Event Log: Gifts from the Door, Monster Version

[hadrielmods]

Who: All characters participating in the event
What: The event log for the monster version of the Gifts from the Door event
Where: All over the city
When: October 12th-17th
Warnings: Like, so many monsters

No monsters arrived with the newbies - great! One less thing to worry about. Except it never quite works out that way, does it? Maybe the Door was just delayed a little, because on the 12th, a few monsters start appearing. And then more. And then more. Where's the off switch?! Oh right, no one knows.

Some of these monsters you might recognize, some your best friend from another world might be very familiar with. Some might be creatures you've never imagined. But don't worry, they all have one thing in common - they'd all be happy to tear you to itty bitty pieces. Or eat your liver. Or consume your soul. Or just scare the shit out of you, that's fun too.

So lock your doors and stay inside, and hope nothing breaks in through the windows. Alternately, now's a great time to get your hero on and go out and smack some monsters around. It's great exercise, and there's nothing better for stress relief! Just avoid those big scary fangs.

► This log covers October 12th-17th.
► Feel free to make your own logs, as well
► Please tag headers of threads with content warnings where they apply
► Please put your character's name and open/closed in the subject line of your starters!
► If you are so delicious that you get eaten by a monster, please let us know here.

Comments

daenerys targaryen ; ota

[lemontree]

[ It makes little sense that such a creature would be here, on Hadriel's islands: manticores are native to the islands of Essos that are mostly covered in jungles, or so they say. Dany has only seen one before - the one that nearly took her life - and so she is startled and terrified to see another. Particularly so far from the Coliseum, considering that it is usually the location of recently-spawned beasts.

Here, just outside their home? She's very unpleasantly surprised to see a monster of any kind, least of all something so venomous.

The young queen stiffens. The manticore twitches, pincers and spiked tail poised for attack. In the precious few seconds that she has to take action, Dany isn't sure that she can rise to her feet quickly enough to avoid an attack. She'd been kneeling down in her meager garden when the manticore appeared and realizes there aren't many options available to her.

Luckily, she isn't naive. Hadriel is full of danger no matter how close to 'home' you may be. As such, she's keenly aware of the value of the dagger that is at her side, lying just by her hand. When the monster scurries forward to sting her, she makes the same sort of movement that had once spared her from a horrible death and aims a stab at its center.

With a horrible crunch, she succeeds. Relief and dread, mingled, coarse through her as she scrambles to her feet and away from the still-twitching creature. They're not at all found commonly in nature, but - what if? Could there be more? ]

[thanks_bunches]

[ It just so happens that Geralt had been stalking the strange little bug-like creature, after seeing what it could do on a not so fortunate small bird that was unlucky enough to land near it. He was hoping that maybe he could catch it, extract the venom to alchemize into a potion and use it's body parts as a special bomb to ward off other nasty little monsters.

Being a Witcher, there was no way the young Queen would have heard him coming up from behind her in the small garden. His footsteps were as light as falling snow and left not prints behind, his breath just as silent too, no, she wouldn't know of his presence until he wanted her too. ]

Mind if I take that?

[ His voice grumbled out in a low, gravel-like octave as he steps beside her, kneeling down to inspect her kill. ]

It's dead huh? No matter, there was plenty more where that one came from.

[ With that said, Geralt prodded the twitching creature with the tip of a small dagger that slipped effortlessly from within his sleeve. ]

[roseofthetyrells]

[Margaery exits the house just as Daenerys kills the--insect? creature? she stops short, all thoughts of where she'd been going forgotten, and leans over Daenerys' shoulder to get a better look at the thing. it's unlike anything she's seen in Westeros, but it vaguely reminds her of a picture of a scorpion she saw once in a book about Dorne. she is assuming that this thing is no less deadly]

What is that? Where did it come from?

