie’s dad had taught her that one.

The sun wanes over the horizon; you’re hungry and tired.

“All right,” Rosie says. “I reckon we’ve only got two or three more hours to the camp. Bad news is, we need to cross through the marshes. We can either camp here and finish our journey after first light, or we can press on, get a hot meal and sleep in a warm bed. Thoughts?”

•
 
“I don’t want to let whatever might be following us catch up. Let’s keep going.”

•
 
“Swamps at night? I’m okay with being the coward in the group—let’s stake camp.”

MAKE YOUR CHOICE

Y
ou run with Tyberius and Cooper to the opposite end of the building. Adrenaline pumping, it doesn’t take long. You make it to the stairwell, ready to fight, but the landing is absolutely clear. Tyberius grabs the rope, the one that will release the furniture dangling above the landing, but stops before pulling it. All he has to do is tug the rope and a dozen desks, cabinets, and chairs will collapse upon the landing and seal the stairs off.

Instead, he stares a thousand-yard stare down upon the landing. “Sims is still down there,” he says. “We gotta give him time.”

“Sims made his choice; pull the rope!” Cooper screams.

Tyberius shakes his head. “I won’t do this again.”

Cooper makes toward the rope to pull it herself, and then Tyberius snaps. He reaches out, his large hand clamped around Cooper’s throat in an instant. She falls to her knees and desperately pries at his fingers. There’s a crazed look on his face.

“He can still make it,” he says, his voice eerily calm. At this time, the first zombie meanders up the stairs. It wears a welding mask. This one is certainly just the first of many.

•
 
Attack Tyberius, pull the release.

•
 
Try to reason with Tyberius.