The Undead - Chapter I (In Progress)

Ada awakes in a city without memory, the cold nearly drives her insane and she discovers something that could shatter her into a million pieces.

CHAPTER I
Twenty years ago

“What magic is it? That keeps me walking, talking and thinking, like a human. Yet forces me, To destroy and kill, Ravage and feed, Until all that is left in this world, Is me and my insatiable Hunger. I Curse it! This cruelty.”

She once said to me, without emotion as if she was already devoid of them trying to mimic them... trying to seem human. It was so painfull to see her like that, She who had given me so much, everything really. fighting herself and loosing.

- “Fighting a lost Fight”

Combined Records of Astrid Miller on her journey with The dark Empress.

With a rattling breath, consciousness slowly returned to her body. Eyes still to unfocused to see she drew another rattling breath. The first thoughts started to return to her and she remembered her name.

Ada tried to recall more, where she was, what had happened, why she felt so tired despite having just awoken. Why was it so cold?

It was so cold.

Her whole body felt numb, she tried moving it to get a better circulation of her blood but it didn't seem to have any effect. all her senses told her that she was freezing to death.
She needed to get up and somewhere warmer, fast, or surely she would never wake up again.
Her arms felt leaden as if she hadn't used them for a long time and her joints ached, but she managed to turn herself around and get onto all fours. Her sight was still blurred and all she could see was deathly, blue, darkness. She turned her head around to see if she could find something to warm herself up.

She was in a narrow alley and at the end she spotted a ray of sunlight, she didn't take much notice of anything else apart from that. There was no snow which surprised her, how could it be so cold without snow?

She started crawling towards the light of the sun and its promise of warmth, every single motion came somehow jerky and ungracefully, perhaps it was the cold.

Finally she made it into the sunlight.

It was bliss.

It was as if all of her body-warmth returned instantly.

It felt like being embraced by... by...

Who? She tried to remember but nothing else returned.

Shocked she realized that she didn't remember anything apart from her name. She hoped more of her memory would return once she was warmer.

Her eyes started to work properly as her warmth returned, her arm's where still deathly pale and covered in minor wounds, it was a good thing that she was numb from the cold, or else it would have robbed her of the functionality of her arms.

Her surrounding where even more torn up then her arms. She stood in the middle of what appeared to have been a city sometime before it was horribly ransacked and burnt.
The alley she had come from was actually nothing more than the remains of two parallel walls no longer then a few feet. All wood that wasn't a pile of ash was at least marked by fire one way or the other. The street was filled with rubble and the dead and the buildings where nothing more than a few smoldering ruins. It would have been a grand city if it was still standing.

On one of the buildings in her immediate vicinity there was a sign hanging only on one side, but Ada could still make out the lettering. It read “Welcome to Orebruck”.
Something or someone definitely unwelcome seemed to have passed through here not a long time ago, at least a week, at most two.

Ada was warm again but something still did not feel right to her, she looked down and froze, not from cold like before but by the sheer incredulity.

There right beneath her chest there was a two foot long end of an arrow jutting out from between her ribs. Stunned Ada looked down at the arrowhead.

It didn't make any sense.

Shouldn't she be feeling something? Pain? Anything? How did this even happen? had she been here while Orebruck had been attacked? Weren't people with an arrow lodged in their chest usually in a lot of pain or... dead?

Panicked Ada grabbed the end with both her hands, she just wanted to get it out of her body, it didn't matter how. She tugged on it as hard as she could but the tip had hooked itself on one of her ribs. With her pulling and shaking she had managed to tear the wound further open but it didn't even bleed. With a sudden loud snap the arrow broke with the iron tip and a few inches of wood still inside of her.

Ada stopped, she felt like losing her mind, well at least the parts that she could still remember, she was alive she knew it, she could walk, feel (to a certain degree) and think. There couldn't be contradictions in reality, she should be dead but she was alive. Somehow.
Or was she?

Ada felt her wrist for a pulse, but she couldn't find one. She felt her breath but no air escaped her lungs. She felt her heart which did not beat.

Sitting down on a large boulder, she was just making it worse, she didn't have any memories, she didn't know who she was, where to go. And judging from all signs she had already been dead for some time.

Ada pulled her knees to her chest and hugged them close to her, she just wanted to cry.
But the dead don't have any tears to shed.

