Burn the light

Chapter 16

I had so much fun writing this chapter. I hope you enjoy it 𖹭

 ☆ ☆ ☆

I am pacing. A lot. Matthew still has not called me and I am watching my phone every few seconds, wondering when it will ring. The truth is, I don't know what I will do when it happens. I don't know if I will answer. I don't know if I will accept coming to his place. I don't even know if he still wanted me to come. So maybe it was for the best if he was not calling at the moment.

With one last glance at my phone, I decide to get out of the room.

Alessio is sitting on one of the couches, a game pad in his hands, a game is playing on the TV. He sends me a look as I sit on the other couch before deriving his attention back to the TV.

He is shooting on zombies. Not caring about being seen by them, he kills them with rapidness and precision.

We stay like that a long time, the game moving between action and storytelling. And I am completely focused without realizing it. Until he hits pause and extends the controller to me. I look at him, surprised, but his gaze is unmoved. I take the controller from his hands and press continue.

Watching and playing a game are very different things. When I am playing it, it feels like I am a part of the game. Like I am feeling everything the character is feeling, their doubts, their fears, their anger. It feels like I am no longer sitting on a couch in front of a TV, I entered the game and I am the main character of it.

The character looks around for zombies and when I hear noises, instead of searching for the intruders and killing them as would have done Alessio, I hide and wait.

I exhale when I see they are not zombies but men. Men I have to kill before they can kill me. I stay hidden, and hit them with my arc one by one, switching hidden places when I can. The more time passes, the more I enjoy it.

When there are not any other signs from intruders, I continue walking in the abandoned building we are in. But as I step on broken glasses, a terrifying noise fills the place. I switch view with the controller and see a zombie going my way. I slightly jump, not expecting it. I try to shoot him but I lack precision and he gets closer to me. I can hear my heart beating and panic rising from me. I did not think there would be zombies there since there were men!

I try to shoot again and this time, I do it correctly but it does not kill the zombie. Instead it seems to anger him. So... I start running. I walk down the stairs I have climbed earlier in the game. I do not look behind me, too afraid to see the zombie close to me. I look for somewhere to hide while running and finally see a room. I enter it.

It is black inside until I switch the lights. More stairs. But this time they lead downstairs. I hesitate but it's either this or going back where I came from and being attacked by a zombie. They won't put zombies upstairs and downstairs anyway. I have watched Alessio play for a while and once he killed everyone in an area, the entire place was safe. I killed all humans so I expected it to be the same but I guess they wanted to create action by also putting zombies upstairs.

I get down the stairs, slowly, listening to any noise. We are in a sort of gym. I exhale. No zombies. There are rooms waiting to be explored and maybe a way out from one of them. I walk towards all the rooms, looking for information, collecting weapons and ammunition.

But I find no way out so I decide to go back to the gym and look for a hidden door I may have not seen. My eyes take in the place one again until I see a ladder bringing to an open window. This is my way out!

I am way more comfortable now. The place is huge. There are lots of windows which bring luminosity. And no noise. No zombies. I am safe.

I walk towards the ladder and as I make a move to climb it. I hear footsteps. Loud. I try to jump on the ladder but it does not work. Is it a glitch? Or do I need to kill whoever is coming before being able to go on it?