Beyond the Walls

That’s Right. This is a Game

Human’s brains are powerful, so powerful that once they convince themselves with 0% doubt, they will be able to exert a power that is beyond normal, sometimes this human superpower is called adrenaline.

Imagine a newly turned undead that rotting hasn’t begun yet. All it’s muscles are intact and aligned and imagine their sole purpose is their insatiable and unimaginable hunger for human flesh basked in this superpower called adrenaline.

How powerful can this undead have?

It was the first lesson that everyone has been taught inside the walls.

So when the people inside the room panic at the thought of anytime now, they will be trapped inside a room with a newly turned undead, fear will unquestionably overflow.

*Click

Brandy directed the gun to Penelope’s head. “Then we kill her now.”

Hiraya shielded Penelope and Aaron grabbed Brandy’s wrist.

“If you shoot now, you will attract every undead here.” Said Elijah.

“THAT CAN’T STAY HERE! DAMMIT! AM I THE ONLY WHO KNOWS WHAT WILL HAPPEN? THAT THING COULD! NO IT WILL TEAR US ALL APART!” Brandy loses his composure as Aaron’s grip becomes tighter and tighter until Brandy lets go of the gun.

“Ha! Are you scared mister? There is only one of her and seven of us.” The girl said as if it was no big deal.

“What can a brat know? Have you ever seen a newly turned undead?” Brandy holds his aching wrist as he takes his anger on the teenage girl.

“Have you?. . . I mean in person? Have any of you seen it? huh?” The girl jumped from the table and faced the angry adult then looked at the crowd.

Residents of the wall had been brief and showed videos during the apocalypse to inform them how the world began to end.

Only Lucas refuses to meet eye to eye with the teenager. He chose not to say anything as he recalled his dreams.

The violence, terror and deafening screams and explosion. He closes his eyes and shakes the images from his head.

“We are being recorded. Think before you act.” Aaron said and reminded everyone of another shitty situation they are in.

“I will take responsibility for her.” Hiraya stood up firmly.

“Can you eve–..!! You better be.” Brandy swallowed his curses as picked up his gun grumpily.

Lucas helped to move the couch in the corner and set a waist high barrier between the sick Penelope and the rest.

As if that could help.

“Why is she turning? Didn’t we all get our vaccine?” Hiraya asked as she wiped Penelope’s sweat.

“Why are you here?” Lucas suddenly blurted it out.

Hiraya was puzzled but eventually understood Lucas’ intentions. They are all here for a reason. She led Lucas far from Penelope and began to tell her story.

“I am a resident of Outer Wall, I run an orphanage, though we barely get by everyday. Everyone is happy and content. I am the only one capable of doing a job to keep the orphanage afloat but one day a man kept messing with me, he wanted me to the point he sent me to jail. Without me, the orphanage cannot run properly. In the few months I was in jail, the orphanage got mixed with bad people. I was ready to swallow my pride and beg at that man’s feet when an offer came in. Aside from absolving my crime I got blinded by the prize money and a place inside the inner wall.” Hiraya said.

“Huh? You too? I also signed to absolve my crimes.” Elijah overhear and joins the conversation.

“What are your crimes?” The girl with many piercings joined in.

“Ah… hahahaha. I’m … you see… I am a professional thief. I was wanted for 5 years and I got caught just recently. Hehe. ” Torn between being shy or proud, Lucas cannot pinpoint exactly how Elijah confessed his profession with pride. Elijah scratches the back of his head as it steals glances at the girl with a baseball bat.

‘Is he blushing?’

“Aren’t you shameless?” The girl said.

Elijah looked horrified at that comment, he clenched his chest and quickly defended himself.

“I, I only stole things from the rich people, excuse me. Have you seen how the inner wall citizens lived? They are basking in electricity, fresh food and better clothing. There are no beggars nor trash in their streets. That is only in the inner walls of the 50s. Can you imagine how innermost cities are? Wha, what about you? Why are you here anyway? ” Getting a little agitated, Elijah tries justifying his thieving job.

‘That explains his moves.’ Lucas was impressed at Elijah’s skills from day one. His agile moves and balance are on point.