* * *

Ada looked at the sun, she still had an hour or two before she had to make camp.
She had to keep a close watch for when it was getting dark, with the darkness the cold always returned. The first night she didn't even have a fire, she had very nearly gone insane.
When she had been a small girl, she had fallen into a lake in winter, her brother had carried her all the way home, the short distance had taken him more than an hour. An hour in which she had very nearly frozen to death.

That first night had felt worse than that, she was constantly cold without the numbness she had experienced as a child and she couldn't do anything about it.

She had tried moving around, to get her circulation going, until she remembered that her heart wasn't even beating, she couldn't make a fire she didn't dare go outside, so she had just settled for a lot of blankets and constantly rubbing her thighs.

It has been a week since she left Orebruck and she still hadn't met another person, dead or alive. She had come through a few smaller villages, some had been ravaged but most had just been empty, like the residents had picked up everything they could carry and gotten the f**k out.

Some of her memorys had come back, but only of her early childhood, nothing else.

The past week she had thought about what she should do, she knew she couldn't possibly go back to her old life, who would take her in? She was dead.

But she wanted to know who she was, if she had family as in husband and child, what she was doing in Orebruck, she knew she didn't live there, if nothing else.

She figured with so many refugees there would be some sort of system, by the government, for finding their relatives, all she needed to do was find a city that wasn't in the process of burning to the ground.

It wasn't all bad at least, for example she didn't exhaust anymore she could spend the whole day walking, even running and she wouldn't be the slightest bit out of breath.
Figuratively speaking.

She was far stronger than she should be, a house had collapsed on top of her and she had just stood up like the crushing weight on top of her was nothing.

She didn't need nourishment anymore. She hadn't known that when she set out first, she didn't only not feel hungry, she didn't even have a sense of taste anymore.
At night her eyes were as sharp as they were in daylight, although at night she was essentially color-blind.

Though she'd rather be alive then any of those things.

She had tried eating some meat, she figured even if she didn't need it she might as well enjoy it. It was like eating tasteless, squishy paste. While being far from enjoyable she couldn't even stomach it.

She had learned something about herself the past week, before she had died she had probably been a scout or a fighter. At least somebody who knew how to survive, she knew how to handle a sword and a bow, she could read tracks and she knew where to find useful things.

Just then Ada thought she had heard something, she stopped walking and listened.
Nothing.

Nothing.

There it was again! Like a distant scream.

Ada started to run for a large boulder and without loosing a stride she leaped for the top, from there she looked around, If the owner of that scream was further away then she could spot from up here, they were out of her reach.

Between the trees perhaps a mile away she could see a figure being pursued by a handful of people.

Jumping down the other side of the boulder, she immediately began running when she hit the ground. It wasn't so much the thought of helping another human being that hurried her on, rather than finally meeting someone alive who could bring some light into the darkness that was her life.

Breaking through the thicket, she saw the pursued person, it was only a little girl perhaps twelve or thirteen. The four people pursuing her were grown men! Odd men she noticed with a second glance, men covered in dried blood, every single one of them seemed out of their mind with rage and... and one was missing an arm.

Drawing her sword she swung it in a wide arc aiming for the first ones neck, taking his head of cleanly which flew to the side somewhere in the thicket, he did another two steps before he fell to the ground.

The three others now perceiving the threat turned their attention towards her, threateningly baring their teeth, crouching ready to jump. But she was already upon them, cutting, slashing severing limbs.

When she was finished with the last one she stood in the middle of the gory pile of human flesh splattered with blood.

It was rapture.

She had just cut four men to pieces and even though they were dead, she should have felt nausea at the task not... not lust. Even now that it was over she wanted nothing more then to rip the remains apart even further, Ada had to exert a lot of self control to keep from furiously chopping at the motionless body's.

After a minute or so she finally calmed down, to the degree that she didn't feel like chopping at them maniacally anymore, she still wanted to spit on them. Turning around she looked for the little girl, who was curiously peeking at her from behind a log.
She had green eyes, a memory flashed and was gone.

Her hair was brown and long, not trimmed short like Ada's.

She still seemed to be frightened to the bone, not surprising, after all Ada was a stranger who had suddenly broken through the woods, maniacally swinging a sword around, chopping four people to bits and after that, having a hard time to banish a look of hunger from her face while eying the corpses.

Sheathing her sword, she squatted and held out her arm's “come on, come here”

The girl looked at her rather doubtful.

“I won't hurt you I promise”

Her eyes narrowed and she still didn't move, feeling safe behind her wall of brittle wood.
Ada looked up at the sky, she didn't have long anymore, she needed to gather wood for the night or she'd freeze again.