Yusuke Kitagawa | ota

[wantsnudes]

i.
[With his deal with Rage in mind, Yusuke had been keen to use the Colosseum to hunt down monsters -- but instead he'd simply found flowers. He couldn't be disappointed for long, though, because now he's found far more than he bargained for with the mass influx of monsters. His particular target is a displacer beast, and, donning his mask and thief costume as Fox, he prepares to defend himself as it charges for him.

It darts in a straight line, tentacles outstretched. Fox raises his katana to hack the tentacles clean in half.

Or so he thinks. His blade seems to simply glance past the tentacles, as if his aim wasn't quite precise -- in reality, the beast itself is using illusions to appear in a slightly different place to where it actually is. It feints to the side and effortlessly avoids another slice of his katana, then pounces, Fox pinned to the ground and holding the flat of his blade in a defensive position to stop those jaws tearing out his windpipe.

Gritting his teeth, feeling the enormous weight of the monster bearing down on him, he can only curse himself. How could he have been so careless--?]


ii.
[Once the beast is finally down, Fox kneels by its side, pulling out a hunting knife from his belt. He surveys the corpse and realises he's faced with a conundrum.]

Just one bone... But which one?

[This is a more disgusting task than he anticipated, and he really has no idea how to carve a monster open and remove a bone. Is he supposed to skin it? Where should he cut that will make the least mess? Its blood hasn't even cooled yet.

He hangs his head and takes a deep breath to remind himself who he's doing this for. The horror and nausea of that day makes this pale in comparison, so he has to do this, even if it just means winging it. He raises the knife.

...Maybe someone should help.]

ii

[am_i_a_monster]

[Abigail overhears thee question.   She realizes it's not meant for her and yet it's nice to have a topic that she has knowledge about.  She grew up learning to find uses for every part of an animal and she tries to do the same with any monsters she kills in Hadriel.]

What are you going to use the bone for? Making something like a knife or a fishing hook? Or more like plumping putty? Or are you going to use the marrow for food?   What about the rest of the creature?   It's usually best to know that before you start field dressing it.

II

[hoperulesdespairdrools]

Bone? What would you need a bone for? [And Komaeda comes up from a few feet behind Yusuke, not meaning to catch him by surprise if he does.]

Still, you managed to defeat a monster like that? That is amazing!

i

[stupid_monkey]

UWAH!

TWHUMP

[The beast is smashed in the side with the gold knob at the end of a red staff. The normal ability of the Displacer Beast is harder for it to take advantage of when the person it's pinned stays in one place. Still, it's large size and uncertain location mean that hit isn't as strong as it should be. It's pushed off it's captive but not sent flying.

There's no time for him to help Yusuke get up. The beast attacks again with it's tentacles. Goku manages to catch one on the staff but the other is not where it's supposed to be and instead of blocking it at shoulder height it smashes him in the side.]

Son Goku| OTA

[stupid_monkey]

[Anywhere on the Islands]
[Goku shouldn't have felt disappointed when no monsters had shown up in the Colosseum on the normal day. It should have been a good thing that no one was being attacked. It was a good thing! But, it was also really boring.

There was nothing boring now with the monsters everywhere on the island. He can be found everywhere on the islands looking for people who need help or just taking out monsters before they find someone else to attack.]

[On the Beach]
[Goku is standing next to a pile of giant crabs with a confused look on his face. They look like they've all come out the worst in a fight. Their shells are cracked and they have large lumps everywhere (even if crabs shouldn't be able to get those).]

Are you supposed to take them out of the shells first... Argh! I wish I watched Hakkai cook more closely!

[Wildcard]
[Hit me with anything]

[hot_mes]

[you know, most of these creatures aren't all that bothersome to overpowered fighters, especially those who go around armed at all times. Law's commute to the clinic has gotten significantly more, ah, dangerous today, apparently, but if Goku comes up upon him thinking he's going to save him from the demodog presently menacing him, he'll have to think again. This is Law's kill, bro, he's got this]

on the beach;

[deviledlegs]

Oi, oi! The hell're you doing?!

