The Last Hope: A Zombie Novella

Prologue

Rain tip-tapped monotonously on the windows, and streetlight fragmented by wooden blinds offered some respite in the otherwise pitch-black building. A figure, illuminated gently at infrequent levels by the light from the window, cautiously tiptoed his way around the office block.

‘Why do these game freaks have so much crap on their desks?’ he thought to himself. His flashlight light got fainter and fainter as he scanned the room for what he was looking for.

‘Great.’

He shook the flashlight vigorously, but this – unsurprisingly – didn’t make any difference. He carried on regardless, and eventually stopped at a desk towards the back of the room. On it was placed a small figurine of a princess holding a sword. It was Princess Zelda, he recognized her from one of his son’s computer games. He shook his head, trying to temporarily erase thoughts of those he loved. He couldn’t lose focus now; he’d come too far for that.

He inspected the workstation closer. The computer and the desk were covered in models, posters and artwork from various zombie movies. Perched perilously on the computer’s screen was a note, which featured a drawing of a smiley face with its tongue hanging out on one side. Just above the sketch was one word, written in red bubble writing: hope.

The man chuckled to himself. ‘How ironic,’ he muttered.

He reached inside his jacket pocket and pulled out a thumb drive. The light from outside shone on the skull & crossbones motif, giving the logo a sinister edge. The man switched on the computer and clumsily attempted to insert the thumb drive. He was shaking uncontrollably.

Taking a deep breath, he steadied himself and – eventually – managed to locate the USB slot for his drive. The computer’s screensaver was a picture of a girl, her blonde hair streaked with blue. She had been ‘zombified’ by some kind of image-manipulation software, which gave her sunken eyes and recessed gums, and revealed bloodstained teeth in all their glory. A speech bubble came from her mouth. ‘I want brainssssss (but not yours, Sebastian),’ it said.

The image gave the man the creeps. ‘I’ve got to get out of here,’ he thought. He sped up his work, accessing the target folder and uploading the file. Once the progress bar hit 100% he shut down the computer as quickly as he could.

‘Tomorrow....this will all be over,’ he thought to himself. ‘And it can’t come a day too soon.’

He got up from the chair and was careful to push it back under the desk in exactly the same position he found it. He exited the offices and looked at the security guard lying prone on the floor. The man had had to, well, ‘account’ for the guard earlier with his beloved equalizer – an extendable baton that tucked neatly into the waistband of his trousers.

The security guard appeared to be in a deep sleep, the kind that feels like you’ve been asleep for days on end, leaving you ready to take on the world.

‘Rest well,’ the man said out loud, gently nudging the guard with his foot. ‘You’re going to need it.’

He pushed open the front door to the office block, the long chrome handle feeling cold against his gloved hand. He looked up to the sky, which was now raining more heavily. He sighed, before disappearing into the night.

Chapter One

Hope pushed her blue-streaked hair off her face and studied herself in the bathroom mirror. Nope, there were no obvious signs of the happiness and excitement she was feeling inside. Just a few worry-lines at the corners of her eyes – payback for the all-night shifts she had been pulling recently.

She’d stayed up until 3 or 4 in the morning on more than one occasion putting the finishing touches to Zombie Killing Machine. It had been something of a labor of love, and secretly she hoped that this would be the game that really put her on the map.

She’d turned down numerous social engagements with Sebastian and his girlfriend Melody (late night Karaoke sessions in the dive across the street count as social engagements, right?), and even rejected the advances of some of her fellow games programmers in order to finish off her pride and joy. Mind you, turning down dates with colleagues who think nothing of turning up to work with egg stains on their t-shirts and toast crumbs in their beards really isn’t as big a deal as it sounds.

Hope pulled on her favorite Shaun of the Dead sweater, slipped into some leggings and a pair of Vans slip-ons and headed through to the living room. The flat she shared with Sebastian was typically Korean, beautifully decorated yet achingly minimalist. It would still look like a show house had it not been covered in layers of clothes, magazines and empty pizza boxes. But that was Sebastian, always marking his territory. Hope just prayed that he didn’t share that other famous cat characteristic....pooping in their neighbor’s yard.

