Ria busily examined the marble, trying to determine its importance. It wasn’t a diamond or even a gem. Its body was as smooth as a pearl, but it was also peculiarly spherical and almost unnaturally round. She noticed that it wasn’t actually even golden in color, but was a transparent globe which housed a fervent golden mist. At first, Ria thought she was delusional –a small side effect of not eating and sleeping properly- but a keen look disclosed that she really was right. There really was a difference between its transparent outer and the volatile inner layer!

She got so transfixed by the marble that when a branch snapped behind her she almost ignored it. Her inner voice-acted when the sound came again –this time sharper than before- and she almost dropped the curious little marble and lost it again to the surprise.

Ria looked back, putting the marble into her right pocket to keep it safe. The corpse on the ground was moving. With its hands pushing the ground and torso lifted up, it was amidst the motions of standing up. Ria paused then hurriedly distanced away from it, befuddled. Her eyes opened wide as ripple washed against her feet.

“What the hell?” she mumbled and watched as the corpse stood up straight- carrying the sound of bones grinding against each other. Its head bobbed as it watched the floor with its chin resting on its chest. Its stiff muscles must have relaxed because gasses –resulted from decomposition- passed through its system, coming out of all its holes with quite some fanfare. As Ria gagged, it stumbled to his left and then to his right, as if learning how to position his foot properly on the ground.

Was it still a corpse if it was moving? But she had clearly cheeked its pulse… she hadn’t actually checked its pulse, but she knew its chest hadn’t been moving and neither had it been breathing. Or, maybe, he had been alive when she had checked him and her sudden jolt had stunned his nervous system and stopped his breathing as a result?

“That’s impossible…” but was it really impossible. She wasn’t a doctor, but even she had heard of cases where the doctors had successfully revived someone recently deceased –people with heart failure being the most in number. Was this a case similar to those? Had she really perceived an unconscious but alive human as dead because of his unmoving chest and left him in the sewer at the mercy of God?

Ria inhaled sharply. It wasn’t alive in the general sense of living. It was moving but it wasn’t a living person. How did she conclude that? She saw maggots drill out of its skin and fall on the ground; Its remaining eye was rolling inhumanely inside its socket; it was groaning and, black tar dripped out of its mouth every time it moved its jaw. Other than these, it had abnormally blue skin and swollen veins. It was still bloated and she still heard no inhales coming from his direction. So yes, he was dead and now an It.

It stretched its limbs in an unordinary fashion, which moved beyond the degree of mobility possible –the sound of bones breaking was explaining enough. Determining how easily bones break, it fixated its clouded iris at her. It stood at its place, silently watching her stepping back. It stood with its weight placed at neither the heel nor the ball of his feet, but at the sides, leading to a uniform, but unhealthy deflection of its legs. It could move but it wasn’t alive. It was dead. It was dead.

Something crunched under her feet. Ria jumped in surprise and it reacted in anger, growling dark spittle at her. She waved her torch to scare it, but the light attracted its anger. It screamed and to Ria’s horror, it ran after her.

“No!” Ria jumped again. She practically ran blindly for the first twenty meters, blinded by the torch’s light. Her feet splashed the sewer water knee-high and the fire growing on the torch formed a short tail behind- growing dangerously close to her face. She hurriedly angled the torch away from her face and ran with all her might. Thank God she had slept for long enough to fill her body with energy; otherwise, her legs would have revolted against the torture.

The zombie slipped behind her and fell into the water with a loud splash, giving her much-needed room and enough time to stabilize her breath. As it seems, she was running toward the Goblins room. But there was no music in the air, which could mean anything actually. If the door hadn’t vanished yet, then she would eventually chance upon it. And if there was no door … then she will just have to fight the zombie one way or another. There was no going past it. She would have to kill it. Kill once again.

She ran with the darkness parting away from the torchlight. But staying true to its nature, the door had disappeared once again. Now, Ria was slowly starting to panic.