[That sure is a barefoot man in dress pants and a tie rushing toward Goku and his pile of deformed crabs like someone is dying.]

Do you even know how long those things have been dead?!

on the beach

[outofthefire]

[Laura was on her way to catch a boat when she came across Goku and his giant pile of giant crabs. the crabs look funny, but what around here doesn't? she smiles at him and tries to think, how do you cook crab? she's seen her mother do it, it can't be that hard, right? think, Laura, think!]

...I think you're supposed to put them whole in a pot of water and boil the water.

I'm here I'm here I'm late but I'm here!!

[abyssalarcana]

[Caedra comes across the boy on the outskirts of some homes as he's just finished with a creature far larger than him - but he did manage to bring it down, which is worth paying attention to. The unfortunate thing is that as he seems to have already finished, she's missing out on the opportunity she's most interested in with all these creatures around - observing these people here, seeing how they fight. What are their strengths, and where are their weaknesses?

Thankfully, she's found a way to get at these answers thanks to the Door generously sending a few co-conspirators her way. The jariliths could hardly be called allies, but the catlike things fear her enough to know their place and know that cooperation benefits them more than antagonism. She sees the three venom-furred creatures stalking along the edges of buildings, knows they're watching the boy and her both, looking for an opportunity.

So as she watches from the middle of a street she gestures subtly toward him, lifting a finger and tipping her chin in a slight nod. The three jariliths, panther-like and trailing poisonous vapors in their wake, bolt toward Goku with fangs bared.]

beach

[am_i_a_monster]

[Abigail looks over at the crabs and shrugs.]

They're already dead, right?   If they're like normal crabs, you'd pry off the shell, take out the gills, scoop out the guts, just take anything that's not white. The white part is the meat. Then you can take off the abdomen.   Looks like you've got enough of them to make a real feast.

Will Graham | Ota | cw: creepy images in links?

[feelslikeimspilling]

I - Nightmare stag -

It had been a while now since Will had last found himself sleepwalking. His feet no longer grazed and bruised from midnight milelong walks, barefoot and barely clothed. The nightmares, on the other hand, they were still a recurring theme in his life, everpresent and just as real. As much as Will feared them, a part of him understood it was just his overactive imagination, so you can understand his disbelief and why the man was currently frozen on the spot when he stood, just a breaths distance away from the huge nightmareish stag.

Will shuddered out a chilled breath. His eyes wide and wet like large, polished marbles behind the glass coffin that were his spectacles. Hands trembling as he reached out towards the hulking beast. Its raven featured shoulders fluttered in the breeze, hot steam puffed from its nostrils like bellows to a fire and Will closed his eyes for a long second, feeling how real the beast was.

The stag raised his head, high and proud, obsidian eyes full of terror and death, stared Will down as it huffed another breath and kicked it's back hooves out. Will was terrified but he had to know it was real, he had to feel it. As his hand twitched, nervous and anxiously down into the black feathers of its fur, Will felt a tear roll down his cheek.

"Please..." His voice just a whisper, it's tone pleading. "-Please don't kill it... It's only here for me and me alone..."

Will had either heard you nearing them or seen you from the corner of his eye, he couldn't turn around and face you though, for that would startle the beast. As much as he feared it, for what it represented to him, Will couldn't bear the thought of someone killing it... As much as he wanted to kill it himself... Before it could or would kill him.


II - Cannibal Wendigo -

It had been a few days now since the monsters started to arrive. Will managed to keep himself to himself after his first encounter with something from home, from his past- but he needed to continue with his daily life, supplies had to be collected and Winston needed to be walked.

Will was down by the shore, he'd been walking the edge of the water, looking for streams that meandered from inland and broke at the mouth of the sea, they had been the best places to fish so far and Will was a keen fisherman.