Looking at the girl she said “fine, stay there if you want to, little one. But I advise you to find something warm for the night or you'll freeze to death, it's not snowing yet, but it is too cold to spend the night outside without so much as a thick coat.”

With that she turned around and started to search for a good site to camp.

* * *

Ada sat in front of the fire absentmindedly poking in the ember of the fire with a long, wooden stick.

She had found a rather nice place really, it was a natural cave on a slope underneath a tree, the trees roots made a good frame, holding up the earth. The entrance was rather small while the cave was rather spacious deeper inside. There was a hole of about half a meter at the top, which worked rather well in releasing the smoke.

First she had dug a round, shallow hole in the middle, after gathering enough wood to last the night she had stacked a few branches like a tent, stashed some dried hay in the middle and started a small fire with her flint and her knife. After it was big enough to survive on it's own for a time she grabbed her bow and went hunting.

It was already dark so she began freezing after only a short time, but after a short while she had two rather nice specimens hanging from her hip.

Back inside she skinned and gutted the rabbits, the entrails she threw in the fire, the skins she hang to dry under tension near the entrance away from the fire and the rabbits themselves she placed above the fire, upon which they shortly began to smell divine.
That moment she was so frustrated that she couldn't actually eat anything but still had to smell something so delicious.

Soon after putting up the Rabbits she had noticed a green pair of eyes at the entrance, filled with longing.

The girl had watched her the whole time and Ada had played oblivious, which had proven to be harder than her hunt for the rabbits, since the little girl was falling over every other step, she was snapping branches and crunching leaves beneath her feet.

Ada thought she would have noticed her even if she had no other sense at her disposal other than smell.

Now she only had to wait for the girls hunger to overcome her fear, Ada knew she couldn't force her, she would bolt like a deer smelling a pack of wolfs and while Ada would certainly catch her in the end, it would serve no purpose.

Instead she thought she should probably give her another, more subtle push.
The rabbits were about ready anyway, drawing her knife she cut out a bigger piece of meat and forced herself to bite into it.

Chewing Ada said “Hmmm, this tastes sooo good!” she swallowed and took another bite.
She needed the girl to come in soon, she didn't think she could stomach another mouthful, somehow she didn't think her throwing up was any incentive to try the food.

Patting her stomach she leaned back “puhh, I can't POSSIBLY eat all this ALONE”

She peeked at the girl from the corner of her eye, who now realized she had been spotted.

Promisingly she didn't shy away, instead she tentatively moved closer.

Ada now looked directly at her and held out the piece she was eating “won't you help me eat this?”

Now dropping all forms of timid behavior whatsoever, she reached for the meat sat down, still a good deal away from her, and began to eat at an alarming pace.

Rather satisfied with herself Ada watched her eat, she quickly finished the first piece so Ada cut and passed her another piece, which she started to eat at a slower pace.

Watching her eat, Ada wondered if she had any children, she thought it unlikely since she was a warrior, but she couldn't be sure. A husband perhaps?

A memory flashed in her mind, a picture of a man with dark hair, a neatly trimmed beard covered most of his face and the most sparkling green eyes that always seemed about to smile. The memory made her feel at ease.

The green eyed girl had finished her second piece and was so openly staring at the last half of the rabbit, she might as well have thrown rock's at Ada's head.

Not bothering to cut off another piece, Ada just gave her the rest of Rabbit number one, in which she sank her teeth without hesitation.

She wondered who he was, to make her feel so peaceful, just thinking about him.

Ada wanted to know, she wanted to know so badly it almost hurt.

Sleep seemed to overcome the girls hunger, she nodded off a couple of times while chewing, until finally she lay on the side with the remains of the rabbit still between her teeth.

Watching the rise and fall of the girls chest while she was slowly breathing in her sleep made her a little jealous. After removing the bone from her mouth, Ada covered her with her fur coat and froze with her hands still on the coat.

On her exposed neck She could see her pulse, her life drumming an enticing melody against her skin, it was welcoming her, drawing her in. It begged for her to sink her teeth deep inside and rip it open!

She wanted nothing more in her life than to savagely rip her to shreds and she needed every little inch of self control to stop herself.

It was a silent struggle and bitter-sweet torture.

Letting go of the coat and backing away Ada covered her mouth with her hand. What was wrong with her? She just spent an evening saving, feeding and covering this sweet child and yet she wanted nothing more than to bite and claw at her until her smoldering desire was satisfied.

She was disgusted with herself, with what she had become.