“I bashed a military officer’s head that molested me. Then next thing I know, instead of Jail I was signing the damn contract in exchange for my life.” She said it as if it was no big deal.

After she answered nobody had said a thing. Killing an officer will send the killer to death row.

“I, I…” Elijah tried speaking but there were no words coming out.

“Kid, don’t feel bad for killing bastards like those. I killed three of them.” Aaron broke the silence. He is wearing a very menacing expression.

“Were you also molested?” Elijah asked densely in the atmosphere.

Hiraya put her arm around Elijah’s neck and squeezed it whispering for him to shut up. She changed the question and asked Unica her reason, she answered she was caught in an affair and instead of prison she chose to play this game. Brandy didn’t answer Hiraya and remained grumpy.

The last one was Lucas. He really didn’t know what really happened but he was supposed to die after his organs were extracted by the money lenders. Instead of telling the whole story he short cut it by saying her sister is sick and in desperate need of medicine but he is lacking money.

“Ahh I see. They exploited weakness to play this game. Do you think they are having fun watching us? I wish I knew what they are thinking in those screwed brains of theirs.” the girl said while giving the camera a dirty finger.

Lucas froze in his tracks.

“Game. Yes this is a game.” He mumbled and proceeded to look outside using the binoculars.

He sees a group doing kill and run tactics on the other side. They stealthily approach the undead and kill them, then another group pulls the undead body and rummages its body. He looks over to the other box room and the same is happening.

“What do you think?” Aaron asked, it’s been going on like that since this morning but he didn’t say a word.

“That’s not it.” Lucas said. He finally realized as to why yesterday there were players that risked going inside the field.

“You know where the key is?” Elijah asked and everything gathered at Lucas.

“I have a good guess.” He answered.

“Where is it? What’s with all these suspense pauses?” Brandy urged.

Lucas starts explaining by saying they are in a game. Thinking like a game master, of course clues are bound to be given. Instead of waking in these box rooms they wake up in a room like a locker room, he could guess, the same had happened to other groups.

“What is the clue there?” Unica puzzled and cannot follow.

“The first clue is the goal itself. ‘Exit the Stadium’ and the second is we wake up in the locker room which the players use as a waiting room before entering the field. The third clue is the exit door placement.”

Seriously contemplating at first Elijah gave up thinking, Others are still not getting it well. It might be a given since a stadium this big and large might be a new concept to them.

“The group that was running in the field yesterday figure it out with just those clues. . . Players and Audience exits are different in a stadium like this. By us, walking in the player’s waiting rooms means we can assume that we are stadium players and we are to exit using the stadium player’s exit. The most recent clue is this. . .” Lucas opened his fist and showed the whistle.

“We need to get access from the original stadium players, or anyone that is not considered as an audience.” Lucas continued.

Now that Lucas finally says it, there are several undead that are wearing jerseys, referee clothing, there are also some reporters, announcers and undeads with a card that says VIP backpass mixed in the casually dressed undeads .

Brandy grit his teeth. “How sure are you about this?!”

“I might be wrong...” Lucas said immediately but this is the most plausible answer he has.

“Are you sending us to our graves?! Huh? There is no way we can get past those hundreds of undeads!”

“There are groups that have been killing undead in the audience seat for a while now, but so far no one has rushed to the exit right?” Lucas asked Aaron who has been watching them since this morning.

“You are right.” Aaron agreed.

“They can be waiting for the right time? Can’t you see the hordes of undeads?” Brandy argued.

“That can be the case, then we can wait the whole day if they don’t exit after dark. Should we assume they don’t have it.” Hiraya said.

Brandy’s lower lip trembles as he can no longer refute or argue with that.

“Fine.” He surrendered and observed the other group.

Lucas also wishes that he was wrong that the key card might be somewhere else beside the field of undead. He opened and closed his mouth several times before just holding back his thoughts.

“What is it man?” Elijah was the only one who saw Lucas’ fidgeting.

Lucas looked at Elijah with urgency.

“We cannot wait until tomorrow. We are running out of time. ” He blurted it out of his chest but it seems like he caught everyone’s attention once again.