He'd been following a small stream for a few hours now, taking him past some abandoned homes and overgrown land left behind from when the Island fist shifted and moved. It had started to get dark and yet Will had somehow lost track of time. Sitting on a fallen wall, Will let his eyes closed as he listened to the tranquillity the silence had to offer before wondering if it was the doing of one of the Gods here?

That thought, along with a snapping sound brought Will back to his senses. There was an imminent sensation of being watched, possibly followed and Will could feel the fear rise inside his chest like a poorly digested meal. Slipping from the bundle of bricks he'd been resting upon, Will drew the gun from his pocket and proceeded with caution. He had not been ready for what he saw! Letting out a gasp of horror, Will fell backwards dropping his gun and twisting his ankle as the Wendigo, black like tar, quickly turned its attention towards him.

"It can't be!? No... No... Please n-no..."


III - Dearheart -

Avoiding the plague of monsters that swelled into the Islands was almost as hard as avoiding people in general. Somehow, they always seemed to find a way to hunt Will down and make him interact. Today was no different.

As he walked through an open door to one of the local, run-down stores, Will started to slow his pace. Yet again, something from his past had crawled its way here to torment him more. This time, the monster that faced Will was more horrific than the last. As it uncurled from the fleshy heart-shaped stance it had been holding, the abomination began to sprout limbs, human in likeness and clumsy like a new born dear, stalked towards Will who in turn started to walk backwards out of the store and back into the street.

He was horrified, watching the metamorphosis from art into life. The token of its creation was not lost and for that Will was all the more fearful. Someone close to him had once carefully and lovingly created this for him and him alone. Will felt the panic in his chest, the rush of blood to his head as if he could pass out. The faster he walked the faster it approached. Antlers dark and slick with gore, Will overwhelmed with visceral.

"Get away... Get it away! I don't want this... I can't fight this, not this..."

I

[requiemshark]

Sorry, brother.

[ Ephemera tries to make his voice gentle. It's difficult when he's in full armor, face concealed behind a visor rimmed by a set of jagged, painted teeth. The rifle he holds at the ready is less ambiguous. ]

Not gonna let it kill people.

III!

[shithefuckup]

[It had been a day or so since Zack's arrival here. Frankly, he was starting to get a little restless, what with everyone and everything here being so unfamiliar to him. Monsters included, as of today; He's been letting loose during the day, hacking and slashing at any monster trying to get at him and by now, he'd gotten a few wounds that while concerning, were nothing to serious.

Yet- that wasn't enough. Ever thirsting for blood, he eventually comes to where Will and the Dearheart are and lets his steps come to a halt before cracking a wide grin on his face.

Ah, yes. Perfect.]

OUTTA THE WAY- !!

[With a tight grip on his scythe, he lunges forward at whatever the hell that creature was as he aims to get a swipe at wherever, cackling madly all the while.]

II

[am_i_a_monster]

Abigail was out looking for Will.   It was partly out of concern and partly because she did not like being alone when it started to get dark.  She knew he enjoyed fish and the water, so she walked along the streams.   It didn't seem as peaceful to her; there were too many unseen dangers that could be lurking around. She was about to give up, return home and try calling Will instead when she heard his voice.  She peered through the darkness and made out the shapes of a person and something with antlers.  With the influx of strange monsters lately, she didn't bother at trying to guess at what it was.   

She began walking over to the two forms, slowly and carefully.  She wasn't trying to draw the creature's attention onto her; she wanted to understand what was happening first.  She needed to know her target, like any good hunter.  And help her father figure, like any good daughter.  As she got closer, the creature threatening Will almost looked like a man, almost like Hannibal.  She chased the thought away, deciding it was her imagination. 

She moved as close as she could and crouched down, reaching for Will's gun.  "Will, are you okay?"   She whispered.

damien scott { ota }

[inthewar]

[ A terrible screeching sound closely followed by screaming had pulled Damien quickly out of a dead sleep. Hell of a way to wake up, but what the fuck else is new around here?