* * *

The fire was slowly dying, it wasn't much more than a heap of glowing ash with a flame occasionally sticking out it's tongue before retreating again.

Not that it was needed anymore, the sun had been up for a couple of hours, but the fire made her feel nostalgia, it made her think about the limitation of things.

People are like fire, they start small, grow strong, burn brightly in all their glory and in the end they shrivel up and die. This certainly seemed like the end of humanity. What made her feel worse is that she couldn't actually claim to still be part of it.

Dragging herself away from sorrowful thoughts, she noticed green eyes looking at her from beneath a coat of furr, filled with pity. Ada wondered why a small, defenseless girl with noone in the world would look at her of all people with pity.

“Finally awake are we?” she asked.

The little girl looked at her unwaveringly and nodded slightly.

“you're not going to talk are you?” Ada asked.

She just stared.

Sighing Ada said “well, under current curcumstances it's probably unneccassary to ask you where your parents are” by the drop of her head Ada could see the accuracy of her statement.

“any rumors or perhaps an idea if there's a place where someone's left alive?”

With her head still cast down she shook her head.

“I feel like i'm talking to myself” After a moment of silence Ada got up “well, no sense in hanging around, there has to be someone still alive and I doubt we're going to have much luck finding them here.”

She kicked dirt on the still slightly glowing ash.

* * *

A knock at his Door woke Commander Stark.

He had fallen asleep on his desk again writing orders and letters, so many, many letters, he needed more forces or all his men, all his people would be lost.

He wasn't angry that he was forced from his sleep, the only thing he saw in his dreams these days was fire, pillage and death. The creator knew he saw enough of that in his waking hours to make a man weep already. The truth was he just didn't have enough energy to manage it.

“come in” he said with a dry rasp. His voice hadn't been the same since he was hit by a burning arrow right in the throat, but he was lucky to be alive.

The door burst open revealing an agitated man in leather armor, a scout, what was his name again, tom something? Thomson? Thomerson!

“Thomerson, what is it? Any new developments at the front?”

“Sir they are moving again, against Stanford's Troops to the east”

“Damn... Very well, grab something to eat and then rest, I'm sending you out again tomorrow, dismissed”

But Thomerson didn't leave.

“Is there something else?” Stark Asked.

“Sir, if... if you would just let me go, I could find out what happened to our Regiment at Orebruck, I can get through the enemy forces, I know I can” He pleaded.

Stark slammed his fist on the table “Enough Soldier! We had no reports From Orebruck for weeks, it is behind enemy lines, every scout we sent in the past has not returned. Orebruck is lost and so are our Forces that where stationed there!”

Thomerson, stood rigid with his head cast down, he slowly lifted it and Stark could see the tears in the man's eyes “Sir, my wife was waiting for me in Orebruck” he said pleadingly.

Stark looked at him for a moment, it reminded him so much of his own loss, but he didn't have time for remorse, he was the Commanding Officer, he needed to set an example “She is dead. Slaughtered by the enemy. The enemy who is pushing us back. You are a soldier, you can fight the people.... the things that did this. You have to, or the death of your wife, of everyone in Orebruck and since will be for nothing.”

Tears were flowing down Thomersons face, he didn't say anything but Stark could see that the fight had gone out of him “Dismissed”

Thomerson saluted and left with a smart turn. He was a good soldier, Stark momentarily thought about releaving him of his duty but then dismissed the notion, he just didn't have enough men, besides Thomerson needed to be occupied, too much time to think about the things he couldn't change and a man would break.

Stark needed him whole, needed a dozen more like Thomerson actually, but wishfull thinking never got you anywhere.

He needed more men, all he could do was pull back further and further every day and evacuate as many people as possible, his superiors had refused to send more troops, blaming him for the current situation. Blaming him for not repelling another Invasion of a jealous neibouring country.

Once again Stark cursed the buirocratic fools who refused him more men, they weren't here, they didn't see the dead rising, kill their former comrades, peel the flesh of their skin and howl in such an unearthly fashion, screaming their fury, their rage against the living into the nights sky. Stark knew a man who hadn't seen it for himself, smelled it and felt it couldn't understand it. The fear, the damnation they were facing.

In his gut he knew this was a fight for humanity survival and as things were, they were loosing it.

Determined he returned to write his last letter, If the Powerhungry idiots in the court wouldn't listen, perhaps adressing the King directly would help.

* * *

Leuitanent Stanford slammed the hilt of his sword in the face of one of his former seargents, who fell to the ground, with a downward slash he took of his head.

