Chapter 19: Book 1: Chapter 9 (Part 1 of 3)

The streets were mostly clear of people. The only difficulty we encountered was that we had to weave around vehicles that had been abandoned in the road or had collided with one another.

Several of the stores and even homes we passed showed signs of looting and destruction. The social contract, the glue which held our society together was being tested and giving way in places. We saw a handful of individuals out and about. We ignored them, and they did us the courtesy of doing the same in return.

It was far too early to tell whether the authorities would be able to keep a lid on things or if the frightened mob would attempt to seize control. My suspicion was that places the size of Flint would probably be okay. The population was large enough to support a significant number of police and other emergency services personnel that could be organised and exert a reasonable level of control. Yet, it wasn’t so large that the weight of numbers of the panicked masses meant they would be easily overwhelmed.

The Detroit area, on the other hand, would descend into chaos, I was sure of it. More people would die there from the behaviour of other humans than from monsters. At least, for the first few weeks.

The ride took a little longer than ten minutes, but we were taking our time and absorbed the surroundings as we went. Soon, we turned off Corunna Road and headed North, shortly after that turned left onto Saratoga Drive.

The homes here were larger than most in Flint, but the area was quiet. There were a series of four-bedroom detached houses on either side of the road. There were no other homes nearby on either side. A few other drives had been built but no homes had been constructed on them.

This jogged a memory of a conversation I’d half-listened to with Keith when I first started working at the BuyMart. Apparently, these houses had been built back in 2008, The whole area was supposed to have been developed into a new suburb of Flint, but then the house price crash hit, and the construction company went bust.

Only the first stage of a planned six-stage development was finished. Well, mostly finished.

At the time, I’d put the pointless conversation down to Keith’s propensity to toke the reefer. Now, it made more sense that he was telling me because this was where Constance lived.

I idly wondered if Constance had got the place on the cheap because of the construction firm’s insolvency, as these houses were way out of the price range of a BuyMart shift manager.

Shana and I freewheeled down the road and scanned the house numbers. We found Constance’s house, it was the last on the left just before a road island for turning around, which had one more house that led off from it.

The properties on the right-hand side of the road had stopped a few houses earlier and on the plot to the right of Constance house there were the foundations for another unit, which had been abandoned and was now overgrown with weeds.

There were two cars in her driveway. The house had a beige stucco façade on the walls and the roof tiles were a light brown colour. The grass on the lawn was patchy and discarded building materials, that had never been removed, poked up through the earth.

“This is the place,” I said quietly, as I dismounted from my bike and sent it to my inventory.

Shana followed suit, she was beside the mailbox and bent down and read the stencilled identification on the side.

“Mr and Mrs Lafleur,” she muttered to herself, but I heard her. “Is Constance married?” she asked.

“No. Must be her parents or a brother and his wife or something. Which kind of explains how she can afford this place, they may have knocked money off for the unfinished construction next door, but this place would still be waaayyy out of her price range,” I snarked.

People who weren’t Constance or her cronies being home was something I hadn’t considered. This could complicate matters, but I wasn’t turning back.

“No lights on in the house,” I pointed out casually.

There was no fencing on the right-hand side of the house which would make it easy to go around the back if we needed to. I walked up to the front door and tried the handle gently. The front door was locked. I listened at the door for signs of life and thought I heard what might be shuffling from deeper inside but couldn’t be sure. The blinds were down for the ground floor windows so I couldn’t peek inside. Shana joined me at the front of the house.

“No joy?” she said.

I shook my head.

“Nope. Let’s head around the back. I doubt that will be open either, but if we have to break in it will be best to do so out of sight. Not that there is anybody around,” I snorted.

Saratoga Drive was both isolated and deserted.

We wandered around the side of the house quietly, keeping our eyes open for any signs of life. The windows on the side of the house similarly had their blinds down.

We reached the backyard; the grass wasn’t much better back here and there was a secondary building that was half-built, separate from the house. I could see over the low fence on the left into the next backyard and they had a nice circular pool. Presumably, the unfinished building was going to be a pool house for a pool that was never installed.

The yard extended for about sixty feet before you reached the tree line of the copse that ran along the back of this drive. Just inside the tree line, it looked like someone had been dumping their broken appliances. I shook my head in disgust.

I took this all in, but the real attention grabber was the sliding glass door at the rear of the property was wide open. I pointed my fingers at the open door to get Shana’s attention. She nodded and wisely kept quiet, and pulled an arrow from her quiver, and then nocked it in readiness. I summoned my ice scimitars and led the way to the open doorway.

Using a scimitar, I moved a horrible yellow curtain out of the way and stepped into the house. This backroom was laid out as a dining area and had a large square pine table in the centre. Several of the cheap chairs had been knocked over and flies buzzed around the remains of several half-eaten plates of lasagne that were on the table. On closer inspection, I could see there were droplets of blood spattered on the table and the beige carpet.

Something had already happened here. Were Constance and her crew involved? If they were, had they been the perpetrators or victims? There were six plates on the table, which matched their numbers.

A thumping sound was followed by a low moan that came from the adjoining room and dragged my attention away from the mess on the table. Shana heard it as well and waited as I approached the arched entrance into the living room cautiously.

I put my shoulder to the side and peeked through. Oddly there appeared to be half a dozen flat-screen televisions strewn about at the far end of the room.