His heart pounding a little with adrenaline, he'd rushed outside quickly, only to be met with absolute fucking chaos. He's lost track of whoever was screaming - maybe it wasn't even a person at this point, who the fuck knows - and heads back inside fast. The idea of just staying inside isn't even a consideration for Damien. For one, people he cares about are out there somewhere, and people he doesn't even know could need help, so, yeah. Not an option. Second, who knows how long this safe room will really stay safe. He'll need some reinforcements to really secure the place, and then in theory, he can hunker down with whoever else needs the help.

Grabbing one of the few weapons he's managed to pick up here - a sharp dagger - along with his cigarettes (because he could be gone for who knows how long and he has priorities), he heads out determinedly.

You can catch him as he's dodging one scary creature after another, or when he takes refuge perched against a building, in a perfect spot to keep watch on this street. He just...needs a minute, so he kneels down, takes a breath, and...yeah. Tears start to actually well up in his eyes.

What the fuck?? ]

[requiemshark]

[ Perversely, Ephemera is actually enjoying himself. Whatever bullshit the gods pulled to make folks irrational and quick tempered seems to have passed him over entirely and the monsters are living, breathing targets to be tracked and eliminated. There's nothing like a good fight to force some sense out of the world and Ephemera could use some sense, now. He hasn't joined back up with the Guard but he's a fighter still. No reason to stay out of the fray.

So he goes out. Does his work.

He pauses, rifle held at the ready, when he spots movement.

Person. Okay. ]

You hurt?

[ He pauses, squinting. ]

...seriously? You came out here with just a knife?

[64th]

[ Cashmere hates monsters, which is why when she hears weird shit going outside she does not venture out to investigate. instead she checks the doors and windows and waits. and waits. the sounds seem to get worse, not better, as time passes and along with it she starts to feel more anxious. so she sends Damien a message, followed by four more when he doesn't reply.

the lack of response is enough to get her to leave her house, grabbing her knife and the gun she doesn't really know how to use before taking off towards his place in a sprint. she's done well avoiding all their terrifying new guests, but when she finally spots Damien trying to fight off some sort of two headed tiger. ]

Hey! Need some help?

[unphase]

[Tinya's Legion costume is splattered with blood and she has a sword bared, its sheath attached to her belt. she's flying through the city, looking for monsters or people being threatened by monsters when she sees Damien kneeling down against the building. she swoops down from the sky and lands before him. she sheaths her sword and kneels down next to him, trying to catch his gaze]

Sir, are you injured?

Peter Parker ; OTA

[itsnotaonesie]

The prompt with all the zombies because we have like three delicious flavors of zombie

[Everything Peter's heard so far about monsters usually includes them only showing up in the colosseum, so he reeeeally isn't expecting to run into a bunch of undead boogeymonters on one of his store trips. But hot diggety dang it, that's exactly what happens. He's just minding his own business, stepping out of one of the shops with a bag of stuff, when he spots someone near by kind of shambling awkwardly up the street. Which is weird, but then most of the people here are pretty weird in different ways, so eh. For all he knows, it could just be someone he hasn't met yet who got hurt somehow, or something? So being the nice boy that he is, he decides to see if they need help.

He approaches the figure from behind cautiously, his spider sense telling him that this is a super Bad Idea for reasons he can't quite piece together yet, but the person doesn't even seem to be turning around so like CHILL spider senses?]

E-excuse me? Hey, are you--

[It isn't until he starts making mouth noises at it that it finally turns to acknowledge him, aaand yeah, he gets what his spider senses were warning him about now. The person who turns around is kind of super gross in that decaying zombie sort of way. You know the way, and apparently so does Peter because he immediately starts backing away from it. He's seen enough George Romero movies to know where this encounter is headed.]

Holy shit. Oh my God, okay... okay, this is a thing now.

