Chapter Text
The once hero stood upon the rooftop makeshift safe house of one of the bigger buildings overlooking the city below, the wind blowing his red hood lightly as it passed by him, carrying with it the smell of death, and smoke from the fires that had engulfed many of the houses and businesses within. The once normal, busy city full of life, was now nothing but hell on earth. A deathtrap, now full of thousands of walking, rotting and groaning corpses that roamed the streets below him, chasing after anything that was a living human to feast upon. The only positive thing about the whole ordeal, was that the zombies went only after humans. They never targeted any animals, not even some of the rare animals that had become infected themselves. The alive animals that were left behind became all feral, and now fend for themselves now and avoiding everyone. Alive or dead. The zombies below weren’t aware like Robbie is, thankfully, and are far more hostile and far more dangerous than anything he’s even encountered before, especially when they were a group.
He had failed the city. He failed the citizens, he failed everyone who trusted him with their lives. Hell, he even failed himself. How could he have let this happen? They relied on him, and look what had happened to them all! He couldn’t save them. He tried his best, but his best wasn't good enough. Marvin, and the others told him that it wasn’t his fault. That he couldn’t help and save everyone, and what he did was enough. They told him not to beat himself up over it, but that did not stop Jackie from doing so by mentally cursing himself over and over ever since the start. He hated himself for not being there for everyone, or at least he felt like he didn’t even try.
It all started yesterday, on a monday. The city was bustling with its usual busy life that Jackie, and the rest of the Septics were a part of. Everything seemed normal. Jackie had helped the police catch a wanted criminal, and went to visit Henrik at the hospital to treat some minor injuries he had sustained during the whole chase and catch game. Mostly bruises, a few scratches, and a sore arm. On his way in, the usual scene greeted him. The staff all greeted him, and congratulated him on the catch, as they normally did whenever he came in. “Hey, JB. Saw you on the news, good job as always.” One of the older nursing staff said with a smile, earning one in return. “Thanks, Mrs. Anderson.” Jackie responded, before earning a laugh from the nurse, who used her motherly tone to him. “Young man, I told you to call me Gracie. There’s no need to be so formal.” She stated before motioning him to follow her using her right hand that was strangely bandaged. “Dr. Schneeplestein is already aware you are coming as per usual, and will see you shortly. I’ll take you to the usual room for you to wait in.” She said before walking as Jackie followed her, who furrowed his brow when he noticed blood being able to be seen through the bandage wraps on her hand as they reached the room.
“Ouch, are you alright?” He questioned, earning a confused look before the female looked to her hand. “What- Oh gosh darn it, it’s bleeding again isn’t it? This is the second time it's gone through the bandages. I thought it stopped. I’ll have to change them again. I’m fine, really. Just a little. tired. It doesn’t exactly hurt anymore, just stings sometimes at random.” Gracie said, sighing before explaining what had happened. “While you were chasing the criminal, one of the ambulances brought in this old guy named Willy. They said he said some weird guy from the homeless shelter was acting erratic and bit him on the arm before he ran off as the staff tried to separate them. Willy and the staff thought nothing much of it until he started vomiting up blood, and his fever was skyrocketing above 105. The driver, Donald, said they got him in and on the way here, he started acting the same way the guy did, and almost bit him. They managed to get him into the hospital here, and he seemed to have passed out, so we got him into the emergency room. He woke up when I was close to him, and checking his wound, he tried to sit up so I naturally tried to ease him back down, and he bit my hand. He went into hysterics after that, then into seizures and he.. Passed away.” Gracie explained to the hero.
Jackie hummed lowly, and nodded in response. This was a strange thing to happen. He hasn't ever heard of something like this happening here. Sure, people had some weird ways of fighting each other, and they did have cases of rabies once in a great while, but never had someone died after something like this. “Have they located the guy who bit him?” He asked curiously. “Not as far as I’m aware, hon. You’re going to go out and check after Schneep sees you, aren’t you?” She responded, chuckling a bit at the end. “Of course I am. I would go now, but last time I never heard the end of it for the whole week!” Jackie responded, laughing quietly at the memory as Gracie laughed with him, before both perked up hearing the good doctor speaking outside to another staff member. “Well, he’s on his way over. I’ll leave you two to it. Try not to stress over it too much.” The nurse said before leaving the room, and being stopped by the doctor, having a brief conversation with her before coming into the room as she rushed off as Henrik walked into the room.