With the bloody sword he pointed at the gaping hole in the wall calmly he said to one of the messangers around him “order to the reserve, I want that hole closed with pikeman and archers behind them, tell them to create a wall, I dont care what they use, tell them to salvage the homes of the civilians for tables and cupbourds if necesarry, unless they want us all to die”

The man ran of without a word.

“Leuitanent Stanford” shouted a man who came running, he had bitemarks on his arms and a cut on his temple “Leuitanent Stanford, the north front is in chaos Seargent Briggs Screams about his arms and now the Corporals won't coordinate appropriately we need a higher ranked officer or our defences will crumble”

“what happened to him?”

“nothing, he has ten shiny fingers on his hands like any other person but he screams as if they're gone”

Stanford cursed, then looked at the mans shoulder “Corporal... Williams am I right?” Williams nodded.

Bending down Stanford cut the Seargent emblem from the headless corpse and pinned it to Williams arm “Congratulaionts, you have just been promoted, now hold the north front on your own or I will hang whatever's left of your body If you get out of it alive”

“Yes sir” Williams said before running of.

Screams and a roar that froze his blood filled his ears, it came from the hole where he had just sent his pikemen for reinforcement. Seemed as if that had been a mistake for they were all dead, he was about to ask what the hell happened when a giant body stepped through the hole.

It was heavily muscled and carried a sword as long as a man, it had impressive fangs red from blood and two horns on its head curled like a ram, it's skin seemed to be the skin of dead body's sewn together. Stanford had no other word for it then “Demon”

“Archers bring down that thing! Reserve swordsman attack!” He ran forward to meet with the unusual opponent and could barely duck beneath a swing from it's giant sword. Other men weren't as lucky, bodyparts and blood filled the air, everything turned red as he was showered in blood and gut's. He took a swing at its thick legs, he needed to bring it down to get at it's head.

His sword sank deeply into the flesh but got stuck, cursing he dodged a swing of a hand the size of his torso, lying flat on his back Leuitanent Stanford saw his end comeing at him in the form of it's rough sword, more of a giant slab of steel really.

Just when he thought it was over burning arrow's filled the air and stuck the giant's chest, with the almost severed leg it caused the giant to loose balance and fall, the tremor almost made him fall over again, quickly he freed his blade from the monsters leg and sliced into it's neck with all his power over and over again until it's head was completely removed from it's body.

Letting the soldiers take over he returned to his point of observation, from where he overlooked the battle a messanger was already waiting for him.

The Man Saluted and said “sir I have a letter from Commander Starck for you”

“give me that” Stanford growled as he swiped the letter from the mands hand, not caring for the blood he spread over it as he broke the seal and opened it he began to read.

Stanford I just received information that the undead will move against you next -“no s**t” Stanford mumbled.- You need to pull out and retreat to Crowshead, send a messanger to adress earl Morgan of the impending danger and that they need to fortify the city, he's a good man and know's how to handle a city's defence. You will follow his orders from now on he's a capable leader.

You should be able to get there in two days, in time for new years celebrations.

I wish you luck my friend,

Commander Stark

Stanford trembled, turning to the messanger he said “this was supposed to be here three days ago what the hell where you doing”

The man looked at him dully “A man has to eat and sleep”

“Then he does it in his saddle, were at f*****g war, you cursed idiot there's a timelimit on everything! It took you three additional days because of that?, Corporal Fisk Get that man down from his horse and hang him, at the moment our supply of lazy idiots is more than enough” turning away from the now screaming messanger he turned to his men “orders to all front's set the barricades on fire, pack up only the essentials and get everyone out of here seperately to crowshead we'll make a stand there! Now!”

He grabbed a soldier by the arm and said “you, take the fastest horse you can find, take provisions with you and get yourself to Commander Starks camp, tell him about that” he pointed at the giant husk “tell him I think they are evolving, tell him what happened here and make it quick sleep and eat in the saddle if you have to” he shoved him away “go!”

The soldier ran, leaving him alone on the hill looking at the burning barricades and retreating soldiers. A sound made him look down The severed head of his former seargeant was baring it's teeth at him, gnawing, even in that state it was still trying to bring his death.

Impaling it on the tip of his sword he waited for it to be still. Defeat tastes bitter thought leutanant stanford, but twice so against such monstorsities.

Spitting on the ground he turned around and followed his soldier, the next two days didn't promise to be any better than tonight.

Author's Note

Still unfinished but still hoping for any kind of critizism.