Chapter 23 - The Dark Portal

Current Location: Confounding Cul-De-Sac

The sun was dipping near the horizon, casting everything in an orange hue.

Brent and Reisa stared at Ray as he clarified his earlier request.

“What weapons do you have, and how much ammo do you have for each one? What other items do you have? I need to know what options are available, and if this objective is even feasible.”

This felt wrong. Brent was the raid leader. People should be telling him what they had, not the other way around! And Ray might be able to use this information against them in the future if they had to fight each other due to the battle royale rules.

“What, should I just read out my entire inventory list?”

“If you want.” Ray shrugged innocently.

Brent glanced down the street. They didn’t have that kind of time. Best to just stick to the important stuff. “Inventory,” Brent intoned, and selected the filters for weapons and ammunition to narrow things down.

Inventory [Weapons|Ammunition]

M870 Shotgun (0/5) [Equipped]

Shotgun shells (4)

7.62mm ammo (30)

Tactical Combat Knife

Diminutive Slugger

.357 Magnum Ammo (1)

5.56mm Ammo (30)

.357 Magnum revolver (5/6)

Noisy Cricket (0/14)

Shotgun, 4 shells. Revolver, 5- no, 6 shots. Noisy Cricket, useless. A baseball bat and a knife. Brent knew it didn’t look good, and Ray only confirmed this.

Well, it wasn’t just his own inventory. “What do you have, Reisa?” Brent asked.

She just held up her bow and two arrows. “Anything else?” She shook her head.

Brent looked at her bag, which clearly had something else. She still wasn’t willing to divulge its contents in this situation?

“Ugh.” Brent wiped some blood out from under his nose.

“Oh yeah, since I’m giving advice now, you should patch yourself up,” Ray said. “You look like shit.”

That was a good point, he’d forgotten he had only 25 HP left. Brent started using his Bandages on himself.

Health 40/100

Health 55/100

Health 70/100

That was all the bandages he had, though this didn’t solve the zombie problem. Brent half expected Ray to say it was hopeless, and he’d be totally justified given their ammo supplies.

But it seemed like Ray still had some ideas. “Do you have any grenades? I remember seeing you pick up a few before, you still have those?”

“Grenades?” Brent rifled through his inventory.

Inventory [Explosives]

Frag Grenade (2)

Smoke Grenade (1)

He’d forgotten all about them. “Uh… yeah, I do, why?”

“Bruh.” Ray rolled his eyes. “Just take them out, you’re gonna need them.”

Right, grenades caused a large explosion. They were basically the modern version of AoE attacks, perfect for densely clustered foes. Brent carefully took his out, not wanting to set them off by accident.

“Okay, this one’s a smoke, just put it away for now.” Ray tapped the silvery cylindrical one. “We may want to use it later to escape. These are the ones we want to use, they’ll do a ton of damage.” He indicated the other two. “Though I’m not sure it’ll be enough.”

“Oh, those? I have a few,” Reisa pulled out three frag grenades.

“Hm, this might actually work,” Ray commented. “Okay, here’s how to use them...”

What else could she have that could help? Brent wanted to protest about this but he didn’t want to interrupt Ray.

Push down on the safety lever, pull the pin, don’t let go of the lever until you’d thrown the grenade. After that, it was a matter of seconds before it went off. Brent thought he got the gist of it. “Alright, so I just throw them right into the middle of the zombies?”

“Basically. There’s enough of them packed together that they will probably absorb all the shrapnel, but you should still make sure everyone’s behind a wall or something solid just in case. This fence is not gonna cut it.”

Hiding around the corner of one of the houses probably would do due to the multiple walls, and Ray agreed.

“Yeah, I’m not gonna throw from here, it’s a bit far,” Brent said. “Where should I throw from?”

Ray shrugged. “It doesn’t matter that much, as long as it hits them and doesn’t hit us. Remember to call it before you throw.”

Brent scanned the neighborhood. In the time they’d spent talking the horde had gotten further ahead, approaching the house where Harry and Karisma had originally hid out in.

“I’m gonna try to get closer,” Brent declared.

“Okay,” Ray replied. “I will reserve the right to not follow you.”

Ray did end up following them though, as Brent took a circuitous route, going around the backs of the houses to catch up with the horde without being seen.

Hm. With their speed, they could do more than just catch up. Brent moved up one house to get ahead of the horde, but it was here that Ray exercised his right and stayed behind.

Reisa did follow him though, and they crept around the side to look at the oncoming zombies.

Here they were, getting closer by the second. Brent readied a grenade. What was the call? “Fire in the hole!”

For some inexplicable reason he felt really Australian after saying that. As expected, none of the zombies seemed to care.

He tugged on the pin, which was surprisingly difficult to pull out. But pull it out he did, and he threw the grenade directly at the horde.

Which turned out to be a slight mistake, as the live grenade hit a zombie in front, bounced off its chest, and started rolling back towards him.