Three figures shambled around the room and I recognised one of them as the previsouly pock-marked Clarence. The other two were an elderly couple I’d never seen before and they didn’t look to be in good shape. I analysed them for more information.

Death Puppet Zombies x3
Grade: X Level:  1
HP: 100	Value: Very Low You are reading story Corsairs & Cataclysms at novel35.com
Threat: Low	30 XP each
Death Puppet Zombies are corpses that have been reanimated by a Death Puppet Scarab that has burrowed into the body of a dead lifeform and fused with the corpses nervous system. These creatures are not truly alive and do not have health as living beings do. However, they do require an intact central nervous system to function. Destroying the head or severing the spine is the only effective method of despatching them.

 

Quixbix surprised me then.

<I have shared this information with Shana, Torin.>

He had been quiet since giving us the quest.

Thanks, Quixbix. One of the zombies is Clarence, it seems like something got to them before us. I thought to him.

<Yes, that should make this easier.> he mentioned.

Shana went around the table quietly to stay out of the zombie’s sight until she was behind me.

“Same tactic as we used against the redcaps,” I whispered. “Shoot and then clear out of the doorway while I go in.”

Shana nodded and slipped past me into the arched opening. She raised her bow and loosed the nocked arrow before spinning out of the gap and drawing a replacement arrow.

“Damn it, I missed,” she hissed to me.

I acknowledged what she told me and stepped into the room. Shana’s attack had got their attention and the trio of zombies had turned and advanced on our position. The Clarence zombie was at the back of the room and stumbled over one of the discarded widescreen televisions.

I shimmied to my right and engaged the closest of the elderly couple. It was the old woman. She was short and overweight and wore too much makeup. She had on a voluminous tribal print dress, which blessedly covered her up. Her eyes were milky white and there was no sign of higher intelligence in her. The vapid and aggressive posture made the resemblance to Constance unmistakable, this had to be her mother.

As she reached for me, I sliced at her arm with my scimitar and cut into her flesh.

Hit! You have inflicted 17 piercing damage and 12 points of cold damage to death puppet zombie #1.

I kicked the zombie in her large gut, and she stumbled back and tripped over the brown armchair. I didn’t have time to follow up as the other elderly zombie lurched for me and impaled itself, right through its guts, on my other scimitar.

 Critical Hit! x2 You have inflicted 34 piercing damage and 24 points of cold damage to death puppet zombie #2.

Unfortunately, for a zombie, being skewered on a three-foot sword was nothing more than a mere inconvenience. The zombie who was likely Constance’s father grappled me and bit me in the shoulder while trying to force me to the ground.

-20 Hit Points. (420/440)

My left arm was pinned to my body as the creature continued to hold me and gnawed on my shoulder. That was when Shana stepped into the room and positioned herself at my side. She unleashed an arrow into the side of the old fella’s temple from point-blank range.

Critical Strike! x8 Shana has inflicted 104 piercing damage to death puppet zombie #2. Overflow of 72 damage is converted at a rate of 2 to 1 (vital spot) for 36 health loss. Death puppet zombie #2 has no health but sufficient damage has been inflicted to its head and it is slain.

The strength of the old man’s grip faded, and he collapsed to the floor. Shana’s bravery did not go unrewarded, but in a bad way.

The Clarence zombie had freed himself from the mess of electronic equipment and possessing a younger body moved quicker than either of the two other zombies. He charged across the room and tackled Shana to the ground, his jaws snapped at her as they landed in a heap on the floor.

 Shana -10 Hit Points. (90/100)

Shana shrieked as she was bitten, but as she was trying to fend zombie Clarence off, the bite was on her bracer protected forearm. This mitigated the damage a little, but her hit points were low enough that I didn’t want her taking harm of any kind.

The only saving grace of the situation was it opened the back of Clarence’s neck to me. I turned toward them and aimed a backhand stroke with my right-hand scimitar.

Critical Strike! x8 you have inflicted 136 piercing damage and 96 cold damage to death puppet zombie #3. Overflow of 132 damage is converted at a rate of 2 to 1 (vital spot) for 66 health loss. Death puppet zombie #3 has no health but sufficient damage has been inflicted to its head and it is slain.

My scimitar carved through his neck and severed his head from his body. The perma-dead Clarence fell limply on Shana.

Before I could help her shrug him off, I felt a sharp pain as I was bitten on the thigh.

-20 Hit Points. (400/440)

Constance’s zombie mother had crawled across the floor and chowed down on my leg. My jeans offered little in the way of protection. A trickle of red blood dribbled down my leg from where the foul lips of the creature gnawed at me.

“You fucking bitch,” I screamed, and slammed the pommel of the ice scimitar into her temple.

The strike had the desired effect, and it loosened her toothy grip on me. I dismissed the notifications as they came in and just sliced and diced the head and shoulders of the zombie until she flopped uselessly to the blood-smeared carpet.

Your party has slain death puppet zombies (3). +46 XP Torin, +51 XP Shana.

You can find story with these keywords: Corsairs & Cataclysms, Read Corsairs & Cataclysms, Corsairs & Cataclysms novel, Corsairs & Cataclysms book, Corsairs & Cataclysms story, Corsairs & Cataclysms full, Corsairs & Cataclysms Latest Chapter