She could see the zombie tirelessly following behind at a distance. It was fast, blazingly so. It wasn’t like the movie zombies which couldn’t even take a step forward without stumbling away. Death seemed to have removed its inhibitors because it was slowly gaining upon her, even though she was sprinting at an abnormal pace herself. It hadn’t stopped shrieking like it didn’t need to breathe. Ria had felt its coldness. She had seen its dead eyes stare back at her. It was a zombie now- with an amazing set of physical qualities. Whatever doubts she had left closed the shop and ran away. First, she met a Goblin and then came a croc, followed by a gnome, and now she was running away from a zombie. What will the next stage have in store for her? Skeletons?

I hope it doesn’t.

The ceiling light soon came in her sight. She had run a whole loop around the tunnel and had arrived back at where she had started from. Now, she was tired. She had broken more than sweat, but her legs still had enough juice to take her through a second run around the tunnel, if she wanted- they weren‘t complaining.

She looked further ahead of the light; there was only darkness waiting for her there with no sign of help. She was on her last torch and even this one had reached its limit. If she wanted to do something about the zombie then she needed to do it now. This was her only chance. Because things would certainly turn trickier once she burned through her last torch. And with her stamina slowly draining, who knows how long she even had before she loses the ability to fight back? This was her chance. It was now or never.

She could see the zombie catching up to her; Its mournful groan was echoing profoundly in the sewer, signaling her of its arrival. She looked to her left and right. She needed help. How was she to defeat the thing without any weapon?  She was nervous. She hadn’t really made up her mind about how to tackle her situation. At least she had decided to focus on surviving. That’s all that matters. She remembered her promise with Nicky. I will survive, she had said. The promise gave her determination. Her anger eased her fear. She wasn’t quite ready to attack the zombie, if only she had a weapon of some sort…

She ignored the bone sticking out of the water. No, her feelings were much more mundane, much more human-like. She refused to hold it again. She refused to even look at it. That thing had taken Nicky’s life. How would she justify taking hold of it ever again? 

However, she stood her ground, holding her torch with both hands. The zombie didn’t seem afraid of the fire. It stopped for a second upon seeing her then rushed toward her with its arms flailing about.

She could see maggots streaming out of its empty eye socket, see its mouth tear at the seams as it stretched its jaw wide open, see its raunchy tongue move inside like a cockroach- It lunged for her, she dodged. They goblin wobbled onto the floor and skidded past. Ria rolled in the shallow water and stood up again, her torch still burning, her heart racing and her back to the wall. Her legs were shaking with fear.

This is crazy.  She thought. She had no idea what to do, how to attack and kill the dammed thing, but she held her ground, spreading her legs for balance and tightly holding on to her burning torch. The zombie thrashed on the ground for a few moments, getting caught up in the mess of its own limbs, before it managed to stand up again, creating a nightmarish cacophony of bones grinding against each other.

It came again, running toward her carrying the weight of a freight train. She somehow managed to jump away but lost her fire in the process. It seemed to have anticipated her reaction, as one of its hands managed to scratch her abdomen, leaving a claw-shaped rip on her flesh. It obviously didn’t come out unscathed either. It struck the wall face first and became a tangled mess of limbs and bones. Its jaw broke upon impact and came to hang loosely from the hinges. But it didn’t show any reaction to the pain.

Ria jumped forward and attacked its head as it wobbled back from the impact. Her strike managed to do nothing other than to remind it of her presence. It looked back shaking its head and jumped at her at an unnatural angle. Its body twisted and untangled midair as it fell upon her screaming self.

She crashed into the water and it fell upon her. She somehow managed to push the torch against its neck while it tried to take a bite of her face in frenzy. The impact made her groan. I am dead. She thought. Its face was so close to hers, she would have practically tasted its breath if it could breathe.  She could hear the sounds of its groans and its jaw biting air. She could feel its weight on the torch. She could feel it thrashing, trying to inch toward her. Water droplets fell from its fingers and splashed against her face as it tried to grab her. It was uncomfortably close to her. When its dark-slimy spittle fell on her face, she decided she had had enough.

It was strong though, Very strong. But where it strength excelled, its intellect failed. It didn’t grab her even though it could. It didn’t try to pull the torch stick away from her hands or even break it. It didn’t try to stand up. It was like it had a single command- to keep biting and eating continuously.