[You know what else is a thing now? The like fifteen other zombie creatures that come shambling out of the shops and around corners into the street, that's a thing. It's a thing that Peter is actually pretty freaked out about. Zombies aren't a thing he thought he'd ever have to fight, okay. How do you even fight a zombie? He's not about to start punching these things because what if he catches the zombification and then becomes an unstoppable Spider-Zombie and eats everyone and oh my God everything is horrible.

So, that's what Peter's up to.]


Wildcard me baby

[Not feeling zombies? THAT'S COOL TOO. After slapping on his Spidey suit, he's going to be doing a lot of patrolling. Monsters suck and he doesn't want anyone to get eaten by them, so hit me with a place and a boogeymonster and Spidey will like. Shoot webs at it.]

zombies!

[unphase]

[Tinya may be only a Junior member of the Guard, but she takes those responsibilities seriously. she's been flying patrols of the islands all day, swooping in out of the sky to help people in need. she's in her Legion uniform, but the white of it is covered in blood splatters and she has her sword in its scabbard tied onto her belt. she's flying low enough to the ground that she sees Peter and, more importantly, sees what look like sprocking zombies. her mouth drops open for a moment because she's only seen zombies in holos and she's shocked to see actual zombies here.

but she dives down out of the sky, landing beside him, unsheathing her sword and standing at the ready]

--where did these things come from?

Kain Highwind | OTA

[dragonsgrasp]

I.

[Kain has gone off to be alone, finding a location somewhere not far from Love's temple, where it seemed there wasn't much of anyone else around. Of course, that's not... exactly going to go according to plan. For now, though, he's standing quietly with something in hand, staring at it quietly. The item in question is a doll of all things, something that had recently appeared and he'd found. It's familiar, after all. It belonged... belongs... to a certain childhood friend.]

[He's interrupted by the sight of several bombs suddenly surrounding him. Gasping in surprise, he drops the doll to the ground as he takes his lance in hand. He also realizes in that moment that he's not as alone as he'd thought he was.]

Be careful! These things can burn entire villages to the ground!

[Of course, there aren't nearly enough of them for that to happen, but the danger is there, regardless.]

II.

[Now at one of the island's beaches, Kain is once again just trying to do something solitary. This time, he's got a bunch of wilted roses in hand, and appears to be seriously contemplating tossing them off into the ocean. Why had these things come through the door? Why can't he get something useful, instead of things that only bring up bittersweet feelings? More bitter than sweet at that.]

[This time, he smells the creature before he sees it. Turning abruptly, he sees a malboro hanging out not too far off. His nose wrinkles as he watches it, knowing he has no choice but to take it on. This kind of monster can make things get out of hand much too fast.]

[Indeed, it proves to be a total disaster right from the start. Kain gets the jump on it first thing, flipping around in the air with a Sky Rave as he stabs straight downward into its writhing tentacles. But the nasty creature lets loose a cloud of its Bad Breath. Kain starts coughing, stumbling backward as the familiar effects of poison set in, and he's also suddenly miniaturized, a very tiny figure waving his lance around uncontrollably, as Berserk also takes over his mind. Well, this is just... great, isn't it?]

III.

[It starts as a typical evening, with Kain headed to get some dinner before he goes on patrol. But when he steps into a restaurant, some "dessert" is already there waiting for him, in an assortment of flans: Black Flan, Red Mousse, Yellow Jelly, Purple Bavaros, White Mousse, and even a Flan Princess.]

[Will this make him lose appetite for the main course? Who knows, but once again he realizes he'd better deal with this problem before it escalates. After all, this is the worst possible place to have a fight. Ugh, and their physical defenses are always difficult... some magic would be ideal right now. What choice does he have though? He gets his lance ready, eyeing the blobs of flan as the ooze toward him. He can't jump as high in here, so some of those attacks may not work as well. But he's determined to try. He takes a running leap, coming down to impale the Red Mousse.]