There was an overwhelmingly powerful smell coming from the kitchen. Melody had obviously been cooking again last night, and it was evident that seafood stew was on the menu.

‘We left you some :)’ read a note on top of the pot. Hope lifted the lid and a nuclear blast consumed her face. If she had wearing any make-up it would have instantly dissolved. As good as a cook that Melody was, Hope just wished that Sebastian shared her abilities when it came to washing the dishes.

Cold fish stew for breakfast? Nah, not today. She picked up an apple from the fruit bowl and made her way to the front door. A pang of excitement shivered up her spine, and butterflies fluttered manically in her stomach. Today was going to be her day....and she couldn’t wait.

*

Seoul is a beautiful city at the best of times, but in December – as Christmas approaches – it really is a sight to behold. Luminescent neon light blinks down from almost every corner, creating dizzying warmth and a kaleidoscope of colors. Festive decorations adorn every office block and shop window, and Mariah Carey’s most famous ditty shrills out from unseen stereos and speaker systems. Last night’s downpours had left a layer of sheen on the pavements, and the air smelt light and fresh.

Hope felt a pang of romanticism overwhelm her. It was moments like this that she longed for home, for the love of her foster parents and for the opportunity to punch her kid brother on the arm and tease him about his non-existent girlfriend. Hope had majored in Games Design at the University of Philadelphia, which was where she had met Sebastian. It was their joint project - a zombie-thriller based on the life and times of David Hasselhoff – which had attracted the attention of Zombindie, the developer that she would later be headhunted for. Relocating to a new country is pretty tough anyway, but it’s especially so when leaving your sleepy hometown in the Mid-West for the sprawling metropolis of Seoul.

But as Hope cycled on the freeway and watched people chat happily among themselves as they made their way to work, she realized there was a lot worse places she could be.

Having locked up her bike, Hope made her way into the Zombindie building and flashed her laminate at the security guard, who had a rather painful-looking lump on his forehead. Must have been a hell of a night, Hope thought to herself, smiling at the man as she passed.

Zombindie had a huge cult following across South Korea and in all four corners of the globe, thanks in part to the ingenuity of the games they develop. They all have a zombie theme, but place the action in various scenarios never seen before. There’s Zombie Pacman, Zombie Sumo Wrestling, The Real Zombies of New York....you name it, it’s been zombified in the name of gaming. It’s why programmers and developers from around the world joined the company, and it’s why Hope enjoyed working there so much: she could really flex her creative muscle. That and the people, she really liked her colleagues. Well, not all of them. But hey, nobody is perfect.

Hope fixed herself a coffee – white, two sugars – and headed for her desk, nodding a few courteous ‘hellos’ as she went. She saw Sebastian guffawing at the desk of Chet, one of their fellow designers. Chet was the proud owner of a serious crush on Hope, and this was something he never failed to make known at the various Zombindie social events. He’s not a bad person, she conceded, but he does possess a particularly powerful body odor – especially in the summer months. He also wore clothes that didn’t really fit him, which gave a tantalizing glimpse of his rather portly belly underneath. Not the kind of man you dream of rolling around in a meadow with, unless you were using his body as a kind of extinguisher if you’d managed to somehow set yourself on fire.

She settled down at her desk, took a sip of coffee and switched on her computer. She’d been working long into the night again, and hadn’t turned her laptop off until gone 3am. But it’s all good – she’d managed to finish off the final bit of code, and just needed to upload this to her master file and she was ready to go. She’d be presenting Zombie Killer Machine for the first round of quality assessing in little over an hour’s time. She was nervous, of course, but excited too. This was the first title that Hope had worked on where she knew she’d hit the jackpot.

After a spot of tinkering – she was finding it really hard to let go – Hope finally admitted inwardly that enough was enough. The game was ready. She was ready.

She exhaled loudly and slid down her chair, allowing herself a brief moment of relaxation. Hundreds of hours of toil and trouble, coffee and cigarettes, headaches and little victories, had gone into the game. And now it was all over.

The moment was here: time to set her baby free into the big bad world. She ejected the disc from the drive and carefully slid it into a plastic wallet. She stood up from her chair, and eventually managed to grab Sebastian’s attention by staring at him, laser-like, for about three minutes.