“Hey, Henrik.” Jackie happily greeted his friend. “Hello, mein friend! Same as last time, I zee.” The German doctor responded, walking closer to examine the hero. “Pretty much, but I knew better than to skip a visit to my favorite doctor.” He said, earning a stare and a chuckle before said good doctor went along with it. “Damn right vu better not. It does not matter how little zee injury is. Vu are not pulling the zame stunt like last time!" Henrik responded, earning a low laugh in response. The two fell into a comfortable silence after a moment of questions that Schneep stated was absolutely mandatory to answer, like always, until Jackie’s curiosity got the best of him as Henrik finished up the check up. “You’ve had a busy day around here too, I take it. I saw what happened to Gracie’s hand.” He said, earning a hum from the doctor in confirmation. “It has indeed been a veird, strange day around here.” Henrik responded, finishing writing something on his clipboard before giving Jackie his complete attention once more. “I have had several cases come in today of zee same sort. Patients having a bite here, or zere. All human teeth marks, too. Some are feeling ill after their bites, but they all vent home after treatment with zee new medication I gave them which seemingly made them feel better. It is like zey is trying to reenact zat boring horror flick of zee rabies outbreak in the apartment building.” The doctor explained, sighing. “But that old man bothers me zee most out of them all.. I have never seen anything like that before. I do not know what these people have yet, and I plan on finding out so I will be running tests using his body. I’ll be keeping a close eye on the nurse and everyone else that comes in as well.” He stated, earning a nod as Jackie stood up. “Let me know if anything goes down. I’m going to go check for the guy around the homeless shelter that bit the old guy, Willy. See if anyone's seen him since.” The hero stated, earning another hum. “If vu find him, bring him to me. I want to compare him to the others.” Henrik said, earning another nod. “You got it. See you soon, doc.” Jackie responded, heading to the door with the other. “Bye, mein friend. Be careful out there.” Henrik said, before rolling his eyes at the hero’s response as Jackie waved and began to rush out. “Aren’t I always?~”
Upon reaching the homeless shelter a little while later, Jackie began to feel something was off. Naturally, he listened to this like all the times before, as he called it his own ‘spidey senses’. So he studied the building. Normally, he’d see people coming and going out of the building, and human movement in the windows. He saw no movement, minus a flashing light, and no one coming in or out. Approaching the doors cautiously, his hand reached the handle when he heard a scream coming from within. Throwing open the door with no more hesitation, Jackie began to head inside, only to be hit with the awful rancid stench, as if someone had left food out in a trash can in the sun, uncovered for days to rot in a moldy garbage can, causing the hero to grimace as his stomach churned at the smell, and quickly cover his nose and mouth with his gloved hand as he stepped forward to investigate more. The lights flickered on, and off, allowing him to see no one was around, while revealing something red covering the floors and walls here and there, as if someone was doing a bad job of repainting, although Jackie’s senses told him that it wasn’t paint at all. “What.. the hell happened here?” Jackie fearfully questioned out loud, only to confirm his fear when he gathered some of the red on his fingers. It was blood, and fresh blood at that. There was no doubt the copper, metallic smell on his fingers was anything but that. He continued to explore, until his keen hearing picked up the now loud sounds of something wet tearing, and what sounded like bones snapping coming from behind a closed door that led to the rec room. Keeping his glove over his mouth and nose once more, he slowly opened the door and took a step forward as he did. His blood ran cold in his veins as he froze in his tracks at the scene before him.