Are there any mages in here!?

II

[jocoeur]

( if there was any monster to be seen as a threat, it was a malboro. and so, akira's outfit had long since changed into his phantom thief attire, and he had been closing in on that armour-clad man he had run into a few times... only for him to disappear??? after that poisonous cloud.

covering his mouth, joker coughs, having narrowly avoided the same fog of disaster, but looking every which way for where kain had gotten off to. the air? no, west? not there either... )

Did he... retreat? ( bad idea, joker— taking your eyes off of that monster, who was winding up for a good ole tentacle swipe. )

Drake | OTA

[braveoff]

[ That flower thing really had been too good to be true. Just part of the glitch, the Door freaking out because it's being poked at... it's been screwing with their heads, then dropping random items from other worlds all over the place, now it's monsters they get to deal with. Honestly? Not the end of the world. The only thing making it a seriously problem is that it's not just one surge of one kind at the colosseum. It's lots of different monsters, popping into existence all over the city, on all four islands, and they just keep coming.

Drake is doing okay at keeping his chin up a few days in. He's tired but wouldn't even count himself as injured, just a little banged up. And he's doing okay on ammo even after the few times he'd resorted to it instead of direct combat, and it seems like the whole city is helping out on this occasion. Which is good, not just for the community but because some of the creatures are distinctly magical, and Drake is useless against that kind of thing. He's happy to hand off whatever he knows is out of his wheelhouse and keep patrolling to knock out the creatures that are. Really, it doesn't seem all that terrible. Not the worst they've fought, not by a long shot.

But for him, it's about to be the most personal.

Lots of people in Hadriel, past and present, have mentioned zombies. It seems like every world's are a bit different, but none are actually quite like Drake's. The universal understanding that somehow excluded his universe was that zombies were, as a rule, the undead. Shambling corpses, nobody home. Some moved fast, some moved slow, some people cited a virus, some said necromancy. If there was a way to cure other worlds' zombies, Drake hadn't heard anything about it. Just how to kill them, and everyone who knew what a zombie was knew that. More than just the people who fought them at home, since apparently they'd shown up in Hadriel once too. Before his time, but people remembered, with extreme prejudice. So he kept quiet, wondering if his world was just some kind of exception. Everyone else basically described Romeros, but officially dead, and never in a state before. Never anyone like him, who wasn't actually dead or rotting, who was still sapient, but did have to eat brains and had certain physical characteristics... traits that, of course, Romeros also have. Their rotting skin is pale, and whatever hair they retain is pure white. It was lucky, Drake had always thought, that no one other world equated those traits with zombiedom -- made it easier to keep himself under wraps.

But when Drake spots a figure shambling into the city, it's easy enough to tell that this isn't just any zombie, from anybody's world. The shock of white hair over its rotting face tells him it's a Romero. There's no coming back from that, he knows. Once your mind's gone, you are just a monster. That's the understanding he's been working with ever since he was scratched, and how he operates here. Which means this is just another monster, and he has to kill it. And these guys follow slightly different rules. A scratch isn't a death sentence, though people might wish it was. He's got to make sure that if someone's hurt by it, another genre-savvy passerby doesn't shoot them in the head thinking they're doomed. Shit.

Even more shit is the fact that as he gets closer and can see downhill, it's clear that a whole pack of them are wandering up from the beach. Both not wanting to draw attention and knowing that he won't register as food to them if he just wades in and starts swinging, he pulls out his axe. This is gonna be messy. And every brain he destroys used to be a person, a victim, just like him. One they couldn't keep fed, or couldn't cure in time.

Feel free to try and help him with this swarm, be confused why they aren't actually attacking him (but they certainly will go after you, if you have a living brain), or be caught up in another herd elsewhere and calling for help! They're easy to kill, just aim for the head, but there are plenty to deal with. A scratch or bite will transmit the virus, so be careful!!! ]