‘It’s done,’ Hope shouted, surprised by the emotion in her voice.

‘Zombie Killing Machine!?’ Sebastian shouted back.

Hope nodded.

‘Hell yeah!’ Sebastian punched the air and started clapping and whooping. His enthusiasm was infectious, and soon most of the office had joined him in celebrating Hope’s big moment.

She thanked them all for their support by nodding to each in turn. It was then she noticed Chet clapping vigorously, to the extent that his man-boobs bounced up and down rhythmically with his movements. It was almost hypnotic.....

Hope smiled at Chet and mouthed ‘thank you’ to him. Sure, he was a bit....you know....but it was great to have co-workers on side, even if they didn’t see personal hygiene as a priority.

She took a big gulp from her bottle of water and prepared to take the disc up to the quality assurance department on the floor above. As she moved forward she noticed a random thumb drive sticking out of the back of her computer.

‘That’s weird.’

She looked closer and noticed that the drive had a strange logo emblazoned on it: a deathly-looking skull & crossbones, with a portion of binary code inscribed underneath. Damn, where had she seen that before?

‘Hey Hopey-Dope, come and have a drink with us.’

Hopey-Dope was Sebastian’s pet name for her. It was a bit geeky, really, but she liked it. She took one last look at the thumb drive and shrugged her shoulders. A lot of the programmers and developers at Zombindie hot-desked, so it wasn’t that strange to come into work and find someone else’s hardware attached to her machine. It was the biscuit crumbs in the keyboard that caused the most frustration.

Hope made her way over to Sebastian’s desk and found a few polystyrene cups of Pepsi laid out in front of him. He picked up a glass and raised it in the air towards her. The rest of their colleagues did likewise.

‘To Hope, and the success of her Zombie Killing Machine!’

‘To Hope!’ the rest of the team chorused.

She did her best to feign indifference, but inside she was glowing with pride.

‘Please....step inside my workstation,’ Sebastian said, beckoning Hope to sit down on his chair.

‘I don’t know why anyone would call it a ‘workstation’. They’re really just cubicles with fancy names,’ she replied, sitting down.

‘So what do you want to do tonight?’

‘How do you mean?’

‘How do you want to celebrate, dummy?!’

‘Oh....erm....I’m not sure really. I was probably just gonna have an early night, catch up on some sleep, you know?’

‘Nonsense! Let’s make a night of it. It’s not every day you get to sign off on the game that’s gonna take the world by storm!’

‘Well it still has to pass QA yet so....’

‘Pah, don’t worry about that. Even those joyless dullards can see this is a hit. They’ll pass it with flying colors. No, I insist. Melody is coming over too, so we can all go out and celebrate together.’

‘Maybe we could go to the karaoke bar?’ Hope said, mockingly.

‘Karaoke, I hadn’t even thought of that! Maybe you could invite Chet to do a duet with you.’

Hope laughed and shook her head. Just then another colleague of theirs, Jack, stopped by Sebastian’s workstation.

‘So what are we celebrating?’

‘Well Jack, my English friend, Hope here has just signed off on her latest opus that is set to blow up big time,’ Sebastian said.

‘Ha! More derivative crap I expect. Let me guess....the protagonist is a woman, right?’

‘So what!? Can women not kick ass too?’

‘Well, it’s just less....believable, that’s all.’

‘Oh Jack, you suck so hard. I bet Hope could kick your ass all around this office, what with all that ninja-shit she knows.’

‘It’s judo. And thanks for the support Sebastian. Jack....why don’t you get your head out of your ass, because clearly it’s having an effect on the amount of shit that is coming out of your mouth.’

‘Oh you got burnt son!’ Sebastian said in a mock ‘hip hop’ accent. Jack did not look impressed.

‘Fuck you guys. You’ll miss me when I’m gone.’

With that, Jack stormed out of the office.

‘God, he is such a loser! Can we not lock him in the stationary cupboard or something?’

‘I’d quite miss him, actually,’ Hope said. ‘I modeled one of my end-of-level bosses on him in the game, the