System, are you messing with me?

Ark 3 - Safe Base? Not with him.

Shu Ning cursed loudly in his head as he stabbed the throat of yet another zombie in his path. His hand was already numb from gripping the handle of the knife too hard and a disgustingly sticky substance was steadily dripping down his fingers.

It's been a month already since he carefully climbed out of the wreckage that was left of his stolen car. He had been a bit shaky on his legs and a bit lost as he stumbled along the path that was barely visible under the dirt and leaves. But to his eternal gratification he could feel the steady thrum of his heart beating in his ribcage. That meant that he was still very much human. 

Since then Shu Ning had been fighting his way up north, stealing cars along the way until they ran out of fuel, ransacking supermarkets for any leftover food he could find and grabbing weapons from the bodys of less fortunate human beings. One of these weapons being a somewhat longer kitchen knive than he was used too. Now barely recognizable under the dried mucus and dirt.

Shu Ning stepped over the still form of the zombie and plunged his knife into the next body to enter his line of sight. Like this he worked himself steadily through the last handfull of undead that had obstructed his drive. Of corse he could have just run them over with the pale yellow van he had been on the move with, but then there would have been no chance to retrieve the colourful stones from the zombies head. 

Nucleo. That was at least what Shu Ning decided to call them. And only because he had read about them in some novel his friend once forced on him. Because the book had also been about the zombie appocalypse, he had chosen to collect these stones, or crystals, or what ever, to see if it really was similar to the story. 

Shu Ning sighed as he looked at the meager collection of nucleo he had gathered and stored them safely away in his system space. Then, with a shove of his free hand, he forced the still form of a zombie from the hood of his van and settled back behind the steering wheel.

It only took another few hours of driving until the walls of B-Base finally appeared on the horizon, making Shun Ning speed up even more to shorten the distance faster. In expectation he even craned his neck a little to look up at the walls edge, but except for rough black stone and behind it the dark grey sky there was nothing else to see. No roofs, no guard towers, no anything.

Shu Ning was slightly dissapointed but hid it quickly behind a slight smile as he approached the gate of the Base. A Man in dark green uniform stood ramrod straight on the side of it and lifted his hand to halt Shu Nings advance.

"Do you have a pass, or are you new?"

"New."

"Drive to the left to park your car, then go right into quarantine for ten hours, there you give half the food you have to the guard stationed there. Your room will be alocated to you after, as will you receive the rules. Most importantly: Don't kill humans, don't steal food, help fight zombies and gather recources. Breaking them means getting thrown out. Any questions?"

Shu Ning felt slight amusement tick up the corners of his mouth as the guard finished rattling off his practiced speech. Not even once did the man look in his direction or relx his stiff posture. Shu Ning wasn't even sure the other actually would answer any questions that would derail him from his practiced pattern. So with a shake of his head, which the guard surprisingly must have noticed as the iron gate slowly opened it's wings, Shu Ning made his way through the gap to follow the Mans instructions.

After the quarantine was over and Shu Ning held a small golden key in his hand, he made his way through the streets of the Base. There were rows and rows of houses and appartment blocks and here and there there were tables littered with useless objects that someone was obviously trying to sell. If you completely ignored the haggard looking faces and the ripped and too loose clothes hanging off of their frames, then this could be a normaly functioning town, in a normaly operating world. But even in the relative safety of the high walls there was still an unmistaken fear hanging over everyones head.