The room in front of him was covered in blood from the walls, a bit to the ceiling and to the floor. There were many bodies of the staff, and shelter residents laying about the floor, with one hanging half out, and impaled on one of the broken windows, their back chewed wide open, their spine easily visible. It took every bit of strength the hero had not to vomit once more. He was a bit thankful he skipped breakfast, and lunch. He could hear the sounds of cars crashing outside, among more screaming, and even loud groaning, but he couldn't bring himself to move, his eyes trained upon the figures that were still moving within the room. Two people, apparently which were once Staff workers themselves, were hovering over another body in the middle of the floor, and two others overtop another, the sounds he heard were all coming from them. Slowly backing away out of fear, Jackie felt his back collide with something soft, yet hard, and cold, causing him to whip around in pure panic, his eyes widening. The owner of the chest he had collided with, let out a groaning, spitty hiss as the once alive male staff worker, now a walking corpse just like the ones enjoying their feast within the room behind them, had his neck torn up, and half of his cheek gone, lunged at him, grabbing hold of the hero’s suit with a strong grip, attempting to bring him closer to bite, causing a struggle to begin as the hero gagged from the smell of the zombie’s breath since it was so close, and the feel of it’s cold, slowly decaying skin against him was absolutely gross. “G-Get off of me!” Jackie yelled, only for the commotion to catch the attention of the four in the room behind them, all slowly rising from their old meals that were now forgotten, now reanimated itself, and crawling along the floor, all coming towards their new, fresh one that was struggling against one of their rotten comrades.
Quickly among his panic, and fear, Jackie managed to finally knock the rotting corpse off of himself, and bolt away back to the outside, nearly tripping over himself, and sliding on the bloodied floor, just as another corpse from behind the front desk he had not seen stood up, and began to follow behind him slowly with the others. The outside was even worse than the inside of the shelter now. He had heard the chaos previously, but seeing it was a whole different story. There were cars crashed everywhere, some on fire, some outright abandoned. He saw one of the owners trapped within one of the cars, thankfully seemingly unharmed, but struggling to get her door open. He rushed over, helping the woman to get free and move her away to a safe distance just in time for the car she was in to catch fire. “J-Jackieboy! Oh thank god! W-What the hell is going on!?” She yelled, panicking. “Y-Your guess is as good as mine! Everything was fine earlier, now there’s a damn zombie outbreak happening.” The hero responded, before noticing a group of people fleeing into one direction, who called over to the two about going to a safer area just as the zombies from the shelter, and others began to gather to chase their prey. “Go with them, and don’t look back! Find a safe place to hide out with them. It’s too dangerous to stay out here.” Jackie told the woman who nodded in response, and took off to and with the group, as Jackie took off in the opposite direction, pulling out his phone, and attempted to call Henrik. “Come on..” He said out loud, only for the call to not get picked up. He was about to try again, when another call came through. It was Jack, their creator. “Jack! Are you alright?!” The hero asked instantly, dodging some of the hands of the undead that grabbed for him when he ran past them and quickly hopped up onto a nearby parked bus to get a better view and to be able to safely stop to speak. “For the moment. I was at a restaurant with Marvin one moment, and the next there’s actual zombies attacking people everywhere. We’re at his apartment, but we can’t stay for long, just picking up some stuff. What the hell is going on? Did Henrik mess with the wrong tonics again?” Jack was quick to say, before saying something to Marvin who responded in the background, though both were muffled.
“Thank god, you both are fine. No actually, it wasn’t him this time. In fact, we have no clue what started it. He said he was getting cases all morning about people with bites..” Jackie trailed off, before he went silent to remember something and he instantly began to worry himself even more. “Oh shit.” He said out loud. “Jackie? Are you alright?” Jack was quick to ask, feeling worried at the sudden pause from his Ego. “I’m fine. Listen, I need to go get Henrik. I tried to call him but I got no answer. He’s still at the hospital, and his main nurse, Gracie, was bitten by someone, and if she was bitten by one of the infected…” The hero trailed off once more. “I tried calling him as well, but no response. Same to Chase..” Jack said with his own pause, swallowing the fear he had rising in his throat, and sighed. “Listen, go get Henrik. Me and Marv will go get Chase, then we’ll get to Anti, JJ and Robbie who’ll be waiting on us at our old hang out spot. After you get there with Henrik, Marvin will take us all someplace safer, alright? Be careful.” He told Jackie, who nodded to himself. “I will. Same to you. See you soon.” The hero responded, hanging up, before looking down at the group of undead at the bottom of the bus, all reaching for him while groaning, and growling.
“Please be alright..” He said, before jumping over the group, and taking off down the road, heading back to the hospital.