How much had she struggled? What would the Croc demand from her this time? She didn’t know. What waited for her in the grave of her past? She didn’t know.

She only knew one thing and one thing only. She needed to survive. She has to leave the sewer alive. She had promised Nicky that she would. She didn’t want to break her last promise with her. She hadn’t bottled through the endless strolls into the dirty sewer water to one day die drowning inside it.

Taking a deep breath, deciding her course of actions, she pushed against the stick. It was heavy. Even though her legs had grown stronger somehow she didn’t feel the same kind of strength from her arms. They were weak in comparison. Her arms were too normal. In this place of goblins and zombies, where abnormal was the new normal, she was the odd one.

Still, Ria pushed. She only managed to straighten her bent arms slightly, before the naked zombie learned from her and pushed back too, equaling the force. No, he was much stronger than her. Its push placed it right in front of her face. She didn’t know what would happen if it bit her. Whether she would turn into an infected or not was unknown to her. So she didn’t want to take the chance by getting bitten.

The push didn’t work. In the process of keeping her face away from the zombie, she pushed her head back and saw the bone handle. It was still sticking out of the water, standing tall. It was bobbing along with the ripples as if sleeping and waiting to be held by her again.

She simply hated her life. She hated being told to do things. She hated being forced to do things even more. First, she had a horrifying childhood and now her adult life wasn’t letting her off either. It was like the goblin knew she had left the knife behind in the sewer; like he knew she didn’t even want to look at the thing and had decidedly resurrected the dead person, just to make sure that she would have to pick up the knife once again -pick up the tool she had used to murder her friend- and then kill again. Although she could technically say that she was defending herself, but would she even have the required mental capacity left after killing once again?

It was like Ria’s life was a game for the nameless Goblin. The Goblin was his master’s tool. and she, his puppet.

So that’s what she did. She kneed the zombie in the gut. It didn’t have any effect on its enthusiasm. It’s possible that it can’t feel pain anymore. She reminded herself. The attack, however, was powerful enough to fold its body. Her eye didn’t lit up, but determination congregated inside her. Crunching her abs, she bent her knees to her abdomen then kicked his gut with all the strength she could muster.

The zombie visibly flew.

Its feet left the ground. Its body folded upon itself. It didn’t feel pain, but it must have felt something form the attack because it stopped moving for a second. She didn’t, however, let it get too far away. No. What would have been the point in that? It would have fallen straight back upon her.

With it being airborne, she struck its face with the smoking end of her torch, swatting it toward her left. Nothing snapped, but her torch splintered and the zombie fell away from her.

Wasting no time, she released the broken half of her torch and rolled backward toward the knife. The zombie fell on its shoulder and without stopping or feeling any adverse effects of the strike, wriggled toward her, dragging its shoulder on the ground without standing up.

She only managed to get a single second to act after which it jumped on her, just like she had jumped on the goblin. Neither held anything in their hands. But it could rip her apart with simply with its fingers.

The zombie came intimately close to her then stopped moving altogether. The zombie’s hands stopped partially from her temples, declaring its intent. They both fell on their backs at the same time. Ria pushed away from it in a frenzy of kicks and swings. The zombie remained motionless with a bone handle sticking out of the roof of its bloodless mouth. Its body twitched every now and then, but it otherwise showed none of its characteristic spark.

It was finished. She did it. She managed to kill a zombie, alone. She did it.

Ria breathed in relief when the zombie stopped moving. Once she made sure it was really dead for good, she crawled to it and removed her knife from its mouth. As black pus leaked from the gaping slit, she clenched the knife in her dormant hand and stood up.

She cleaned the blade and put it in the back pocket of her jean. She didn’t stop grieving, but she was done being stupid. Why blame a fellow tool? It neither had the opportunity nor the choice to act according to its wish, but she did. She could use it however way she wanted. Without her, the knife was purposeless. So she gave it one.

“I blamed you as a killer. Prove me wrong.” She said staring at the closed door. “Help me survive.”