Brent stared at this for a moment, and Reisa stared too, the latter not seeming to notice that anything had gone wrong. To be fair, the grenade was still closer to the zombies than it was to them.

But Brent had no idea if they were a safe distance away, and he didn’t want to take any chances. “Uh, let’s get back!” he called, and they retreated behind the house right before it went off.

BOOM! The explosion was quite loud, though there was no earthshaking rumble like Brent had expected. Though the grenade had gone off out of sight, he could see his kill counter had gone up.

Zombies Killed: 19

Only three more? It must have only hit the ones in front.

They went back around and confirmed that yes, most of the horde was still intact. Brent would have to throw higher next time.

The asphalt was blackened, even more than normal, and there were signs of fallen bodies, but the impact site was already being covered up by the advancing horde.

The zombies still didn’t pay Brent and Reisa any mind.

“Is that all? I expected more,” Reisa remarked.

“Uh, that’s because it was a bad throw,” Brent admitted, “Next one will be better.”

“Let me try.”

Brent turned back to her, surprised. “Are you sure?”

Reisa nodded. “I was watching Ray as well.”

What the hell, she couldn’t be that much worse than him at it. Brent handed her two.

“Okay, I’ll throw first. Watch where it goes and then try to throw it so it lands kinda far away but still in the middle of them. So if I throw to the left, you go to the right, got it?”

They had to avoid overlapping the areas of effect too much, as one grenade was already enough to one shot kill some of them and Brent wanted to do the most damage.

“Ah, like an area spell. I understand.”

“Cool. Alright, fire in the hole!”

Brent pulled the pin and flung the grenade out with more strength than before. This time it flew right over the heads of the first row and landed in their midst.

Reisa made her throw right after, her explosive traveling farther.

Brent wanted to follow its trajectory, but the first grenade was probably due to go off any second so he had them back off around the corner.

BOOM!

Zombies Killed: 30

Damn, that was a lot.

BOOM! Reisa’s grenade went off.

Brent made to return, but then saw the first row of zombies start passing through from the gap between houses.

They were running out of time. Brent led Reisa to the next house over to get ahead of the relentlessly marching horde again.

Said horde had been thinned significantly though, not just from the direct explosion, but many had tripped over the bodies of their slain fellows and were reduced to crawling at an even slower pace.

One more throw should do it. “Fire in the hole!” Brent called, and they hurled their grenades into the crowd before diving to cover.

Bo-BOOM! They both went off around the same time.

Zombies Killed: 37

Peering back out, Brent saw that there were under a dozen undead still on their feet, still completely oblivious to their attackers even after so much destruction had been wrought.

How should they mop these last ones up? Going in with melee weapons might actually work if they were that hyperfocused. Brent’s train of thought was interrupted when he saw where the zombies were headed.

The soccer field was in view. As the sky grew dark the surrounding streetlamps lit up, bringing the scene into stark white relief.

Clang! Clang! The sound of metal on metal came from the center of the field, where Harry was… hitting the portal frame with a crowbar?

Trrrt! Karisma stood behind him, spraying down the occasional fast zombie as it came in with her SMG. Her eyes went wide with fear as she saw the remainder of the horde approaching, some of which were tough zombies. “Oh crap. Harry? I think we need to leave soon, I uh, don’t have enough ammo left to deal with those.”

“No, wait, keep going!” Brent shouted, dashing out into the street.

Karisma looked over. “Huh?”

“Oi, that sounded like Brent,” Harry exclaimed, “They must be back already!”

Weapon Equipped – Diminutive Slugger

“Don’t worry about those guys, we can take care of them!” Brent ran towards the back of the group, zeroing in on one zombie in particular.

“Uh, okay!” The clanging continued.

A sense of apprehension grew within as he drew closer, half expecting it to turn around at the last second and reveal that it had been aware of him the whole time.

It didn’t do that though, and Brent struck it full force in the back of its head. Thwack! The zombie’s already fragile skull shattered, the yellow number 54 popping out amid a spew of brains and black fluid.

Zombies Killed: 38

Without pausing, Brent stepped over to the next zombie and repeated the process.

Zombies Killed: 39

Two down, about nine to go. It was by no means an easy task, each swing taking a toll on his arms, but he felt confident he could pull it off so long as he remained unnoticed.

Clang! Thwack!

Zombies Killed: 40

He was really racking those up now.

Clang! “The portal’s looking pretty weak! I’m almost through!” he heard Harry call.

Suddenly, there was a flash of pink light as the portal activated. A tough zombie emerged from it, and immediately turned towards Harry.

Right. The zombies didn’t stop spawning just because they were hitting the portal.

“Shite! K, I need some help here!” Harry backpedaled from the frame as the zombie advanced on him menacingly.

“What- ack!” Karisma tried to turn around but Harry bumped into her in his mad backward scramble. The tough zombie threw a gloved punch at them as they stumbled, and it managed to connect with Harry. Karisma yelped as the man was knocked several feet away, rolling sideways across the grassy field.

Well, this was going south pretty fast.

Could Brent help them? He was a bit far, but if he switched to a ranged weapon and got a little closer…

He tried to maneuver around the side of the group of zombies he’d been following, but as he did so a few of the zombies at the rear slowly turned to look at him, and he stopped.

“Guhhh…” They moaned, stretching out their arms and changed directions to shamble towards him instead. Now Brent was the one who was frantically backpedaling. But why the sudden change?

As the rest of the zombies began to wheel around, he made the connection. Since Harry and Karisma were dealing with the tough zombie, nobody was hitting the portal anymore, and so the zombies were no longer prioritizing them over everything else.

The orchestral music continued to blare as Brent was forced to retreat. He managed to meet back up with Reisa, who was looking quite frightened and confused.

“W-what now?” she asked.

“I’m thinking…” Brent put away the baseball bat as going into melee was no longer a desirable option.

Weapon M870 Shotgun (0/5)

Shooting them might be a waste. He didn’t remember exactly how much ammo he had of each type, but they were all in the single digits.

“Uh, we’re still faster than them, so let’s loop around that house and head for the soccer field.” There was a chance of losing the zombies from breaking line of sight, but even if that didn’t work, they would still be able to regroup with Harry and Karisma. He didn’t know what they’d do after that, but they’d be together at least.

The sky grew darker, and Brent’s eyes adjusted as he moved away from the street into the less well lit lawn behind the houses.

The two of them paced themselves at a brisk walk to save energy and reduce the risk of tripping up on something, which would allow the restless dead behind an opportunity to catch up. Brent finally found his shotgun shells and started reloading as they walked.

M870 Shotgun (1/5) M870 Shotgun (2/5) M870 Shotgun (3/5) M870 Shotgun (4/5)

They made it to the edge of the soccer field without incident, where they found Harry and Karisma standing. Thankfully, the tough zombie lay dead some distance away, riddled in bullet holes.

“Well hey, didn’t expect to see you two again that soon,” Harry remarked. “You all right?”

“For the most part, yeah. There might still be a couple behind us. How about you?”

“Eh, I’m a tad banged up. That boxing bloke really did a number on me.”

Karisma nodded. “I was able to to shoot it down, but…”

She waved helplessly at the center of the soccer field, where the portal stood. Instead of briefly flashing like before, it was now continuously active, and another tough zombie emerged from the pink plane of light. There were already three of them milling around.

Another defensive mechanic, huh. Brent watched a little more and noticed that it wasn’t on 100% of the time. The pink light kept flickering occasionally, and each time it flickered sparks were emitted from the left side of the frame which was partially bent in and had a massive tear in it.

“Yeah, that’s where I was hitting it,” Harry pointed, “I was shooting it at first, but then I ran out of ammo so I just started wailing on it with this thing.” He wiggled the crowbar. “I think I almost broke it, one or two more hits should do the trick. But the big ones there are not gonna let us get close.”

“And I used up the last of my ammo just now,” Karisma added, looking around nervously. The tough zombies hadn’t noticed them yet, but the growing darkness could conceal any number of zombies still wandering out there. “I don’t think we can destroy it at this point. Not and escape alive. Let’s just get out of here.”

Brent grimaced, yearning to say it wasn’t so. They had already spent so much effort and resources on this plan, they couldn’t just give up now!

His mind raced to find a solution, some way to salvage this. Harry and Karisma may be out of ammo, but he still had some left.

The shotgun couldn’t hit the portal frame from here. The revolver probably could, but the distance was about the same as when he was first testing whether the portal could be damaged with the Noisy Cricket. Brent didn’t feel confident he could hit it in one shot, especially since there were tough zombies wandering around that could get in the way.

Weapon .357 Magnum (5/6)

Well, he had more than one shot. He had 5, 6 if he reloaded- but no, that would take too long.

“Wait, if you can cover me I can still try-”

“Cover you with what? We just said we had no ammo!” Karisma said, exasperated. “If anything, you should be covering us!”

Damn. If only Ray was here. This situation would definitely counted as too dangerous and risky, so he had likely left the area already.

But the portal was right there! All he had to do was point and shoot!

But the noise would re-alert all the zombies to their location. That might happen at some point anyway, but to do so on purpose wouldn’t be worth it if he missed all his shots or worse, it turned out one wasn’t enough.

Another tough zombie emerged from the portal.

“The road we came in on is clear,” Reisa indicated, slowly inching in that direction. “For now. We really should hurry.”

It looked like he had no support for his risky gambit.

He tried so hard and got so far, but in the end it didn’t even matter.

“Yeah. Let’s get out of here,” Brent reluctantly agreed.

He’d failed as a leader. But there was still one last thing they had to do before it was truly over.

They had to leave the neighborhood.